Game Modes

There are primarily seven game modes present in P5X. Four casual ones — Heart Rail, Tycoon, Tartarus, and Velvet Trials, and three endgame ones — Sea of Souls Trials, Door of Nightmares, and Astrolabe Trials. Some might not be available from the start in the English version.

Velvet Trials

The Velvet Trials are a series of increasingly difficult stages, with all of them except 1 (which has various stage set-ups) themed around 2 specific Elements. As you progress, the difficulty ramps up to the point where you'll need to use two separate teams, each with different characters and Personas.

Every stage features score multipliers that are essential to increase your stage score to earn stars. These stars unlock valuable rewards such as Meta Shards, Fated Echoes, Major Inspiration Points, Janosik duplicates, and more.

Heart Rail

Heart Rail is P5X’s first Roguelite mode. In this mode you can bring characters you own through a gauntlet of different random events and enemy encounters, while choosing between a wide variety of team buffs and enemy debuff rewards.

After each run, you can spend tickets to upgrade the Skill Tree for meta-progression.

The mode offers plenty of one time rewards, and contains almost everything you might want in the game, be it Revelation Card Selectors, Level and Rank-up Materials or even Meta Shards.

Tycoon (CN)

Tycoon makes a return from P5R.

You can complete many challenges to gain Tycoon Points used to unlock more Tycoon Character Skins, Tycoon Card Skins and lots of growth materials.

There are currently 3 modes for Tycoon.

• Rank Mode: You play against other players in a Ranked Ladder for Seasonal rewards and one time Rank rewards. Each game consists of 3 rounds.
• Classic Mode: You play against AI for the classic Tycoon experience. You can choose between playing for 1 round or 3 rounds.
• Joyful Mode: You play against other players in 1 round games. You can choose to do a Double to double the stakes of Tycoon Coins after seeing your hand to increase the Tycoon Coins multiplier.
• You can increase this multiplier by using a Super Double Card instead of just doing the normal Double, or playing a Revolution.
• When the game ends, Poor and Beggar will lose Tycoon Coins based on the multiplier and score. Tycoon and Rich will then gain the Tycoon Coins based on how many the other players lost.
• The leaderboard is based on your total Tycoon Coins at the end of the season.

Here’s the basic rules of Tycoon to get you started!

• 1 game consists of 3 rounds. Your final rank is determined by how many points you obtained each round. Tycoon will obtain 30 points, Rich will obtain 20 points, Poor will obtain 10 points, and Beggar will obtain 0 points.
• A card’s number determines its strength. Each card must beat the previous one and the numbers of cards in play must be met (such as pairs). The weakest card is 3, but the strongest is 2.
• In the first round a random player will go first and the Beggar starts each subsequent round.
• Cards are traded before the next round begins: Tycoon and Beggar trade two cards, Rich and Poor trade one card, and Poor and Beggar must trade their best cards.
• You can choose to pass if you do not want to play a card during your turn. You’ll have to pass if you do not have any cards you can play. If all players pass, the turn will end.
• If the Tycoon is not able to maintain their status during the next round, that player will lose the round and become the Beggar.
• Playing four of the same card triggers a Revolution, reversing the value of all cards. Repeating this move will return the cards to normal.
• Playing an 8 will cause an 8 Stop, which forces the turn to end. The player who played the 8 card will get to start the next turn.
• The Joker card is stronger than a 2 and a 3, and can also be used as another number.
• Playing a 3 of Spades after a single Joker card will trigger a 3-Spade Reversal and end the turn.
• The Wonder card can always be played. Playing the Wonder card will cause an X Stop, which forces the turn to end. The player who played the X card will get to start the next turn.

Tartarus (CN)

Tartarus is P5X’s second Roguelite mode. In this mode you can challenge 18 floors of procedurally generated maps with a team consisting of 9 Combat characters and 3 Navigators.

• Your Wonder level and what characters you own outside of Tartarus doesn’t factor here. You increase your Wonder level and you add characters to your party during the run.
• Defeat Roaming Shadows to gain Clock Gears, Heart Fragments, and Dawn Fragments. Enter Shuffle Time after battle.
• You can choose one out of three cards as reward during Shuffle Time, certain fights will give higher quality Shuffle Time.
• You will decrease Will after battle, having low Will will have serious negative effects.
• You need to find the stairs to reach higher floors. Once you decide to enter the next level, there is no turning back.
• You can find the Grand Clock in Tartarus, you can consume Clock Gears to purchase various cards at Grand Clock.
• You can also find the Clock in Tartarus, after consuming Dawn Fragments, can choose to restore WIll or increase character's Awareness.
• There is a Tangled Shadow as the boss encounters every three floors, you can only continue by defeating it.
• After each run, you can unlock many meta-progression:
• Antique: There are many Antiques with unique effects, you can purchase and upgrade them for future runs, you can only equip one Antique.
• Mastery: A sprawling skill tree with many upgrades ranging from basic stats to special passives during Tartarus exploration.
• Team: You can manage your team and consume Heart Fragments to unlock characters for this mode.
• As you win the run of the current difficulty, you’ll unlock a higher difficulty, each difficulty adds a new modifier that makes the run more difficult but increases the collection rate of meta-progression items. Currently there are 12 difficulties.
• You can view many characters’ Chapter of Dreams by consuming Dream Fragments earned from Tartarus exploration. These act like Social Links for the P3R characters where you will hangout with them and interact with many characters from the P5X cast.
• There are also many challenges that give many Meta Shards as rewards. Such as winning a run on certain difficulty or with certain character.

Sea of Souls Trials

In this mode, you'll challenge two bosses per patch and compete on a Global Leaderboard for rewards. It's the only consistent source of Rainbow Persona Coins, which are required for upgrading high-rank Personas.

• Each boss is tailored around the Rate-up character and includes Seasonal modifiers.
• You'll need 2 separate teams, each with different Personas, characters, and Revelation Cards.
• There are 8 Rank Tiers, and your rewards improve with higher scores.
• Based on your score relative to your current tier, you can promote, maintain, or drop a tier at the end of the patch.

Door of Nightmares (Guild)

In Door of Nightmares, you'll face 3 bosses per patch and compete against other Paradises (Guilds) on a Paradise Leaderboard. Each member's personal best score is added to Paradise's total score.

• This mode is the only reliable way to obtain Universe Cards.
• One of the three bosses is tuned for the Rate-up character, and each patch introduces a Seasonal modifier.
• You'll need 3 distinct teams with different Personas, characters, and Revelation Cards.
• You can borrow 1 unit from your Paradise, this gives each Paradise an unique strategy as they try to figure out who and what to borrow for the patch to maximize score based on what character each member has.

Astrolabe Trials (CN)

This mode offers a Zodiac-themed map filled with bosses, each with unique modifiers. It's the only dependable source for Mental Image materials which are used for upgrading Mental Images. You typically earn enough to fully upgrade one character per monthly season.

The mode features branching paths, allowing you to choose which encounters to tackle in any order.

There are two Energy systems:

• Mental Energy: Used to challenge nodes. You spend 1 per attempt, win or lose. You can reset a node and regain spent Energy. You can spend Energy multiple times to reattempt the same node.
• Thieves Usage: You gain 1 per unit each week. Once a unit is used in a node, they cannot be used again until their Thieves Usage refreshes.
• Example: If you use Cattle in one fight, you cannot use him again until he regains his Thieves Usage.