PSO2 JP: February 2013 Tidbits

Shougai posted information from the latest Famitsu Connect!On which shed some light over Advance Quests.

Advance Quests:

Available from Class Level 45+
You'll use an item called "Advance Capsule" each time you accept the quest.
For example, there could be a quest that has 1 person use 10 Advance Capsules to go through the quest.
Upd: You can acquire element pyroxene stones in Advance quests.

How to Acquire Advance Capsules

You can purchase Advance Capsules in the shop. (1 for 50,000 Meseta)
You could also acquire Advance Capsules in Advance Quests. (Details Unknown)

Advance Capsule Payment Process

When you accept the quest, you can pay 10 capsules for 1 person.
For example, if there's four people, it would require 40 capsules.
The Party leader could choose to pay for all party members if they want to.
Each person in the party could pay 10 capsules to cover themselves or the party leader pays 40 capsules to cover everyone.

Kinds of Advance Quests

There's three types of Advance Quests (so far…)
Forest, Caves, and Desert.

Types of Advance Capsules

Advance Capsule A = Forest
Advance Capsule B = Caves
Advance Capsule C = Desert

Advance Risk

As you clear each advance quest, your advance risk will "rank up" which will increase the boosted enemy rate and enemy level (Lv 56+).
Also there will be some exclusive rare drops, (it's uncertain if this is the result of the enemies having higher levels.)
The advance risk that you've accumulated will reset after 7 days.

Advance Quests are sort of like an evolution to Guardians Boost Road, and it will be coming sometime in mid-February.

UPD: Pyroxene (Magic Stones) Shop Update

UPD New magic stones "Fire Pyroxene Agni" and "Wind Pyroxene Vayu" and "Earth Pyroxene Prithvi"
Trivia: Agni is the Hindu deity for Fire and Vayu is the Hindu deity for Air/Wind. Prithvi is the Hindu goddess for earth. (This would imply there will be more stones based on each element)
Upd: You can acquire these stones in Advance Quests. There's three types so far, Fire, Wind, and Earth.
There are also new weapons in this shop that require other "weapons" as materials to be traded in.
Pyroxene Shop will have a 10 star weapon called Lava Seeker*, a different colored version of Messer Agate.
"Messer Agate" and "Fire Pyroxene Agni" can be used as exchange materials.
The process seems to be, trade a lower ranking version of a weapon you don't want, to get a much stronger, higher ranking version of said weapon.
Trade Iku-tachi to get Kaku-tachi.
Trade Seitenweise to get Seitenheise
Trade Metalisolidum to get Metalignis
(Certain Weapon) + (Element Pyroxene) = Higher Ranking version of that weapon.
According to the screenshot, you need 90 Fire Pyroxene Agni and 1 Messer Agate to get a Lava Seeker.

Magic Stones Upgrade List [Warning: Speculated List]

メッサーアゲート Messer Agate + (Fire Pyroxene Agni) = Lava Seeker
イクタチ Iku-tachi + (Wind Pyroxene Vayu) = Kaku-tachi
セイテンバイセ Seitenweise + (Wind Pyroxene Vayu) = Seitenheise
シュミットール Schmidtore + ???? = Komlotore
メタリソリドム Metalisolidum + (Earth Pyroxene Prythvi) = Metalignis
イシュライ Ishurai + (Wind Pyroxene Vayu) = Surukrai
ルストデバイス Rusty Device + ???? = Old Device
グラヴェルコア Gravel Core + ???? = Olavacore
ディブルカーン Divulcan + ???? = Divulnigel

Future Speculated Weapons to be Pyroxene'd

Tundra: Vyefrost, Cruel Froga, Cruel Coffin, Cornelia
Mines: Block Bellow, Belk Welker, Noise Bullova
Skylands: Jade Racion, Gramasciento, Tourmalinka
Ruins: Ruins Charm, Latria Rain, 'Plosion, Fossiletrix

[thanks Manta]

New! How to get Abducted (As described by the Development Team)

Whenever you get good results on certain quests, it increases your chances of Abduction
However, if you cancel the quest before you clear it, your chances decrease.
A shortcut to getting abducted is to clear quests back to back.

Commentary on getting Abducted (As described by Shougai)

Whenever you S Rank Time Attack Quests, there's a possibility you may get abducted when you start the next TA quest.
If you do what's called a "Retire Marathon," your chances decrease.
A "Retire Marathon" is a phrase coined by the Japanese community where you repeatedly cancel and accept a quest.
(Now of course people have used the "Retire Marathon" method to get abducted so it may not be that much of a decrease?)

[via shougai]

PSO2 Augmented Reality

You can select from a variety of animations and take pictures alongside your character in Character Portrait.

Kuna (Voiced by Eri Kitamura)

She'll be performing with her band on stage at the Arks Lobby. In one of the cut-scenes she stylishly spins around and teleports somewhere. Aside from her, there's this mysterious girl with blue hair.