This. Add King's Raid and Alchemist's Code to that list as well.

Retore my rotator cuff a while back, which makes using my PC annoying, so I tried out a fuckload of mobile games. KR was basically one huge premium currency advertisement, and Alchemist's Code was just a really boring version of Final Fantasy Tactics.

Honkai Impact 3 is great though, I still play it and use it as my time-filler game since you get way more playtime out of it than FGO. Agreed on Granblue, great description of it.

You really don't NEED to spend money on FGO, in the end it all comes down to RNG. The average F2P player gets about 3 SSRs per year - I know people who have been playing from the start and only have SSRs from guaranteed banners, and I have a friend who's been playing for 3 months and has gotten 5 SSRs without spending money apart from the guaranteed banner... It's all luck and RNG.

 

Also tried several gacha games and I have to say, FGO is the one I stuck with most, even if I fell of for a few months at some point.

What I really appreciate about FGO are a few things: For one, it tells a new story with characters one likes or is at least somewhat interested in. Most of the other gacha games are either brand new IPs where it is hard to get into/where I don't give a single fuck about any of the collectable heroes/story or they are retelling an already existing story with bad pacing, in a rushed format with immersion shattering inclusions. Take the One Piece game, for example, you are basically going through the story of canon again, only when you fight Alvida, you roll on her with Marco the Phoenix, Admiral Aokoji and Nico Robin, at least I did, which is just bleh.

Now, don't get me wrong, FGO is not Shakespeare (although he is a character in it, I guess), the story can be garbage and the game has plenty of drawbacks but at the very least, it is new garbage and you get flashes of insight into existing characters or at least entertaining interactions between them.

Other games can also drown you with rare cards. While FGO skews a bit too much on the other end and is rather stingy, when you do get something good it actually feels good. Bleach, Valkyrie Chronicle and others just flooded me with so many rare cards at the beginning that it was difficult to appreciate any of them. Then on a more personal level, I hate that games with existing IPs just have like a dozen versions of the same character. There are like a bajillion Straw Hat or Soul Society Captains in their respective games to the degree that it is difficult to differentiate between them, let alone be happy. Sure, there is always one better than the others but it is also a shitty feeling to go "okay, I got the five bad Nami's, here is me hoping I'll get the good one next". Kinda not what I want to feel about characters I like.

Again, FGO is not perfect in that regard, a few Servants do have several iterations and the Saber face has been a problem that has plagued the franchise for years where I actually think someone over there needs a beating for it but at least the servants tend to different enough in either skill-set or personality/point in time. Saber Alter and Saber might do similar things but design-wise they are different and cost different resources. They feel like different Servants still. Scathach Lancer is designed against strong single target Archers whereas Scathach Assassin is good against waves of Riders and so on. It's not perfect here or anything but they each feel distinct enough to be their own person regardless.

The gacha being rather expensive is actually kinda a good thing for me. It's so ridiculously expensive to get quartz for a roll that I am never tempted. At ten euro for a roll or whatever, I might have splurged a few times, but like 30 € for one booster pack where chances are good it only has garbage? Yeah, no thanks. So have been F2P in this game and it's still rather fun.

It's a grind but I kinda like that, tbh. Farming and such is relaxing, the animation is great and it's fun to improve characters you like. The rolling, as mentioned, can be really frustrating, as the game is notoriously stingy and not getting the servant you want because there was like a half a percent chance of getting them does suck. Especially if they are an even only servant and won't appear again for at least a year where you will again only barely have a chance. But when you do get something good, it actually feels good and since getting them max levelled and skilled takes quite a while, you're unlikely going to run out of things to do. Been playing for half a year and think I maxed like 2 skills completely and only a few servants to max level. They are long term projects where you can spend like half an hour a day to do them for months, while listening to something or waiting for the train.

Other bad sides is the fanservice and character design on some Servants. It can get very anime what with huge boobs and outright stupid costumes but I can tolerate those even if they make my eyes roll. Someone should have been arrested for Jack the Ripper, though. Pandering to the vermin in that regard isn't something the game does often but it still does and it really sucks but yeah, what can I say except that anime fans can be the worst.

Still, overall, it's fun. Gameplay is fun, I like enough of the characters to always have someone to shoot for and even if not, it's good to save until the times comes for someone I do like. Once you get them, it takes a while to really make them viable and yeah, overall a good experience even as a no money scrub.

 

There's also the community. It's really hard to enjoy a game when you're the only one playing. NA and European players community is very vibrant, with a very good Reddit page, lots of fan works, mostly translated, and the discord is very useful too. In Japan, it's just mind blowing huge and there's a lot of extra stuff.there that really adds a new depth of enjoyment to the game (among those, memes and events are only really enjoyable due that). Hell, DLP FGO thread is pretty fun if not very alive. Other forums I frequent also have very lovely FGO communities.

 

I am suprised no one has mentioned it yet. 21 hours of maintenance. A new record (by a very large margin) for NA.

 

Not too bothered by it, hoping they will be slightly less stingy with quarts or summoning tickets though.

 

I enjoy watching the subeddit meltdown whenever there is is unexpected maintenence. Excellent memes.

 

Didn't those fuckers want the JP Experience? Well, why aren't they celebrating it?

 

tried to send you one man but it said you were full
I'm Oniluna 053,475,312

 

Used a summoning ticket, got Saber Nero. Not really sure how to feel about that xD. I mean, it is a 4 star but since I have alter and lily already she feels a little redundant.

And they were rather generous this time so happy on that front.

 

I mean, the apology gifts for that maintenance downtime weren't too bad, truth be told...

Rolled a summoning ticket, got Nero Bride. Yay! I think.

 

They work on entirely different team comps, Nero is for arts memes np spam and Salter is your buster. Lily can do decent enough for when you need an AoE for simple farming.

 

First time I am running out of QP and don't have enough for leveling and stuff. Huh, oddly exasperating feeling.

 

Man, the exhibitions on this event are certainly a refreshing challenge. I actually had to think of a team to take out 12 lives Herc rather than just going full murder with Jeanne Alter and Arjuna.

This event is brilliant for QP too, Nemrut. Just abuse the lottery and spam the apples it gives you.

 

I went in blind and got rekt.

Managed to get it done with Hans, Jalter Waver and Iri, Mash Cu in the backline.

That arts down debuff made stalling really awful. Toughest fight we've had in a long time. Had to use a command seal to fill Cu's NP at the very end.

 

I went in blind as well with Squirtoria, Tamamo and Waver as front line. My backline consisted of Waver (supp), Mash and Gil. Somehow I managed to pull through without losing a single member despite 90% arts debuff (which I found out only in hindsight that it was 90%).

 

Same, but I had someones lvl 100 Jalter, my own Saber Alter and my herc in the backline and managed to pull through on the first time as well. Well, mainly thanks to Jalter and Herc tbh.

 

If you did Martha's strengthening her third skill removes everyone's debuffs, which is what I did. I had a friend who had the damage booster CE MLB'd on their Cu Alter, that fucker just dominated everything. Heracles just got pulverized by him.

 

I've decided not to go hard on this lotto.

As much as I like chains and medals, I really don't need pieces and monuments... At all. Not even a little bit.

Going to save my apples for the Christmas rerun, I've burned through so many skill gems in the last few months that even if I get a new servant there's no way I can get their skills to a respectable level. Gold Skill Gems are also way harder to farm than monuments, so laziness is a real factor here.

And if any of you want White Rose thrown on a particular servant in my lineup, just let me know.

 

Xmas has better stuff in the box, but the ratio to clear a box is a lot more as well.

NF box requires about 1.1 apple per box. Xmas requires 2+ apples on average. For me the QP, embers and some mats justifies on going hard.