Digimon World 3 [NTSC-US] Counter Crest Game/Low Level Start !!

Here is my newest game project for youtube along with other one (I'm not announce it yet)
https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLP7TvLWnx931Mr34RblG0fcxaUKySAn9q

if anyone have other questions you can post here or my youtube channel...




FAQ and notes

So, what is the CCG means at all?
Counter Crest Game, the objective is beat the game with minimal grinding and level up by using one best accessory in the game, Counter Crest (CC)

Is this work in other DMW3 versions (PAL/Japanese)?
Well that's the main point. Since US version considered as vanilla version, the CCG is a lot easier and reasonable in this version, same as speedruns. I actually did the same thing in PAL before (you can check my DMW3 videos before this recorded) but in most times you will need to kill the random battles in order to survive because CC doesn't always work. In the end, while you can still below average levels you actually leveled so much which kills the fun for this playstyle.

So from your videos, is this only possible with Kumamon?
No, in-fact this challenge was inspired from speedrun communities here and they are not using Kumamon as base. However indeed not all Digimon can be used for this challenge. Good luck if you want to beat this with Renamon or Patamon.
https://docs.google.com/spreadsheet/pub?key=0Aqe0g0HQQj_EdDZOcXJ4SS1PaGprNktJNUJmTUhESVE&gid=10

Then how about pack B? I already check every type of runs but seems that no one really try this yet.
Yeah the pack B is not recommended mainly because you lack a former healer (Patamon). Monmon is viable and actually cheaper to gear up, but that's if you have patience to just doing normal Attack (shooting since he is a Sniper). Agumon is the magician for this game and have good HP but you need to always train his Speed so that he doesn't get his turn so slow. 

Why do you choose Kumamon?
He has highest HP growth and strength, then his natural Digivolve skills are good. Hammer Rush and Soul Charge comes in mind, Whirlwind and Metal Attack also useful for Galacticmon. One other advantage is he can survive without trainings until half of the game. Of course he has his own weakness, mainly vulnerable against Darkness skills. 

Is there something I missing if I try this playthrough?
I actually will say a lot. Mostly the features in-game that requires you to be high level and high charisma. You can't do the tamer battles on end game, you can't access epic weapons, and you will lose auction items since we need to sell them for money or skip them because it's too far to come back to Asuka City. You can still play Card Battles but I don't cover them here, in any case if I want to start playing Cards I just get Kicking Boots and Fishing Rod then farm Cardmon on Amaterasu server.

Why in most forced fights you put the weaker Digimon at first?
If they stay alive they will leech the EXP gained from the fight.
 
How do I get CC?
Fight Tuskmon in Plug Cape by climbing a ladder there, the same spot where you farm TNT Ball after you disguised as Blue Agumon.

Besides CC, what good equipments you need to get?
For around 75% of the game you will stick at the equipments you buy at Asuka Black Market, especially Dark Cloak. Also the 2nd accessories are optionals but I can recommend some: Elemental Power 1/2/S (this increase any physical damage,including Counter), Runner Sandals/Shoes (Gesomon, Tankmon on Amaterasu). All of them are enemy's drop so it's depend on your luck if you can get them. You will meet them during the story so kill them when you can. Specifically for Galacticmon, buy 1 Power Ring for your main Digimon and around 2-4 element resistance Ring for the other 2 Digimon depend on what skill you're gonna give to him to copycat (see below)

Where do you get the references like Circuit Board maps?
Someone made a map on GameFAQs but I don't use that, there is a website which contain many useful info for this game but the site are occasionally down, so I use web archive website to access it. Try to search wit keywords "digimon world 3 circuit board map" or "digimon world 3 otaku kun website"

Some Gameplay Mechanics You Might not Know yet... (to be added for the details)

• Rushing to Galacticmon

Credits from holyniwa from Digimon World 3 speedrun and applied from Ridelith and other speedruns world record after him....

Keep a save before you fight Chief Officer so that you can decide to level up and do a normal game if you wish or rush to Galacticmon. All you need to is after you beat Chief Officer NEVER TALK TO LISA !!!

After beat Chief Officer go back directly to Asuka's Game Master and Amaterasu's Game Master room in Admin Center (you can go between Asuka and Amaterasu Central Park in a hole near Beach entrance), by doing this you skip large portion of story and directly go to Gunslinger and face Final Battles

• Random Battles

While the battles against wild Digimon in DW3 is random there are some mechanics on it:
- The battle trigger using step-count meaning that you will meet random battle in random number how many steps you running after the last battle. This doesn't include forced battles like boss/tamer/fixed battles. So what can you do is while it's not always work, you can plan to reduce battle number in same area by trigger battle by yourself in previous area (this is useful when you want to avoid certain Digimons, Musyamon on early game Jungle Grave, Boltmon/Vikemon on Amaterasu North Sector, etc)
- If you running away, most likely this step number to trigger next battle will be reduced. So don't surprised to see 3 battles in a row while you even just running one step.
- There are some fixed battles in the game, the battle when you always meet some wild Digimon when you step exactly on a spot. Some good examples are Kuwagamon in Wire forest, Minotarumon when you jump down from Pharaohmon, Numemon on Fire Dungeon if you avoid bombs. Fortunately, the final Dungeon only have Armagedemon as fixed battle (and you can run away, try it!!)

• Buff's Mechanic in General  

Credits from Funeralord and Eric_astley on gamefaqs. Each buffs has different levels, with negative value means you get more debuff than buff (stat lowered), this buff system is also similar with other Digimon games but each game has different levels (DW2, Digimon Adventure PSP)

For DW3, here is level information..

Damage Buff/Debuff
-4: 0.5
-3: 0.625
-2: 0.75
-1: 0.875
0: 1 (you deal normal damage)
+1: 1.25
+2: 1.375
+3: 1.5
+4: 1.75
+5: 1.875
+6: 2

Level Increasing for specific skills :
Double Power: +2 to own Strength
Mega Strength: +3 to all your 3 Digimon's Strength
Power Plug: +3 to own Strength, -1 to own Defense

Defense Buff/Debuff (enemy attacks you)
-4: 1/0.5 = 2
-3: 1/0.625 = 1.6
-2: 1/0.75 = 1.333...
-1: 1/0.875 = 8/7 = 1.142857142857...
0: 1 (you receive normal damage)
+1: 1/1.25 = 0.8
+2: 1/1.375 = 0.7272...
+3: 1/1.5 = 0.666...
+4: 1/1.75 = 4/7 = 0.571428571428...
+5: 1/1.875 = 0.5333...
+6: 1/2 = 0.5

Level Increasing for specific skills : 
Double Guard: +2 to own Defense
Mega Protection: +3 to all your 3 Digimon's Defense
Guard Plug: +3 to own Defense, -1 to own Strength

Speed Buff/Debuff
-4: 0.5
-3: 0.625
-2: 0.75
-1: 0.875
0: 1
0:1
1:1.125
2:1.25
3:1.375
4:1.5
5:1.625
6:1.75
7:1.875
8:2

Level Increasing for specific skills : 
mach plug and speed up: +2
mega boost: +3
slow down gives -1
mega break gives -2

Specifically for Kumamon's DV line
The damage multiplier for soul charge is 2.25
for Misshukikou: 191/64=2.98
This multiplier is stack with damage buff/debuff

• Buff on Death

One remaining mechanics that's not explained yet for buff/debuff is the turn-count. Basically when you cast a buff there will be a random number turn-count before it expired and it's not shown in the game. However, this is the thing, the turn-count will be frozen when your Digimon is dead. If you switch a Digimon with a buff and stay alive, your buff will expire later but it doesn't when the Digimon stay dead and revived by Life Disk. It will be expired if you re-cast the buff but it won't (so far when I'm trying this) when you're not re-casting the buffs.

This can deliver another tactic for this game, either you play low level or not. When you predict your Digimon will be die next turn, stack buffs in your turn and die by purpose. Revive and switch back your Digimon and your Digimon will be a beast

• Suijinmon vs Renamon Glitch

Credits from KHeartz and Ridelith from speedrun twitch.
You'll need to keep Renamon lv 1 in entire game then bring her in the final boss. Don't equip her anything too. Kill Fujinmon then let your main Digimon die on Suijinmon (while you can stack buffs as I said before, I suggest just stack Speed, Power/Guard Plug will screw the strategy use Power Plug in Raijinmon). Switch to Renamon and revive, then see what happened to her when Suijin give deadly 4 hits.

Renamon will stay alive despite this, but it can be failed and she died if Suijin deal critical hits (but it's uncommon if not rare to happened). Then 2 things can happened, 1st Suijin take turns again causing Renamon blasted so you need to endure turn and repeat this (I simply give TNT Ball) or 2nd your turn is up and switch to your main Digimon again.

With this condition Renamon's HP will be in thousands even 2x or 3x than Kumamon has, her HP will deplete in the next Galacticmon fight by damage. To endure this, equip Renamon with the best armor and give her Accessories that reduce elements depend on what skills you give to the final form of Galacticmon (see below)

This glitch only works for Renamon because of the lowest defense and possibly lowest Machine tolerance (if Suijimon use machine elements in it). Other Digimons in the same condition, they will stay alive but get blasted so it's only to endure their deaths by 1-2 turn unless you can switch them fast.. Guilmon being 28 Defense in lv 1 can be another tester but unless someone really can prove it I'm not gonna bother (and he has over 100 machine stat). Besides, Guilmon's buff and early MetalMamemon were interesting making you better to level him up.

• Galacticmon's Copycat Strategy 

Galacticmon has 3 forms, in 1st form he just spam physical attack that you can counter but also copycat the last skill you used to him before 1st form killed. In 2nd form he self destruct and reduce your HP to 1 and finally the 3rd form that we need to deal with....

Galacticmon's copycat skill will depend on its elements and ailments, it doesn't matter if it's strong or weak skills as the damage base depends on elements... For example Mamemon has Metal Attack and Mechanic Bash while Bash is stronger the damage is still same if copy-ed by Galacticmon

So here is the deal:
- Conserve TP during the whole game, at least for your alt Digimon who just support or revive your main Digimon. Main Digimon should have around 50 TP. Keep in mind TP capped at 99 so assuming you never train single time, you must spend that TP once you touch lv 20. Get Platinum ID from BlackWarGreymon before training season.
- You must decide what element skills to give to Galacticmon, train the element resistance depend on your decision to all Digimons. Train some Speed too.
- Buy elemental Rings from Gomamon, 2 each for alts, total 4 rings. Buy Power Ring your main Digimon. Equip them once the trio God fight ends....Main Digimon should stick with Counter Crest and Power Ring
- In 1st form, give the skill that you want to copy-ed and just kill it by Counter, spend turns to stacking buffs and suicide (focus Speed first). If you do Renamon glitch then don't use her yet for reviving.
- Never use the skill that inflict any debuffs/elements. If he doesn't copy anything because the skill is neutral element it can be bad because this skill will highly depends on Resistance Stats. Neutral resistance by default is 0 (yes there is no stat for this). 
- Once 3rd form appeared use another buff and die again, revive and switch again. Now our main course is Galacticmon's counter. You will see that if you train the correct element resistance, even lv 15 Digimon can survive Galacticmon's copycat skill and in Renamon glitch she will endure 1-3 turns with glitched HP depend on how well you gear her.