Can I mostly ignore it for the majority of the game? Are there huge consequences. I'm sure there are youtube videos explaining this. I basically just want to treat this like a souls game and not worry about logging in x amount of times a week, etc.
Yes. There's no need to put up defenses at all. In fact, there are many veterans who don't have any. And you don't need to raid others' bases either, if you just want to beat the main 40 floors.
You may want to participate in the regional fights though, as you can get 1-3 Death Metals from them, depending on if your team wins or loses, and if you're in the top 5% of your team. The latter shouldn't be that hard at this point, when there aren't that many active raiders, and you can raid targets of all ranks during the fights. For example, I can reach the top 5% by just gathering about 5k points in fights, but team Finland isn't very active. It may be harder in bigger and more active teams. The fights occur once or twice a week, and last 24 hours.
EDIT: Forgot to mention, that if you fail a raid during a regional fight, you can't participate in it anymore.
Death Metals, the premium currency in the game, are mostly used to increase storage space for upgrade materials, and in the endgame to send materials back to your base from the Tengoku floors. You can also acquire them by doing quests, and completing the Stamp Rally.
https://psnprofiles.com/trophy/5639-let-it-die/12-hoarders-curse
Stamps are collectibles obtained from Stamp Machines scattered around the Tower of Barbs. These stamp machines require you to walk up to them and interact with them. Once interacted with, a ''Guitar Hero''-like screen will pop up, and icons will start to appear, it's always 1 of the 4 button icons, not multiple on 1 stamp machine. The player must hit these buttons once they appear on the line at the bottom of the screen.
There's a total of 40 stamps in the game, 36 of the stamps require you to find their stamp machines, the other 4 unlock when you beat each of the Dons.
CAUTION
: make sure the surrounding area is safe around the Stamp Machine. Enemies, as well as yourself, could destroy it at any time with an attack, if this happens the player must first return to the waiting room and go back into the tower as this will respawn an undestroyed Stamp Machine.
You get one DM for every five stamps, and you don't even need to hit all the icons succesfully.
IIRC, you also get them from finding all Tales From The Barbs and Yotsuyama Bionics Pages. Their locations can be found in the link as well.
Feel free to PM me, if any questions arise. :) The game can be pretty cryptic, and it's recommended to read through all the info sheets it gives you. They don't tell you everything though, like the hidden hunger meter, that depletes your stamina if you don't eat anything for a while.
Yep, the spiders are a pain in the ass, and hard to kill. I suffered them a couple of times in the chalice dungeons.
Fortunately for my brother, this time i was in charge of entertaining them while he kicked Rom's ass. But even with my help, there were so many on screen that he got damaged and ended with a Double Ko.
Yeah, the Chalice version was even more annoying, due to the limited space.
Have fun with your co-op run. :)