Dynasty Warriors 8: XL CE - Wei Story Mode 1 - Escape from Luoyang (Ultimate)

This is the start of my DW8XLCE playthrough. This is the PS4 version and since I have every character leveled up with their strongest weapons, I'm playing on Ultimate difficulty. Ultimate difficulty raises enemy attack and defense to the max, occasionally buffs them, makes the AI use musou much more often, makes only +50 HP and +1 Musou items appear from pots, and lowers the drop rate from defeated enemies so low you almost never get items. And since it's story mode, I have no bodyguards to help make it easier on me. However if you set Red Hare as your mount in Free Mode, your horse will have the effects of Red Hare in story mode so my horse never gets interrupted and I can heal by killing enemies atop it.

Now with that out of the way, the stage itself. You immediately have to run like hell from Lu Bu and fighting him in this stage on this difficulty is not advisable. Certainly not with Cao Cao who only triggers elements for one of his attacks. Lu Bu has the deadliest musou in the game, with a huge AoE and being unblockable, and its his one most likely to trigger if you manage to juggle him. So unless you like restarting a lot, it's best to just do as the game wants and run away.

If you're fast enough, you can get Lu Bu to be blocked by Xiahou Yuan barring the doors and he'll eventually lose interest. Since this is XL, Chen Gong shows up for this stage to fight you alongside the ballistae and man ballistae can be a bitch in this game. Particularly on this difficulty with a musou officer nearby. Aside from that you basically just continue to run away. Diaochan shows up to help you for a bit too. You pretty much see Dong Zhuo's entire officer line up in this stage, aside form Jia Xu.

Also I happen to really enjoy the cutscenes, particularly for early Wei.