Oh boy, if you’re playing Sword Art Online: Hollow Fragment and you’re a masochist who’s decided that you want to unlock the various battle costumes of the heroines, you’ve taken on quite a task. Not only will it be extremely time consuming, but it’s confusing for two simple reasons: the first being the language/grammatical barrier and the second being the actual process. I’ve decided to attempt to crack this code and I want to share my research with you. While there are aspects I still don’t fully understand, I discerned a formula to unlock the four outfits for the various heroines.
Through various screenshots, charts, and examples, I look to help transfer this knowledge. Sadly there is no definitive starting point – it all sort of goes together. So let’s go with the very basics. Each of the seven heroines has four outfits you can unlock but doing various things in combat. There is one outfit for each of the three ‘Parameter Diamonds’ (made up term): Atk, Def, and Buf. The 4th outfit is rewarded to those who are able to get all three costumes on one character. Once unlocks, you permanently have it and through the ‘Character Info’ dialogue option you can tell the heroines to change back and forth.
- Attack Equipment: filling part of the Atk (red) Parameter Diamonds
- Defense Equipment: filling part of the Def (blue) Parameter Diamonds
- Buff Equipment: filling part of the Buff (green) Parameter Diamonds
- Additional Equipment: unlocked through receiving the other three outfits
- Default Equipment: original outfit, option unlocks once you get one of the others.
So the next logical place to look is at these Parameter Diamonds since partially filling them is the goal. As previously mentioned, there are three of these colored diamonds. Each diamond has four points. Three of these points are unique and one is shared (Sword Skill). The wording on these can be deceiving. So be careful, I’ll cover that more later. For now, let me break down these 10 unique points to the best of my knowledge
- 1: Cooperation – When you do action at the same time as partner, combos, and doing what they ask
- 2: ATK Support – Atk related spells
- 3: Switch – Having partner take hate away and then they use a skill
- 4: Cover – Uncertain… theory has a relationship with switching or coop while mostly Def blue focused
- 5: Threat – Having partner take hate away from you
- 6: DEF Support – Def related spells
- 7: Recover – Partner heals
- 8: Stun – Partner stuns target enemy
- 9: Interfere Support – Buf related spells
- 10: Sword Skill – Break attacks done by partner correlate to what your partner is currently focused in
In a nut shell, the more your partners do these specific actions, the more these diamonds will fill. It’s so much more than that though. Your partners will only learn through you telling them what you want them to do outside of combat and then praising them when they do it. I think of it as a struggle between where the heroine is in her Parameter Diamonds, what you want her to be doing, and what she is doing. She could be deep in the green, doing Atk actions, but you want her being defensive. This is a mess. However, there are ways to fix it.
So to start the process of forcing your partner down a specific path, you going to need to talk to them outside of town. Through the ‘Talk About Battle’ dialogue option, you get bombarded by a grammatical nightmare. My advice, look for key words, attempt to learn the gist, and know that the first option you have is always to tell her to not change anything and the second is to change. This will have your partner “focus” on this task. Let’s use a straight forward example followed by a difficult example:
In the first example, Philia is asking if I want her to focus generally in the Atk Parameter Diamond. There are two types of requests, general and specific. Philia is asking a general request. Now Sinon… no one knows what Sinon is asking. Just look at what she says and then my options. This is a specific request though. If I had to guess, I’d say she is asking to “focus” on Interfere Support. This is an example of how the translation and grammar can actually hurt gameplay.
If you’ve noticed, each time I say focus I’ve thrown quotes around it. Let me explain. The character isn’t going to be doing more of that option but instead when she does do that option, you’ll have the option to praise her for it – this is how you progress in the Parameter Diamonds. Let’s say Sinon was actually asking about the Interfere Support. Now when she casts spells that fall under the Buf diamond while under the general Buf request (what Phila asked), you’ll see a green Buf Icon above the character’s name on the left of the screen in combat. When you see this, praise them (up on the directional pad). If it takes, you’ll see a message appear in the top left of the screen that says you praised Sinon for a specific thing.
That was really confusing, let me break it down more in a step by step process:
- 1: Decide the Parameter Diamonds you want to start filling
- 2: Talk to the heroine outside of town and choose the ‘Talk About Battle’ option
- 3: Cycle through the options until you find the general and / or specific task you want to focus on
- 4: Fight monsters
- 5: When you see the icon above the Heroine’s name on the left, hit up on D-Pad.
- 6: If it worked, you’ll see a message at the top left saying it worked.
- 7: This moves the arrow closer to the edge on the diamond for the specific task praised. Note this is a long process and won’t happen in just a few praises.
- 8: Rinse and repeat until satisfied
I learn through examples and pictures, so let me show it. For this example, I’m going to tell Sinon that I want her to fill up Cooperation under the Atk Parameter Diamond. The first picture shows where Cooperation is on the Parameter Diamond. The second shows the dialogue option to tell her to Cooperate more. The third picture shows the ‘ATK action’ icon above her name. Lastly, the fourth picture shows the praise was successful for a ‘combo attack.’
I want to talk more about praising. First off, it’s not a timing thing – it just sometimes doesn’t work when you see the icon. You’ll get the message that says +50 SP to the party which can get reaaaally frustrating. The chance of it working in multiplayer seems VERY low but still can happen. You have the window to praise until your partner does a new action to remove or change the current icon. I’ve even noticed this holds over from combat to combat. It just doesn’t, you know, always work. Depending on the sort of action you are praising, the message at the top left will be specific. The cooperation example is above but here are two more showing the ‘ATK Sword Skill’ (bottom of the Atk Parameter Diamond) and Switching (right of the Atk Parameter Diamond).
Don’t become a praise machine. If you’re trying to focus on Atk and see a Def icon appear in combat, DON’T praise it. That’s not going to help anything. If you’re heroine is full on support and you want to swap her to Atk – the process is grueling. At first, she’s going to perform mostly support Sword Skills and Interfere Support abilities because that is the groove she’s in. After talking to her and saying you want her to attack more, no longer will Buf icons appear when she uses these actions. Instead, Atk icons will appear the rare times she uses these skills. You better praise these when you see them. The more you praise her, the more her AI will shift to doing this more. You have to crawl out of where she’s at before you can get her where you want her to be. At first though, it’s really painful. You also may have to talk to her outside of battle to tweak what you want from her more – never settle.
Before you say that’s impossible, there are tips and tricks to get them where you want them faster. Through holding the right and left bumpers on the Vita, four options appear on each that tell your heroine to perform specific tasks. If those tasks correlate with what you’ve asked them to do in the ‘Talk About Battle,’ the icon will appear and you can praise them. Because I love you all, let’s look at color coordinated Parameter Diamonds picture again followed by a side by side picture of the Call Palettes with the same numbers connected:
Left Bumper:
- Skill Stop – Has partner stun the enemy. This will trigger a Buf Icon to boost the Stun Parameter Diamond in Buf. Tip: when going for a support outfit, always use Skill Stop because it has a long cooldown and is easy to trigger.
- Target Please – Has partner pull hate. This will trigger a Def icon to boost the Threat Parameter Diamond in Def. Tip: similar to skill stop, a decent cool down and easy to level.
- Wait Please – Doesn’t help Parameter Diamonds as far as I know.
- Guard – Has partner use a DEF Support skill. This will trigger a Def icon to boost the DEF Support Parameter Diamond in Def. Tip: when going for a def outfit, literally spam this whenever you can for easy Def icons.
Right Bumper:
- Good – Doesn’t force Parameter Diamonds icons but makes them develop when they appear.
- Use Skill – Uses a Sword Skill that heroine has. Depending on how developed the Parameter Diamonds are, the more likely she’ll use a Sword Skill of that type. When your partner uses a Sword Skill of what you asked her to do with her in the ‘Talk About Battle’ an icon will appear. I’ve had the most success with Atk Sword Skill here.
- Switch – Partner switches, this is only way she actually will switch. After switching, if she initially uses a Sword Skill and an Atk icon appears, praise it. This is the only way to boost the Switch Parameter Diamond in Atk.
- Heal – Your partner heals (in theory). I’ve had such little success with this skill, I don’t bother with it that often. It works more when your health is super low and seems to have a long cooldown. I’m sure there is a way to exploit it, I didn’t figure it out. This is the only way to boost the Recover Parameter Diamond in Buf.
Now that I’ve talked about what you need to do, now let’s talk about how much you need to do to unlock. I call it the ‘Six-Point System.’ Take a Parameter Diamonds and think about each four directions as having four-notches for a total of sixteen in total. To unlock a costume, you need six points anywhere in the diamond. The best way to show this is through picture, observe below.
Philia’s Buf diamond is at the minimum and would count as zero-points. Her Atk Parameter Diamond has seven points, one more than what’s needed. Just for learning processes, her Def Parameter Diamond would have one-point. Sinon has the minimum of 6-points in Def to unlock her def outfit. Her Atk Parameter Diamond has two points and her Buf Parameter Diamond has two. Note, you only need 6-points anywhere. You don’t need to max out (four-point) one direction to unlock, just anywhere.
Once you unlock the costume, you aren’t told. You only know by talking to your partner and choosing the ‘Character Info’ option. If you haven’t unlocked any costumes, this will take you directly into the Player Data page. If you have unlocked one or more costume, you’ll see them here. You’ll also gain the option to change back into the default outfit if you prefer it. If you’re getting close to six-pointing a Parameter Diamond, check here to see if you’ve received it.
Since I brought it up, let’s talk about the Player Data page real quick:
This is the same Lisbeth from level 98 to 108. There are a bunch of things to note here. If the Parameter Diamonds didn’t tell enough, you can read what’s going on in the data. She goes from being a ‘Battle Partner’ to an ‘Attacker.’ These are just titles, but give you an idea of what they’re about. While she remains a ‘Battle Type,’ note the description of what she does is changed. The other big thing to note is how her ‘Favorite Skill’ and ‘Frequently Used Support Skills’ change. These are the skills you’ve liked the most recently and therefore are the ones she’ll tend to use more.
There is it, it’s not perfect but that’s all the research I’ve done explained the best I can with visual aids. I’ve uploaded all the heroine’s outfits in the gallery if you want to see what you’re working towards – I suggest taking a gander over in that section. After all, that is what it’s all about. I’m going to end this guide with my suggestion of how to max out each of the Parameter Diamonds the quickest, best of luck!
Atk Parameter Diamond: Spam Atk Sword Skills and do lots of quick fights, you’ll raise the chance of Cooperating. Tell her you want to cooperate more since you can force Atk Sword Skills with the ‘Use Skill’ Call Palette. ‘Switch whenever available.
Def Parameter Diamond: The easiest to max out IMO. Spamming ‘Guard’ and ‘Target Please’ will get you lots of easy Def icons to capitalize on. Treat it as a race between the two to get to six-points fast.
Buf Parameter Diamond: The hardest one for me. The ‘Heal’ Call Palette is near useless but the ‘Skill Stop’ is pretty reliable. The cooldown on ‘Skill Stop’ is long and when the praise doesn’t take, it’s aggravating. Try to get in a grove where your partner casts a bunch of Interfere Support or Buf Sword Skills.
Going from one Parameter Diamond to Another: Besides what I wrote earlier, I’ve noticed Sinon had a ‘Talk About Battle’ battle option asking about footwork. When I told her to change this I think it put her back to where she was when you first get her. If that’s the case, do this after you get each outfit. It’s easier to change their minds before the Parameter Diamond is near filled – less to crawl out of. This option may be linked to Approval level. This is all theory.
Check out my review of Sword Art Online: Hollow Fragment while you're at it.
Historian, teacher, writer, gamer, cheat master, and tech guru: follow on Twitter @AndrewC_GZ
