Lost Judgment: Combat, useful skills, and earning SP

Lost Judgment: Combat, useful skills, and earning SP Tiger, Crane, and Snake each have their own attacks, defenses, and upgrades. Learn the defensive timing for each style so you can switch when an opponent starts countering your usual attacks. I'll use the action names here so the guide works across controllers: light attack, heavy attack, grab, guard, fighting stance, and evade. On the default PlayStation layout, those attacks are Square, Triangle, and Circle, with L1 guarding and R1 taking a fighting stance. Check the control menu if you've remapped anything. Basic controls and combos Use short light-attack strings followed by heavy finishers. A different number of light attacks produces a different finisher. Against a boss, end the string while you still have an opening rather than automatically committing to the longest possible combo. Hold fighting stance while quickstepping. Dodge around the attack and then turn back toward the opponent. Backing straight away from every move often leaves you too far out to punish it. EX Actions spend meter on contextual attacks. EX Boost changes what you can do while it is active and spends that same resource over time. Don't repeatedly empty the gauge on a single familiar action if keeping Boost active would let you handle the whole group. Hold the EX-suppression input, L2/LT on the default controller layout, when you want a normal heavy attack without accidentally triggering the green EX prompt. This is especially important in Gauntlet challenges that fail if Boost ends. Mortal Reversal When an enemy commits to a glowing Mortal Attack, evade it at the appropriate moment and respond with the reversal prompt. The reversal differs by style. Learn this on a clearly telegraphed attack before relying on it during a difficult boss. Watch the attack itself. Dodging as soon as the enemy glows can leave you exposed when the strike arrives. Evade the strike, then take the counter prompt. Crane Use Crane when several enemies are pressing in. Its movement and sweeping attacks let you change position while hitting more than one target. A desk, wall, or nearby weapon can also become part of an EX setup, so keep checking the space around you. Useful early purchases: - Sky Dancer Air Walk, 600 SP: opens the airborne stance from guard plus evade. - Sky Dancer Kick, 1,200 SP after Air Walk: gives attacks from that position. - Crane King's Pride, 600 SP: prevents knockdowns while Crane is in EX Boost. - Projectile Counter, 600 SP: gives an answer to thrown objects with correctly timed guard. - Rising Cloud Vortex, 1,200 SP: gives a recovery attack from the ground. Later, add Triple Kick for the extra finisher, Lightfoot for movement, and the recovery/counter options that suit the attacks causing you trouble. Don't overlook Crane merely because Tiger has the obvious single-target damage role. Tiger Tiger is useful against a durable enemy whose guard and health need breaking down. Charged finishing blows are the core of that pressure. Set them up during a real opening rather than charging while a boss is already swinging at you. Double Quickstep costs 5,000 SP and gives you more room to reposition. Re-Guard and Guard Reversal help when an opponent keeps pushing through your defense. Perfect Guard opens a more deliberate defensive route, with further upgrades later. Flux Fissure requires the book from Welcome Pharmacy's squirrel and a 10,000-SP purchase. Learn the hold-and-release timing instead of treating it as an ordinary extra hit at the end of a combo. Dragon's Crushing Fist requires To Crush a Dragon and 40,000 SP. In fighting stance, time the heavy counter against the incoming attack. It is powerful but arrives late and needs accurate timing. Snake Snake is particularly useful against ordinary armed enemies. Time guard to parry, move into the opening, and disarm when appropriate. A grab followed by the throw/disarm prompt can remove a weapon and leave the opponent frightened. A frightened enemy can be finished with EX Surrender when its prompt appears. This is the route for Merciful and the surrender-based Gauntlet challenges. Hitting the enemy until it dies normally doesn't satisfy a surrender requirement. White Snake Mastery, from the Wette Kitchen squirrel book, lets successful parries build EX outside Boost. Overwhelming Parry and Threatening Parry improve the fear setup. Agonizing Strike, 5,000 SP, lets Snake charge its finishers and inflict agony. Clutch Counter gives a response to certain enemy grabs. Later weapon skills add specific EX responses, but read their conditions. Secret Technique: Defang is not a promise that you can remove a story boss's weapon. Boss restrictions still apply. Style buffs and switching Each style's Hidden Arts rewards a particular action: Tiger's charged finisher raises attack, Crane's successful evade raises attack speed, and Snake's parry gives knockdown resistance. The first levels last nine seconds, the second twelve. The corresponding Secret of the Tiger, Crane, or Snake upgrade keeps the buff active after a style change. Trigger the buff, then switch to the style you want to use. Repeat the required action when the buff expires. Recovery skills Getting knocked down is costly even when the hit itself wasn't lethal. Rising attacks, knockdown reversals, and EX Waking Wrath help you recover control. EX Bind Reversal is another option when grabbed. These become especially valuable against enemies who recover health while you are stuck on the ground. EX Burst: Immortal requires its three earlier EX Burst abilities. Its protection is conditional on the relevant low-health/Boost state. Don't treat the name as permanent invincibility or let the gauge expire while standing in a dangerous attack. Boxer and DLC The boxing-gym School Story belongs to the base game. Using Boxer as a fourth style in ordinary street combat requires the School Stories Expansion Pack. Its street skill list draws several unlocks from the gym progression, after which the corresponding street skills can be learned cheaply. Boxer is useful additional variety, but none of the core combat advice requires buying it. The three base styles can complete the main game and its required fights. Earning SP Side Cases, School Stories, TownGo objectives, and story battles give SP while moving completion forward. Do those before committing to a long street grind. The 28 skill books also need collecting, so a large SP balance alone won't open every branch. Battle Bonus upgrades improve the SP earned from varied combat bonuses. Mix your actions: style changes, throws, disarms, EX Actions, and clean finishes give you more to work with than repeating one basic string against every enemy. For street fights, try Ijin Street around Restaurant Row, where groups appear frequently. Equipment and restaurant bonuses can improve your SP gains. Training Innerwear increases SP gain but reduces attack. Other training items also carry trade-offs. If your setup makes every fight twice as slow, compare whether the bonus is actually helping. Switch back before bosses. City missions need 500 defeats in each of Tiger, Crane, and Snake, plus 1,000 street enemies and the EX-related totals. Rotate styles while finishing those requirements so the SP grind doesn't leave you with another 500 Snake kills afterward. Onodera also charges SP for books and other items. Leave room for those purchases in your plan. In particular, the 50,000-SP Art of Gluttony book and its 40,000-SP Bottomless Stomach skill are separate expenses. Skill Master and TownGo require all 184 base skills. The complete skill catalogue lists their costs and conditions, and the book guide gives all 28 book locations. Check the prerequisite arrows on any ability that remains locked.