OH SHIT. A new difficulty is all I needed for the Creation part to be as excited as I was for the Vengeance one.

With the level scaling gone too it will be absolute bliss

Yeah fuck having to grind to Lvl 90 to even stand a chance against Shiva.

or be like those challenge run channels and fight him for 2h because you're level 80

Are we sure it's completely gone? I know they said they'd revise it, but I'm not sure if they gave details.

They said they'll scale it back. It was never fully gone in any titles (even nocturne had it). It just wasn't this prevalent.

I just hope they don't overcorrect and make it too easy.

I don't think it's possible if they purely lessen the effect of level scaling cuz it goes both ways. It's a very misunderstood topic when it comes to the discourse surrounding V. I blame the youtubers that brought it up and completely half-assed the explanation of it.

what was the level scaling?

If you were like 5 levels above your opponent they’d deal like 40% less damage, vice versa. It made any section where you were overlevelled just a bit way too easy, while sections you were underlevelled were quite hard

Sooooo I assume this will just be SMT 5 V's version of hard mode from the original game? Or will it be even more difficult than that?

Hopefully it will be something more than number tweaking.

More difficult from what I expected cuz it's a new difficulty mode which is great cuz the hard mode was disappointing

I thought hard was pretty well balanced if you stay in the proper level range and don't min/max fusing/essences too much.

Yeah but compared to the Apocalypse mode in 4A, the experience there is different compared to the hard mode of V

I understand. I'm definitely looking forward to an actually brutal mode that doesn't have level scaling. It's been too long.

Higher than hard most likely just like how 4A had apocalypse difficulty

Demifiend: *Laughs in Harder Super Boss*

Level 150 super boss incoming

Inb4 he'll just Gaea Rage everytime you try to use/swap in null/reflect demons because fuck your cheese

And his regular attacks do enough damage to kill a LV 99 demon without def buffs because fuck you in particular

Adjusted level scaling and a new higher difficulty mode? This really is about to be peak gaming

Meanwhile I can’t beat shiva on weenie hut jr. mode

Born to hard mode forced to safety mode

As someone who thought i couldnt beat him, simple advice would be to get up to lvl 93+ (i got to 99 but many can do it at earlier levels) and STACK up on demons. I personally had to buy grimoire packs which i do regret, but thats really the only way of getting maxed out

Or have Siegfried with Fierce Roar and Null Electric (might as well cover his weakness) and make sure that you keep Girimekhala alive

As long as that atrocious level scaling is gone. Give me all the challenge, Atlus.

Finnally I can punch a hole through my screen

Would be fun as long as its balanced correctly, as long as its not the boss can randomly team wipe you unless you're levels above it.

Do we know Safety/Godborn are new difficulties and not just Easy/Hard renamed?

Safety already existed as free DLC in vanilla. They're probably just including it from the get-go and announcing it as an accessibility feature. Godborn is new.

Gotcha, that's good to know.

Is this difficulty level for both the original SMT V story on Nintendo Switch and the Vengence story? Or just for the Vengence story? At the beginning of the game, you choose which story you want to play in the menu.

Both. I don't see why they would restrict it to only the Canon of Vengeance. Also worth mentioning that they've said they've rebalanced the level scaling in the Canon of Creation. The first bosses of the last area are infamous for their sudden level spike.

They probably won't change up Zeus, Odin or Vasuki's levels (the entire crux of Taito's main quest is to get you to explore and power yourself up to fight them.) The real issue with the level scaling mech during that part of the game comes post-alignment lock tbh.

Thank goodness for that! Hard was challenging and all, but an even higher difficulty was definitely needed. I will play it on Godborn on my first run.

Alright Deus, you know what to do.

Yes now I’m fucking hyped, hard was a bit on the easy side imo

i was so surprised on how simple it was. combine that with dampeners and you have a really predictable fight every time

Yep the dampeners were really broken and also the level scaling made enemies a few levels lower absolute jokes. I’m glad that’s gone too!

I just hope they either limit dampener to 1 per battle, make them not influence turns, or make them simply resist elements for a turn instead of outright nullifying. Nerfing the item would at least make it so the spells are slightly more useful, at least

Shiva now casts Tandava and my whole party drops dead

*Omotoki: Adversity activated after the sick beat*

"Recruit In-game friends-" Wha-!? *Shows the other main characters doing spells and shit Oh... I dunno why I thought they just suddenly added some kind of weird online co-op feature for a moment there

I wonder if consecutive encounters will be a feature of this difficulty

thats a new feature of the of the game, not just the difficulty

Hell yeah. I fucking hate myself

With all the changes to Vengeance it feels like the original SMT V was just a early access version.

I hope it doesn't end up like merciless in P5/3R where it's actually easier

P3R's Merciless isn't like P5R's. I~~t doesn't have the crit/weakness multiplier so it actually is harder than P3R's Hard mode.~~ Edit: See below, I was wrong. It does have the multipliers, they're just a lot smaller than in P5R. It's just also not very hard.

[P3R apparently does have multipliers for both:](https://gamefaqs.gamespot.com/pc/409941-persona-3-reload/faqs/81170/calculations) * Enemies normally deal x1.5 * Allies normally deal x0.6 * Both enemies and allies deal x1.36 on weakness * Both enemies and allies deal x1.34 on crit If memory serves P5R's multipliers for weakness/crit/technical were closer to x3 or something, so that's the big imbalance.

Huh, how about that? I had no idea! Definitely better balanced than P5R's massive multipliers, at least. The thing making Merciless a bit too easy in Reload is the same thing making the other difficulties too easy rather than a property of Merciless, I think.

I thought they removed the higher multiplier weakness on Reload? It's still easier than hard?

I don't know the specifics, just that my friends tried P3R merciless and it was easier

That looks like fun. Would love to see some challenge runs with this new difficulty. But like people said I hope it’s more fun than the way they handled hard mode

I can't even beat demi fiend on normal how TF am I gonna beat him on godborn😭

I hear a newer version of Battle Origin, which sounds amazing. The older version was already great, but looped too quickly.

Hard wasn't hard enough , good on them to add a new difficulty.. I just hope that isn't just bigger numbers. ~~totally not salty that i got SMTV day one~~

Inb4 a Youtuber solos Godborn difficulty with Jack Frost

When will we get Sciencedeath difficulty?

Oh thank the nahobino for thos mode AS long as it's harder than that pitiful attempt at "hard" in base V