The new forums will be named Coin Return (based on the most recent vote)! You can check on the status and timeline of the transition to the new forums here.
Please vote in the Forum Structure Poll. Polling will close at 2PM EST on January 21, 2025.
[FFRK] Summoner and Combat Lucky Draws tonight! Hope you like Lann.
Rius
Globex CEONobody ever says ItalyRegistered User regular
Globex CEONobody ever says ItalyRegistered User regular
Final Fantasy Record Keeper
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pbAOQrH7MHMPast Thread Silence1186 wrote:How naive I was about this little game.Naive, past Silence1186 wrote:[Final Fantasy Record Keeper] Is actually a pretty fun mobile free-to-play game for iOS and Android. It's not perfect by any means, but it's a HUGE improvement over such duds as All The Bravest. It's a walk down memory lane with a simple ATB style combat system with a surprising amount of depth and strategy. There is a new event every week, featuring your favorite characters and stages from Final Fantasy history, so it never gets old, and it IS free to try, so give it a shot if you have some time to spare. Just don't give them any of your money.
This is the thread for talking about Square Enix's F2P Mobile game Final Fantasy Record Keeper (FFRK) for iOS and Android. Initially met with skepticism after some of SE's lackluster F2P entries in the past, it has grown in scope and popularity to the point where it gets as much discussion as any other mainline Final Fantasy game.
The game features a pretty basic Active Time Battle system. You can take up to 5 characters, made up of all your favorites from past games (and one original starter character) as you journey through the cliff notes version of all the Final Fantasy games. Each Final Fantasy game is a world, made up of dungeons with several stages. Each stage requires you to spend stamina to attempt them. Stamina recharges at a rate of 1 every 3 minutes. There are also limited time events that occur every week featuring additional stages, characters, and rewards.
There is a surprising depth of strategy to this game, as each character can equip different combinations of equipment and abilities, allowing for many different approaches to tackling some of the at times quite intense challenges. Characters and equipment also get bonuses if you match them to the world you're in (for example, Cloud gets a bonus in FF7 stages, as does anyone equipping his Buster Sword).
The F2P comes in the form of the in-game currency, Mythril, which allows you to pull powerful relics from reward banners. Mythril also allows you to recharge stamina, and to try again if you happen to be defeated in a stage. You can spend real money on Gems which have the same function as Mythril, though refreshingly for a F2P game it's possible to clear all content without spending a dime. This is thanks to several quality of life features implemented by DeNa, chief among them the Friend Summon system and Guaranteed 5*, which gives you at least one top-rarity item per 11-pull you do. Additionally, rather generous amounts of free Mythril are available between a combination of login bonuses, stage completions, event participation and quest completion.
Tips and information for new players starting out;
1) Quests.
From the home screen, the Missions button in the upper-right features Wayfarer, Normal and Special missions. The Wayfarer missions are meant for new players and will guide you to some of the game's basic features, as well as giving you some nice ability and item rewards. Move on to the Normal missions from there. Special missions typically involve defeating some of the game's highest difficulty level fights with certain team limitations, which are usually "only use characters from this realm."
2) Stamina.
You can see the current / maximum stamina numerically in the upper right corner of your Home screen. Below that is an orange bar that shows the same thing, but below that bar is a set of 5 hexagons representing your current Stamina Shards. When you get 5 Stamina Shards, you refill your stamina to full and your maximum goes up by 1. The filled in hexagons show you how many stamina shards you have towards the next stamina refill and maximum +1. It is to your benefit to collect that fifth shard when you're running out or empty of Stamina. Efficiency is good!
3)Record Info.
When reading about the record in question, several tabs will be available with story, reward and boss info. Here you can read about the story background, rewards, and boss strategies as well as any medal requirements.
Upon completing any given stage in a record, your performance will be ranked. For any stage without a boss, you can earn up to 9 medals. You will lose medals if more than one party member dies, or if the party takes too much damage or uses too many actions to clear the stage. Earn enough medals and you will gain the Expert or Champion rating for the stage, which provides 150% and 200% experience, respectively.
Upon finishing the entire record, there are 3 reward levels; Completion, First Time Completion and Mastery. You can get the Completion bonus every time you complete that record. However, the other two can only be achieved once and typically include excellent rewards. To attain Mastery rewards, you must have earned 83.33% (5/6th) of all medals within the record. Remember those boss medal requirements? Each gives 3 medals if completed or 0 medals if not, so for records with few or only one stage, boss medal requirements can be crucial for obtaining Mastery rewards.
4) Realm Synergy.
Every character and every item comes from a specific realm. When you go into a record for a realm, characters from that realm are treated as if they are 10 levels higher. Items from that realm are significantly boosted in stats, provided the item itself is leveled up. If you're going into an FFVII record, it's a good idea to bring Cloud. It's a great idea to bring someone carrying the Buster Sword. It's a fantastic idea to bring Cloud carrying his own Buster Sword!
The boost from synergized items is stronger than the boost from synergized characters, so it's good to collect and maintain a spread of items from all realms. You will accumulate this over time, so don't worry too much.
5) Events.
Typically, there's 1 or 2 events running at any given time. These events start at a very low difficulty that even first day players can participate in, and end at very high difficulties that even longtime veterans can have trouble with. Rewards for completing event stages can include new or returning characters and their Memory Crystals (used to break level caps), weapons, armor or accessories from the event's realm, orbs, upgrade materials and of course Mythril. Events typically run for about two weeks and overlap, and you should definitely try to complete as much of each event as possible.
6) Hall of Rites.
The Hall of Rites is a place where you can exchange Hero Souls for characters and Blank Memory Crystals for their MCs. MC1s are used to break past level 50 and enable the Record Materia slot. MC2s are used to break past level 65, and MC3s are used to break past level 80.
7) Record Dive.
The Record Dive system allows you to power up certain characters who have reached level 65, adding small amounts of stat points, percentage boosts to certain types of abilities, adding or increasing ability ranks or adding additional equipment options. The available powerups are different for each eligible character. You unlock these power ups by expending Motes, which are a special type of currency obtained from a variety of sources including Event rewards. 4* motes are attainable by completing the hardest difficulty of weekly multiplayer content.
Record Dive is also where one can spend 5* Job Motes, which enable the use and provide copies of certain 6* abilities. Sources of these motes are few and far between.
8) Daily Dungeons.
Each day has a specific set of 1 or 2 dungeons. You can only get the First Time Completion and Mastery rewards once, same as the records, and those rewards don't refresh from week to week. So if you complete a stage of the Sunday dungeon, next Sunday it will still show them as all completed (though you could still farm the dungeon for normal drops or experience.)
Monday through Saturday, the daily dungeons have rewards for and can be used to farm orbs, upgrade materials or Gil. The Sunday dungeons feature battles with a tremendous amount of experience. To put it into some context, A + difficulty stage of a Monday-Saturday dungeon gives around 10,000 exp to be split to the party, while the experience dungeon gives up to 100,000!
The daily dungeons now reward Gysahl Greens upon completion, and enemies have a small chance to drop additional Greens. These Greens can be exchanged for orbs, eggs, gil or upgrade materials at any time, and once per week the Special Shop will restock a variety of Major Orbs (at half price, relative to buying 10x Greaters), MC lodes and Mythril. Additional purchases may become available from time to time (accessories, items, etc.)
9) Nightmare, Mote and Torment Dungeons
The Nightmare area is now permanently open, and features a set of 12 dungeons with 5 challenging boss fights apiece. Each dungeon culminates in a special fight where all characters of a certain 5* ability will get full synergy for themselves and all equipped items, regardless of what realm they or their equipped gear are from! These final fights are like puzzles that must be solved and typically require planning and tactics instead of super powerful gear.
Completing the final boss of a Nightmare dungeon gives you a Record for a powerful 6* ability, which require 6* crystals to make. These crystals are currently very slow to acquire, so spend them carefully.
There are five Mote dungeons which are all accessible for a few weeks at a time. Each features a single boss fight, and completing these fights reward you with large amounts of 4* motes for record diving. The first, vs Ifrit, is very overtuned; the rest are more reasonably tuned.
There are several Torment dungeons, with more on the way. Each features a single boss fight in two difficulties, and these have replaced the Mote dungeons as the game's hardest content. Each fight is precluded by 4 or 6 (based on difficulty) waves of high-HP trash which itself requires significant effort to clear, and there is no stage break between the trash and the boss. The bosses have elemental weaknesses but only at 50% strength. Rewards include 5* orbs, 6* crystals and 5* Job Motes for specific ability schools.
10) Relics.
The Relics page, accessible via shortcut on the bottom right of most screens, is where one can "pull" from a variety of "banners" for items. Banner pulls are always at least 3* rarity, with a lesser chance at 4* rarity and a ~13% chance at 5* rarity. Doing so costs Mythril (in game currency) or Gems (purchased with real $$$).
All banners from this point forward will have "Guaranteed 5*", which means every 11-pull comes with at least one 5* item. The likeliest result is two 5* items per 11 pull.
Banners are typically linked to current Events, and every banner has featured 5* relics. When you pull a 5* item, most of the time it will be one of the featured relics, but there's still a small chance it won't be.
One can do a single pull for 5 Mythril, a triple pull for 15 Mythril or an 11 pull for 50 Mythril. In this modern era of Guaranteed 5*, it is most efficient to do 11 pulls and only 11 pulls. Aside from that, on a per-draw basis your odds of drawing a 5* item are the same no matter how many items you pull at once and no matter which currency you use to pay for them.
11) Stacking Debuffs.
A relatively common feature of relics these days are an SB that includes stat debuffs to the enemy targets. A good party setup might include one or more of these SBs, and a key piece of information is that they stack if the affected debuff/debuffs are different combinations. One ATK/MAG debuff won't stack with another, but an ATK/MAG debuff will stack with an ATK/DEF debuff and an ATK/RES debuff. This rule of thumb goes for Support abilities as well; see the second post for more information.
From the home screen, the Missions button in the upper-right features Wayfarer, Normal and Special missions. The Wayfarer missions are meant for new players and will guide you to some of the game's basic features, as well as giving you some nice ability and item rewards. Move on to the Normal missions from there. Special missions typically involve defeating some of the game's highest difficulty level fights with certain team limitations, which are usually "only use characters from this realm."
2) Stamina.
You can see the current / maximum stamina numerically in the upper right corner of your Home screen. Below that is an orange bar that shows the same thing, but below that bar is a set of 5 hexagons representing your current Stamina Shards. When you get 5 Stamina Shards, you refill your stamina to full and your maximum goes up by 1. The filled in hexagons show you how many stamina shards you have towards the next stamina refill and maximum +1. It is to your benefit to collect that fifth shard when you're running out or empty of Stamina. Efficiency is good!
3)Record Info.
When reading about the record in question, several tabs will be available with story, reward and boss info. Here you can read about the story background, rewards, and boss strategies as well as any medal requirements.
Upon completing any given stage in a record, your performance will be ranked. For any stage without a boss, you can earn up to 9 medals. You will lose medals if more than one party member dies, or if the party takes too much damage or uses too many actions to clear the stage. Earn enough medals and you will gain the Expert or Champion rating for the stage, which provides 150% and 200% experience, respectively.
Upon finishing the entire record, there are 3 reward levels; Completion, First Time Completion and Mastery. You can get the Completion bonus every time you complete that record. However, the other two can only be achieved once and typically include excellent rewards. To attain Mastery rewards, you must have earned 83.33% (5/6th) of all medals within the record. Remember those boss medal requirements? Each gives 3 medals if completed or 0 medals if not, so for records with few or only one stage, boss medal requirements can be crucial for obtaining Mastery rewards.
4) Realm Synergy.
Every character and every item comes from a specific realm. When you go into a record for a realm, characters from that realm are treated as if they are 10 levels higher. Items from that realm are significantly boosted in stats, provided the item itself is leveled up. If you're going into an FFVII record, it's a good idea to bring Cloud. It's a great idea to bring someone carrying the Buster Sword. It's a fantastic idea to bring Cloud carrying his own Buster Sword!
The boost from synergized items is stronger than the boost from synergized characters, so it's good to collect and maintain a spread of items from all realms. You will accumulate this over time, so don't worry too much.
5) Events.
Typically, there's 1 or 2 events running at any given time. These events start at a very low difficulty that even first day players can participate in, and end at very high difficulties that even longtime veterans can have trouble with. Rewards for completing event stages can include new or returning characters and their Memory Crystals (used to break level caps), weapons, armor or accessories from the event's realm, orbs, upgrade materials and of course Mythril. Events typically run for about two weeks and overlap, and you should definitely try to complete as much of each event as possible.
6) Hall of Rites.
The Hall of Rites is a place where you can exchange Hero Souls for characters and Blank Memory Crystals for their MCs. MC1s are used to break past level 50 and enable the Record Materia slot. MC2s are used to break past level 65, and MC3s are used to break past level 80.
7) Record Dive.
The Record Dive system allows you to power up certain characters who have reached level 65, adding small amounts of stat points, percentage boosts to certain types of abilities, adding or increasing ability ranks or adding additional equipment options. The available powerups are different for each eligible character. You unlock these power ups by expending Motes, which are a special type of currency obtained from a variety of sources including Event rewards. 4* motes are attainable by completing the hardest difficulty of weekly multiplayer content.
Record Dive is also where one can spend 5* Job Motes, which enable the use and provide copies of certain 6* abilities. Sources of these motes are few and far between.
8) Daily Dungeons.
Each day has a specific set of 1 or 2 dungeons. You can only get the First Time Completion and Mastery rewards once, same as the records, and those rewards don't refresh from week to week. So if you complete a stage of the Sunday dungeon, next Sunday it will still show them as all completed (though you could still farm the dungeon for normal drops or experience.)
Monday through Saturday, the daily dungeons have rewards for and can be used to farm orbs, upgrade materials or Gil. The Sunday dungeons feature battles with a tremendous amount of experience. To put it into some context, A + difficulty stage of a Monday-Saturday dungeon gives around 10,000 exp to be split to the party, while the experience dungeon gives up to 100,000!
The daily dungeons now reward Gysahl Greens upon completion, and enemies have a small chance to drop additional Greens. These Greens can be exchanged for orbs, eggs, gil or upgrade materials at any time, and once per week the Special Shop will restock a variety of Major Orbs (at half price, relative to buying 10x Greaters), MC lodes and Mythril. Additional purchases may become available from time to time (accessories, items, etc.)
9) Nightmare, Mote and Torment Dungeons
The Nightmare area is now permanently open, and features a set of 12 dungeons with 5 challenging boss fights apiece. Each dungeon culminates in a special fight where all characters of a certain 5* ability will get full synergy for themselves and all equipped items, regardless of what realm they or their equipped gear are from! These final fights are like puzzles that must be solved and typically require planning and tactics instead of super powerful gear.
Completing the final boss of a Nightmare dungeon gives you a Record for a powerful 6* ability, which require 6* crystals to make. These crystals are currently very slow to acquire, so spend them carefully.
There are five Mote dungeons which are all accessible for a few weeks at a time. Each features a single boss fight, and completing these fights reward you with large amounts of 4* motes for record diving. The first, vs Ifrit, is very overtuned; the rest are more reasonably tuned.
There are several Torment dungeons, with more on the way. Each features a single boss fight in two difficulties, and these have replaced the Mote dungeons as the game's hardest content. Each fight is precluded by 4 or 6 (based on difficulty) waves of high-HP trash which itself requires significant effort to clear, and there is no stage break between the trash and the boss. The bosses have elemental weaknesses but only at 50% strength. Rewards include 5* orbs, 6* crystals and 5* Job Motes for specific ability schools.
10) Relics.
The Relics page, accessible via shortcut on the bottom right of most screens, is where one can "pull" from a variety of "banners" for items. Banner pulls are always at least 3* rarity, with a lesser chance at 4* rarity and a ~13% chance at 5* rarity. Doing so costs Mythril (in game currency) or Gems (purchased with real $$$).
All banners from this point forward will have "Guaranteed 5*", which means every 11-pull comes with at least one 5* item. The likeliest result is two 5* items per 11 pull.
Banners are typically linked to current Events, and every banner has featured 5* relics. When you pull a 5* item, most of the time it will be one of the featured relics, but there's still a small chance it won't be.
One can do a single pull for 5 Mythril, a triple pull for 15 Mythril or an 11 pull for 50 Mythril. In this modern era of Guaranteed 5*, it is most efficient to do 11 pulls and only 11 pulls. Aside from that, on a per-draw basis your odds of drawing a 5* item are the same no matter how many items you pull at once and no matter which currency you use to pay for them.
11) Stacking Debuffs.
A relatively common feature of relics these days are an SB that includes stat debuffs to the enemy targets. A good party setup might include one or more of these SBs, and a key piece of information is that they stack if the affected debuff/debuffs are different combinations. One ATK/MAG debuff won't stack with another, but an ATK/MAG debuff will stack with an ATK/DEF debuff and an ATK/RES debuff. This rule of thumb goes for Support abilities as well; see the second post for more information.
Multiplayer!
We have a Discord channel set up to coordinate PA runs of Multiplayer bosses. You can join it with this link; https://discord.gg/mNKVTKf
FFRK Acronyms 101
MC - Memory Crystal [MCs break a character's level 50 limit. MC2 is used to break their level 65 limit, and MC3s break the level 80 limit.]
RM - Record Materia [New equipment type once MC is used. The RM slot is unlocked by using a character's MC1. RMs are acquired from level broken characters in a variety of ways.]
SG/SSII - Sentinel Grimoire/Stoneskin 2 [Also refereed to as Wall. These SBs apply a massive defensive buff to the whole party.]
SB - Soul Break [Powerful abilities learned by acquiring character-specific relics, then equipping them until mastered.]
SSB - Super Soul Break [Like an SB, but stronger, with a variety of bonus effects.]
BSB - Burst Soul Break [Like an SSB, except they also grant Burst Mode, which changes your Attack and Defense commands to something else for a limited time.]
- C1 - Command 1 [Replaces the Attack command during Burst Mode]
- C2 - Command 2 [Replaces the Defend command during Burst Mode]
OSB - Overlimit Soul Break [6* items! They're very powerful SBs that hit only once, but can break the 9999 damage limit.]
USB - Ultra Soul Break [6* items! These are what utility/healer characters get instead of an OSB. Bundles several beneficial effects into one.]
GxO, MxO [the middle x represents which type of orb is being talked about, i.e. MPO for Major Power Orb.]
_*++ - Blank is a number 1-5 which represents an items base rank (not combined). Every plus after the * represents how much its been combined. [A 3*++ will show up as a 5* in game but will be only about as powerful as a 4*. Rule of thumb is every item combination adds about half a rarity level of power.]
RS - Realm Synergy [Applies when a character or his equipped items matches the current realm. An example would be Cloud in any FF7 dungeon or an equipped Blitzball in any FFX dungeon. This adds about 10 levels of stats to a character or about a rarity level in power to an item.]
Mister P's PDF is a compilation of super useful information about FFRK. Ability damage multipliers, character skillsets, super break details, upcoming event information, etc etc.
Enlir's spreadsheet has a ton of useful information. So does Kaonohiokala's.
A while ago, FFRK added a friend summon system. We have a spreadsheet here you can plug your friend code into, and find the friend code of other PAers. If you're looking to fill out your Friends list now that RW lists can be refreshed during selection, I recommend this site, which features a searchable list of Friend Codes that constantly updates and can be sorted by realm stats.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
Rius on
+2
This discussion has been closed.
Posts
Keeper's Choice Volume 1 - This banner can be activated up to 5 times, each for an 11-pull. It does NOT come with Guaranteed 5*. The featured relics are all SSB strength.
Additionally, after pulling on the banner you can choose one 5* relic from a predetermined list. There are several useful relics on the list, with Ramza's Armor (party 40% max HP heal and Protect) likely at the top, followed by Leila's party Shell + Haste and Red XIII's party Protect + Haste. There are also a pair of good Medicas; Arc's which also raises Resistance and Yuna's which also adds party high regen.
Keeper's Choice Volume 2 - This banner can be activated up to 5 times, each for an 11-pull. It DOES come with Guaranteed 5*, and the banner items include Sentinel Grimoire (Wall) and Platinum Sword (Shout), both extremely powerful soul breaks good for any account. The other items (3x BSB, 2x SSB) are decent.
Additionally, after pulling on the banner you can choose one 5* relic from a predetermined list. This list includes items with Shared soul breaks (good for running Cid Missions) and elemental resists/boosts. Of these, the Red Armlet and Oath Veil are probably the most useful, especially if you have Fire- or Wind-element SBs.
--- --- --- --- ---
New Player Hone Recommendations:
Mitigation is king in the game and never stops being useful, so Shellga, Protectga, Power Breakdown, and Magic Breakdown should be at the top of the priority list. The regular breaks are useful too, just because a different set of characters can use them. AoE Mitigation (without damage) is offered by the Dancer line; 3* dances match up with 3* breaks, 4* with 4* breakdowns, etc. Good Dancers include Faris, Lenna, Penelo, Cait Sith, Mog, Rikku and Yuffie. Bards have their own 4* abilities which are identical to Protectga and Shellga.
Abusing Retaliate's mechanics can cheese you through a LOT of content and it's a 2* ability, so is incredibly cheap to hone up. You can pair it with Draw Fire (also cheap) for extra cheese with cheese on top. Give the rest of your team copies of Double Cut or Tempo Flurry and use them against your Retaliator.
Self Boosts are useful to increase a character's damage before you pull relics with Party Boosts. Many jobs have access to them; Monks have Punishing Palm which deals damage and increases ATK, Samurai have Mirror of Equity which does the same. Thieves have Steal Power which doesn't do damage but does debuff the target's ATK at the same strength as Power Breakdown. 4* Darkness users have several options depending on which stat they'd like to boost; Casters can use Memento Mori which increases MAG but also Dooms the caster. Physical characters can use Death Throes which increases ATK but also Dooms the caster. And Physical users can opt for Dark Bargain which raises ATK but lowers DEF.
If you want to get into Black Magic, start with the Water line in each tier as opposed to fire/lightning/ice; Water is infrequently resisted and easier to hone than the primary elements are. Plus it casts faster, so it does more damage over time not counting resistance/weakness.
If you want to get into Summoning, note that Summons are difficult to hone for the time being, and you only get one use per hone. Having said that, the 3* primary element ones are an ok place to start for lesser difficulty fights. As for 4*, Carbuncle is occasionally useful at R1 but the others take a lot of resources to hone. Once you have a large pile of 4* Summon orbs, Maduin is always useful where AoE is needed. With regard to elemental 4* summons, the good ones are Alexander, Leviathan and Fat Chocobo. Syldra is an upgrade from Ramuh, and if we ever get Noel then that's an upgrade from Shiva. The only 4* fire summon is Phoenix and it does not hit twice, so it is not recommended.
With regard to White Magic, Curaga will suffice until it doesn't (party level ~55-60+). Renewing Cure is an alternative that heals for less than Curaga but applies Low Regen. Memento of Prayer applies Low Regen to the entire party. The Dia line is really only viable if the target is weak to Holy or if you pick up some MND gear/RMs and +Holy% gear.
With regard to Status Effects, the Machinist line is a series of 4* abilities that have a high chance to apply a status effect, and deal additional damage if the target already has that effect. White Magic has access to high proc chance Slow and Silence, while Black Magic has access to high proc chance Blind.
With regard to Spellblades, the 3* abilities are fine. It's not really necessary to push into the 4* ones.
After that, it all depends on your relic pulls. We're at a point in the game where pretty much every smaller population job is fleshed out with 3*, 4* and 5* abilities, so there's plenty to choose from.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
I didn't want this to get left on the previous thread, because I feel it's good information.
*quoted from previous thread*
Not to be a downer, but I don't think that's how the chase effects will work out.
They might change the mechanics starting now with Bartz BSB3 and his LM, but Edge already has something similar with his Wild Moon USB where he has a 100% chance to chase a ninja skill, provided he has a physical blink effect up. Several of the Scarmiglione MP Raid videos show Edge's doublecast Ninja LM triggering, but the Waterbolt Seal chase only triggers after the single or double cast, not on each one.
Now, as far as the chance to double, then triplecast spellblades? Who knows. Going to have to wait for JP to run some tests on that and see if it's even possible to get 5 uses off a single spellblade ability. I'm pretty sure the chase attack is only going to happen once, whether it double or triple casts.
Steam: TheArcadeBear
LMK your thoughts.
Inquisitor77: Rius, you are Sisyphus and melee Wizard is your boulder
Tube: This must be what it felt like to be an Iraqi when Saddam was killed
Bookish Stickers - Mrs. Rius' Etsy shop with bumper stickers and vinyl decals.
Re: Squall BSB2
Going C1 x4, C2 x1 is probably overkill. C2 will run into damage cap problems, and if you have any kind of delay burst mode might drop off before you even get to cast C2.
The ideal mix is C1 x3, then C2 x2, or depending on your RM and the damage cap, C1 x2 then C2 x3.
The only thing I'm curious about is if you refresh Burst Mode before it falls off, do your junctions from C1 persist, like with Firion C1?
Ultra Cure has managed to make its way towards the top of my list of most useful 5* abilities. Cramming multiple abilities into one is always a recipe for good times, and WHM starting at 4 uses at R1 means that it'll be more useful from the getgo
EDIT: As a general rule, healing/support abilities should always float to the top of 'must-have' lists, since you'll pretty much always need/want at least one WHM and 1 support. Damage abilities will depend on the relics/characters you have at your disposal. The exceptions to this would probably include having Meteor and...that's it I guess?
My go to 5* abilities are Full Break, Ultra Cure, Saint's Cross, Dark Zone (with Memento Mori for the Doom portion). Any other 5 star abilities are situational to me, but these are my core 5 stars that I think a new player would get the most usage out of. It's easy to dmg cap a dark mage and Knight's just tend to be generally all around good with solid SBs so that's why I would say these. Ultra Cure is awesome for esuna/heal.
I'm sure there are other 5* abilities I use, but these are my core. Thinks like chain-aga are nice but as a new player the above would be my go to.
Ok. Then the max number of hits from Bartz per turn will be either 20 or 32, depending on if getting double and then triple is possible.
Unless you do something a bit silly, like RWing Steiner's BSB, for even more hits.
Full Break
Multi break
Powerchain
Full Charge
Saint Cross
Gaia Cross (but this is win more over Draw Fire)
Ultra Cure is good, but you can definitely get by without it for a long time.
C1 caps at 3, so C1 x4 doesn't make sense to do in the first place.
Banner 1
Garnet BSB2: Lightning MAG staff. Imperil (lightning)! And also a party 30% ATK/MAG buff. C2 does lightning/non damage to a target, with an extra hit if summon mode is on. C1 turns on summon mode and gives one ally a 40% heal, or turns off summon mode to do a party 30% medica and do a smallish AOE lightning/non attack. This feels incredibly awkward to me - if you want this exact combo of effects, it could be ok, but I struggle to imagine what that setup would look like.
Quina BSB: Water ATK robe. AOE Full Breakdown with ATK/DEF break and MAG/RES break commands. I'm not a fan of Full Breakdown SBs since they don't stack with Full Break, but at least the commands stack with many other breaks, so it's still a pretty decent debuff burst.
Kuja BSB: Dark rod. Imperil (dark)! On its own, might be a little better than one of the basic en-element mage burst, but not as good as one of the mage bursts that comes with self and/or party MAG buffs. Would be an excellent addition to a Dark team, though.
Beatrix SSB2: Holy shield. En-holy. It's basically Pecil's burst, minus the commands (which most folks don't use, anyway). Solid for an SSB.
Kuja SSB2: Dark MAG light armor. En-dark. Solid for a damage SSB - combo with Memento Mori, Dark Zone, or the upcoming Dread Heal.
Garnet SSB2: Party +30% MAG/DEF and 3000 HP Stock. It's a medica and a stacking MAG buff all in one effect, so this is very good as the healer of a mage team.
Quina SSB: Water hat. Meh. Damage plus party +50% ATK is not usually what you want out of your support's SB.
Freya SSB2: En-wind. I don't think this is very good due to no Lifesiphon, others strongly disagree and suggest using it with Wrath.
Banner 2
Amarant BSB: En-fire. Commands do extra crit damage, but it doesn't come with a crit rate buff, so this is way worse than the similar Refia burst, which does come with a crit rate buff and also a Dark Bargain command for good measure.
Vivi BSB: Fire MAG staff. En-fire. Standard en-element mage burst, which makes it pretty good, but not top tier.
Beatrix BSB: Holy sword. Imperil Holy! Has a Sentinel (combo Draw Fire + Magic Lure) effect, which is occasionally very good - I've been using this to tank trash in 250 Torments. Nearly identical to Agrias' burst.
Amarant SSB: Damage, with a self ATK/DEF buff. Deals extra damage on crits, but that doesn't do anything unless you have a crit rate buff. Could use the buff to help get Lifebane going, but overall, not that exciting.
Zidane SSB2: Wind ATK light armor. En-wind. Solid SSB damage, and buffs Dash+Slash.
Steiner SSB2: Imperil fire!
Beatrix SSB: Lifesiphonable magic blink is a very nice tool to have available. I've gotten a lot of use out of this, alone or in conjunction with Beatrix's burst.
Beatrix SB: Low damage. Party +50% DEF is ok, but there are other SBs that have +100% DEF stapled to better effects or more damage.
Overall thoughts, next IX event, etc.
Other than the element boosts, I don't think these banners are that attractive. The bursts are all sort of OK, but there's not anything top-tier here. It's hard to recommend these IX banners over fest banner 3 or 4 depending on what sorts of items you're after.
Next IX event is about 13 weeks away. Banner 1 features Steiner OSB, Vivi BSB2, Zidane BSB2, and Steiner BSB, with Legend Materia relics for Steiner and Zidane. Banner 2 has a full boat of Beatrix stuff (OSB, BSB, SSB1, SSB2), along with Quina BSB, Garnet BSB2, and legend materia for Vivi and Beatrix. Vivi BSB2 seems preferable to BSB1, as it has a party MAG/RES buff and an additional self MAG buff on one of the commands, but maybe you want to get his OSB stick now while you're waiting. If you love Beatrix, all of her relevant items are conveniently on one banner there, so think hard whether you want to split your pulls now or do them all then (and pick up her LMR while you're at it).
Alternate opinions:
https://www.reddit.com/r/FFRecordKeeper/comments/61tauh/relic_discussion_rose_of_may_losing_me_is_not_an/
Other 5* abilities: I use Gaia Cross all the time, A+, would recommend. After that, Lightning Dive, though that's flavored by my ownership of lightning boost spears and shields.
I'll need to play around with it a bit, but I suspect I'm going to start recommending Memento Mori/Dread Heal over Memento Mori/Dark Zone.
Japan got it the week before the Rose of May event which starts today. They also got a Greens-only dungeon a week or two before that, which I doubt we'll be seeing at all.
And we usually get major mechanic updates a little early, when they push the big data dumps. As in we got the Chocobo Store I think three weeks 'early,' and the Atk softcap raise two weeks early. I imagine things got a little rocky since our data dump update was a week before our (delayed) fest.
So... should've been about 5 days ago? Any day now? Best guess, probably a week or two after all the anniversary stuff finishes. It's all translated in the last data dump, but I don't believe there's any date associated with it yet, so it could be as far off as the next major data drop (April 25ish).
This list right here. These are the abilities I started with on my son's account.
They have been joined by all Chain-agas to r2, plus Thief's Revenge to r2.
Dark Zone is great but I feel its time has passed, for the most part. You can easily get that kind of damage out of any mage burst nowadays.
If you aren't concerned about status effects, then Curaja is better than Ultra Cure due to its faster cast time.
Saint Cross is generally strong and doesn't conflict with Full Break, and knight 5 is everywhere now.
Most other stuff like Powerchain/Full Break, Chain -gas, Multi Break, etc are kinda determined by what relics you have now. Like, if you have Abel's Lance, I'd put Lightning Dive right behind Full Break in terms of usefulness, but I'd never suggest making it if you don't have that BSB.
Ultra Cure I generally haven't played with, my trusty R4 Curaja hasn't let me down yet, and I'm not prepared to dump 36 wind orbs on it especially given it's slightly slower cast time. Personally I'd rather have Saint Cross over Ultra Cure.
You're correct. I also notice that this is the first Dungeon Update draw that Japan got. Instead of a Lucky Draw though, it was a single draw for free. Not even a guaranteed anything or an 11 draw. Just one single free 1x draw, after which it was like any other regular banner. SSB+ relics from 3/12/14. They were (and still are) getting the random themed "Pickup" lucky draws once a month though.
https://ffrkstrategy.gamematome.jp/game/951/wiki/Keepers Victorious Over Nemesis（0328）#victors_list
I'm the first entry that doesn't include pictures
They're apparently going to be a New Years-only, Japan-only thing.
Still... so many orbs...
Whoops, read it as 1/2/3/4 instead of 0/1/2/3.
Also, upon checking, it looks like your stacks of Draw reset if you refresh Burst Mode or if it falls off.
True, but nearly every realm has a MM/DZ user, which can be useful for new players without synergy everywhere.
1/11, dupe
Ffffffff
Hopefully tomorrow will be better than that.
Ugh. Just ugh.
E: Which is not to say things haven't been good lately, but it's been highs and lows like crazy.
If that's true, the SB is way less good than people have been saying. But I think what I've heard is that the stacks stay as long as you stay in burst mode, sort of like the Summon Mode toggles, which is what makes it very, very good.
The stacks definitely reset to 0 if you reset the burst. If they didn't, and just stayed around like Firion's stacks for example, the damage would be insane since that's like... just shy of OSB level damage per C2.
And you get two of them per burst. Possibly more if you have TGMode or a party powerchain effect you can pop... and then get to drop a now empowered enIce BSB after you finish. In addition to the three junction attacks also doing (terrible) damage.
It's definitely nutso good.
She went down pretty easy.
DS Friend code: 3840-6605-3406
i grimace each time i get a healer item after pulling her bsb
Streaming 8PST on weeknights
Finally.
Also happy to get Setzer's MC3, but he can level up the legitimate way.
And honestly, looking at the banner in person, I'm not so sure I want to do a proper pull on it. Especially with banner 4 tomorrow.
-Beatrix's OSB is nice, but there's a banner tomorrow with two Holy OSBs on it that are easier to use to their fullest potential. And her Enholy SSB is kinda outclassed by my having Pecil's BSB.
-Garnet's BSB2 is a bit awkward, though healing + attacking is nice. The Imperil Lightning would pair nicely with Ashe's BSB. But do you know what else would pair well with that? Ashe's OSB, coming tomorrow. Her Fence+HP stock is nice, but I'm not sure I could fit it into my team well. I'd rather use Diving Guardian.
-Kuja's BSB is good, but Raines blows it out of the water. Also his new SSB is literally just Dread of Death again, but with one extra hit and a Non component. WTF?
-Six Dragons is a dupe. And if it wasn't, I'm still sick to death of physical Enwinds.
-Frog Drop is nice, but I have Blessing of Light and Visions of the past. Also, Lets face it, i was only ever looking at Quina's BSB as a replacement for Setzer's. With the rest of the banner as it is, I think I can let it go and wait for Lion or Fran or someone.
and then i got a 3*. oh well.