AFFINITY:

Learn about basic and Transfer Affinities in Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne HD Remaster. Understand how they affect demon strengths, weaknesses, and skill inheritance during fusion.

Hey there! Let's break down the 'Affinity' system in Shin Megami Tensei III: Nocturne HD Remaster. It's pretty important for understanding how your demons fight and how you can best set them up for battle. Basically, there are two types of Affinities: a basic one and a Transfer Affinity. Good news is, these never change once a demon has them!

Basic Affinity is all about what your demon is strong or weak against. Think of it as their natural elemental leanings. While these innate strengths and weaknesses are fixed, you can actually 'bypass' them with certain skills. For example, if a demon is naturally weak to Hama attacks, a skill like 'Hama Immunity' will completely negate that weakness. However, the game has a priority system for these effects. If a demon has a skill that's 'better' than its natural affinity, the skill takes precedence. The game prioritizes effects in this order, from lowest to highest: Normal Resistance, Weakness, Immunity, Absorption, and finally Reflection. So, if a demon has both 'Ice Absorption' and 'Ice Reflection' skills, it'll reflect ice attacks, not just absorb them. It's the highest priority that counts!

It's worth noting that 'Resistance' skills are a bit unique. They'll reduce the damage or success rate of an attack, but they won't negate a natural weakness. So, if a demon is naturally weak to Ice and has the 'Ice Resistance' skill, Ice attacks will still exploit that weakness and do more damage than to a demon without that specific weakness, even if the damage is reduced. These Resistance skills also stack, meaning a demon that's naturally resistant to Ice and also has the 'Ice Resistance' skill will take even less damage. It also works the other way around: an Ice Absorbing demon with an 'Ice Resistance' skill will heal less from Ice attacks than if it only had the absorption.

Transfer Affinity, on the other hand, is mainly relevant when you're fusing demons. It basically dictates what kinds of Skills a demon is likely to inherit from its 'parent' demons during fusion. We'll dive deeper into this in the fusion section, but just know it influences which skills you can pass down!