Interested in joining sword hell? Whether you're a new, old, or returning saniwa, here's everything you're going to need to know to love, protect, and raise your precious sword boys (whilst kicking Revisionist ass).
Content and formatting in progress. Check changelog for updates.
Table of Contents (anchors to be added as each section is posted)
New Saniwa Quickstart Guide
Servers
Starter Swords
Familiarizing Yourself
. General User Interface
Combat
. Battle Conditions
. Battle Formations
. Ikkiuchi (一騎打ち/Duels)
. Ni Katana Kaigan (二刀開眼/Double Attacks)
. Shinken Hissatsu (真剣必殺/Awakening)
. Stats
. Sword Types
. Tō[u]sen (遠戦/Long-Range Phase)
Kebiishi (Houmen)/KBC
Grinding
Expeditions
Farming
. for Resources
. for Swords
Era Guides
. Era 6 - Memory of Ikedaya
. Era 7 - Memory of Enkyou
Missions
. Dailies
. Monthlies
Smithing Swords
Optimizing Your Swords
. Horses
. Refinery
. Sakura Fubuki
. Troops
. Upgrades
. Kiwame
. Toku
. Toku Ni
. Toku San
Collecting
. Sprites
. Recollections
Campaigns
. Repairs
. Reduced/Zero Resources
. Reduced/Zero Time
. Smithing
. Training
Events
. Regiment Battle
. Underground Treasure Chest
. Village of Treasures
. War Training Expansion
Glossary
. Technical
. Names and References
Helpful Links and Resources
. Touken Ranbu Helper
. ENG Links
. JP Links
Changelog
New Saniwa Quickstart Guide
Quick tips for those who want to jump in and play without the lengthy reading.
- Be careful of spawning Kebiishi. A map will be permanently infected after you have cleared its boss node ten times. When grinding or farming a map, retreat before the boss node to ensure KBC won't be triggered. (See: Kebiishi/KBC)
- Focus primarily on leveling your swords and farming before sinking your resources into smiths and troop creation. Do the daily minimum; try not to go more than double and triple the requirements per day (no more than six sword smiths and/or nine troop squadrons). You'll be needing your resources for repairs. (See: Smithing Swords; Troops)
- Do your expeditions. Don't be silly. Send off your auxiliary teams as often as you can. (See: Expeditions)
- Do your dailies. They help. They also help you fulfill monthly missions. (See: Missions)
- Max refine your swords. Whether you do them pre-Toku at all is up to you. There's really no point in not fully refining a sword that has reached Toku (even with Hizamaru and Higekiri's Toku Ni and Toku San). (See: Optimizing Your Swords)
- Don't do Horsekeeping or Sparring for Internal Affairs. Stick exclusively to Fieldwork unless you like wasting your time (or seeing each toudan's lines for yourself). (See: Internal Affairs)
- Use 1-1 to easily Sakura Fubuki a sword. (See: Sakura Fubuki)
- Send Fubuki'd swords off on expeditions to increase your chance of great successes. (See: Expeditions)
- Your team leader/captain/secretary gets a 1.5x exp bonus in battles. Use that to your advantage. (See: Grinding)
- If you're looking to collect all Recollections, take note of which toudan are required and their fulfillment requirements (map, boss clear, joint battles). If you don't like a particular boy but spend time leveling him for a recollection only to find out it can be triggered on any map (like 1-1), you're in a world of hurt. (See: Collecting)
- If you're looking to collect casual sprites for your Album, do them by pairs (only bring two toudan to Internal Affairs) to guarantee you get the sprites you want after 24 hours. (See: Collecting)
- Put some koban in a "do not touch" pile (note: there isn't an actual "do not touch" pile; I'm using that figuratively). Once in a blue moon, an event will roll around that will allow you extra entries on special maps as long as you cough up a chunk of change--generally 300 koban per additional entry. Saving a minimum of 15k koban is more than enough for you to not cry yourself to sleep during one of these events. (See: Events)
- Do your PVPs. Live a little. They're part of your dailies. (See: Missions)
- Don't neglect your little ones. Tantou and Wakizashi are integral (and, in some cases, required) for Era 6. If you don't want to be stuck at 6-1 spending a majority of your saniwa life regretting that you never prepared for night battles, be sure to train the babies. (See: Era 6 - Memory of Ikedaya)
- Equip omamori if you have them. (See: #16)
- Don't be a kuso aruji. (Translation: Don't break a sword.)
- Equip horses. Their stat boosts don't take effect in urban or indoor battles but everywhere else is fair game (including PVP). (See: Optimizing Your Swords)
- Note what each type of troop does/boosts and where they can or cannot function. (See: Optimizing Your Swords)
- Lock the boys you want to keep (unless you like crying over accidentally scrapping, selling, or using a good boy as fodder). (See: Familiarizing Yourself)
- Understand battle formations and their advantages/disadvantages. Or just make sure you have hella Scouting so you can always choose the most advantageous formation. (See: Combat)
- Understand battle conditions. Naginata and Ootachi have their strike range reduced to one enemy whilst indoors; at night, Tantou and Wakizashi have a sharp boost to stats whilst Tachi, Ootachi, and Naginata suffer tremendously (to the point that they're not recommended at all for night battles). (See: Combat)
- If you haven't done so, claim the free 500 DMM-point promotion for linking a method of payment to your account. If you have yet to purchase items from the Shop (read: you still have the first-time promotion available), you can get a 10-slot sword expansion and a couple other goodies for free. (See: Helpful Links and Resources)
- If you need help or advice, ask. There are plenty of fellow saniwa (hi!) who are happy to give recommendations or answer questions! (See: Helpful Links and Resources)
Combat
Stats
Stats. What else is there to say? These determine a plethora of things for your boys: how hard they hit, how much they can take, how often their clothes rip off.. You get the picture, no?
Some saniwa exclusively play attention to each boys' stats whilst others choose to play with their favourites, regardless of their numbers. Others do a hybrid of the two; the way you play is, obviously, up to you. Check the Touken Ranbu wikia's Sword Stat List for information about base, max, and upgrade stats for each toudan.
Touken Ranbu stat terminology
- Survival (生存/Seizon) - HP (health points)
- Impact (打撃/Dageki) - Strength
- Leadership (銃率/Jū[uu]ritsu) - Defense
- Mobility (機動/kidō[u]) - Speed
- Impulse (衝力) - Critical hit chance
- Killing Blow (必殺/Hissatsu) - Shinken Hissatsu chance
- Range - A toudan's attack style (short, wide, vertical, horizontal)
- Scouting (偵察/Teisatsu) - Advantageous/disadvantageous battle formation spotting (must be higher than the enemy's in order to be successful)
- Camouflage (隠蔽/Inpei) - The stat to beat if another player wants to scout your battle formation; used only for PVP
- Troop strength (兵力/Heiryoku) - The total HP of equipped troops
Kebiishi (Houmen)/KBC
HistoryKebiishi are enemies based off the central group of officers in Japan's Heian period by the same name (source). Kebiishi are neither on our side (the saniwa/toudan) or the Revisionists' (the force we actively fight). They act as the true "neutral;" they attack both parties equally due to our unnatural properties (revisionists aim to change history; we fight with embodied swords). There are several theories about the purpose of the Kebiishi in Touken Ranbu, one of which can be read on Yue's Tumblr post.
Ingame
Kebiishi are at a much higher difficulty than the revisionists you'll meet on regular nodes. Be wary of accidentally spawning them; once you defeat a boss node ten times, a special cutscene will occur that will inform you that these beings have spawned and may appear whenever you enter the map. Triggering this will cause the map to be marked with a special purple symbol (called KBC) that will be visible when you are on the sortie selection screen. Once a map has been KBC'd, there is no way to get rid of it. In order to prevent KBCing a map, be sure to retreat before you reach the boss node of any map (after you've cleared it once).
Kebiishi are unlike other enemies in that their levels scale with the highest-leveled toudan on the player's team. This means that if your composition is, say, level 32, 45, 28, 69, 55, and 89, the Kebiishi that spawn will be scaled to your level 89 sword. In this respect, the best way to face Kebiishi is to set up a team that is within the same Kebiishi level tier so no one is completely overpowered.
The level tiers for Kebiishi are
- Level 10-29
- Level 30-49
- Level 50-59
- Level 60-69
- Level 70-89
- Level 90-99
Benefits of Kebiishi
- Kebiishi drop exclusive swords that cannot be smithed or found elsewhere
- The experience amount from Kebiishi scales with the highest-leveled sword on our team
- Defeating Kebiishi is part of our daily/monthly missions
*Urashima and Nagasone Kotetsu can now only be obtained via smithing
Kebiishi in Events (Virtual Kebiishi)
Event notes will always specify whether Kebiishi can spawn on event maps. The only events that currently have Kebiishi spawns are War Training Expansion events (WTEs) in the form of "Virtual Kebiishi." Unlike regular Kebiishi, Virtual Kebiishi can be fixed at a certain level tier (generally fixed at the lv.30-49 tier). They are usually found on the third map, although they have been placed in the second map in past WTEs (WTE 1 and 2).
Farming for Resources
One of the requirements of sword hell is to experience the grief that comes with low resources. Be it a result of heavy and continuous repairs, smithing like a fiend, or trying to hold onto your troops, learning how to farm and stockpile resources is pretty vital if you don't want to just sit around and wait for natural regen (regeneration) or event rewards.There are two main ways to farm for resources: going on expeditions and farming resource nodes. We'll go over the first (which is, arguably, the most important) and then talk about resource nodes in regular maps. A bit about farming via events will be the end bit.
Farming Resources through Expeditions
If you have yet to read or learn about expeditions (skipping around or what-have-you), I'd suggest going over there and giving it a quick skim. I'm going to assume that you know the basics if you keep reading past this.
Expeditions are your number one way of farming resources. Number one. It is the most efficient method and doesn't require much effort aside from putting a few boys in teams and sending them on their merry way (granted you fulfill the requirements and have your auxiliary teams unlocked). Even if you can't regularly reset/send off your expeditions, every little bit counts.
The lovely saniwa of the Touken Ranbu Expeditions wikia page have made an incredibly easy-to-understand chart for resource gain. Below is a screenshot of the chart for ease of detail, but do go and bookmark the page for convenient access and reference. [to be added]
The bolded numbers are how much of each specific resource is obtainable per hour. These amounts do not account for great successes, so it is entirely possible to get much more (1.5x) than what is listed.
A1, Battle of Toba-Fushimi, is the most objectively efficient expedition for steel (AKA the devil's resource), netting 90 steel per hour. That's 1,080 steel for half a day's play, which sounds pretty hecking fantastic. However, there's a catch that some saniwa don't pay attention to. Bear with me as we do a little calculating to illustrate my claim (go ahead and skip over the next couple paragraphs; the lesson is bolded, anyway).
For the sake of math, we can conclude (if we didn't look at the information already) that the base output of A1 is 10 charcoal and 15 steel per run of ten minutes <60 charcoal and 90 steel divided by six>. If you're aiming to get that marvelous 90 steel/hour, you'll have to be able to reset your expedition right when your team gets back at least six times, every ten minutes.
Now, that's not difficult for the bunch of us who have the game open and have the time to pay attention to timers. However, for some, that's not entirely the case. If you have to leave (or forget) to reset for thirty minutes, you'll easily lose out on half of your possible gain, dropping your rate to 45 steel for that hour. If you look at A4, Shirakawa Front, you can get 60 steel per hour, meaning it would have been more efficient to send your team off over there--saving yourself from the stress of resetting yet still getting a better result (we're looking exclusively at steel here). The crudely illustrated moral of the story here is that even though some of these numbers look great for our depleted resource piles, the most "efficient" resource farming is based completely on your gameplay/online schedule.
With that in mind, no one can really tell you much more than what this chart shows you. Take a few minutes to realistically think about how many times you can check the game per day when you're not actively playing and tailor your composition with that information in mind. If you stick to that schedule, you'll be able to steadily gain resources to do whatever the hell you want to do. If you want to maximize your gain when you're sleeping, send your parties off to some of the longer expeditions and go back to your usual schedule when you're up.
Some fellow saniwa with similar schedules have told me that my setup works for them so I'll just detail what I do. Go ahead and skip this area if you can't check your game ~12 times per day.
The following is literally a copy-paste from my /r/toukenranbu comment in response to a question about Request Tokens.
What I personally run is B2, B3, and B4. This nets me the most efficient per-hour output of:
- Charcoal @B3, 60/hour
- Coolant @B3, 60/hour
- Whetstone @B2, 83/hour
- Request Token @B3, 0.5/hour
- Help Token @B4, 0.4/hour
B2 offers the fourth-highest koban output per hour and B4 offers the second-highest steel output. Steel and Whetstone overlap with B2 and B4 so I get higher totals for them. These work best for me because of the length of the expeditions.
Expeditions D1 and C1 are also expeditions that can get you Request Tokens (0.5/hour and 0.25/hour).
Farmable maps for Tokens
- 2-4 (max. level average: 32)
- 3-2, 3-4 (max. level average: 42, 51)
- 4-1, 4-4 (max. level average: 55, 68)
- 6-3 (max. level average: none)
- 7-1 (max. level average: none)
If you're really low on resources, remember that you can do the bare minimum for dailies in order to minimize losses/net gain. Smith three 50/50/50/50 swords and three 50/50/50/50 troops; refine two swords and scrap the rest. Before the Oodenta/Sohaya campaign (rip), I was sitting at 160k+ charcoal/steel/coolant, 225k+ whetstone, 350+ help tokens, and 275+ request tokens (I was on-and-off hiatus and neglected my expeditions for months.. woops). Every little bit counts. Good luck!
Through Battles
Another way to farm resources is via resource nodes on maps. The nice thing about this method is that you can grind your swords at the same time, killing two birds with one stone (granted you're not using lv.99 boys). The following are the different resources each map offers. [to be added]
Through Events
UTCs and WTEs both have resource nodes that are farmable--however, UTC floors can only be cleared once and are unable to be repeated (the 100th floor is an exception). Bringing Tantou increase your chances of routing to resource nodes in UTCs, with bonuses given if Hakata Toushirou is in your team. Many WTE resource nodes are only accessible through bamboo'd areas, which are only passable if there are no Tachi, Ootachi, Yari, or Naginata in your team.
Glossary
TechnicalA
Aruji - Master/lord
B
Bead event - Village of Treasures (event)
C
Citadel - Your main screen, incl. the blacksmith, armory, repair room, shop, et cetera
CP - Campaign
D - E
F
Farming - Gathering (generally for resources or toudan)
Fodder - Something used for a minimally significant purpose (e.g. sword fodder = toudan used to refine another sword)
G
Goshujin(-sama) - Master/lord
Grinding - Training/leveling
H
I
Impact - Strength
Impulse - Critical hit chance
J
K
KBC - The purple symbol marking a map that may spawn Kebiishi. This will appear after defeating the boss node of a map ten times
Kebiishi - Higher-difficulty enemies that may appear once a map has been KBC'd (see: Kebiishi/KBC; History)
Killing Blow - Shinken Hissatsu chance
Kiwame - The second upgrade Tantou can reach (requires lv.60+ Tantou and Kiwame set) (see: Upgrades_
Koban - Touken Ranbu's currency; can be used to buy backgrounds in the shop and additional entries to special maps for certain events
L
Leadership - Defense
M
Mobility - Speed
N
O
Ofuda/ema - An item that can increase your chances of smithing a high-rarity toudan
P - Q
R
R4/R5 - Rarity-4/rarity-5 swords. Marked with either a black crest (rarity-4) or pure gold (rarity-5). All R4s and R5s can equip three troop squadrons.
Recollections - Special scenes that trigger when certain requirements are met; saved to Album
Revisionists - Enemies (see: History)
S
Saniwa - Sage; the character you (the player) portrays
Scrap/scrapping swords - Dismantling swords via the Smithy
Shinken Hissatsu - Awakening (see: Combat)
Squadron - The group of troops that fill one slot
Survival - HP (health points)
T
Taichou - Captain
Toku - The first upgrade toudan can reach at either level 20 or level 25
Toku Ni - The second upgrade some toudan can reach at level 50 (currently only available to Higekiri and Hizamaru)
Toku San - The third upgrade some toudan can reach at level 75 (currently only available to Higekiri)
Toudan/Touken Danshi - Sword boys
Tourabu - Touken Ranbu
U
UTC - Underground Treasure Chest (event)
V
VoT - Village of Treasures (event)
W
WTE - War Training Expansion (event)
X - Z
Names and References
0-9
100all hell - Refers to a 2016 smithing campaign for Juzumaru Tsunetsugu
1:30:00 hell - Rarity-2/Uchigatana smithing timer; a common result when trying to smith for higher-rarity swords
324/324 hell - Refers to a 2016 smithing campaign for Oodenta Mitsuyo and Sohayanotsurugi
A
Arujicon - Heshikiri Hasebe
B
Bandaid(-kun) - Aizen Kunitoshi
Blanket(-kun) - Yamanbagiri Kunihiro
C
Cashew - Kashuu Kiyomitsu
CCP - Shokudaikiri Mitsutada (Candle-Cutter Pikachu)
Crane Man - Tsurumaru Kuninaga
D
Dategumi - Shokudaikiri Mitsutada, Tsurumaru Kuninaga, Ookurikara
Drowning - Historical demise (and recurring game theme) of some toudan
E
F
Fire - Historical demise (and recurring game theme) of many toudan
Firefly - Hotarumaru
Flamingo - Souza Samonji
G
H
Horikane - Horikawa Kunihiro/Izuminokami Kanesada
Horse shit - Refers to Namazuo Toushirou's Internal Affairs Horsekeeping line
I
Ichi-nii - Ichigo Hitofuri
Imano/Imanotsuru - Imanotsurugi
Ishipapa - Ishikirimaru
Iwatiddy/Iwa - Iwatooshi
IZMNKM/Izu(mi) - Izuminokami Kanesada
J
Janitor - Nihongou
Jiji/Grandpa - Mikazuki Munechika
Jirou - Jiroutachi
K
Kakaka(ka) - Yamabushi Kunihiro
Kane-san - Izuminokami Kanesada
Kinkkou - Kikkou Sadamune
KogiMika - Kogitsunemaru/Mikazuki Munechika
Kuri/Ookuri - Ookurikara
Kurodagumi - Hakata Toushirou, Heshikiri Hasebe, Nihongou
L
M
Matsuri/festival(s) - Aizen Kunitoshi
Manba/Yaman - Yamanbagiri
MT(S)NKM/Mutsu/Mucchan - Mutsonokami Yoshiyuki
N
NEET - Akashi Kuniyuki
NTR(-kun) - Houchou Toushirou
O
P
Pikachu - Shokudaikiri Mitsutada
Q
R
Rai trio - Aizen Kunitoshi, Hotarumaru, Akashi Kuniyuki
S
Sadacchan/Sada-chan - Taikogane Sadamune
Sake Mama - Jiroutachi
Shotaru(maru) - Hotarumaru
Sohaya/Sohayano - Sohayanotsurugi
Sword Jesus - Ishikirimaru
T
Tanuki - Doudanuki Masakuni
Tarou - Taroutachi
Tenka Goken - Oodenta Mitsuyo, Mikazuki Munechika, Juzumaru Tsunetsugu
Tractor - Refers to scenes in Touken Ranbu: Hanamaru
TsuruMika - Tsurumaru Kuninaga/Mikazuki Munechika
Turtle - Urashima Kotetsu
U - X
Y
YAA YAA (kore naru wa) - Refers to Nakigitsune's fox's lines
Yasu/YMTNKM/YSSD - Yamatonokami Yasusada
YasuKiyo - Yamatonokami Yasusada/Kashuu Kiyomitsu
Z
Zuobami - Namazuo Toushirou/Honebami Toushirou
Helpful Links and Resources
Touken Ranbu Helper
[to be added]
ENG Links
Discord server
reddit
Touken Ranbu Roster + Recollections Checklist
[to be added]
Wikia
JP Links
GamerCh
Media Mix
Twitter
Wikiwiki
Changelog
25/10/16Combat (Stats)
24/10/16
Initial posting; Intro, New Saniwa Quickstart Guide, Kebiishi (Houmen)/KBC, Farming for Resources (through Expeditions, through Battles, through Events), Glossary (Technical, Names and References), Helpful Links and Resources (ENG Links, JP Links)
(Thanks sheesh for yelling at my Tenka Goken mistake and missing your
ur gay
ReplyDeleteonly4u
ReplyDeleteNice guide. Thanks ^^
ReplyDelete