NOTE: The following article is a translation from the JP wiki link below.

http://wikiwiki.jp/godeater2rb/?%B9%B6%CE%AC%A4%CE%BC%EA%B0%FA%A4%AD

The God Eater series are all action games at heart, and as such, they demand great technical ability from the player. Furthermore, you cannot choose difficulty, and you will not be able to clear most missions by button-mashing. Also, considering that some situations are designed to be particularly difficult, you will be unable to proceed unless you practice. Whether it be that you tend to use up healing items, or you find that you barely clear missions within the time limit, these are signs that there is a significant problem hindering your progress.

The following notes were written to help solve these problems. However they are all related to action game techniques, so there will be no effect unless the player actually practices.
Also, as a general rule, techniques that rely on specific equipment or skills are to be avoided, as they can result in bad habits that will worsen the inability to make progress.

There are other, more specific articles regarding recommended equipment and specific mission walkthroughs.

We cannot proceed if you do not understand the following basics. This game uses every button on a typical controller. There are a variety of shift and combination actions, so it can be quite complex. Putting aside practical movement, it is more important to learn the minimum controls. Before going into any sort of combat, it is ideal to put the following to memory for easy use (these are Type A controls, notation is dualshock).

• Movement: Left stick
  
• Camera movement: Right stick (or + pad)
  
• Reset camera: L1
  
• Jump: x
  
• Guard: R1+o
  
• Step: Left stick+o
  
• Basic attacks: □、△
  
• swap melee/gun: R1

In particular, the combination of R1+O for guard is rather unique, and you will want to be able to use the R1 and O buttons without worrying about malfunctions.

Once you're used to that, proceed to acclimating yourself to the other controls.

Additionally, you will find yourself looking at the monster radar a lot during combat, and you will not have much time to look at your hands. If you ever find yourself forgetting a button during play, that is a good opportunity to memorize it.

**It is possible to change your controls to Type C, which makes O your guard button, and changes step and dash to R1, and weapon swap to R1+O. While these controls are a little easier for a beginner, there are also situations where you may end up on a collect point and you'll collect the item instead of guarding. You will also find that the majority if players use Type A, and you may find any discussion regarding game controls confusing.

Players can avoid attacks by moving, jumping, stepping, and guarding. All of these options are quite efficient, to the point that if you defend well, as long as you are fighting a single enemy you can avoid taking damage almost entirely (*). Gun form movement is pretty much the same, and can avoid damage just as well. You ought to learn all of these defensive maneuvers by all means, and approach your enemy without taking damage. The specifics of each are as follows.
(* On the other hand, if you are fighting multiple targets at once, it may become impossible to void taking damage)

• Moving
  Moving with the left stick. Simple input, and consumes no stamina, but the speed is a bit slow, and there are a number of attacks that cannot be avoided this way. It is not recommended for beginners to learn evasion in this way.
  
• Jump
  Pressing the X button. You can jump high enough to clear another human character, and as such you will avoid all low attacks. Of course, you cannot evade with this method if you have bad timing. Uses stamina. During Burst, you can jump again in mid-air, making evasion with this method much easier.
  
• Step
  Left stick + O button. Move instantly, and with great speed, in the direction of the left stick. This is the main method of evasion.
  Your stance goes a bit lower during this maneuver, and you can avoid higher attacks in this way. There are no invincibility frames. Uses stamina. During Burst, move speed increases, as well as distance covered. In blade form, you cannot use this consecutively, while you can in gun form.
  
• Guard
  R1 + O button. Stands in place and deploys your shield. You can guard attacks in a 225 degree radius, and damage taken from the attack is greatly reduced. Damage reduction depends on the shield class. Guarding consumes stamina, and you cannot recover stamina while guarding. There are no unblockable attacks, but if your stamina is depleted while guarding, you'll enter the long breathless animation. As such, guarding multi-hit attacks is quite dangerous. You cannot guard while in gun form.

These techniques can be combined to avoid damage from all enemies, though it is difficult for beginners to combine them all. It is recommended to make guard your primary method. (Other actions can be added by feel)

There are some situations where you may take unfortunate hits, but the flinching motion gives you a short period of invincibility, preventing you from dying instantly to multi-hit attacks. You can also cancel the flinch motion into other actions like step, although you will be vulnerable again the instant you cancel, so make sure that this does not increase your damage taken. For example, when fighting Dyaus Pita, if you are hit by the first bullet of its lightning barrage, you can avoid the rest of the hits if you do not input any actions, but you will get hit again if you try to do anything.

This is not an action, but the shield you have equipped will reduce the damage you take when you are not guarding. Naturally, the higher the defense, the greater the reduction. Taking less damage per hit will make it easier to keep your composure, and reduce the number of times you must heal, so while you are getting used to the game it may be better to focus on upgrading shields rather than weapons.

Until you get used to it, practicing the aforementioned techniques will not prevent damage. As such, you will need to heal.

Although you will primarily rely on healing items, item use has a long period during which you are stuck in place. As such, there will be instances in which you use an item, and you'll be struck during the recovery animation and take unnecessary damage. You must watch the enemy carefully and heal during openings, and also take care to heal before your health reaches dangerous levels. Additionally, many players may feel that overheal is a waste of an item, but on the other hand such stinginess will often lead to your demise. Particularly while fighting against mid to large sized aragami, it is strongly recommended to always heal to full.

Also, there are likely many players who have experienced NPCs healing them the instant their HP has reached 0, and thereby avoided KO. Of course, there are a number of factors which would prevent you from being able to rely on this from happening, including obstacles, NPC step timing, or NPC OP usage. It is best to rely on yourself for healing.

In order to perform well in battle, it is necessary to know the enemy. You can learn these things while playing normally, but is much faster to research each monster. There is a lot of information to cover at first, but once you understand patterns between species, things will fall into place quickly. There are many resources covering monster weaknesses, but as mentioned before, it is a lot of ground to cover, so for the timebeing it is fine to remember the following:

• Aragami attack patterns
  Once you grasp the tells of enemy attack patterns, you'll be able to select the best method of evasion, and the best location to stand. As for memorization, learning is doing. A particularly effective method is fighting an aragami 1 on 1, without attacking, and trying all different sorts of evasion. While doing this, pay attention to the following factors:
  -telling movement -> how much time to react
  -attack range -> which appropriate evasion technique to counter
  -inflicts status -> mitigate with skill or item
  -power, element -> affected by equipment (such as shield), possible to tank the hit?
  -speed of the attack vs its recovery/opening -> choosing an appropriate evasion technique to maximise counterattack
  -conditions of the attack (used when eraged? used at a certain distance?) -> choose an appropriate evasion and counter technique
  
• Aragami status
  An idle aragami's patrol route is not random, but is determined by the mission and species
  Generally, aragami that see you will move to attack, aragami that know of your existence will chase after you, or else they do not sense you and will standby on alert. If aragami see or hear you, they will immediately enter combat mode. If they are hit by an attack, they will search for an enemy.
  An idle aragami's range is dependent on the mission and species. If you cannot avoid a melee, it is useful to prepare.
  The skill "sensitive" or the blood power "intuit" will reflect these states in the radar. Red means it is hostile to you, yellow means hostile to a party member, green means in alert, and blue means standby.
  
• Aragami senses
  Aragami will detect you through hearing or sight. The aragami's detection range varies greatly between species. Understanding each aragami's range will allow you to prevent other aragami from joining in mid-battle (though there are certain missions in which this is unavoidable).
  [Sight]
  Each aragami has a set vision radius that will detect you. An aragami that has detected you will attack right away. This radius can be hindered by obstacles. Most aragami have a relatively narrow vision radius, and you can charge them from the side undetected, though there are other aragami with wider vision. There are also aragami that can turn their heads during standby, so be careful.
  [Hearing]
  In a set radius, regardless of angle, aragami can detect noise. This cannot be obscured by obstacles, as aragami can detect noise from across a wall. There are some aragami that immediately detect you, while others will simply investigate the source of the noise. The operator can inform you of which type of aragami has heard you.
  Both aragami and god eaters can make detectable noises. Running and dashing do not make any noise, but weapon-change does, and you cannot mute your allies or engaged aragami, so be careful.
  
  
• Activation/Enrage
  An aragami will enrage after taking a certain amount of damage. This status will cancel with time or when the aragami goes to eat. Generally, one of the two changes will occur when an aragami enrages.
  -Attack changes
  New attacks may be used, or normal attacks may have increased range. The attack power can also increase.
  -Resistance changes
  Certain parts of the aragami can have higher or lower defense. Resistance to status effects can also change.
  
  
• Aragami parts
  Mid and large size aragami have different parts, with different attributes. Small aragami count entirely as a single part.
  
  • Resistances and Defense
    Aragami parts have different resistances. Resistances are notated on a scale from 0~100, if the value is 100, there will be no damage to that part, and a value of 30 will imply a 30% damage reduction.
    The resistances to physical damage types (sunder, crushing, piercing, piercing shots, crushing shots) tends to vary greatly between parts. There are many cases where one part yas 90 resistance, while another part only has 20.
    The approximate amount of resistance a part has to your attack is reflected in different hit effects as follows:
    
    • White: 0~30 (essentially critical damage, the most efficient damage)
      
    • Red: 31~60
      
    • Green: 61~85
      
    • Spark: 86~100 (Almost no damage will be dealt)
  • Bond breaks
    Certain parts will break when enough damage has been dealt to it. Most aragami have 3~4 breakable parts. There are a number of changes that occur, most of them beneficial, but there are some aragami that become stronger when a bond is broken.
    
    • Activation
      An aragami generally activates after a bond is broken.
      
    • Resistance change
      The broken part usually has reduced resistances, though there are some cases in which a resistance may rise.
      
    • Attack change
      When some bonds are broken, certain attacks will change. For the most part, the attack is weakened, and sometimes disabled altogether. However, some aragami like Hannibal will start using new attacks, and many aragami do not change at all.
  • Down and Stagger
    When certain parts are damaged enough, the aragami may stagger. The stagger status is usually short, but it is always a good opportunity. However, because the animation may be large, a prepared attack can sometimes miss, or else the target can fall beyond a barrier.
    Dealing larger amounts of damage can also down. This status lasts longer, and is a good opportunity to attack weak points. Many bosses can expose a particularly weak part when downed.
• About status effects
  Each aragami species has a different resistance to status effects, and this can change the length of the effect. Each effect has a maximum number of times it can be inflicted. There are also aragami that always activate after a stun grenade. Hold is a powerful status, but there are several aragami that cannot be inflicted.

Small aragami are often treated as small fry, and alone they pose no threat.
However, particular caution must be exercised when fighting ogretails and coccoon maidens.
They may be weak, but they attack with grat frequency, have a long range, and great accuracy. If you are surrounded by these types of aragami, you may become victim to a concentrated barrage. Also, the "fallen" species have attacks that inflict status, and you may find yourself at an unforeseen disadvantage. As will be mentioned later, it is important to avoid fighting multiple enemies, and to move so you can see all targets. The only saving grace is their attacks are weak.
Zygotes have particularly long detection range, and are rather difficult to deal with. It is important to consider your fighting location at all times. They also can inflict status, so exercise caution when these are present. If you take the time to hit them, they will usually die quickly.

As for Dreadpikes and Night Hollows, in general they are much easier to deal with and much weaker as well. However, Night Hollows have a projectile with particularly strong guidance, so it is still best to deal with these monsters beforehand.
Silkys appear very late in the game, usually when players have upgraded gear, but their long-lingering attacks will still be dangerous to melee.

Considering how most individual aragami have strong attacks with a wide radius, fighting many at once can be fatal. In fact, fighting multiple mid~large size aragami is suicidal for any beginner. In addition to this, most aragami cannot be outrun, and the size of most maps is quite small. Only in a few instances can you shake off pursuit.
As such, one must take precautions in order to minimize situations in which multiple aragami are engaged at the same time, considering the enemy detection radius relative to map size.

Many maps have a central area that idle aragami can easily wander into. As much as possible, lure aragami into an area that is out of the way and hard to see from other areas of the map. In a first playthrough it is difficult to understand patrol routes, so it may behoove you to take a moment to observe the map.
NPC party members may often wander off while moving across the map, so it also helps to utilize gather commands.

As stated before, different aragami have different detection ranges. Because of this, if there are two aragami, and you attack the one with a smaller detection range, you are more likely to end up fighting both at once. Always try to isolate and eliminate the more sensitive aragami. Generally, it is good judgement to elminate aragami that can hear you across obstacles, such as Kongou-types.
Aragami with good hearing, will detect melee noises and weapon mode swaps, and can be lured into good battle areas using this method. If a battle-status aragami encounters an idle aragami, you don't have to worry, as this will not alert the other monster (although this did happen in previous versions of the game). It can also be effective to pull them with long-range bullets.
An aragami with good eyesight can be dealt with as long as you make sure to have your NPC partners prepared to move when or as soon as you pull.

There are situations in which aragami join-ups are unavoidable. Despite all your countermeasures, you end up with multiple active aragami. As mentioned before, dealing with multiple enemies at once is dangerous, but even in this situations you have recourse.
You can try to damage one aragami enough that it runs off to eat, or else is defeated. Freely throw stun grenades and use your ranged bullets. Through this method it should be possible to make one enemy break away. The target of this strategy ought to be the aragami with the duller senses, as an aragami with sharp senses will simply return to the battlefield after a short break. If the target moves to eat nearby, it is important to move to a more distant battlefield.
If this does not work, you can try throwing a stun grenade and ordering your unit to disperse. If your party is spread out, the aragami are likely to as well. However, the direction an aragami runs after recovering from a stun grenade is pretty much random, and there are cases in which the aragami will all choose the same target. In the worst case, you may be discovered during your own attempts to break away. Additionally, there are some aragami that will not be stunned during certain attacks, and you may end up throwing a grenade uselessly. To avoid such things, you should try to grenade while standing by a corner, and time your grenade between attacks.
It is important to remember these things in sink-or-swim situations.

After learning evasion techniques, you learn to attack, but even before that, it is recommended to devour. Players and NPCs both enter burst status by using devour. Attack, defense, move speed, all are strengthened during this state. Whether or not you can maintain burst status can drastically change the pace of the battle. You can find documentation regarding the particulars.
Learning to maintain burst can be difficult at first, but you must consider how to match the length of the devour animation with the length of a given aragami's openings. Once you get the hang of it, you'll be able to decide instinctively when to devour. Even in cases where there are few openings, combo and guard devours can be used in the right instances.

Learning evasion and tactics is great, but if you don't attack, you cannot eliminate the target. All NPCs have generally low damage output, so if you go sight-seeing, it will be difficult to clear missions.

• Strike at openings
  The first thing to learn about attacking is to strike when the aragami shows an opening. With few exceptions, there are no actions that allow attack and defense at the same time, and on top of this, you generally cannot stop aragami attacks with your own. Because of this, you cannot bulldoeze through large aragami.
  
• Aim for weak points
  As mentioned earlier, aragami parts have different defense values. For example, one part can have 90% defense, and another will have 50% defense, resulting in a 5x increase in damage. In otherwords, you only have to hit the second part once for every 5 hits on the other part. As such, even if you have few opportunities for attacking, as long as you hit a weak point you will get results.
  
• Understand the characteristics of attack movements
  All attacks have unique startup, range, power, and recovery. Understanding these traits will allow you to strike aragami weak points and openings with more precision. Learning about your weapons while practicing against aragami will surely improve your own ability to judge situations. Even if you experiment in low-rank quests, you should experiment to see the varying effectiveness of different weapons.
  
• Understand the different weapon classes
  There are 6 types of melee weapons (Short Blade, Long Blade, Buster Blade, Boost Hammer, Charge Spear, and Variant Scythe), and 4 types of guns (Sniper, Assault, Blast, and Shotgun). There are 24 possible weapon combinations, and if you include the three shield types (buckler, shield, tower) there are 72.
  Each weapon is almost like playing a different game, and since there are so many weapons it can be difficult to learn them all. It's best to simply try them out and see which fits your playstyle. God Eater can be cleared with any weapon, even if they all have strengths and weaknesses, so pick any one you like. There are many weapon specific guides, and the NPC Damian can also tell you more about each weapon.

• Short Blade
  A small bladed weapon. Sporting quick attacks with little recovery, which can be canceled with step or jump, this weapon is designed for mobility. In exchange, the range is rather short, and the damage per hit is low.
  This weapon can dash once in the air by default, and when combined with double-jump, results in very long airtime. This weapon recovers OP quickly, so it works well for gunners. Most of these weapons are a combination of sunder and pierce damage, but in the endgame you can make weapons that specialize in sunder, pierce, and crush. As a result, this weapon can be easily used against any aragami.
  If used well, there are blood arts that allow this weapon to outperform others, but it requires a great deal of finesse and precision. The vertical reach of the weapon while on the ground is short, and there aren't many blood arts that allow for pinpoint accuracy.
  Despite this, the weapon is quite straightforward, so this weapon is still useful for beginners. The weapon forces the user into close range, which may result in taking hits, but surely will force the user to learn the enemy's attack patterns, and this knowledge can be applied to other weapons. Therefore, it can be good to start with the short sword, and transfer to other weapons, when you desire more power or a change of pace.
  
  
• Long Blade
  A mid-sized sword. Slow compared to the Short Blade, but more than enough speed to strike at aragami openings. The range is somewhat longer. The weapon allows the use of "Zero Stance" which allows the user to continue or reset combos, cancel into step, jump or guard depending on the situation.
  It also has "Impulse Edge", a mini explosive shell that is pretty strong even without the use of a Blood Art. This is particularly useful when there are melees in which you have few opportunities to swap weapon modes but you want to make use of your overflowing OP. A well-balanced weapon with almost no shortcomings, a fitting weapon for the default protagonist.
  
  
• Buster Blade
  The largest bladed weapon. Its movements are heavy, and both first swings of □ and △ are quite slow. As such, it is recommended to start combos with step attacks.
  Using this weapon's "Charge Crush" allows you to concentrate your strength into a single, powerful attack. Though it takes time to charge and is hard to use on fast aragami, you can adjust your direction during the charge, and the range is quite a bit longer than the normal attack. If you strike surgically with this attack you can get a lot of damage output.
  Also, almost every attack can eliminate its recovery with guard. This is a feature specific to this weapon. The weapon movements are comparatively slow, but the step performance is the same as other weapons.
  Additionally, this weapon has the ability to directly counter aragami attacks with it's unique autoguard weapon action. This weapon is for players seeking a weapon that will demand timing and finesse.
  
  
• Boost Hammer
  A hammer with a booster attached. Just as it looks, its movements are slow, and the range is small. As with the Buster Blade, it is recommended to match the aragami movements .
  The weapon action activates a special Boost Action, allowing you to use Boost Rush and Boost Drive.
  Boost Rush stands in place and chain swings together, while Boost Drive rushes forward a set distance while swinging. Both of these attacks can chain into an ender, Boost Impact. Using Boost Action to swoop in on aragami openings can be exhilarating.
  However, during Boost Action, you can only move with Boost Rush, so it can be difficult to position properly to hit weak points. All attacks during Boost Action also consume stamina, so it is wise to end combos quickly.
  Achieving a smooth playstyle with this weapon is difficult. There are many weapon-specific habits for this weapon, so it is difficult to recommend to beginners. However, once you get the hang of this weapon, it is extremely powerful.
  
  
• Charge Spear
  The weapon class that most closely resembles polearms, a long spear. The □ attack is a somewhat slow sweeping attack, while the △ attack is a quick thrust. The △ attack is quite good for striking weak points, while the □ attack is best used for mowing down smaller aragami.
  Holding □ for a short time will charge the special "Charge Glide" which rushes forward while thrusting, and buffs the power of the rest of the combo. In addition, you can move, dash or jump while charging.
  The weapon action is a backflip, mostly used for retreat. With some practice you can backflip forward to easily leap over an aragami, or access aragami weak points that are suspended in mid-air.
  The basic use of this weapon involves circling around while waiting for openings, and rushing with with charge glide to combo weak points. A weapon with comparatively few gimmicks, and rather straightforward. The primary weakness of this weapon is the difficulty of accessing smaller weak points in the air.
  
  
• Variant Scythe
  A new weapon added in Rage Burst. □ button quickly slices up enemies in close range, △ and R1+□ will make large sweeping attacks with long range to mow down many targets at once.
  The R1+□ weapon action in particular, called "Round Fang", has a very long and wide range. This attack will also score multiple hits on any aragami part it passes through, making this attack extremely effective on aragami with weak points at ground level. However, you leave yourself open during this attack, so you must watch out for aragami projectiles or rush attacks. If you step during Round Fang, your step attack will resume roundfang, so it is possible to read aragami attacks and avoid them while using this move.
  From here, you can combo into cleave fang.
  The scythe is a relatively safe weapon, due to its long range. You must still be wary of enemy projectiles and rush attacks, and be careful not to exhaust your stamina. This is one of the more unique weapons, so picking this one to start may make things difficult if you change weapons later on.

With the exception of shotguns, these projectile weapons are your long-range option, and in exchange for consuming OP, you can output a lot of damage in a short period. In exchange, you are unable to guard while in gun form, and you are more vulnerable. It is difficult to control who the aragami is attacking, so it is best to attack from a distance. As such, the basics of using these weapons is to find opportunities to dump large amounts of damage from relative safety. Hitting with melee weapons generally refills your OP, so it is best to spend most of your time in melee mode.
Also, there are support and healing bullets, meaning that guns are a high utility weapon, but it is best to save that until after you've mastered the basics.

• Sniper
  A gun designed for sniping. The base bullet cannot be affixed with a homing chip, as the first bullet is always fixed as a sniper shot. As a result, you must be able to aim each shot. If you are able to hit a weak point, you will score a critical and get a large damage boost, and this can be increased further if you find a good bullet edit recipe. Players that can aim quickly in FPS or TPS mode can quickly shave off enemy HP.
  Sniper bullets hit instantly, so there is no need to worry about bullet deviation or travel time. The range is not infinite, but there are very few situations in which this will be a problem.
  The aim speed is not very fast, so it is best to already be aimed at the target when entering scope vision. Movement during aim has a bit of inertia and there can be a bit of lag between the button press and firing. As such, if you fire rapidly while aiming, your bullets may fly off in unintended directions. There are also situations where certain aragami parts can obscure the intended weak point. Either way, practice will be necessary.
  The weapon action is "Stealth Field" which hides you from all aragami senses. This effect is canceled if you attack, so make sure to remember that you will be revealed when you sneak attack.
  On a different note, sniper NPCs are very quick to aim at weak points, and thus can be a decent source of damage.
  Also, snipers have a unique blood bullet, "Bond Blocker", that can inflict defense-down debuff on the enemy when critting. Unfortunately, there are some aragami that have no crittable points.
  
• Assault
  Boasting a fast firing speed, this weapon deals damage through rapid-fire. In exchange for having low damage, you can equip a bullet that refills OP, allowing the user to keep firing without having to stop to melee. The rapid bullets can also cause aragami to stagger easily, and you can also run while firing.
  However, this weapon when fired aimlessly will completely fall behind other weapons in terms of firepower. Like the sniper, it is best to aim carefully at weak points, and use bullet edit or aragami bullets to fire in bursts. Sometimes it may even be better to foresake rapid bullets for expensive, hard-hitting ones.
  Again, like other guns, you cannot guard while firing. Most aragami will generate additional hate against gunners, and you'll be wanting for some evasion techniques.
  Learning to fire consistently on the enemy can be unexpectedly difficult. Also, since this weapon fires so many bullets, you'll have to be careful of friendly fire in multiplay.
  At any rate, there are certain aragami that are immune to melee (including impulse edge), and against such opponents, an assault is possibly the best counter.
  
• Blast
  Unlike other guns, this weapon can store up to 10 bars of OP with "Oracle Reserve", bullet edit modules numbering at 8 slots, and unlike other guns, can make practical use of LL-size bullets. As such, the strength of this weapon depends greatly on the quality of your bullet-edit recipes, and if you can appropriately make use of it, blast guns exhibit unparalleled firepower. There are many different situational recipes, and it is difficult to recommend a single one.
  It should be noted that LL-size bullets have a large radius, and you ought to exercise caution when firing in multiplay. If you've ever had Kanon in your party you can guess what happens.
  
• Shotgun
  A weapon with extremely short range, despite being a ranged weapon, it specializes in close-range.
  An equippable blood bullet allows this weapon to ignore aragami defenses, making this weapon a decent compliment to melee weapons. As such, bullets that dump large amounts of damage during infrequent openings are recommended. There is also a blood bullet that draws in aragami projectiles, and with such a tool you can render certain aragami completely powerless.
  The weapon action "Rush Fire" can also be used for quick movement, despite being intended for closing distance.
  Additionally, healing bullets and aragami bullets will travel long distances normally.
  The main drawbacks to be wary of is the added danger of friendly fire due to proximity, and forcing yourself into close range while being unable to guard. This weapon is a poor match for beginners.

There will not be many details in this article, but thorough knowledge of equipment, skill, link support devices, and NPC partner abilities will surely help you in battle. To a certain extent, if your equipment is not upgraded sufficiently, you will often find it difficult to make progress. Depending on the situation you may need to take the time to gather materials.
With certain items, you can temporarily increase maximum HP, or induce Burst Status. Some items can be surprisingly useful, so make sure to investigate each one. Equipment sets are your lifeline in survival missions. As you progress the story, you'll be rotating through equipment, but when you encounter survival missions, you want to avoid fighting fire-resistant monsters with fire weapons.
Take note that your first two equipment sets will be transferred along with your avatar card.

• Read additional information from the radar
  The radar can be useful for detecting attacks from outside your sight range during battle. For example, the Garm's high-altitude nose-dive attack will be displayed on the radar by showing the Garm's marker spinning distinctly while moving closer. With good timing, you can avoid the attack without having to turn to look. Using similar ideas for other aragami, you'll be able to fight even more cleanly.
  
  
• Be aware of different sounds
  Aragami attacks usually have unique sounds. If you are aware of these sounds, you can guard or evade them despite being unable to see them. If you have surround sound, you'll be able to discern the direction the attack is coming from. Also, aragami sounds can be heard by other aragami, so keep this in mind when other aragami with acute hearing are on the map.
  
  
• Command your NPCs to avoid melees
  The default command is to gather your party together. When the fight begins this can result in the party constantly being battered by wide melee attacks. It can help to select the "disperse" command without sending it at the beginning of each mission so you can send it more quickly in a pinch.
  During gathered formations, split-off NPCs (with a white-colored codename) will not recieve the dispersal command. As such, you can split off from your party during a fight, draw near to a single NPC, and command that NPC to follow you to a different location, which can result in the aragami following. If the entire party follows, you can order them to disperse or search, and repeat the attempt to gather a single NPC. There is always the risk of all NPCs and Aragami gathering together, so be ready to attempt this at any given moment.
  
  
• Support your allies
  NPCs can act as important decoys for aragami targets. You will understand this quickly if you deploy solo. NPCs, with few exceptions, cannot deal any sizable amounts of damage.
  They have a certain amount of defense and evasion AI, but not to the extent of the old God Eater Burst days, and they tend to get beaten up if they go into melee. There are many instances when they can be tasked to hold an aragami at bay 1on1 and still be KO'd.
  As such, in severe circumstances, NPCs will usually fall before the player does. Even if you spend the HP to revive them, they can easily be defeated gain, resulting in situations in which their prescence is no longer useful. However, if you leave them, the enemy will focus more on you, which can result in worsened situations.
  As such, it is best to be prepared to support your party in the following ways:
  
  • Healing Shots
    Using healing shots, you can recover other party members' HP, and with blood bullets, buff attack or defense, or recover status effects. Also, heal shots can disappear if they hit an aragami, but lasers will pierce aragami bodies. If an NPC's HP falls too much, it will use an item, so it is effective to heal them before their HP falls too low. You can expect great performance from such bullets during survival missions. It is always useful to prepare one healing bullet.
    Healing bullets are greatly effective in online play, during challenge missions or in rooms with beginners. Blast bullets can also use a blood bullet to refill ally OP, allowing you to act as a vanguard and help your support.
    
  • Transfer Bullets
    Using aragami bullets and transferring them will increase your target's burst level by 1. As mentioned before, a God Eater's performance increases greatly during burst status. As a result, you can prevent a lot of damage.
    In this game, it is impossible to increase burst level on your own, so maintaining burst level in multiplay is very important.
    
  • Healing Items
    Healing Pillars and Healing spheres will heal party members that touch them. NPCs tend to use these freely. Healing Pillars are particularly useful, but you can only carry 2 at a time, so it is important to use them carefully.

Blood Arts were added in God Eater 2 as a way of strengthening melee with special moves. There are many resources regarding these various arts.
There are many blood arts that greatly affect the way weapon moves work. These often take practice to use, but they are usually quite powerful. You should try them all without reservations.
Also, some blood arts have a dark grey background, and are usually blood arts that deal particularly high damage under specific conditions. You may find some of these are so difficult to pull off that using a weaker but more consistent blood art is better. Some blood arts like Last Revenger can be a particular problem. It is best to practice with these arts plenty so you have the technique to use them.
Even ignoring grey BAs, there are certain arts that will deal more damage per hit than others, but it is also important to consider the DPS. In the end, as long as you can clear the mission, you can use whichever blood art you like, but by the time you can do such a thing, you have nothing to learn from this paragraph.

Compared to Blood Arts and Blood Rage, a system present in each entry of God Eater that can be considered the signature path to creativity is the Bullet Edit system, or BE for short. Combining up to 8 bullet modules, you can create almost any kind of shot you can think up. If you can imagine a bullet that automatically hits a weak point and delivers high damage, you can understand how useful this system is.
The methods and recipes are covered in other articles, but there are several points to consider when choosing recipes.

• Bullets with a clear use
  Bullets have many uses: delivering damage from afar, deploying an AOE from the middle of a melee, a bullet for pulling aragami regardless of attack power, or even decoys.
  
• Ease of use
  For attack bullets, even if the bullet deals massive damage, it is useless if you can't hit with it. Should the bullet go straight at high speed, or curve around the target, does it need to home on the target, will it be unusable near walls, and how much OP will be spent (will you be able to fire another shot right away, or will you have to build up OP again)? These are all important factors.
  
• Used OP vs damage dealt (DPO)
  It is desirable to deal the most damage for the least Oracle. In general, as the chip size and count increases, DPO decreases. Also, as small bullets hit consecutively, there will be damage falloff. Find the compromise between your playstyle and ease of use.
  
• Damage dealt over time (DPS)
  In most battles, your window for firing is quite short. Because of this, using a less efficient bullet that deals more damage all at once can be the better choice. Consider whether the bullet is appropriate for the mission, as well.
  
• Preventing friendly fire
  Friendly fire is usually disastrous in multiplayer. Being hit by other players is annoying, especially if they are not as cute as Kanon.
  It may not be on purpose, but if you do not include countermeasures in your bullet recipes, it can qualify as willful negligence.
  This may be less of an issue for snipers, but blast bullets with radial or bomb bullets over L-size, assault bullets with rapid shots, and shotgun bullets are all difficult for other players to avoid. It is important to have some bullets with Friend or Foe chips.
  
• Healing Shots
  Healing bullets are generally simple, but adding chips to buff attack or defense or cure status ailments is very helpful.
  Healing bullets cost a lot of OP, and lasers that penetrate aragami cost even more.
  In missions at 99 difficulty, healing bullets combine well with the skill "Firm Stand" that allows you to survive any hit as long as your HP was over 51.
  You may want to consider using skills to reduce OP costs.
  
• Gimmick bullets
  It is popular to bring decorative bullets to fire while waiting for extraction after a mission, or during easy missions. Use them as you see fit, but if you're going to do it, be creative.
  
• Time
  It is easy to become engrossed in bullet edit, and you may end up spending quite a bit of time. Make sure to be prepared beforehand.