Final Fantasy Record Keeper

[DiscipleofBob]

Well, found my new crack.

If you haven't heard, Final Fantasy Record Keeper is a (relatively) new freemium smartphone game which is like Pokemon only instead you collect Final Fantasy characters and classes from every game. Then you form a party of 5 and in classic 16-bit style go through dungeons from every game.

It's not the best-designed game. There aren't a huge number of available characters and a lot of big names are from temporary event dungeons. From what I've read the event dungeons tend to repeat so they're not gone forever. Getting decent equipment is based on a lottery, and there aren't a lot of character customization options. Each character has two slots you can assign up to two abilities that you have to craft from farmable items. And in true FF fashion, there are certain points where you have to farm EXP to progress.

That being said, the graphics and classic music are well worth the game's faults. You get synergy bonuses for taking party members and equipment from the same game as the dungeon you're facing, and the different bosses have the same weaknesses and strategies that they do from their original games, so there are reasons to try different parties.

As someone raised on Final Fantasy, the sheer amount of nostalgia packed into every part of this game is amazing.

Friend Codes:
Mr.Sandman: 95HA
Suichimo: 9Qce
Infernally Clay: 9uVh
DiscipleofBob: ef9h
Forbiddenwar: QFWA
tyckspoon: e3iN
Starwulf: GUtu
Deadline: esWa
Calemyr: Gmfa
Fleeing Coward: qxZD

[danzibr]

I saw this as new on the app store and wanted to get it immediately, then when I tried to download it, I saw my phone is too old for it :(

[Red Fel]

I'm a bit reluctant to get into this one, to be honest. The nostalgia is there for me too, but... I dunno.

Remember that airship game that they did awhile back? I did that for awhile, but it turned into a slog. I'm a bit reluctant to try again.

It ain't After Years, is what I'm saying.

[Calemyr]

How bad of a "freemium" game is it? I've heard of some horribly blatant money-grab "games" that are simply unplayable without a constant influx of in-app purchases. I've also seen and played games where the "freemium" aspect either has minimal impact on the game play or offers nothing that can't be earned in-game at a reasonable rate, but are purchasable early on.

Honestly, I have an overwhelming suspicion against any "freemium" phone game, but the way you describe it sounds at least worth asking about.

[DiscipleofBob]

I'm a bit reluctant to get into this one, to be honest. The nostalgia is there for me too, but... I dunno.

Remember that airship game that they did awhile back? I did that for awhile, but it turned into a slog. I'm a bit reluctant to try again.

It ain't After Years, is what I'm saying.

I don't think I played the airship game.

After Years is a pretty high standard. I played it when it first came out on the Wii, in-purchase installments and everything, and it remains one of my favorite RPGs of all time.

On a pure nostalgia factor, I recommend it. Even if you only play the bare basics of it it's kind of worth it. The actual gameplay mechanics can be kind of simple and grindy, but I think the nostalgia makes up for it.

The majority of the dungeons at this point are FF4 and FF6-related, going through most of each game's respective content.


How bad of a "freemium" game is it? I've heard of some horribly blatant money-grab "games" that are simply unplayable without a constant influx of in-app purchases. I've also seen and played games where the "freemium" aspect either has minimal impact on the game play or offers nothing that can't be earned in-game at a reasonable rate, but are purchasable early on.

Honestly, I have an overwhelming suspicion against any "freemium" phone game, but the way you describe it sounds at least worth asking about.

I haven't had to spend money on it yet, and with a party of level 25 I'm starting to do some of the temporary "event" dungeons. I can't do all the high-level stuff yet or afford the high-level abilities, but I can manage all right.

From what I've read, most of what people who do spend is for more chances at the equipment lottery, but even that is just luck. I don't think spending any money is absolutely necessary at this point. There aren't any characters/equipment where money is absolutely necessary to get.

[DiscipleofBob]

I'm just going to spoil some of the available characters for people thinking about picking up the game.

The following are available through the main storyline:
Tyro - The game's original character. Can use all equipment and abilities.

Knight
Red Mage
Black Mage
White Mage
Summoner
Ranger
Bard
Warrior of Light
Gordon
Josef
Luneth
Rydia
Cyan
Cloud
Wakka
Snow

These next characters have appeared in promotions or events. They're no longer available, but most have already reappeared at least once in the JP version, so they'll likely show up again eventually.
Warrior
Dark Knight Cecil
Paladin Cecil
Terra
Celes
Tifa
Aerith
Sephiroth
Rinoa
Tidus

A few names on that last list I'd really like to recruit, but I can wait for them to come back around.

I should also mention that some signature character abilities are available through Soul Break (this game's version of limit break) or through alternate Soul Breaks you get by getting lucky and finding character-specific equipment.

[Starwulf]

I love FFRK. Started up about a month ago, though I don't play every night. Primary characters are all 30+(Rydia, Aerith, Cloud, Tidus & Wakka). I'm working on the Elite set of dungeons of the new FFVIII event(this is the first time in the States they've released Elite version of event dungeons).

Been saving up my Mythril for a big roll(11 for the price of 10) in the hopes of getting my 2nd 5 star(first was Genji Shield). Hell a couple of 4 stars would be nice at this point, would boost me quite a bit I think.

[Red Fel]

Tried it out, and I stand corrected, with a few provisos.

The game is fun. It's basically an FF battle simulator, so it's easy to grasp. The graphics are appealing, the music is lovely - it's the nostalgia factor writ large. And oh, the nostalgia.

That said, my two provisos. First, after the tutorial, it fairly unceremoniously deposits you into gameplay. And although it offers you some cursory explanations of abilities and equipment, it really doesn't explain much at all. I'm intuitive enough to get that I can craft new abilities, and something something equipment upgrade, but the game doesn't really explain those mechanics to you all that well. I'm probably going to have to delve into a wiki or guide to get what I should do there, and if I have to go to outside sources to understand core game mechanics, the ball has been dropped.

Second, difficulty curve. The difficulty ramps up quickly. I went to the FFIV zone (my favorite in the franchise), fairly waltzed through the first several zones, and then Baigan and Caignozzo handed my Pink Tail to me. It was brutal. That's not to say difficulty is bad, but the difference between "cakewalk" and "oh god my face" is a pretty fine line.

Overall? I'm going to keep playing it. Good recommendation.

[DiscipleofBob]

Tried it out, and I stand corrected, with a few provisos.

The game is fun. It's basically an FF battle simulator, so it's easy to grasp. The graphics are appealing, the music is lovely - it's the nostalgia factor writ large. And oh, the nostalgia.

That said, my two provisos. First, after the tutorial, it fairly unceremoniously deposits you into gameplay. And although it offers you some cursory explanations of abilities and equipment, it really doesn't explain much at all. I'm intuitive enough to get that I can craft new abilities, and something something equipment upgrade, but the game doesn't really explain those mechanics to you all that well. I'm probably going to have to delve into a wiki or guide to get what I should do there, and if I have to go to outside sources to understand core game mechanics, the ball has been dropped.

Second, difficulty curve. The difficulty ramps up quickly. I went to the FFIV zone (my favorite in the franchise), fairly waltzed through the first several zones, and then Baigan and Caignozzo handed my Pink Tail to me. It was brutal. That's not to say difficulty is bad, but the difference between "cakewalk" and "oh god my face" is a pretty fine line.

Overall? I'm going to keep playing it. Good recommendation.

I recommend this site (https://ffrkstrategy.gamematome.jp/game/951/wiki/Home) for your wiki needs. It seems to be missing some information I'd like, but covers about 90% of what you ask for.

I've noticed that the challenge is largely into boss battles and they range from long but easy to ridiculously hard, largely because the boss battle was set up for a specific party in the original game that you just don't have. Later in the game, for example, Golbez and his Shadow Dragon. They're doable, but overleveling definitely helps.

Baigan's a pain but not impossible. Cagnazzo's easier IMO, but that largely has to do with the timing of your Thunder spells. The worst by far has been the Phantom Train from FF6. It almost comes down to luck as it can randomly afflict all of your party members with Blind/Poison/Confuse/Doom at once. The one time I managed to beat it I managed to just throw everything including my Cure spells and somehow killed it before it used Doomwhistle. Other times it used that attack before I even got a turn.

One thing I learned the hard way: save your Mythril. There's a lot of things you can spend it on, but aside from emergency heals to get through a ridiculously tough series of bosses (normally I'd say it's better just to start a dungeon over), 50 Mythril gets you 11 Relics.

[Red Fel]

I recommend this site (https://ffrkstrategy.gamematome.jp/game/951/wiki/Home) for your wiki needs. It seems to be missing some information I'd like, but covers about 90% of what you ask for.

Useful, thanks. Still, it's frustrating that the game itself gives you next-to-zero guidance on ability and gear upgrading and such.


I've noticed that the challenge is largely into boss battles and they range from long but easy to ridiculously hard, largely because the boss battle was set up for a specific party in the original game that you just don't have. Later in the game, for example, Golbez and his Shadow Dragon. They're doable, but overleveling definitely helps.

Yeah. Went back and tried it again, having overleveled Rydia and shifted some spells around. Went a lot smoother, but a fair portion of it was luck. That strikes me as problematic design.


One thing I learned the hard way: save your Mythril. There's a lot of things you can spend it on, but aside from emergency heals to get through a ridiculously tough series of bosses (normally I'd say it's better just to start a dungeon over), 50 Mythril gets you 11 Relics.

True of most free-to-play games. They tend to have a regular currency and a premium currency (FFRK also seems to have gems, in addition to mythril, but I've yet to encounter any); as a rule, premium currency should only be spent on rare gacha, and only in packs of multiple (usually 10), since that tends to either get you bonus odds or an extra pull.

[Starwulf]

http://www.ffrkguide.com/

This site will become your best friend once you reach a bit further into the game and need to start hunting specific equipment drops for record synergy, or specific orbs in order to craft new spells/abilities. It's always loaded and ready in my browser for when I need it.

[DiscipleofBob]

Just got my first limited event character: Rinoa. Now I'm leveling her and Josef as a potential replacement for Kain.

Only level 28 right now, so these event characters aren't unattainable.

[Starwulf]

Just got my first limited event character: Rinoa. Now I'm leveling her and Josef as a potential replacement for Kain.

Only level 28 right now, so these event characters aren't unattainable.

Congrats! I'm hoping that they bring back past events eventually, as I missed Cecil/Dark Cecil, it was the event going on when I first started, I couldn't make it past the 4th or 5th stage even by the end of it.

[Forbiddenwar]

I'm deep into this game, my party is 35. Ive havent spent a thing. I've unlocks dungeons from ff1,ff2, ff4, ff5, ff6, ff7 and ff10.

Things I've learned:
Only use mithral on rare relics. I'm too impatient for the 10 for 11 deal. I feel I've gotten really lucky to get 3 5 star weapons. I was just a thinking of dumping Kain when I got my first 5 star golden spear.

On stamina:
I spent 5 hours playing today straight without running out. See, nearly every other dungeon I cleared gave me enough stamina shards to raise my max stamina which also fills the bar back to full.

Do the dailys! It is the best place to get the orbs money and upgrades you need.

There are difficulty spikes, but by working on the special events, I haven't had much difficulty overcoming them. Each dungeons displays the difficulty before playing them, so you can tell which ones to tackle and which to avoid.

But that's just my experience your mileage may vary.

[DiscipleofBob]

Congrats! I'm hoping that they bring back past events eventually, as I missed Cecil/Dark Cecil, it was the event going on when I first started, I couldn't make it past the 4th or 5th stage even by the end of it.

According to the people who play the JP version, characters get repeated every six months or so, sometimes as part of a different event. They should be back soon.

[Calemyr]

Well, I got it and I'm in the later 20's. Even got Rinoa. The game is oddly addictive, despite my horrendous luck when it comes to relic drawing (seriously, only one 4* item so far, and it isn't even a very good one). Just kind of cool to build your own dream team out of heroes from across the franchise. Granted, they lock off my favorites behind events (Terra, Celes, and either Cecil), I despise stamina, it's constantly going online and won't let you play if you're in an area with bad reception, and they're basically brainwashing me to like Cloud...

Still, it's addictive. And it is really kinda cool to see these old bosses pop up again. The shiver down my spine upon seeing the Atma Weapon, Rubicante, or Ultros (he'll always be Ultros to me).

Edit: Maybe you guys could help me with something. I'm on the second Rubicante fight (where he's enveloped in the flame shield, after the king and queen of Eblan). There has to be a trick to this guy, but darned if I can figure it out. Physical attacks cause a party-wide Fira, while he absorbs ice damage. What's the trick to this guy?

[Chen]

You need to wait until he opens his cloak to hit him with ice/water attacks.

One of the KEY things to this game is closing the app if a fight is going badly. Starting the app up again starts you from the beginning of the wave you left at. Sometimes you get some really bad RNG, so this can be used to mitigate it without having to may mythril to heal. Just remember to press "Continue" when the app opens again. Pressing cancel exists the fight and uses up stamina. This can be used to re-roll on fights where the boss drops something good though. Basically turn off your wifi/data connection at the start of the boss wave. Kill the boss see if he drops what you want. If not, reset the app but press cancel. You will lose the stamina for the boss fight but you'll be able to start the fight again without doing the rest of the levels. Useful when you get to farming greater orbs. Drops are rolled once a fight a specific level is loaded so doing the previous trick of resetting a wave and starting it again WONT re-roll the loot.

I started in the middle of the Aerith event and was still easily able to get her. Seems most of the characters are quite easy to get even if you've just started the game. Finishing the whole special event is much harder though. This current one is in fact ridiculously difficult in the end. My team of full level 50s with several 5 star relics can't do it. I'd need more honed abilities to get through it I think.

[Calemyr]

You need to wait until he opens his cloak to hit him with ice/water attacks.

One of the KEY things to this game is closing the app if a fight is going badly. Starting the app up again starts you from the beginning of the wave you left at. Sometimes you get some really bad RNG, so this can be used to mitigate it without having to may mythril to heal. Just remember to press "Continue" when the app opens again. Pressing cancel exists the fight and uses up stamina. This can be used to re-roll on fights where the boss drops something good though. Basically turn off your wifi/data connection at the start of the boss wave. Kill the boss see if he drops what you want. If not, reset the app but press cancel. You will lose the stamina for the boss fight but you'll be able to start the fight again without doing the rest of the levels. Useful when you get to farming greater orbs. Drops are rolled once a fight a specific level is loaded so doing the previous trick of resetting a wave and starting it again WONT re-roll the loot.

I started in the middle of the Aerith event and was still easily able to get her. Seems most of the characters are quite easy to get even if you've just started the game. Finishing the whole special event is much harder though. This current one is in fact ridiculously difficult in the end. My team of full level 50s with several 5 star relics can't do it. I'd need more honed abilities to get through it I think.

Yeah. First couple of times, I didn't notice his cloak (the two sprites are very similar). Figured it out eventually.

I'm currently around level 28, and I'm running into a bit of direction loss. The only classic missions are level 30 or higher at this point and stamina starvation is killing me. Also, I'm getting absolute utter crap for relic rolls (one 4* item total, crystal sword. Only two of the 3* items are even useful, since all I'm getting is heavy armors, shields, and staves). Random number generators hate me. Trust me when I say the feeling is mutual.

[Chen]

Im not sure how representative the mission levels are. I had no issue with any of the classic missions when I was going through them. Some of the elite missions are also quite low level and have good rewards. I think one rewards the light staff (or rod don't recall which), which is awesome for your healer. I saved all the mythril I got doing the regular levels and such to do an 11 pull and it resulted in some good gear. That said, record synergy gear is of HUGE importance. I have a level 20 Danjuro (natural 5 star) and it's much worse than my 4 star leveled greatsword (from the Celes event) when in FFVI. Seems items get a bigger boost depending on what level they are so those 2 star items you can farm from monsters get very strong when leveled up and in the appropriate dungeon. The other key is spend ALL your stamina on Sundays doing the Exp dungeon. Having a solidly leveled squad is definitely a huge boon. The other day's dailies are useful too, but Sunday is the most important one. Also just squeeking through the "hard" dailies can be worth it just to get that 1 mythril for completing them.

[Red Fel]

Well, Seifer has become a complete roadblock for me, on regular mode, which is frankly just embarassing. Go into the fight with full health and spells, walk out a corpse. Not fun. Tried using Bio. "It's super effective!" And he still won't die. I have Slow now, and every expectation that it won't help. This difficulty curve is officially punching me in the face.

I get the distinct impression that I should go back and orb-hunt until I can have better abilities and hone them. Unfortunately, I haven't the slightest idea where to begin. As Calemyr points out, the game gets very directionless when you hit a difficulty hump; the things that might make a difference are too hard to beat, or too much of a stamina drain, and the things you can handle just seem to be a waste of stamina. It would be nice to have an indicator of "you should probably go over here and work on this for awhile," other than that flashing NEW! sign which seems more interested in mocking my weakness than offering a helpful suggestion. I'll probably just go back and level-grind, given that most stuff worth farming appears to be in the Elite zones, which are likely beyond my abilities.

... Still gonna do it, though. Grumble grumble addiction grumble.

Out of curiosity, I get how important record synergy is, but does that also apply to 1- and 2-star gear? Or is the power gap between them and 3-5-star such that record synergy doesn't bridge it?

[Calemyr]

Im not sure how representative the mission levels are. I had no issue with any of the classic missions when I was going through them. Some of the elite missions are also quite low level and have good rewards. I think one rewards the light staff (or rod don't recall which), which is awesome for your healer. I saved all the mythril I got doing the regular levels and such to do an 11 pull and it resulted in some good gear. That said, record synergy gear is of HUGE importance. I have a level 20 Danjuro (natural 5 star) and it's much worse than my 4 star leveled greatsword (from the Celes event) when in FFVI. Seems items get a bigger boost depending on what level they are so those 2 star items you can farm from monsters get very strong when leveled up and in the appropriate dungeon. The other key is spend ALL your stamina on Sundays doing the Exp dungeon. Having a solidly leveled squad is definitely a huge boon. The other day's dailies are useful too, but Sunday is the most important one. Also just squeeking through the "hard" dailies can be worth it just to get that 1 mythril for completing them.

Light staff is nice, but the only characters I can use it on at this point are Tyro (whose stats are poor for any role, but can play any role) and White Mage (who is very useful in some cases but otherwise pretty unimpressive).


Well, Seifer has become a complete roadblock for me, on regular mode, which is frankly just embarassing. Go into the fight with full health and spells, walk out a corpse. Not fun. Tried using Bio. "It's super effective!" And he still won't die. I have Slow now, and every expectation that it won't help. This difficulty curve is officially punching me in the face.

I get the distinct impression that I should go back and orb-hunt until I can have better abilities and hone them. Unfortunately, I haven't the slightest idea where to begin. As Calemyr points out, the game gets very directionless when you hit a difficulty hump; the things that might make a difference are too hard to beat, or too much of a stamina drain, and the things you can handle just seem to be a waste of stamina. It would be nice to have an indicator of "you should probably go over here and work on this for awhile," other than that flashing NEW! sign which seems more interested in mocking my weakness than offering a helpful suggestion. I'll probably just go back and level-grind, given that most stuff worth farming appears to be in the Elite zones, which are likely beyond my abilities.

... Still gonna do it, though. Grumble grumble addiction grumble.

Out of curiosity, I get how important record synergy is, but does that also apply to 1- and 2-star gear? Or is the power gap between them and 3-5-star such that record synergy doesn't bridge it?

Seifer was a wall for me as well. My white mage used all four slow spells and didn't land one, while I let loose with bio and poison strike with other characters. Took me many tries to pull it off. Fortunately Edea (the final stage) is a pushover. Girl only used one target spells that did moderate damage.

From what I've heard, Synergy is can make 3* item outperform a 5*. I personally haven't seen this in play as a major factor, though. I haven't even seen a 5*.

[Chen]

Out of curiosity, I get how important record synergy is, but does that also apply to 1- and 2-star gear? Or is the power gap between them and 3-5-star such that record synergy doesn't bridge it?

A two star greatsword which you got 3 of in Celes' event becomes a 4 star item after combining twice. It is a fair bit stronger than my Danjuro dagger which is a natural 5 star items, once record synergy is taken into account. Since you can farm 2 star items from various bosses it means you can get by with quite strong items as long as the record synergy works. Sure if I upgraded the Danjuro to 7 stars it would be stronger, but getting multiple 5 star items that are the same is quite unlikely to begin with. Even then they'd probably be more valuable distributed among your group than used in combining.

There are various posts on the FF record keeper reddit or Gamefaqs boards that can show where and what to farm. I believe there's even a 3 star mage helm (black cowl) that is farmable meaning you can get that up to 5 stars which will be quite strong defensively.

[Deadline]

I've been playing this since a few days after it first dropped here in the states, and my oh my is it strangely engaging. But Red Fel is right, there are some things that are left as a frustrating exercise for the player. I'm going to see if I can put down the general advice a friend of mine gave me, maybe it will help you folks as well:


How to use equipment upgrading and combining

What's with these stars?
Ok, so by now you will have noticed that your weapons and equipment has a number of stars from 1 to 5. This is a straight up basic evaluation of the power of the item, and you can expect that more stars means a more powerful item. The only exception to this is equipment that has been combined (see Combining below).

There are other factors to an items power level. Each item has a designated Final Fantasy game it is from, and if you use that item in dungeons from that game, it will be much more powerful than normal. This bump can be as much as a two star increase. If you ever want to check the stats of an item while it is boosted, you can enter the party screen while in the game dungeon (before you select a battle to fight), and then take a look at the item's stats at that time.

Another factor to item power is synergy with a specific character. Some items are meant to be used by certain characters, and you can see that if you equip them with said item, they will have an option of using a different Soul Break (which is usually much more powerful than their regular one). As an example: Rydia's normal Soul Break duplicates the Summon Chocobo ability. The improved Soul Break she gets from equipping her Ice Whip changes that to duplicate the Summon Shiva ability.

Upgrading
To upgrade your items, the process is simple, but not terribly intuitive. You select the Upgrade Equipment option on the Party screen, and are then presented with a list of all of your equipment. You need to select the item you want to upgrade at this point. Then you are taken back to your list of equipment without explanation. At this point you can select up to 10 items to fuel the upgrade. These items are destroyed when used. The best items to use in this process are Scarletite (for weapons) and Adamantite (for armor). Rather frustratingly, these items will be found as the last items in your equipment list. You can upgrade items to a maximum level based on their Star rating. Once that is done, they cannot be increased in power further unless you use Combining.

Note: I would recommend selling items that you don't use, and only upgrade or use 3 Star or higher items on your characters. It's expensive to burn items for upgrade purposes, as they give far less "item experience" compared to Scarletite or Adamantite, but cost the same amount of gil to burn.

Combining
Once you have fully upgraded an item, the only way to increase its power is to Combine it. In order to Combine an item, you need to have another item of the same kind. So if you want to Combine a fully upgraded Wooden Staff, you need another Wooden Staff in your inventory. You select the Combine Equipment option on the Party Screen, and are then presented with a list of all of your equipment that is a viable option for Combining. After you have selected the item you want to modify, you are returned to the screen to select an item to combine it with. When an item is combined, it gains a "+" symbol after its name, and it gains 1 star to its rating. You cannot Combine an item more than twice, after which your item will have two "+" symbols after its name and 2 extra stars to its rating. Yes, this means that if you have enough of the same 4 or 5 Star items, you can improve one of them up to a 6 or 7 Star rating, respectively.

Note: A fully upgraded Combined item will be weaker than a fully upgraded item that naturally has the same number of Stars. So if you Combine a 3 Star item up to a 5 Star item and fully upgrade it, it will be weaker than a fully upgraded natural 5 Star item.


Ability Creation and Honing

Orbs? Where do I get those?
So, if you've taken a look at the "Create Ablities" section of the Party screen, you will probably have noticed that you need lots of various qualities of Orbs in order to create them. You will find that you are always on the hunt for these little buggers, and finding a good place that drops them can often be tricky. That said, there are three daily events that drop orbs. Check the daily event schedule to see what day will be running the event that provides the orbs you want. Also note, daily event dungeons regularly drop Minor Orbs at Easy and Normal difficulty, Lesser Orbs at Hard difficulty, and the normal 3 Star Orbs at Heroic difficulty. You have a chance of getting rare drops of Lesser Orbs at Normal, 3 Star Orbs at Hard, and 4 Star Orbs at Heroic. You will also get orbs of varying quality out of the various game dungeons. If you find a dungeon that regularly drops a type and quality of orb you need to farm, make sure to remember it and frequent it. Also, if it drops Black, Lightning, or Wind Orbs, please let me know, because I need a lot of those :smalltongue:

Honing abilities
A newly created ability will be at level 1. By Honing the ability, you improve the ability level (up to level 5). A higher level ability simply allows for more uses (i.e. how many times you can use the ability in a dungeon). Most abilities have 2 uses per level. Summon abilities tend to have 1 use per level. You'll need a ton of the orbs you used to create an ability in order to Hone it.


Difficulty Curve
This can generally be tricky, but there's an easy way to tell when you'll get stomped, and when you won't. Every dungeon has a "level" in its description. As a general rule, if you have decent equipment and abilities, and your characters are all above the dungeon level, you'll probably breeze through it. If you take party members that are at or below the dungeon level in with poor equipment and weak abilities in, you'll probably get hammered down. There are a couple of bosses or enemies that require you to either perform a certain gimmick, or to pay attention to their attack patterns or such (Magitek Armors, for example, will counterattack the entire party every time they are hit with a physical attack that doesn't kill them, so use magic abilities and only make a physical attacks when you are sure you'll kill them). For the most part though, if you've got decent equipment and levels, you can autobattle your way to every boss (most of the bosses require your attention).

Daily Events
These are very useful dungeons, don't ignore them! Each day of the week has a specific daily event dungeon, and they don't seem to change. You can get various Orbs, Scarletite, Adamantite, Gil, and EXP. I'm fond of Sunday's EXP dungeon for rapidly leveling characters. Every daily event dungeon also has a Final Fantasy game descriptor, so if you find yourself needing the extra boost from same-game synergy, pay attention to that.

Special Events
These events almost always reward a special character after you've completed a certain amount of them. They are also an excellent source of Orbs, EXP, Equipment, and often Mythril. As I understand it, they are supposed to be on some sort of repeating cycle, though I have not seen them repeat a Special Event yet.


Hopefully that info helps somewhat. :smallsmile:

[Forbiddenwar]

. You cannot Combine an item more than twice, after which your item will have two "+" symbols after its name and 2 extra stars to its rating. Yes, this means that if you have enough of the same 4 or 5 Star items, you can improve one of them up to a 6 or 7 Star rating, respectively.

Note: A fully upgraded Combined item will be weaker than a fully upgraded item that naturally has the same number of Stars. So if you Combine a 3 Star item up to a 5 Star item and fully upgrade it, it will be weaker than a fully upgraded natural 5 Star item.[/I]:

Huh? You can or cannot combine + items? If you cannot, how do you get a ++ item?

[Deadline]

Huh? You can or cannot combine + items? If you cannot, how do you get a ++ item?

I never said that? I said you can't combine more than twice. The first time you get a "+" item, the second time you get a "++" item.

Edit - Ah, I see what you are asking. Yes, you can combine a "+" item. If you do, you wind up with a "++" item.

[Starwulf]

Just to expound a little on the combining bit since I didn't a specific reference to it in deadlines post: You do NOT have to upgrade both items to a + to make a ++. When I first started playing I wasted a fair amount of resources upgrading two pieces of equipment to +'s to combine them into ++'s when that is totally unnecessary. The only thing feeding a + to a + does that feeding a regular to a + does not, is grant a bit more item experience, and it's totally not worth the effort(the gain is absolutely minimal, I fed off a ++ 1 star staff to a 4 star staff and it gave maybe twice the exp a regular 1 star staff gave).

So, I had a quick question for peeps: I have 52 Mythril, I want to do a pull, but I do not want any of the Soul Break items from the "special" draws, and I've read on the subreddit that the special equipment draws have higher %'s for the featured, but much lower for the other 5 stars. So given the choice, would you all hold onto the mythril for an event where you can get some 5 star equipment that you actually want, or just roll it now?

I only have 1 5 star piece of equipment, and 2 4 stars(well, native 4 stars), so getting some better equipment could be a huge boost, but I don't want to come away with something I'm never going to use(Cyan/Josef/Rinoa/Tyro/Lenna are all people who will never make it into my party, at least not until my primary guys are all 50).

[Chen]

Apparently right now Tyro's Sentinel Grimoire is one of the most powerful relics in the game. From what I've read it's almost a must have for the very difficult Ex+ content that is already present on the Japanese server. It changes his soul break into a 60% damage reduction for the entire party which is crazy good (and stacks with things like protectaga I've read). If you're sure you're not going to be using Tyro then I guess wait until an event comes up that has a character who's special item you want. The chance for the individual characters special relics drops to almost 0 (0.001% I believe) when it's not their particular event so getting one later is nigh impossible.

Note too that some other people can use unique character's relics. I have Cloud using Cyan's katana just because it's better than the other 5 star weapons I have (Danjuro). I also have 2 of Wakka's game ball and when I need to grind something easyish out I dump that on Tyro to use. It helps a fair bit.

I do like the fact that Tyro can wear heavy armor. Even though he heals less (about 300 on a Curaga) than Aerith I find he takes damage MUCH better. Not sure if I'm going to find a good white mage replacement for him. The fact he can use any skill is excellent too since I can keep a curaga on him and a double-cut or boost or something on him to use with my retaliate guys.

[DiscipleofBob]

The newest event character, Lenna is easy to get. Even people who started playing yesterday shouldn't have too much trouble I should think. She also looks to be an incredible white mage. I'll give her a shot when I'm done leveling my current party to 50.

[OrcusMcP]

Been having lots of fun chugging around with this. Hits me right in my nostalgic feels.

I have 2 characters I'm always using (Wakka and Kain, have both their 5 star weapons), but switch everyone else out based on what the event/dungeon is.

[Red Fel]

The newest event character, Lenna is easy to get. Even people who started playing yesterday shouldn't have too much trouble I should think. She also looks to be an incredible white mage. I'll give her a shot when I'm done leveling my current party to 50.

Oh yeah. After Easy, Easy +, and Normal, I had enough to grab her, plus both event Mythril. Stats-wise, she's easily superior to WM, and has a broader range of equipment and spells. And after running her semi-solo through Easy and Easy+ (with only one chaperone), she's already on par with the rest of the party, at least for the event zones.

And Deadline, very helpful guide!

[Deadline]

Oh yeah. After Easy, Easy +, and Normal, I had enough to grab her, plus both event Mythril. Stats-wise, she's easily superior to WM, and has a broader range of equipment and spells. And after running her semi-solo through Easy and Easy+ (with only one chaperone), she's already on par with the rest of the party, at least for the event zones.

And Deadline, very helpful guide!

One run through on Hard gets you about 1000 shards (not counting the bonuses you get for the first time completion, which is more than enough to buy Lenna and a few other things on the chart).

And I'm glad I could be of use. I certainly don't know everything, I have 7 characters (Cloud, Sephiroth, Terra, Aerith, Rydia, Kain, Celes) at the level 50 cap and I'm still having a hard time mastering some of the elite content (a buddy of mine is doing much better, and even managed to complete the T-Rex fight in the Rinoa event on Heroic). If you run into something you have a question about, definitely ask it here.

And Starwulf, if the current relic event doesn't have relics you want, then save your mithril. It takes so long to get, you're better off waiting for a time when you've got a chance to get what you want.

I think I'm going to start a "B" team made up of only CORE characters (Tyro and most of the generics like Black Mage, White Mage, Fighter, etc.) so that I can get them to the cap and use them to run the gil Daily event. Maybe with synergy I can beat the heroic level. :smalltongue:

And a note on the Heroic level stuff - the Japanese version of the game has been out for much longer than here, and apparently several Heroic dungeons are ridiculously hard. As in, people with full parties of synergy characters wielding 7 Star personal equipment (that also synergizes) are having significant difficulty. Which is to say that some of the heroic content we have access to over here is probably impossible to complete at the current time, at least until we get more game-specific characters.

[Red Fel]

And a note on the Heroic level stuff - the Japanese version of the game has been out for much longer than here, and apparently several Heroic dungeons are ridiculously hard. As in, people with full parties of synergy characters wielding 7 Star personal equipment (that also synergizes) are having significant difficulty. Which is to say that some of the heroic content we have access to over here is probably impossible to complete at the current time, at least until we get more game-specific characters.

Yeah, I noticed that there's a profound dearth of material with respect to some games, and an abundance with respect to others; I can't imagine taking on the truly challenging dungeons without a lot more to work with, at least for synergy purposes.

I figure that, at this point, based on the availability of characters alone, IV, VI, and VII dungeons will provide less challenge. There seems to be more spread among weapons, but armor seems to be heavily IV, V, and VI, and accessories (do those even get synergy?) are almost exclusively VI and VII.

Or are the hardest dungeons all IV-VII anyway? Because that would explain a few things.

[Chen]

Leveling some of the core characters to 50 is important to eventually be able to get their record materia. These are boosts you can add to any char that has also hit 50 and gotten their record materia slot open. Black and White mage each have one that has a chance to restore 1 black or white magic each round. I think their second ones guarantee 1 is restored which is pretty damn good.

[Deadline]

Leveling some of the core characters to 50 is important to eventually be able to get their record materia. These are boosts you can add to any char that has also hit 50 and gotten their record materia slot open. Black and White mage each have one that has a chance to restore 1 black or white magic each round. I think their second ones guarantee 1 is restored which is pretty damn good.

This is not a thing I've heard of. I don't see any "record materia" slots on my level 50 characters, what am I missing? (Because this sounds awesome and I must have it.)


Or are the hardest dungeons all IV-VII anyway? Because that would explain a few things.

That's a good question, and I'm not sure. I've mastered all of the available levels (classic and elite) for ... IV and VI I think. And I haven't noticed a significant difference in difficulty between the dungeons.

[DiscipleofBob]

This is not a thing I've heard of. I don't see any "record materia" slots on my level 50 characters, what am I missing? (Because this sounds awesome and I must have it.)

I haven't reached level 50 myself, but I *think* this is a feature in the JP version that will eventually be implemented to the US version. It involves some character-specific passives. I don't know much about it yet.

[Red Fel]

This is not a thing I've heard of. I don't see any "record materia" slots on my level 50 characters, what am I missing? (Because this sounds awesome and I must have it.)

Linky (http://ffrk.kongbakpao.com/preparing-for-the-future-record-materia/)!

Also (http://finalfantasy.wikia.com/wiki/Record_Materia)!

[Chen]

I haven't reached level 50 myself, but I *think* this is a feature in the JP version that will eventually be implemented to the US version. It involves some character-specific passives. I don't know much about it yet.

You're correct in that it's not implemented in the US version yet. That said the passives are character specific to unlock, but apparently can be moved between chars after that. So you can take your special black mage record materia and dump it onto Rinoa to recharge her black magic abilities each round.

[Hunter Noventa]

I read this thread, go looking for the game...it's iPhone only isn't it?

[Deadline]

I read this thread, go looking for the game...it's iPhone only isn't it?

Nope. I have it on my Samsung Galaxy S3 (it's an android phone). You can find it in the Google Play store.

[Red Fel]

So, it also looks like JP already has (and we can soon expect) quite a few new characters to even up the numbers a bit more, which is a tremendous relief. Bonus, one of my favorite anti-villains is among them! (One of, but I liked one of his minions better.)

So, hey, things! They are happening! They are things that happen!

[Starwulf]

Has anyone beaten the Lenna event on hard, and if so, how high do you need your levels to be? My whole party is mid 30's, but I nearly died to the boss at the end of Normal+, albeit because I didnt' bother with an actual strategy to stop him from using his mass fire attack.

[Deadline]

Has anyone beaten the Lenna event on hard, and if so, how high do you need your levels to be? My whole party is mid 30's, but I nearly died to the boss at the end of Normal+, albeit because I didnt' bother with an actual strategy to stop him from using his mass fire attack.

I've done it. If you don't due the gimmick for the boss, the fight is really hard. The boss changes shape everytime he gets hit. And he's only vulnerable to ice in the humanoid form.

[Starwulf]

I've done it. If you don't due the gimmick for the boss, the fight is really hard. The boss changes shape everytime he gets hit. And he's only vulnerable to ice in the humanoid form.

What are your levels? Could I do it with my group of mid-30's if I abided by the gimmick?

Edit: Meh, this isn't going to happen with my current party level and equipment levels. I'm halfway dead after the second stage and only have 1 Cura left.

[Red Fel]

What are your levels? Could I do it with my group of mid-30's if I abided by the gimmick?

Edit: Meh, this isn't going to happen with my current party level and equipment levels. I'm halfway dead after the second stage and only have 1 Cura left.

I've heard of people doing it in mid-30s. The trick is getting your timing right. It's very straightforward: Attack only once per form. Each time you attack, he shifts forms. If you're too eager, he shifts forms and counters. That said, there are three parts to the gimmick: Human Form: Hit with ice magic only. Blizzard Strike provokes a counter, so save it and just use magic. Tornado Form: Hit with physical only. Blizzard Strike counts as physical (I think), so you should be okay there. Attack promptly, however, or he will self-heal. Hand Form: Magic is useless, so attack with physical attacks. This is where you burn your ATB.If he counters, he hits hard, but if you can avoid his counters, you should be able to heal through his attacks.

Of course, I'm still not able to get Normal+ quite right, because inevitably I miss a form shift and get curb-stomped.

As an aside, if you're running low on Cura, consider simply honing Cure instead. I have Lenna running a Rank 3 Cure (8 uses) and Rank 1 Blindna (4 uses), and she has barely touched them by the time I reach the boss. Further, because of her MND, her Cures do pretty solid work; Cura would be mostly overkill. (I picked Blindna because Crew Dusts start using Flash, and in a physical-heavy party, that can be crippling.)

[Whammydill]

I was able to beat it on Hard on the first run through. I didn't even have ice magic, i just plowed through it. Two of my guys died though, stiill got mastery. My part is near level 40 though

[Hunter Noventa]

Nope. I have it on my Samsung Galaxy S3 (it's an android phone). You can find it in the Google Play store.

Ah ha, it's under DeNA, not Square Enix, that's why I couldn't find it.

[Starwulf]

I'm just not going to be able to do it because the regular monsters are hitting me far to hard. My equipment isn't exactly the best(I have no 3 star or above FFV equipment, so no synergy). My Cura has 8 uses as well, not that it mattered since Aerith died by the end of the 2nd stage.

Guess I just need to get some better gear before I attempt that.

[Red Fel]

I'm just not going to be able to do it because the regular monsters are hitting me far to hard. My equipment isn't exactly the best(I have no 3 star or above FFV equipment, so no synergy). My Cura has 8 uses as well, not that it mattered since Aerith died by the end of the 2nd stage.

Guess I just need to get some better gear before I attempt that.

I'd advise against using Aerith for this. She's generally an MND slot, and you can use Lenna for that. In fact, I think Lenna gets better MND even without the synergy bonus. My team is actually Cloud, Kain, Cyan, Rydia, Lenna, and it works pretty well. Not a lot of gear synergy, but Lenna catches up quickly.

But yeah, if the harder levels keep pounding you, just stick with the easier ones. I've managed to get by in Normal+, but Hard is still beyond me, so I've been doing my damage in the former.

Speaking of, any suggestions as to which goodies to buy? After Lenna and the Mythril, of course. Anything there particularly worth nabbing?

[KillianHawkeye]

I picked this game up after seeing this thread. My guys are only level 7-ish right now, but I'm really enjoying it so far. Lack of equipment seems to be an issue in the beginning, but I've gotten a couple decent relics including the FF5 Javelin. And MY GOD Cloud has a lot of hit points!

[shizukanashi]

Yep I just picked it up too after reading this thead. I don't have Lenna yet but I am so close to beating easy+ and I have done it enough thatbeating it will give me enough to buy her. I got a level 3 staff fro! My first relic pull that has carried me, hopefully my second will be enough to push myarty over that last easy+ boss.

Anyway I am really enjoying this game, thanks for recommending it.

[DiscipleofBob]

A little bit of speculating here:

If the U.S. Events follow the JP version, the next character we might get is either Vanille or Locke.

[Red Fel]

While I'd probably prefer Locke, numbers-wise, it'll probably be Vanille. There's already an abundance of VI-content, but XIII is mercifully woefully underrepresented.

Then again, Locke is a more popular character for nostalgia purposes, so...

[tyckspoon]

This is the kind of blatant cash-grab I want to encourage Square/contracted companies to keep doing (as compared to charging another $20 for the nth rerelease of FF6/Chrono Trigger/whatever), so I went ahead and bought a 10-pull pack of gems to kickstart my progress. Hopefully the last money I spend on this game, tho. Got a good handful of four-stars (several pieces of armor, a Mag-based staff, a MND-based staff, and a Giant Axe) as well as 2 copies of Tyro's 5-star shield grimoire. So I guess eventually I'll have a 6-star version of that. Used that nice early-game OP stuff to bull through Easy+ of the event, and I'm reasonably sure I could get through Normal if I wanted to.

Does the effect of that shield Soul Break last for the entire fight you use it, just the next attack, a few turns, or what? There's no visual indicator or timer of the effect that I can see to tell.

[Starwulf]

Aww, I'm super sad now :-(. I had 63 Mythril so I decided to do a single pull from the Cyan/Josef/Tyro sect of relics, and I got a 5 star. It was Josefs Giant Glove that can ONLY be worn by him, and I've never even used the guy, nor do I particularly want to start :-(. Why couldn't it have been like a 5 star useable by everyone.

[Red Fel]

Aww, I'm super sad now :-(. I had 63 Mythril so I decided to do a single pull from the Cyan/Josef/Tyro sect of relics, and I got a 5 star. It was Josefs Giant Glove that can ONLY be worn by him, and I've never even used the guy, nor do I particularly want to start :-(. Why couldn't it have been like a 5 star useable by everyone.

Ugh, that soul break. Don't get me wrong, it's a very nice weapon, and the SB is very fitting given the story, but... Ugh.

Think about it. Compare Josef to, say, Snow, as both have access to the Monk ability set (currently consisting of one ability, but still). Snow bests all of Josef's stats except for Attack and Resistance. Snow can also access Celerity abilities, on top of Monk and Combat. Other than his Attack and Resistance, Josef's only advantage is his access to a wider variety of weapons.

So let's give him a fist weapon, narrowing his only real advantage, and make it one that kills him. Oh, sure, it buffs the party, but it kills the ever-loving crap out of him.

... And that's why I won't use Josef unless there's a II-event. Ugh.

[DiscipleofBob]

Ugh, that soul break. Don't get me wrong, it's a very nice weapon, and the SB is very fitting given the story, but... Ugh.

Think about it. Compare Josef to, say, Snow, as both have access to the Monk ability set (currently consisting of one ability, but still). Snow bests all of Josef's stats except for Attack and Resistance. Snow can also access Celerity abilities, on top of Monk and Combat. Other than his Attack and Resistance, Josef's only advantage is his access to a wider variety of weapons.

So let's give him a fist weapon, narrowing his only real advantage, and make it one that kills him. Oh, sure, it buffs the party, but it kills the ever-loving crap out of him.

... And that's why I won't use Josef unless there's a II-event. Ugh.

I'd still take Josef rather than Snow. His special SB might be useless except for very specific combos and Snow might be more of a tank, but I'll take the extra damage he can dish out anyday. I might use Snow if FFXIII's taunt mechanics were present, but as it stands I don't see much reason to use him aside from an FFXIII event. At least his normal SB does damage. Though I haven't used SB much since I got a Retaliate and three Double Cuts.

Personal dilemma: I have enough Summon Orbs for either Ifrit, Shiva, or Ramuh. Which one should I pick?

[Red Fel]

Personal dilemma: I have enough Summon Orbs for either Ifrit, Shiva, or Ramuh. Which one should I pick?

I'll be honest, I don't waste time on summons. They're situational, they take too many resources to hone up to be sufficiently useful, and they take resources (other than the Summon Orbs) away from abilities you might actually use. Oh, and all of, what, two characters can use them? Two characters who could be using actually useful spells at that moment instead?

Rage aside, hmm. My first instinct is to say Ramuh > Ifrit > Shiva, simply because so many robot bosses have a lightning vulnerability, and so few things seem to have an ice vulnerability. But then I actually think about it. Off the top of my head, Shiva is extremely useful against Mombomb, and ice is also effective against bosses like Adamantoise, Djinn, Baigan, Rubicante, Ifrit, other Ifrit... And I'm already out. Okay. Shiva really doesn't impress me.

[DiscipleofBob]

I'll be honest, I don't waste time on summons. They're situational, they take too many resources to hone up to be sufficiently useful, and they take resources (other than the Summon Orbs) away from abilities you might actually use. Oh, and all of, what, two characters can use them? Two characters who could be using actually useful spells at that moment instead?

I've actually gotten a lot of mileage out of a rank 1 Mist Dragon. Sure it's only one use until I upgrade it, but Rydia can wipe a screen with it. There aren't a lot of abilities that can hit multiple enemies. Well, that I can actually get at my level. Plus I've always had a nostalgia spot in my heart for summons, and really, that's probably the most important factor in this game anyway.

[Red Fel]

I've actually gotten a lot of mileage out of a rank 1 Mist Dragon. Sure it's only one use until I upgrade it, but Rydia can wipe a screen with it. There aren't a lot of abilities that can hit multiple enemies. Well, that I can actually get at my level. Plus I've always had a nostalgia spot in my heart for summons, and really, that's probably the most important factor in this game anyway.

The nostalgia factor is a pretty good point. And I'll give you the fact that summons can hit multiple enemies, which is a substantial boon. But against non-bosses, I'm unlikely to unload abilities, and the majority of bosses are solo or duo encounters, with notable exceptions like Mom Bomb, Calcabrina, and the Magus Sisters. (Curiously, those are all FFIV.) In a boss encounter, I'd prefer to have something that's both effective and reusable. Let's face it, if I'm using Rydia as my summoner and she uses her one-shot, she just sits there plinking with a rod and embarassing everybody; if I use Aerith, that means I'm taking up a slot that could otherwise be used for the healing spell I needed to keep this guy from killing Cyan yet again dangit Cyan stop dying you fool.

I agree that there are certain boss encounters, like those mentioned, where having a screen-clearing nuke is valuable, even if it's a one-shot. But that seems more the exception than the rule. Now, if they made summons more usable, maybe reduced the honing costs, I'd be inclined to reconsider, but they're just too expensive and too situational.

... I'm totally going to craft Odin once I can, though. I mean, freaking Odin, man.

[DiscipleofBob]

While obviously I'm going to change my loadout for different bosses, I find myself relying less on abilities for bosses except for the occasional elemental weakness and retaliate + double cut meta combo. I find certain mobs are far more dangerous, for example if something manages to blind one of my fighters early on (and I don't feel like wasting a slot on Blindna) or if five monsters gang up on one character. Also one action to kill five mobs helps achieve that 'actions taken' condition for mastery.

I also try to keep in mind that mobs can randomly drop refills for abilities, and if I don't have everything earmarked for the boss I can actually sometimes get 2 - 3 uses per encounter out of a normally 1 use summon that hits everything on the screen for harder than my Soul Breaks.

My party's far from ideal though. I'm using Rinoa as a white mage for some reason, until I get Lenna up in level I guess. Her job is mostly to Boost Cloud while Josef and Cyan do the Double Cut + Retaliate combo. Rydia just pokes things with a stick unless she can either blow up the boss or summon when to convenient.

[Forbiddenwar]

Is there a solid five star dark magic user yet? I don't think I have one available, which is why I use summons.
Where's Vivi when you need him?

[DiscipleofBob]

Is there a solid five star dark magic user yet? I don't think I have one available, which is why I use summons.
Where's Vivi when you need him?

Rinoa if you managed to get her. Which makes me feel even more stupid for having her relegated to healer in the current party. Maybe at later levels when I can actually use those 5-star spells.

If there are any others, they're event-related for the time being.

[Forbiddenwar]

Rinoa if you managed to get her.

Rinoa? Really? But she's healing and support in the ff8 game. Her limit break heals and results characters. Her affinity is for the protection and healing summons. At least that's what I recall from playing the game last year?
What other character roles have changed? Is Aerith secretly the best melee fighter in the game?

I have her, but I didn't expect her to cast any black magic. I never played with her, since I had a level 40 white mage.

[DiscipleofBob]

Rinoa? Really? But she's healing and support in the ff8 game. Her limit break heals and results characters. Her affinity is for the protection and healing summons. At least that's what I recall from playing the game last year?
What other character roles have changed? Is Aerith secretly the best melee fighter in the game?

I was surprised too, especially since I've been using Rydia as my primary magic damage dealer. I think it comes from the whole 'Sorceress' thing that only comes three fourths through FF8. Doesn't make a lot of sense I know. Rinoa's Mind stat isn't spectacular but her Magic stat is through the roof, and if that weren't enough, she's one of the few mage characters who also has access to Support abilities like my current MVP ability: Boost.

[Deadline]

Rydia has the best magic stat of all currently released characters at the moment. She can only use 3 star black magics, but she hits like a truck with them (7-9k). And be honest, do you really have any 4-5 star abilities? Terra has the second best magic stat in the game and she can use 5 star magics. I've also been using Aerith because she's solid support and can use 3 star black magic. Rydia can do around 700 damage a pop with physical attacks from the back rank with her ice whip as well.

Edit - Just checked and Rydia, Rinoa, and Terra all are tied for highest magic stat at 120. If Rinoa has good white mage abilities, I'm going to have to replace Aerith.

[DiscipleofBob]

Rydia has the best magic stat of all currently released characters at the moment. She can only use 3 star black magics, but she hits like a truck with them (7-9k). And be honest, do you really have any 4-5 star abilities? Terra has the second best magic stat in the game and she can use 5 star magics. I've also been using Aerith because she's solid support and can use 3 star black magic. Rydia can do around 700 damage a pop with physical attacks from the back rank with her ice whip as well.

Edit - Just checked and Rydia, Rinoa, and Terra all are tied for highest magic stat at 120. If Rinoa has good white mage abilities, I'm going to have to replace Aerith.

Rinoa's Mind stat is rubbish by comparison to Aerith. She's still been able to heal as well as anyone without a specifically geared SB for me at this stage, and if you can manage to get her specific weapon or otherwise a decent Thrown weapon she can actually do decent physical damage from the back row.

If you want a replacement for Aerith, Lenna is probably your best bet for now.

[Starwulf]

Le'sigh, I've only ever played FFV once, so I can't even remember who Lenna is, and because of that I'm very hesitant to put her in my party. This is basically a walk down memory lane for me, and I only want characters I like/know in my group, LOL.

[shizukanashi]

I just plugged Lenna into my party. She is only lvl 12 and the rest of my party is 20, but she is already better than my 20 Tyro as long as I have her protected and healing. I have her in the back with an icebow, especially good for the Fire event as she and the bow are getting synergy plus fire being vulnerable to ice.

[GloatingSwine]

Rinoa? Really? But she's healing and support in the ff8 game. Her limit break heals and results characters. Her affinity is for the protection and healing summons. At least that's what I recall from playing the game last year?
What other character roles have changed? Is Aerith secretly the best melee fighter in the game?

I have her, but I didn't expect her to cast any black magic. I never played with her, since I had a level 40 white mage.

Rinoa has no recovery limits (Selphie and Quistis do), one outcome of Combine is invincibility, but that's it. Her story granted limit (Angel Wing) makes her spam cast offensive spells (like Berzerk status but with offensive magic). She also has the highest innate Magic stat in FF8 (highest innate stats overall).

GF compatibility depends on what magic you use with the character as well, so if you used Rinoa as a healer she would have higher compatibility with the defensive GFs. She's not "supposed" to be though, she's supposed to be the game's offensive caster. (albeit the junction system renders the distinctions moot because the stat gain from junctioning is far more than the inherent stats).

[Chen]

If you want a replacement for Aerith, Lenna is probably your best bet for now.

I use Tyro as my white magic user. He's versatile in that I can add a second random ability if needed and he's MUCH tankier than the other healers since he can wear full armor. His stats suck, but he's still healing around 2k with Curaga which is more than enough for most of the content so far. Now granted he and my progression guys are already level 50 so that's part of what makes most of the elites easy.

[midagedgamer]

Guys, I download the app on my xperia C3, but its lagging?

Is there any solution to this?

[DiscipleofBob]

Guys, I download the app on my xperia C3, but its lagging?

Is there any solution to this?

No clue myself. This is the first I've heard of any lagging in the game. Worst I've had is when my phone suddenly has trouble getting a connection in the middle of a game.

[Calemyr]

Guys, I download the app on my xperia C3, but its lagging?

Is there any solution to this?

Lags on my Xperia Z3 as well. Game sometimes pauses for a second or two mid-attack. Kinda frustrating, but nowhere near as frustrating as the always-online nonsense and my utter inability to roll a decent relic.

[shizukanashi]

I get lag some days and others not. I am on a dell android tablet.. I forget what exactly it is though.

I saved from the start and just bought the 11 relic pulls deal. I didn't get any of the current event items. What I got was a 5 stra Golden Spear and a 4 star Crystal helm. The other 9 items were 3 stars.

[Starwulf]

For those who are having issues with lag, on the FFRK subreddit there is a thread that should help some of you: http://www.reddit.com/r/FFRecordKeeper/comments/34zl98/for_those_who_experience_lag_through_menus_or/

[Red Fel]

A little bit of speculating here:

If the U.S. Events follow the JP version, the next character we might get is either Vanille or Locke.

And as of the latest event announcement, looks like we're getting XIII, so...

[Deadline]

And as of the latest event announcement, looks like we're getting XIII, so...

Ugh. I have never hated any other Final Fantasy character as much as I hate Vanille. I really hope she isn't some special snowflake that has a unique and necessary ability in this one, because then I can safely leave her sitting on the roster at level one, cold and alone.

[DiscipleofBob]

Ugh. I have never hated any other Final Fantasy character as much as I hate Vanille. I really hope she isn't some special snowflake that has a unique and necessary ability in this one, because then I can safely leave her sitting on the roster at level one, cold and alone.

While I wasn't a huge fan of XIII in general, I never got the hate that Vanille seemed to get. She wins the award for strangest weapon in a Final Fantasy to be sure, but character-wise I never had a problem with her.

Hope on the other hand...

[Deadline]

While I wasn't a huge fan of XIII in general, I never got the hate that Vanille seemed to get. She wins the award for strangest weapon in a Final Fantasy to be sure, but character-wise I never had a problem with her.

Hope on the other hand...

For me, she's basically every terrible character trait of every Final Fantasy character rolled into a single hate ball. And if she weren't played off as such a "lovable clutz", she'd be well placed to be the game's villain. She's basically an idiot savant villain. "But it's totally ok guys, and you should totally like her, because she feels really bad about it!"

If Vanille-Death-Spam wasn't the most viable method of farming Adamantoise's, I would never have used her at all.

Blerg. I could use my rage to boil coffee right now. :smalltongue:

[DiscipleofBob]

For me, she's basically every terrible character trait of every Final Fantasy character rolled into a single hate ball. And if she weren't played off as such a "lovable clutz", she'd be well placed to be the game's villain. She's basically an idiot savant villain. "But it's totally ok guys, and you should totally like her, because she feels really bad about it!"

If Vanille-Death-Spam wasn't the most viable method of farming Adamantoise's, I would never have used her at all.

Blerg. I could use my rage to boil coffee right now. :smalltongue:

How would she be a villain?

Granted, even after getting to the final dungeon in FFXIII my knowledge of the plot is basically that it goes something like:

1. Awesome train fight sequence.
2. Let's run away from the bad guys!
3. Oh look, a hallway!
4. Let's run towards the bad guys!
5. Oh look, another hallway!
Repeat steps 2 - 5 until credits.

[Deadline]

How would she be a villain?

You know the Purge? The death of Hope's Mom? Serah turning into a crystal? Sazh's son turning into a crystal? Yeah, all of that is Vanille's fault.

[DiscipleofBob]

You know the Purge? The death of Hope's Mom? Serah turning into a crystal? Sazh's son turning into a crystal? Yeah, all of that is Vanille's fault.

I thought the whole point of the entire plot to FFXIII was that all the main characters were completely powerless to do anything but play into the villains' hands no matter what they did, so none of them could be held responsible for anything that happened because it all went just as planned, or some nonsense like that.

[Red Fel]

I thought the whole point of the entire plot to FFXIII was that all the main characters were completely powerless to do anything but play into the villains' hands no matter what they did, so none of them could be held responsible for anything that happened because it all went just as planned, or some nonsense like that.

Yeah, there's been a whole lot more of that in the more recent games. Gonna level with you, VII marked the point where I started growing disenchanted (no pun intended) with how convoluted the plots in the franchise were becoming.

I grew up with the early ones, which read like a D&D campaign or a particularly lovely, if occasionally dark, fairy tale. I don't mind the steampunk aspects, a lot of them are fun, but I miss stories that you don't have to re-read five times to figure out what the crap is going on and who the crap is that and what the crap does s/he want anyway?

No particular fondness for XIII, is my point.

[Deadline]

I thought the whole point of the entire plot to FFXIII was that all the main characters were completely powerless to do anything but play into the villains' hands no matter what they did, so none of them could be held responsible for anything that happened because it all went just as planned, or some nonsense like that.

It's not quite that clear cut. That said, I hold Vanille responsible.

At any rate, I've got Lenna up to lvl 37 or so, and have almost finished grabbing all the things from her event that I want. I'll be hopping back to trying to master the most recent elite dungeons before the new FFXIII ones open up.

[GloatingSwine]

I thought the whole point of the entire plot to FFXIII was that all the main characters were completely powerless to do anything but play into the villains' hands no matter what they did, so none of them could be held responsible for anything that happened because it all went just as planned, or some nonsense like that.

It did all go "just as planned". Why was there a Pulse Fal'cie lying around inside Cocoon where just anyone could trip over it? So that someone would.

[DiscipleofBob]

It did all go "just as planned". Why was there a Pulse Fal'cie lying around inside Cocoon where just anyone could trip over it? So that someone would.

That's one of my problems with FFXIII's storyline. The majority of the game is spent with the main characters forced into a catch-22 where they can't do anything without playing right into the whole doomsday scenario. They just kind of wander around aimlessly until the DM main villain forces them to go back and follow the plot.

[Red Fel]

Speaking of problems with XIII's plot, the event is up now.

I like the reward structure. It's easy for my tired brain to grasp. Play and get rewarded. Play more and get more rewards. It's straightforward, and involves ample amounts of Thundajagaraja.

Too many suffixes on spells nowadays. Why, back in my day, we just used numerals...

Also, has anyone seen the stat spread on Vanille? She's a fairly awesome sub-healer or sub-caster. Her Mind makes her the third best healer, after Lenna and Aerith; her Magic puts her immediately after Terra, Rinoa and Rydia (all of whom are tied at the top). Also, she can use light armor - light armor! - which gives her more survivability than Rydia, Lenna, or Aerith. Which is good, because her defense is the second worst out of the non-Core classes (only Rydia's is worse). Her attack is also the worst among the non-Core classes, but that doesn't matter nearly as much for a caster.

All in all, she's a deceptively powerful character. I'm definitely going to use her in this event, possibly after. Still have to decide if she's replacing Rydia or Lenna for me, though. Probably Rydia.

[DiscipleofBob]

Her SB deals damage to everyone and lowers enemy Resistance. If you can get her custom SB though, it also does damage to everyone and lowers their Defense. Either sounds very useful.

[Tono]

So, I just started playing. I got Lenna, can go through this event easily enough on normal(So picked up Vanille), and my highest chars are around 30. So question: Would it be wise to dump all the growth eggs I get into buffing up one char to bring him up a few levels (probably Cloud for retaliate) in order to make this event/future dungeons easier on me until I can start getting better gear/orbs? I don't have any of my skills honed due to bad luck with the one daily I got for it(except for Cura, I got that honed once) or would it be better to use it on future chars/chars I don't use much to bring them up to speed some? I kinda wanna be able to do this on hard mode, but don;t want to try it out unless I am positive I can clear it. Thats a lot of stamina for my little pool.
Im loathe to spend the eggs on someone that I don't feel like I would use much, but at the same time I feel like they are wasting away just sitting in my storage.

[DiscipleofBob]

So, I just started playing. I got Lenna, can go through this event easily enough on normal(So picked up Vanille), and my highest chars are around 30. So question: Would it be wise to dump all the growth eggs I get into buffing up one char to bring him up a few levels (probably Cloud for retaliate) in order to make this event/future dungeons easier on me until I can start getting better gear/orbs? I don't have any of my skills honed due to bad luck with the one daily I got for it(except for Cura, I got that honed once) or would it be better to use it on future chars/chars I don't use much to bring them up to speed some? I kinda wanna be able to do this on hard mode, but don;t want to try it out unless I am positive I can clear it. Thats a lot of stamina for my little pool.
Im loathe to spend the eggs on someone that I don't feel like I would use much, but at the same time I feel like they are wasting away just sitting in my storage.

The best way to get EXP is to farm the Sunday daily dungeon. Not only do you get a ton of eggs, but you get tons of experience for every monster. As far as I can tell, the main two uses for growth eggs is to either 1) get new characters out of the kiddie pool dungeons so they won't die in two seconds if you put them in the main party, or 2) if you REALLY want to avoid using a character as much as possible.

Level 30 might be difficult on Hard. I at least wouldn't be betting on Mastery yet, but hey, even novice completion will get you Mythril.

[GloatingSwine]

That's one of my problems with FFXIII's storyline. The majority of the game is spent with the main characters forced into a catch-22 where they can't do anything without playing right into the whole doomsday scenario. They just kind of wander around aimlessly until the DM main villain forces them to go back and follow the plot.

No no, the entirety of the game is spent playing along with the villain's masterplan, including the bit where they kill him at the end.

The point at which the main characters deviate from doing what the villain wants them to do is about halfway through the ending cutscene.

[Chen]

So you get around 6000-8000 memories for hard and around 30k for heroic. Getting thundaja or whatever it is will be pretty easy even if you just do it on hard. This event gives a LOT of orbs by going through the reward tree and some pretty good items (updated wrist guards). Definitely seems worthwhile to do.

[Calemyr]

Is it just me, or does Vanille seem to be a super red mage? Black 4, White 5, Support 2, mind and magic in the double digits at level 1. Not that a red mage is all that valuable in FFRK, though: with only two ability slots, it's not like you get much out of being capable on both fronts.

I suppose the real question is this: is Vanille a better healer than Lenna? Because she's not going to outdo Rinoa/Rydia as a black mage.

[DiscipleofBob]

Is it just me, or does Vanille seem to be a super red mage? Black 4, White 5, Support 2, mind and magic in the double digits at level 1. Not that a red mage is all that valuable in FFRK, though: with only two ability slots, it's not like you get much out of being capable on both fronts.

I suppose the real question is this: is Vanille a better healer than Lenna? Because she's not going to outdo Rinoa/Rydia as a black mage.

Definitely not a better healer than Lenna. Rydia only gets up to 3 stars black magic though, so even with a superior magic score Vanille should eventually outclass her. Rinoa still outclasses Vanille as a Black Mage though.

One way Vanille has an advantage over Lenna is she can use support abilities like Boost.

I see Vanille shining brightest in a caster-centric party with a SB that can lower enemy's Resistance.

[Red Fel]

Is it just me, or does Vanille seem to be a super red mage? Black 4, White 5, Support 2, mind and magic in the double digits at level 1. Not that a red mage is all that valuable in FFRK, though: with only two ability slots, it's not like you get much out of being capable on both fronts.

I suppose the real question is this: is Vanille a better healer than Lenna? Because she's not going to outdo Rinoa/Rydia as a black mage.

Here is a ranking of playable characters by max Mind stat (https://ffrkstrategy.gamematome.jp/game/951/wiki/Character_Rankings_Mind%20Ranking) - that's the one that calculates healing. Vanille is a close third after Lenna and Aerith. It's also worth noting that, unlike those two, Vanille can use more powerful black magic and has an offensive SB. She can also use light armor, and has higher Resistance.

As to black mages, here's that ranking (https://ffrkstrategy.gamematome.jp/game/951/wiki/Character_Rankings_Magic%20Ranking). There's a three-way tie for first between Rydia, Rinoa and Terra; Vanille follows immediately after. Vanille's SB is better, in that Rinoa and Terra can only target one character, and none of them carry the debuff rider that Vanille's does. Other than that, though, she's probably not a better black mage than they are.

I'm still using her in place of Rydia, simply because Rydia has failed me one time too many; she does not replace Lenna, because Lenna's regen SB is useful to me.

[Calemyr]

Definitely not a better healer than Lenna. Rydia only gets up to 3 stars black magic though, so even with a superior magic score Vanille should eventually outclass her. Rinoa still outclasses Vanille as a Black Mage though.

One way Vanille has an advantage over Lenna is she can use support abilities like Boost.

I see Vanille shining brightest in a caster-centric party with a SB that can lower enemy's Resistance.

Ouch. Who'd do a caster-centric party? You'd have to it pretty late in the process, when you can farm orbs for honing abilities (and honing is expensive) to kingdom come. Because maybe it's just me, but mages kinda suck when they run out of ability uses.

Also, just got Warrior of Light. Nifty guy, but (like Vanille) starting at level 1 is a real pain when your already stamina starved. Still trying to find the path to get to that Luneth guy from FFIII.

[Deadline]

Ouch. Who'd do a caster-centric party? You'd have to it pretty late in the process, when you can farm orbs for honing abilities (and honing is expensive) to kingdom come. Because maybe it's just me, but mages kinda suck when they run out of ability uses.

Also, just got Warrior of Light. Nifty guy, but (like Vanille) starting at level 1 is a real pain when your already stamina starved. Still trying to find the path to get to that Luneth guy from FFIII.

I'm running a 3-caster party, but I've got several caster abilities at 4-6 uses. The two melee fighters (Cloud and Sephiroth) carry the battles until I get to a boss, and then the casters murderfy the boss. I'm not sure how I'd have killed several bosses on hard without the Black Magic Punch I brought with me. That said, you can probably get by with a single black magic user and a single white mage with an offensive spell or SB.

But a party full of melee seems like it would get stomped on hard.

[Calemyr]

I'm running a 3-caster party, but I've got several caster abilities at 4-6 uses. The two melee fighters (Cloud and Sephiroth) carry the battles until I get to a boss, and then the casters murderfy the boss. I'm not sure how I'd have killed several bosses on hard without the Black Magic Punch I brought with me. That said, you can probably get by with a single black magic user and a single white mage with an offensive spell or SB.

But a party full of melee seems like it would get stomped on hard.

Well, yeah. My current party is:
Tyro (Lvl 36 w/ 4* axe, Curaga, Thunder Strike)
Cloud (Level 38 w/ 4* sword, Blizard Strike, Fira Strike)
Josef (Level 33 w/ 4* dagger, Double Cut, Blade Bash)
Rinoa (Level 33 w/ 4* rod, Watera, Thundara)
Lenna (Level 30 w/ 4* staff, Cure, Dia)

And, yeah, the first three cut through normal encounters quickly, while everyone goes all out on bosses.

Looking at the list on page 1, I only have Luneth and Gordon left to acquire of the base cast.

[Chen]

I've recently replaced my black mage (Terra) with Celes as a second spellblade user. It's working pretty well. I will switch Celes out once she hits 50 not sure what I'll replace em with. Vanille is tempting since they look like they're competing well with Terra for the black mage slot, since I'm using Balamb Guard Armor (light) for Terra anyways. Having 4 melee attackers (Cloud, Wakka, Kain, Celes) makes things go quite quick. For farming hard dailies I usually just give Tyro one of my other 5 star weapons and I can auto battle through them fairly easily.

[Deadline]

So you get around 6000-8000 memories for hard and around 30k for heroic. Getting thundaja or whatever it is will be pretty easy even if you just do it on hard. This event gives a LOT of orbs by going through the reward tree and some pretty good items (updated wrist guards). Definitely seems worthwhile to do.

I'm up to 25,000 at this point, just by farming hard a few times. This event seems like it's much easier than some of the earlier ones. I'm really looking forward to playing with Thundaja. :smalltongue:

[Infernally Clay]

I missed out on a lot of the limited time characters when my phone was out of commission for a while. My party is currently around level 26... Cloud, Dark Knight Cecil, Kain, Lenna and Rydia. Actually got my first ever five star relic today - the Zantetsuken, which gets Cloud's attack to 140.

This new event is pretty tough, though. Had trouble getting through Normal. I really want that Thundaja but I'd currently need to clear Normal another 120-odd times to get it. Not sure I have the time or patience for that.

[shizukanashi]

My party is Cloud, Kain,Wakka, Rydia, and Lenna. They are all around 28. I managed to get Vanille to 19 with a dozen eggs and I think I am going to use her to replace Wakka (he is the only person I have who still uses a level 2 Weapon)

I don't have any trouble with normal on this event, but I am still losing on hard.

[DiscipleofBob]

I'm having trouble on Hard as well, but at least part of that is I chose to replace Josef and Rydia on my team for Snow and Vanille for the duration of this event. So far they're not completely useless but neither are they pulling the weight I need to master Hard, but that's forgivable since they're a good 20 levels below the rest.

I also don't like this event format compared to the others. Oh look, 3 - 5 random bosses in a row when I should be saving my big guns for Anima. Yay. :smallannoyed:

Is Regen completely underwhelming or is it just bad for this event? Every time I have use Snow use his limit break I don't see any noticeable effect until he's already dead.

[Forbiddenwar]

Ouch. Hitting hard is like hitting a break wall. My team is all level 45 (cloud, Kain, sepheroth, rinoa ( leveled her hard to get her there) and Lenna all with 5 star equipment. I can breeze through Normal on autopilot, but I can't get anywhere on hard. Freaking crabs hit my whole team for 1000 every turn. Then its Anima on phase 2, 3, and 4

[Starwulf]

Ouch. Hitting hard is like hitting a break wall. My team is all level 45 (cloud, Kain, sepheroth, rinoa ( leveled her hard to get her there) and Lenna all with 5 star equipment. I can breeze through Normal on autopilot, but I can't get anywhere on hard. Freaking crabs hit my whole team for 1000 every turn. Then its Anima on phase 2, 3, and 4

Wow, you sure you aren't mixing up Hard and Heroic? I mean I can't beat Hard, but I've made it slightly over halfway, and I have 1 5 star equipment, and then mostly 4 star's and my guys are mid-30's. Can't imagine you're having so much trouble on hard with 10 more levels and far superior equipment.

[DiscipleofBob]

Ouch. Hitting hard is like hitting a break wall. My team is all level 45 (cloud, Kain, sepheroth, rinoa ( leveled her hard to get her there) and Lenna all with 5 star equipment. I can breeze through Normal on autopilot, but I can't get anywhere on hard. Freaking crabs hit my whole team for 1000 every turn. Then its Anima on phase 2, 3, and 4

Wow, I didn't even know you could encounter Anima outside of the last phase. I'm having better luck with Hard and two of my characters are currently vastly underleveled. If you have 5-star equipment I think you almost have to be on Heroic with those kinds of numbers.

[Forbiddenwar]

It's hard, not heroic. I've tried three runs before posting in frustration. My problem might be wrong abilities, bad strategy for anima or both.

I only have thundara (2 star), honed to level 3. Protectga looks impossible to get right now. And I have no idea what people mean by retaliate. I think I'll farm some crystals and buy the right orbs from the previous event while I can.

As for anima, attacks are instantly countered hard by the claws and killing the claws is pointless since they instantly regrow. It takes so much to just kill one claws it doesn't seem worth it.

The random natural of the event might explain why some breeze through while others tear their hair out. According to the wiki you can be forced to fight Anima four times, and the warmech 3 times all in the same run on hard. And each of my three attempts looked pretty much like that.

[Tono]

Ret is having one boosted char(Cloud in my case) use Retaliate then having the other chars attack (or double attack!) him so he attacks the lowest % enemy. Also, you're chars will miss so you wont be damaging him and the boss wont counter. Its... Nifty.

I have found if you kill one arm, it wont regen. So I kill the left because it hurts me more, power break the body, hit the body once so it isa lower % then the arm, boost/ret cloud, then have 4 people hit Cloud. It works for me on normal, but I can't reliable get to him on Hard to do it without busting out all my resources on the other fights, and that is a very iffy pain to do. I think ill try it again monday after leveling/gearing some. =( Starting late sucks.

[DiscipleofBob]

It's hard, not heroic. I've tried three runs before posting in frustration. My problem might be wrong abilities, bad strategy for anima or both.

Bad luck's part of it. Encountering Anima before the final phase is rare. It only just happened to me for the first time. For the record I haven't been able to beat Anima on Hard yet and I have three characters at ~45 and two I'm leveling at ~28. My biggest problem is I have to spend too many resources on the boss fights before Anima.


I only have thundara (2 star), honed to level 3. Protectga looks impossible to get right now. And I have no idea what people mean by retaliate. I think I'll farm some crystals and buy the right orbs from the previous event while I can.

Retaliate is a cheap, low-level ability in the Other section, a Samurai skill usable by Cloud or Cyan. Retaliate makes physical attacks miss the user and the user counters all physical attacks. There's an exploit where you can attack someone with Retaliate, the attack misses, and they counter attack the enemy. A good strategy for bosses is to have one warrior with Retaliate, a support character with Boost, and at least two characters with Double Cut, two copies on each character if possible. If you use Double Cut on a character with Retaliate, said character will counter attack the enemy twice.

EDIT: Shadow'd. Or Edge'd. Maybe Yuffie'd. :smalltongue:

[Starwulf]

Retaliate is a cheap, low-level ability in the Other section, a Samurai skill usable by Cloud or Cyan. Retaliate makes physical attacks miss the user and the user counters all physical attacks. There's an exploit where you can attack someone with Retaliate, the attack misses, and they counter attack the enemy. A good strategy for bosses is to have one warrior with Retaliate, a support character with Boost, and at least two characters with Double Cut, two copies on each character if possible. If you use Double Cut on a character with Retaliate, said character will counter attack the enemy twice.

EDIT: Shadow'd. Or Edge'd. Maybe Yuffie'd. :smalltongue:

I.....I....I'm in love. That's a brilliant strategy. I mean, I really hate abusing bugs, but my god that may be something I might have to do so I can complete hard at least once. Cloud has my retaliate, and I have two copies of double cut, man that could literally be the solution to my issues with a strategy like that. I mean, I'd feel low as hell afterwards having done it, but I mean...Thundaja!!!!!!!! I want it so much. If I could start farming Hard with a strat like that I think I'd take the guilty feelings and just suppress them.

[Chen]

It's hard, not heroic. I've tried three runs before posting in frustration. My problem might be wrong abilities, bad strategy for anima or both.

I only have thundara (2 star), honed to level 3. Protectga looks impossible to get right now. And I have no idea what people mean by retaliate. I think I'll farm some crystals and buy the right orbs from the previous event while I can.

As for anima, attacks are instantly countered hard by the claws and killing the claws is pointless since they instantly regrow. It takes so much to just kill one claws it doesn't seem worth it.

The random natural of the event might explain why some breeze through while others tear their hair out. According to the wiki you can be forced to fight Anima four times, and the warmech 3 times all in the same run on hard. And each of my three attempts looked pretty much like that.

Have you made any of the break skills yet? They really help. Armor break + two fairly strong abilities from your melee guys will kill an arm (I use drain strike from cloud and double cut from Wakka). After that armor break the body once then start retaliating. If you have appropriate hard hitting SBs from your 5 star weapons you can just ignore the retaliate bit all together. My usual strategy for hard is:

Kill arm as above
Armor break + Status reels (Wakka's second SB) the body.
Attack body with Kain's Lancet then Jump, Wakka double cutting, Cloud drain striking and Celes doing whatever strikes I have left over (I bring water and lightning for her both 4 uses since all the mini bosses are vulnerable to lightning and water).
Use Celes SB (party wide magic protect) after 1 full round of hitting the body. That protects against the AoE near the end.

Do you have bad armor for your guys or something? The arms are hitting my guys in 4 star armor for around 300 damage (150 after power breaking)...so getting hit for 1000 seems way out there.

Also I don't see how retaliate is an exploit. It's exactly like using Reflect and bouncing magic off yourself to hit enemies in pretty much all FF games. I mean I don't recall which game (FF IV or VI I think) where there's a boss that explicitly uses this technique against you. The only difference here is that retaliate is for physical attacks instead of magic ones. I do suppose the fact that it uses the retaliators attack is somewhat different since it can boost your mages melee attacks. That's the only possible "exploit" part.

There's a bigger exploit of using shell on the enemy, then mental breakdown, then shell again to set their Res to 2, which makes pretty much all magic attacks hit for 9999. This doesn't really work yet for physical attacks since there's no armor breakdown skill yet (just armor break which isnt efficient enough to drop their Def all that much).

[Klaatu B. Nikto]

Is it worth collecting the orbs from Mog? I got a lightning orb so I could get Thunder II (Thundara?) but what of the others? I mainly have minor orbs so no really powerful spells yet other than Water II, Ice II and maybe Fire II. I pretty much have all the trinkets except for the items at 1500.

Otherwise, I'll alternate between farming memories and the usual XP/Gil. I think I got Vanille last night.

[Deadline]

I'm running the following party through the event on Hard:

Cloud (Front Row, lvl 50, 4* Crystal sword, Genji Shield, Hyper Wrist), with Double Strike and Drain Strike
Sephiroth (Front Row, lvl 50, 5* Gladius+, Diamond Armor, Hyper Wrist), with Double Strike and Blade Bash
Terra (Back Row, lvl 50, 4* Gravity Rod, Genji Helm, Earring), with Fira and Blizzaga
Lenna (Back Row, lvl 45, 4* Light Staff, Summoner's Robe, Angel Ring), with Curaja and Haste
Rydia (Back Row, lvl 50, 5* Ice Whip, 4* Black Cowl+, Earring), with Thundara and Thundaga

For Anima, I focus attacks on the main body. Use Lenna to heal if needed, or Haste Cloud and Rydia when healing isn't vital. Cloud and Sephiroth unload Double Strikes, Terra drops Blizzaga, and Rydia either uses her SB (Shiva), or drops Thundaga and Thundara on the main body.

I get probably 3-4 rounds of attacks in before Anima goes down.

For the Beta Behemoth and the Manasvin Warmech, I focus on hasting Rydia and using Thundara and Thundaga to make quick work of them.

For all of the other encounters, I auto-battle through them, keeping an eye on health levels to see if healing is needed.

When I run into Anima earlier than the final battle, things get a little rough (it's happened 3 times, and I died one of those times), so don't give up on Hard, it's just really rough when you hit Anima more than once (although the rewards are nice).

[Chen]

Is it worth collecting the orbs from Mog? I got a lightning orb so I could get Thunder II (Thundara?) but what of the others? I mainly have minor orbs so no really powerful spells yet other than Water II, Ice II and maybe Fire II. I pretty much have all the trinkets except for the items at 1500.

Otherwise, I'll alternate between farming memories and the usual XP/Gil. I think I got Vanille last night.

I picked up all the summon orbs except greater since they're usually annoying to get. Also picked up all the lesser power orbs since you want a ton of those to hone double strikes, retaliates and 2* elemental strikes. I picked up a few greater orbs but got fed up of doing those events.

The latest event gets you a ton of orbs. It's definitely worth going through even if you can only do normal. You probably won't get thundaja but you can pick up a lot of 3 and 4 star orbs pretty easily.

Focus on finishing the campaign though too. More stamina is always nice if for nothing else than the overnight fill-up. Odds are you'll have bigger gaps during the day too though. I believe max stamina is 100 currently which is 5 hours worth of resting.

[Starwulf]

Man I really, really, reaaaaaaaaaaaaaaallllllyyyyyyyyy hope that the next set of 5 star equipment they feature in relic draws is something I want, I now have 85 mythril saved up, and if it is something I want, I'll likely have the other 15 ready to go by that point for 2 full sets of 10(+1) ^^ Going to be my absolute best chance to come out of it with some killer equipment for my guys.

@Chen: Thanks for the info that there is now the ability to reach 100 stamina. The last time I checked the cap was 50 and I figured it couldn't possibly have gone up "that" much, but apparently it has, so I'm going through and doing some elite dungeons and some of the regular dungeons to get my stamina higher!

[shizukanashi]

I just got Snow is he worth it? My current party is Kain, Cloud, Rydia, Camille, and Lenna. All around 32. Kain has my only 5star weapon and currently does almost 3 times the damage Cloud does with a 3 star.

[DiscipleofBob]

I just got Snow is he worth it? My current party is Kain, Cloud, Rydia, Camille, and Lenna. All around 32. Kain has my only 5star weapon and currently does almost 3 times the damage Cloud does with a 3 star.

Meh, I think I prefer Josef outside of XIII dungeons. Both have high attack and crap defenses. They use the same kind of weapons, so having a decent fist weapon is a big factor.

As you mentioned above, 5* equipment makes a huge difference in the game. Under more equal circumstances, Cloud should leave Kain and most characters in the dust.

[DiscipleofBob]

If the source I'm using proves to be accurate, Locke will be up next. It'll be another event like Rinoa's with the large dungeon, only this will kind of span the majority off FF6 or at least the parts Locke was/could be a part of.

15 levels. No idea on difficulty level but if it's anything like To Slay A Sorceress, I'd expect a party of late 20's, early 30's should be able to do it.

Elite mastery is a Phoenix summon. O_o WANT!!!

Still looking for raw numbers... Basics are that his attack is respectable but nowhere near the top contenders, but his speed is through the roof.

Confirmed in JP version Locke is fastest in the game. Second is Lightning, Vaan, Tifa, Balthier, Tidus all tied. Attack-wise he's behind Cyan, Tifa, and Snow. But ahead of Warrior of Light, Paladin Cecil, Tidus, and Wakka.

Uses: Dagger, Sword, Throwing
Shield, Hat, Helmet, Light Armor, Robe, Bracer
Combat 4* Support 3* Celerity 5* Thief 5*

SB: Surprise - Damage that doesn't change from the back row. Not sure how that's useful since if you're in the back row it's because you have an ability or weapon to use from there. Still damage is damage I guess.

Special equipment is Rising Sun, a throwing weapon. New SB is Mirage Dive, which hits all enemies and inflicts Slow.

[Infernally Clay]

I just got Snow is he worth it? My current party is Kain, Cloud, Rydia, Camille, and Lenna. All around 32. Kain has my only 5star weapon and currently does almost 3 times the damage Cloud does with a 3 star.

I gave Cloud the Zantetsuken I pulled and he does more damage than Cecil or Kain even with the synergy bonus. Has, like, a little over 150 attack or something.

[Calemyr]

I hate the relic system in this game. Just to give you a sense of where I'm coming from, I've got 70 stamina, I have recruited all of the core characters, and my main party is 4/5 into the 40's. I have one 5 star item: the Regal Gown (a robe with no special effects or stat bonuses). Am I out of line for being frustrated by this?

[DiscipleofBob]

I hate the relic system in this game. Just to give you a sense of where I'm coming from, I've got 70 stamina, I have recruited all of the core characters, and my main party is 4/5 into the 40's. I have one 5 star item: the Regal Gown (a robe with no special effects or stat bonuses). Am I out of line for being frustrated by this?

Not at all. So far all I've gotten are 2 Genji Shields. What's frustrating is that the equipment makes a huge difference in gameplay and there's no way to guarantee you get something. I still can't really use Kain or Wakka because all they can use are 2* weapons for me.

I mean I'm not expecting all the 5* equipment be easy to get, but maybe at least something guaranteed? Like if you spend the 50 Mythril you're guaranteed at least one of the 5* item in question.

Hopefully there will be at some better equipment rewards for events and other quests in the future. The Elite story mode missions sometimes have decent 4* equipment as rewards.

[Starwulf]

Meh, at least it's a guaranteed 3 star every time you pull, so even doing the 11 pull at the very least you'll get 11 3 stars, and any dupes you can use to upgrade to a 4 or 5 star equipment that way. I've played games where not even that much is guaranteed(Most notably: Castle Clash! I've rolled tens of thousands of gems on that game(all free) and I've barely gotten squat for legendary heroes). Games like this require a fair amount of patience if you are a free to play and want to excel.

[Fleeing Coward]

Game's perfectly fine as is. I've only been playing less than a week, made a single set of 11 pulls, no 5 stars, only 2 4 stars and I'm almost done with a full master clear of normal dungeons. The events basically guarantee you one 4 star after combining too so it's not like the game's forcing you to use 2 star gear unless you're desperate to play a certain character.
For the most part, it's just grinding for the right skills for the battles and like Starwulf said, patience. You're going to progress slower than pay to play people but it's not like any of the fights are impossible unless you have all 5 star gear.

[DiscipleofBob]

Game's perfectly fine as is. I've only been playing less than a week, made a single set of 11 pulls, no 5 stars, only 2 4 stars and I'm almost done with a full master clear of normal dungeons. The events basically guarantee you one 4 star after combining too so it's not like the game's forcing you to use 2 star gear unless you're desperate to play a certain character.
For the most part, it's just grinding for the right skills for the battles and like Starwulf said, patience. You're going to progress slower than pay to play people but it's not like any of the fights are impossible unless you have all 5 star gear.

You get a lot of Mythril early on until you run out of story missions to complete. Then it becomes a lot harder to get since the Daily Dungeons don't renew. In my experience, anything less than 4* equipment is pretty much useless, and even combining equipment to raise its level is very limited compared to actually drawing a 4* or 5* item. For 4* equipment I've been pretty lucky. I've managed to get one sword, two katanas, a fist weapon, and an obscene amount of rods and staves that I'll rarely use. But without a decent Spear or Thrown weapon, a lot of characters just aren't worth using.

Hey, Locke's out!

[Fleeing Coward]

You get a lot of Mythril early on until you run out of story missions to complete. Then it becomes a lot harder to get since the Daily Dungeons don't renew. In my experience, anything less than 4* equipment is pretty much useless, and even combining equipment to raise its level is very limited compared to actually drawing a 4* or 5* item. For 4* equipment I've been pretty lucky. I've managed to get one sword, two katanas, a fist weapon, and an obscene amount of rods and staves that I'll rarely use. But without a decent Spear or Thrown weapon, a lot of characters just aren't worth using.

Hey, Locke's out!


I know it'll slow down over time but that happens in pretty much every freemium game. They give you alot at the start to hook you in and hope that you're addicted enough to want to buy more when it dries up.
My point was more that the game's still perfectly playable with some planning even if you have bad luck with gear and all the 5* items will do is make it slightly easier but they're not exactly must haves especially in a pve game.

[Chen]

We got 20 free mythril just from the celebration daily events over the last month or so (it's not done yet). You also get 1 mythril every 5 days via the login bonus. I'm at 90 stamina and I've done 2 50 mythril pulls along with several individual 5 mythril pulls (one purchased 11 pull as well to support the Devs). They definitely give you a fair bit as you go through the game/events. I mean this current event has a good chunk of it from what I've seen so far (first 4 normal missions each give 1 mythril I suspect many others will too.

Also 3 star weapons + realm synergy getting pretty damn high in stats. I know for sure my 4 star weapons (greatsword ++ for example) is about on par with a 5 star katana I have for cloud when realm synergy is active. It's better than my other generic weapons (danjuro) with realm synergy.

[Red Fel]

Hey, Locke's out!

Yeah, the Locke event is up and running, and it's... Surprisingly straightforward. Even moreso than the Vanille event. Moreover, my god, it's full of Mythril!

Seriously, if you're at least level 30, you can pretty much just autopilot through and grab a crap-ton of Mythril from this thing. There are some two-stars that you can easily upgrade on the normal levels, and some three-stars on the elite levels. Oh, and Locke. Oh, and the Phoenix summon.

... And I have a beef with the Phoenix summon. Setting aside for a moment how bloody hard it will be to upgrade it, it infuriates me as a moderately useless ability. Fire damage to all targets isn't all that great, since most multi-target battles really don't have that many fire-vulnerable targets (looking at you, Mom Bomb and Calcabrina). And reviving from KO is nice, but you've already lost mastery at that point - the goal should be not to get KO'd at all, not to come back from KO.

Overall, I like the event. Unlike certain recent ones that need not be named, it doesn't feel like a repetitive slog; you're not doing the same level over and over, you can just run it once and move onto the next. And get oodles of Mythril.

[DiscipleofBob]

Yeah, the Locke event is up and running, and it's... Surprisingly straightforward. Even moreso than the Vanille event. Moreover, my god, it's full of Mythril!

Seriously, if you're at least level 30, you can pretty much just autopilot through and grab a crap-ton of Mythril from this thing. There are some two-stars that you can easily upgrade on the normal levels, and some three-stars on the elite levels. Oh, and Locke. Oh, and the Phoenix summon.

... And I have a beef with the Phoenix summon. Setting aside for a moment how bloody hard it will be to upgrade it, it infuriates me as a moderately useless ability. Fire damage to all targets isn't all that great, since most multi-target battles really don't have that many fire-vulnerable targets (looking at you, Mom Bomb and Calcabrina). And reviving from KO is nice, but you've already lost mastery at that point - the goal should be not to get KO'd at all, not to come back from KO.

Overall, I like the event. Unlike certain recent ones that need not be named, it doesn't feel like a repetitive slog; you're not doing the same level over and over, you can just run it once and move onto the next. And get oodles of Mythril.

You can get one KO and still make Champion on most levels though. Frankly I'd rather use a revive then start an entire dungeon from scratch. And if you're using Phoenix then it's probably not for the fire damage.

Then again, it is a 4* summon. Not sure what the damage upgrade is like at that level.

As a side note, gettin' REAL tired of the rods and staves I keep pulling on the Relic draw. :smallannoyed:

[Deadline]

As a side note, gettin' REAL tired of the rods and staves I keep pulling on the Relic draw. :smallannoyed:

Use the best ones on your casters, and sell the rest?

I have, to date, pulled the following from Relic Draws:

Rydia's Ice Whip (Awesome)
Genji Helmet (Awesome)
Genji Shield (Awesome)

A couple 4* Gladius (meh, but Sephiroth is using a Gladius + for now)
A 4* Crystal Sword (meh, but Cloud uses it for now)
A 4* Gravity Rod (meh, but I have a caster using it)
A 4* Diamond Armor (meh)

A 4* spear that Kain is using

And a whole bunch of mostly useless 3-4* stuff. I've upgraded and combined stuff to get better gear, but look forward to replacing it with native 5* gear as I get it. At the very least, use the 3-4* stuff and sell the 2* or worse gear. And upgrade your stuff as much as possible, every little bit helps.

[Suichimo]

So exactly what skills should I be using on Locke? I started with the Lenna event so I sadly couldn't get some of what would've been my favorites(Celes/Either Cecil) and I've been waiting to replace Tyro/miniSuichimo. I'm right before unlocking Cyan in the story. Should I move Locke, with whatever skill setup I can figure out, in to Tyro's spot? Or should I wait for a better character?

Edit: Current team is Kain/Cloud/Tyro/Lenna/Vanille w/ her unique weapon.

Deprotega is beast.

[Calemyr]

So exactly what skills should I be using on Locke? I started with the Lenna event so I sadly couldn't get some of what would've been my favorites(Celes/Either Cecil) and I've been waiting to replace Tyro/miniSuichimo. I'm right before unlocking Cyan in the story. Should I move Locke, with whatever skill setup I can figure out, in to Tyro's spot? Or should I wait for a better character?

Statistically, Tyro is a pretty mediocre character, with midling stats across the board. What he gets in trade is pretty impressive, though: the boy can use any weapon, armor, or skill in the game. This absurd level of versatility is pretty darn nice, so don't be too quick to discount him.

Locke is a B-class fighter with S-class speed, and access to a host of physical skills. He also gets "Thief" skills, but I don't see any of those in the game. He's a bit of a drop down from Joseph for damage output, but I happen to love FFVI.

[DiscipleofBob]

So exactly what skills should I be using on Locke? I started with the Lenna event so I sadly couldn't get some of what would've been my favorites(Celes/Either Cecil) and I've been waiting to replace Tyro/miniSuichimo. I'm right before unlocking Cyan in the story. Should I move Locke, with whatever skill setup I can figure out, in to Tyro's spot? Or should I wait for a better character?

Edit: Current team is Kain/Cloud/Tyro/Lenna/Vanille w/ her unique weapon.

Deprotega is beast.

Definitely at least level up Locke and keep him waiting in the wings for other FF6 dungeons.

I think with his speed he'll probably make an excellent support character who can also use a decent range of equipment. If you can get a decent ranged weapon he can even stay in the back row.

[Ogremindes]

I've been playing this a bit. It's hard to shake the thought that I could be playing FF5 or 6 instead and probably having more fun, but still, I've been firing it up every now and then.

I've been doing the Locke event, got as far as Airship, but I've hit a wall, I just don't have the resources to tackle two boss fights in a row.

[Starwulf]

Well, after burning through 2 mythril(Only because I apparently got the best path, nearly 9k in memories) I finally beat Hard. Both were on the boss, the first time I just tried to nuke him, that didn't work, second time I wiped out the left arm, then beat the middle down, then thought it was safe to kill the right arm, but it regenerated them both almost immediately, so the last time I killed the left arm then burned every single resource I had on the middle and managed to kill it right before it would have killed me. Amazingly enough I still got Mastery because I got mastery on everything else besides that stage, those Summon orbs were great, I just need 2 more and I can make a Shiva or Ramuh!

I'm done with the event though, everything else after this is just a single orb reward and that's just not worth it to me at this point in time. I did consider grinding to 30k in order to get that 3 star hyper wrist, but meh....just not feeling it.

[DiscipleofBob]

Good news: on the Locke event, you don't need to clear all the Elite stages in order again. You can jump straight to the last fight if you want.

Bad news: My level 50 party can barely get through one encounter in the Elite Fire Cavern. Even if I burnt Mythril, no idea how I could kill the Fire Dragon if I'm having this much trouble on basic monsters. Really want that Phoenix summon too...

[Chen]

Good news: on the Locke event, you don't need to clear all the Elite stages in order again. You can jump straight to the last fight if you want.

Bad news: My level 50 party can barely get through one encounter in the Elite Fire Cavern. Even if I burnt Mythril, no idea how I could kill the Fire Dragon if I'm having this much trouble on basic monsters. Really want that Phoenix summon too...

Looking at a reddit post the dragon has ~180k HP too. You apparently need magic break/breakdown and Celes default SB (or Tyro's sentinel grimmoire) to handle the spamming of AoE casts the dragon does.

I didn't realize you could do them in any order so I may give the fire caverns a shot. I have a lot of FF VI gear so hopefully that'll help. I suspect I may not have enough honed skills though to get through all the trash and boss, let alone master it to get the Phoenix summon.

There is another hyper wrist among the levels though and an Angel wings both of which are quite nice. Will have to push to do those at least.

[DiscipleofBob]

Looking at a reddit post the dragon has ~180k HP too. You apparently need magic break/breakdown and Celes default SB (or Tyro's sentinel grimmoire) to handle the spamming of AoE casts the dragon does.

I didn't realize you could do them in any order so I may give the fire caverns a shot. I have a lot of FF VI gear so hopefully that'll help. I suspect I may not have enough honed skills though to get through all the trash and boss, let alone master it to get the Phoenix summon.

There is another hyper wrist among the levels though and an Angel wings both of which are quite nice. Will have to push to do those at least.

You don't need to Master for Phoenix. Just complete it.

[Hunter Noventa]

I only started this game a little while ago and it's been beating me up in some places. Somehow I found Ultros and Typhon harder than Atma Weapon. (Screw the translations they use. Orthros? Seriously? FF14 calls him Ultros)

But I've almost got Locke.

My party's been Cloud, Kain, Vanille, Lenna and Tyro, mostly because I got a 5-star spear for Kain.

Is Tyro better as a caster or a fighter? Both he and Cloud have 3-star swords equipped right now and I was wondering if I might be doing it wrong.

[Calemyr]

Is Tyro better as a caster or a fighter? Both he and Cloud have 3-star swords equipped right now and I was wondering if I might be doing it wrong.

Statistically, I'd say Tyro is about B-Class in every category. He hits about as hard as Locke (which is honestly fairly good, but significantly weaker than Cloud or Josef). He is equally capable in any role, assuming equivalent gear and skills for all roles, and can equip very rare or currently unrepresented class skills like summoning, swordspell, and ninja skills. His access to any gear and any skill is his strong suit. Whatever good stuff the rest of your party can't use can be well spent on him.

Personally, I give him my second best sword, my best defensive gear, my highest tier healing spell, and a 2* swordspell that makes sense for the dungeon (or fills in gaps in the rest of the party's loadouts). With that loadout he's usually able to participate strongly on auto-attacks, while being able to heal in a pinch and exploit any weaknesses his swordspell can take advantage of. If you've got a good summon spell, he's also a good person to give it to.

For the rest of the party:

I give Cloud my best weapon, my best attack gear, and two of my highest tier swordspells (currently Blizzara Strike and Thundara Strike). He hits like a truck and when he can exploit a vulnerability, he really digs in.

I give my white mage (Vanille or Lenna) a low tier but highly honed Cure spell and an offensive spell (Dia if they're a MND only character or my third best elemental spell if they're red mages like Vanille).

I give my black mage (Rinoa or Rydia) my two highest tier elemental spells.

I give my final member (currently either Locke or Josef) the best gear I can find for them and both Double Strike and Armor Break.

[Chen]

You don't need to Master for Phoenix. Just complete it.

Oh nice. I clearly looked at that too quicky.


Is Tyro better as a caster or a fighter? Both he and Cloud have 3-star swords equipped right now and I was wondering if I might be doing it wrong.

Tyro has very bad stats but can use everything gear and ability wise. To me this puts him firmly in the healer/support role. I equip him with heavy armor, light staff and angel wings (or ring whichever the healing one is). With that he can heal around 1600 per curaga. That's pretty solid for almost all content so far except the very hard ones (Rinoa elite events, maybe the end of the Locke events). If I put Aerith in the same gear she heals maybe 200-300 more with a curaga but is MUCH squishier. And honestly 1600 vs 1900 on healing isn't a huge deal. Putting him as melee or caster dps seems bad since his low stats do gimp his output a fair bit. For easy content he can be given a decent weapon so you can auto battle through it, but once the content gets hard his damage starts noticeably becoming sub par. The second elite level in Locke's event he can no longer one shot mobs while Wakka can, and both are using the exact same gear (Hyper wrist and Wakka's game ball, yes I have 2 :P).

[Hunter Noventa]

Well that about fits how I've been using him. If i got a decent bow I'd probably stick him in the back with more support-type abilities, but they're not very forthcoming.

I'm one dungeon away from getting Locke, and the only thing that gave me trouble was Ultros. I doubt I'll manage the elite version though, not with my levels in the mid-twenties.

Kain and Cloud are rampaging through everything. Helps that Kain has a 5-star spear like I said, in addition to buffed-up ninja gear and a Hyper Wrist. And I just crafted Jump, that'll be fun.

[shizukanashi]

My only 5 star is also a spear for Kain and he does about 3x the damage as anyone else. I leveled both Locke and Cyan to 25 with eggs and threw them into my level 35 party. They are making up for the lack of levels with synergy and I hardly notice a difference. I am about halfway through the elite missions and loving this event. The previous two I got Lenna and Vanille but little else, this event I am getting gear and orbs galore. The announcement said water and intimidate would be needed so I am working on honing thpse, I don't have armor break yet.

I am doing the elite in order and thus far have no trouble but I fear I may not get to Pheonix. Besides armor break any other tips?

[Forbiddenwar]

Well today's daily has been a pile of bad news good news.

I started the day needing 1 black orb to hone an ability. I thought I'd puck it up quick and get back to the event.

14 hours later spent farming three star orbs from heroic level and I still need just 1 black orb.

The good news is I managed to get a hundred white orbs and maxed out curaga, so yay?

[Starwulf]

Man because of the Pulse event and the Locke event I now need to seriously grind out a TON Of Black Orbs, I have loads of fire and lightning and Ice orbs, but virtually no Black orbs to use to hone my 3 star spells.

[Chen]

I am doing the elite in order and thus far have no trouble but I fear I may not get to Pheonix. Besides armor break any other tips?

The difficulty ramps up pretty quick once you hit Vector. I'd be incredibly surprised if you could beat the red dragon without a level 50 party (maybe some lower but with realm synergy). I'd say try the first battle of the Elite Fire Caves. The trash is already kind of an eye opener.

For reference my level 50 Kain with his 5* weapon and a hyper wrist can no longer one shot trash once I hit Elite Esper Caves I believe. Celes with a maxed Falchion++ is right around the threshold of being able to depending on the monster.

Intimidate definitely helps on many of the bosses since they're vulnerable to paralyze. The Red dragon unfortunately is immune. Also read on the reddit post that using reflect for the red dragon fight (to force it to keep dispelling it) doesn't actually work since the dispel is basically "free" for the dragon (doesn't eat up any ATB time). The shell->magic breakdown -> shell trick is one way I heard to make the dragon easier. Even that though at around 170k-180k HP that's 18-19 9999 hits before it dies. That's a pretty long fight.

[T.G. Oskar]

So yeah, joining the bandwagon too. Well, joined a few weeks ago, mostly when I heard the event that allowed you to unlock Terra was on the horizon. Would have liked to do it on a smartphone, but mine's effectively out of commission (to be precise: it still works, but I have it on permanent lend because someone else needs it more than I do, and that has happened since the last 8-9 months), so I'm playing it on the house's tablet.

It's entertaining because it has a strategic requirement. You can have favorites, but it doesn't help if your favorite isn't that great. Cloud's a fan-fave, so he's kinda overpowered; very surprised that, of all the characters, Terra is considered one of the best, if not THE best, Black Magic user (too bad I couldn't have her Enhancer weapon...:smallsigh:). Getting the new characters seems pretty easy, and the rewards for doing the harder levels aren't so OP that they invite a P2W mentality. In fact, getting Mythril is relatively easy, so much that I've done two sets of 11 Rare Draw Relic gachas (got only three 5-star items; a Genji Helmet, a Blitz Sword, and Locke's signature weapon the Rising Star, which was a really lucky grab!)

So far, my team consists of Terra, speedy character (formerly Wakka, currently Locke, doubting if I keep Locke or eventually, if they release him, switch to Balthier), Keeper, a white mage (currently Lenna, probably switch if Rosa is released and ends up being better), warrior-type (currently Celes, still on flux unless Steiner appears and happens to be good enough; the warrior-type MUST have Spellblade, tho). Keeper currently divides its duties into casting Protect and using a Spellblade; Terra has Firaga and a debuff (as of now, Venom Attack, but might switch to Venom Buster); my speedy character has the Boost ability, my White Mage has the highest Cure spell I have and Haste, and my warrior-type has another Spellblade attack. So far, it has allowed me to run most of the missions nicely. Level is gravitating, but my highest two are the Keeper at lv. 36 and Terra at level 38 (and they're fixed slots, so no changing!).

Didn't got too much love for the FFXIII event, so I'm really taking advantage of it now rather than at the moment, since I found the FFV event more profitable (plus, I wanted to give Lenna high levels); got Locke today, and slowly doing the Elite quests in order. Locke, naturally, is right now my highest hitter, despite his level: with Boost, I can hit pretty high with Mirage Dive (and the Slow effect is great!).

Oh, and...next update will have "Friend Summon" and Record Materia. About time!

[Starwulf]

Ya know, I have to ask, to those of you who say you just started in the last week or two and claim to have already done ALL the normal dungeons, how? I'm in my late 30's, and I am barely winning the later FFXIII dungeons and I had to completely give up on FFVIII dungeons I was getting my butt whomped, and I've been playing since a few days after the start of the Cecil event which was like 2 months or more ago. Elite versions are even worse, I have plenty that I can't even attempt and quite a few that I can beat but not get full Mastery.

Are you putting in cash? 5+ hours a day in grinding out mats to super hone your abilities? Because I honestly just don't see how it's even remotely possible. I have Several T2 spells up to 6 casts for Black Magic, and Cura/Curaga to 8 each. Combat skills are at 4 uses almost across the board, but that just really doesn't seem to be enough to for some of the later dungeons. Heck I haven't even been able to beat Hard version on about half the daily dungeons yet.

And yes, I use synergy where I can. I don't waste upgrade mats on 1 star equipment, but I'll happily do so on T2 ones and upwards.

I think one of the most annoying bits is trying to fit in spells like Blind, or Bio in order to get full mastery for a dungeon, especially when it's one I'm barely beating as it is and need those extra spots. They seriously need to add a third skill slot in this game, it would make things much more manageable.

[Fleeing Coward]

Personally, I just waste virtually no stamina other than the couple of hours I sleep which is how I got through all of normal with full mastery so quickly. I got my 10th 3 month celebration login bonus last night so I've been playing 11 days.
Only a single 5* (Genji Shield), a couple of 4*/upgraded 3* from my 2 11 pulls, havn't spent a cent on the game.
Only a couple of rank 2s in terms of honing, I just auto through to bosses then blow all the abilities there.

Team setup (All currently in low 40s):
Cloud - Retaliate/Thunder Strike
Kain - Blade Bash/Double Cut
Tyro - Dark Buster/(Insert Mastery Skill Here)
Lenna - Cura/(Insert Mastery Skill Here)
Vanille - 2 x -ra Black Magic Skill

Retaliate cheese works real well on most bosses as long as your level doesn't fall too far behind. Didn't even bother with realm synergy.
Gear wise, I took the time to max out all the gear that my 5 are wearing.

Also if you havn't already, go master Elite Chaos Shrine, Elite Underground Waterway and Elite Mako Reactor No. 5. That'll get you 3 decent free 4* pieces.

[DiscipleofBob]

I've only been playing a few weeks and I'm done with the classic dungeons. Having some 4* equipment helps (although I JUST got a 5* sword! Woot! ), but I'd attribute my progress on farming those weekly XP dungeons. They can be a huge lifesaver. Right now I have 4 level 50 characters: Cloud, Cyan, Rinoa, and Rydia. Josef is close at 45, but there aren't any II event dungeons coming up soon so I'm trying to get all the IV, VI, X, and XIII characters ready for realm synergy.

EDIT: Adding to the free 4* equipment, Elite Baron Castle will net you a 4* Bow. It can be difficult even with maxed characters though, especially Baigan and his self-destructing arms.

[Chen]

Ya know, I have to ask, to those of you who say you just started in the last week or two and claim to have already done ALL the normal dungeons, how? I'm in my late 30's, and I am barely winning the later FFXIII dungeons and I had to completely give up on FFVIII dungeons I was getting my butt whomped, and I've been playing since a few days after the start of the Cecil event which was like 2 months or more ago. Elite versions are even worse, I have plenty that I can't even attempt and quite a few that I can beat but not get full Mastery.

Are you putting in cash? 5+ hours a day in grinding out mats to super hone your abilities? Because I honestly just don't see how it's even remotely possible. I have Several T2 spells up to 6 casts for Black Magic, and Cura/Curaga to 8 each. Combat skills are at 4 uses almost across the board, but that just really doesn't seem to be enough to for some of the later dungeons. Heck I haven't even been able to beat Hard version on about half the daily dungeons yet.

And yes, I use synergy where I can. I don't waste upgrade mats on 1 star equipment, but I'll happily do so on T2 ones and upwards.

I think one of the most annoying bits is trying to fit in spells like Blind, or Bio in order to get full mastery for a dungeon, especially when it's one I'm barely beating as it is and need those extra spots. They seriously need to add a third skill slot in this game, it would make things much more manageable.

How many 11 pulls have you done? We got a crapload of mythril recently and those 4-5 star weapons really help. I started during the Terra event and my first 11 pull was lucky in that I got Wakka's ball, Kain's lance and a Danjuro. That said, even without the 5 star gear you get a fair bit of 2-3 star gear from events that can thus be combined into 4-5 star gear. The greatsword from Terra's event for example. Or the various armor sets from all the events (Power vest from Terra's event was awesome for a good while).

Have you done some of the easy elite levels? There are some that are around level 10-15 difficulty. Two of the easier ones give the light staff and light rod as rewards which are HUGE boosts for your casters. I'm still using both those in fact on my white and black magic users.

Another thing would be that on Sundays you should ONLY spend stamina on the Exp dungeon. Nothing else. Getting your characters leveled will be a huge benefit. The flans in the Rinoa event were a godsend for that too though I guess thats more hindsight. Was very easy to level chars up to 50 there, especially if they had summon (one Dragon cast killed all the flans). For now the sunday dungeon is the best.

I imagine you should be able to master at least the first level of the hard exp dungeon especially if you blow all your abilities on it. Then just retreat and do it again with a full refresh. You won't get the 1 lesser growth egg for completing it, but its FAR more efficient than slogging through the dungeon and not mastering it (thus getting less exp) since you have to ration your ability use.

I've been doing this with my woefully underleveled black/white mages and summoner. Black mage has 2 uses of quake which lets me one shot 2 of the 3 waves. White mage hastes and hopefully i get 2 thundaja casts off before the last waves kills anyone. S/L to make sure no one dies. I then reset the dungeon and repeat. Once I hone quake I suspect I'll be able to do it on Heroic with 4 quake casts.

[Mr.Sandman]

Man, I don't see how you all do it. I started Mid Areith dungeon, the first Event if my research is correct, and I am still only high 30's and just starting the FF8 dungeons today. I have only done around 3 11 pulls, no character specific stuff, 3 5*s etc. Maybe I work too much, and don't have much time for this, but still, fun game.

Edit* Not Areith, Tifa. You could get Sephoroth too, but only by beating the whole event. Areith was later.

[Forbiddenwar]

Man, I don't see how you all do it. I started Mid Areith dungeon, the first Event if my research is correct, and I am still only high 30's and just starting the FF8 dungeons today. I have only done around 3 11 pulls, no character specific stuff, 3 5*s etc. Maybe I work too much, and don't have much time for this, but still, fun game.

Perhaps those talking about completing the normal dungeons don't have ff8 or 13 dungeons yet? I don't know, I just know that I don't have any ff8 or any ff13 and only have the tutorial dungeons in ff7 nor has there been an aeirth event yet as far as I know.
To clarify, maybe there is some more difficult dungeons that haven't been released yet in the west.

[Chen]

Perhaps those talking about completing the normal dungeons don't have ff8 or 13 dungeons yet? I don't know, I just know that I don't have any ff8 or any ff13 and only have the tutorial dungeons in ff7 nor has there been an aeirth event yet as far as I know.
To clarify, maybe there is some more difficult dungeons that haven't been released yet in the west.

I think everyone is talking about the dungeons released in the west overall though. Its probably easier to say what your stamina cap is to determine how much content you've done. Im currently at 92 stamina I think but it's only because I've had a hard time finding a long period to play in a row and I end up wasting energy if I just clear through elites (every 2-3 refil your energy).

On that note I tried the Red dragon yesterday and still got my ass handed to me. I may have to break down and spend a mythril to refill on that fight after the trash. That said I took biora instead of poisonra by accident which didn't really help. Also took Watera instead of Blizzaga in the foolish hopes of not losing medals for the "don't exploit ice vulnerability". After seeing the fight I'm convinced mastery is a pipe dream so I'll just bring the big guns next time.

[DiscipleofBob]

Perhaps those talking about completing the normal dungeons don't have ff8 or 13 dungeons yet? I don't know, I just know that I don't have any ff8 or any ff13 and only have the tutorial dungeons in ff7 nor has there been an aeirth event yet as far as I know.
To clarify, maybe there is some more difficult dungeons that haven't been released yet in the west.

West guy here with all classic complete. There are dungeons including III, VIII, and XIII in classic mode. And as far as I know, ours is the global release as opposed to the JP version. If you don't have those classic dungeons yet, you haven't completed all the prerequisite dungeons.

Event characters released so far include Tidus, Cecil (both versions), Terra, Celes, Tifa, Aerith, Sephiroth, Rinoa, Vanille, and Locke.

[Forbiddenwar]

West guy here with all classic complete. There are dungeons including III, VIII, and XIII in classic mode. And as far as I know, ours is the global release as opposed to the JP version. If you don't have those classic dungeons yet, you haven't completed all the prerequisite dungeons.

Event characters released so far include Tidus, Cecil (both versions), Terra, Celes, Tifa, Aerith, Sephiroth, Rinoa, Vanille, and Locke.

Strange. I'm in the US and have completed all the normal dungeons and most of the elite dungeons, but I don't have any 8, 3 or 13? How do you unlock them?

[Calemyr]

Strange. I'm in the US and have completed all the normal dungeons and most of the elite dungeons, but I don't have any 8, 3 or 13? How do you unlock them?

That is very strange indeed. Also in the US and I've got stages in all three of those games.

[Chen]

Strange. I'm in the US and have completed all the normal dungeons and most of the elite dungeons, but I don't have any 8, 3 or 13? How do you unlock them?

Are you sure you've completed all of them? A HUGE number got added to FF VI and I think those are the ones that start unlocking the others. The Phantom Train is the first new one I think in FF VI.

[DiscipleofBob]

Strange. I'm in the US and have completed all the normal dungeons and most of the elite dungeons, but I don't have any 8, 3 or 13? How do you unlock them?

You probably missed a few classic dungeons. Scroll around, double check all the doors again. Make sure you didn't already unlock FFXIII and miss it

[Starwulf]

How many 11 pulls have you done? We got a crapload of mythril recently and those 4-5 star weapons really help. I started during the Terra event and my first 11 pull was lucky in that I got Wakka's ball, Kain's lance and a Danjuro. That said, even without the 5 star gear you get a fair bit of 2-3 star gear from events that can thus be combined into 4-5 star gear. The greatsword from Terra's event for example. Or the various armor sets from all the events (Power vest from Terra's event was awesome for a good while).

1 and I got 2 4 stars out of it, both armor, everything else was 3 stars >< I have enough for another but I'm not pulling until there is relics I WANT.


Have you done some of the easy elite levels? There are some that are around level 10-15 difficulty. Two of the easier ones give the light staff and light rod as rewards which are HUGE boosts for your casters. I'm still using both those in fact on my white and black magic users.

I've done all of FF7, FF1, FF10, FF2 and half of FF4. Maybe a few of FF5? None of FF6, none of FF8 or 13. And yeah I have both of those rods fully maxed out.


Another thing would be that on Sundays you should ONLY spend stamina on the Exp dungeon. Nothing else. Getting your characters leveled will be a huge benefit. The flans in the Rinoa event were a godsend for that too though I guess thats more hindsight. Was very easy to level chars up to 50 there, especially if they had summon (one Dragon cast killed all the flans). For now the sunday dungeon is the best.

I imagine you should be able to master at least the first level of the hard exp dungeon especially if you blow all your abilities on it. Then just retreat and do it again with a full refresh. You won't get the 1 lesser growth egg for completing it, but its FAR more efficient than slogging through the dungeon and not mastering it (thus getting less exp) since you have to ration your ability use.

I can't even touch Hard for EXP, it slaughters me. I just tried it this last Sunday, I barely made it past the first round, was dead by the second. This is what I don't get. I've been playing for quite a while, all my guys are late 30's, Tidus and Wakka are nearly 40, and I just get trashed on stuff like this ><


I've been doing this with my woefully underleveled black/white mages and summoner. Black mage has 2 uses of quake which lets me one shot 2 of the 3 waves. White mage hastes and hopefully i get 2 thundaja casts off before the last waves kills anyone. S/L to make sure no one dies. I then reset the dungeon and repeat. Once I hone quake I suspect I'll be able to do it on Heroic with 4 quake casts.

How the hell do you have Quake? Isn't that a Tier 4 spell? And Thundaja?! That's the one that just got released in the Pulse Fa'Cie event, and farming that many points would have required me to grind 8 hours a day on normal every day to get there.

Yeah I'm pretty frustrated, people that I have 2-3x as much play time are significantly farther ahead and I really don't understand it. All my guys are wearing 4 star equipment, either be from combining 2* or 3* stuff, or just natural 4*, I've honed my abilities to have 6 casts of the Black Magic spells I have, 8 for the cure spells, all my weapon skills have 4 uses(including retaliate, though I only have ONE retaliate), and I just get whupped, and yet others don't have this issue....grrr.

[DiscipleofBob]

Sounds like the problem might be the equipment, which I'm sad to say is still a crapshoot no matter how much Myrhril or Gems you spend. Some people get multiple 5* equipment, some people get, like, a robe and that's it. Upgraded 4* equipment should at least get you through Hard.

[Forbiddenwar]

Are you sure you've completed all of them? A HUGE number got added to FF VI and I think those are the ones that start unlocking the others. The Phantom Train is the first new one I think in FF VI.

I got all of FF6 mastered through the floating continent part 2, most of which I have mastered elite as well

Here is all the dungeons I have access to:
FF1: 2 Normal mastered and elite mastered
FF2: 3 Normal mastered and elite mastered
FF4: too many to count all normal mastered

.
.
.
Oh
Feymarch hasn't been played.
Well at least this will be quick.

[Forbiddenwar]

1 and I got 2 4 stars out of it, both armor, everything else was 3 stars >< I have enough for another but I'm not pulling until there is relics I WANT.



I've done all of FF7, FF1, FF10, FF2 and half of FF4. Maybe a few of FF5? None of FF6, none of FF8 or 13. And yeah I have both of those rods fully maxed out.



I can't even touch Hard for EXP, it slaughters me. I just tried it this last Sunday, I barely made it past the first round, was dead by the second. This is what I don't get. I've been playing for quite a while, all my guys are late 30's, Tidus and Wakka are nearly 40, and I just get trashed on stuff like this ><



How the hell do you have Quake? Isn't that a Tier 4 spell? And Thundaja?! That's the one that just got released in the Pulse Fa'Cie event, and farming that many points would have required me to grind 8 hours a day on normal every day to get there.

Yeah I'm pretty frustrated, people that I have 2-3x as much play time are significantly farther ahead and I really don't understand it. All my guys are wearing 4 star equipment, either be from combining 2* or 3* stuff, or just natural 4*, I've honed my abilities to have 6 casts of the Black Magic spells I have, 8 for the cure spells, all my weapon skills have 4 uses(including retaliate, though I only have ONE retaliate), and I just get whupped, and yet others don't have this issue....grrr.


Sounds like the problem might be the equipment, which I'm sad to say is still a crapshoot no matter how much Myrhril or Gems you spend. Some people get multiple 5* equipment, some people get, like, a robe and that's it. Upgraded 4* equipment should at least get you through Hard.

Did you mention the characters and what abilities and weapons you've given them? There is a huge disparity between on the characters capabilities, especially when given the wrong abilities

[Mr.Sandman]

So, was looking through the Elite prizes for Lockes event, and saw Blizzaga. 'Ooh,' I thought to myself, 'Another 3* I don't need to grind orbs for.' I burned all the Growth Eggs I had on getting Locke up to mid 20's, grabbed Terra and Celes, and went in swinging. Cloud and DK Cecil rounded out my party, with this setup I usually have Celes playing subpar healer to simply have some healing, but her damage is decent, as is her Def and HP for someone who can heal at all. I breeze my way through to Orthos, and am doing rather decently until he hits the bottom left corner, and starts Confusing. His confuse always hit all the boys, always missed the girls, and my people started killing each other. I end with only Locke and Celes with slivers left of HP, Locke confused again and moving way quicker than Celes. By random chance he targets the darn'd octopus through his confusion and finishes him off. I was nowhere near mastery, but that Blizzaga was mine.

[Chen]

I can't even touch Hard for EXP, it slaughters me. I just tried it this last Sunday, I barely made it past the first round, was dead by the second. This is what I don't get. I've been playing for quite a while, all my guys are late 30's, Tidus and Wakka are nearly 40, and I just get trashed on stuff like this ><

Clearing the first round is really what's important. Blow ALL your abilities, big, little etc to clear it as fast as possible. With the rod you mentioned having your black mage should be able to one shot the enemies. Gang the rest of your guys on the second enemy and blow all their skills and they should die fairly quickly. And then just quit after the first battle. Unless you mean you can't even beat the first fight itself. I can't believe that would be the case though, unless you haven't leveled any of your black magic users (Terra, Rinoa, Vanille, even black mage really).


How the hell do you have Quake? Isn't that a Tier 4 spell? And Thundaja?! That's the one that just got released in the Pulse Fa'Cie event, and farming that many points would have required me to grind 8 hours a day on normal every day to get there.

Phantom train elite is a level 23 dungeon and drops 4 star Dark orbs (yes the FF VI elite dungeons start high and drop low again at the phantom train). This is also a FF VI level which means a greatsword is 105 attack if maxed out. That's equal to a natural 5 star weapon. Mist Cave elite is a level 20 dungeon and drops 4 star Earth orbs. The dragon is easy to kill if you give your strongest attacker (Cloud usually, Sephiroth if you have him) retaliate and just have everyone else double cut that guy. 4 star black orbs are obtained from various elites including some of the easy ones (you probably already have enough of these if you cleared a fair number of easy elite levels). That's all it takes to make quake.

Trick to save on stamina: get to the boss level and clear to the boss. At the boss turn off your wifi (after the fight as started). Finish the fight. If the orb drops, turn on your wifi again and continue. If it doesn't drop when you get the "cannot connect" screen, exit the app and restart it. Now instead of clicking continue, click cancel. This will use up the stamina for the boss fight, but will let you try it again. This way you only have to clear TO the boss once and then just keep doing the boss fight (at its stamina cost) until you get the 4 star orb drop. Phantom train is super efficient for this since the boss is only 5 stamina.


Yeah I'm pretty frustrated, people that I have 2-3x as much play time are significantly farther ahead and I really don't understand it. All my guys are wearing 4 star equipment, either be from combining 2* or 3* stuff, or just natural 4*, I've honed my abilities to have 6 casts of the Black Magic spells I have, 8 for the cure spells, all my weapon skills have 4 uses(including retaliate, though I only have ONE retaliate), and I just get whupped, and yet others don't have this issue....grrr.

What are the attack stats on your weapons out of curiosity? I'm assuming around 50ish range? How hard do your melee guys hit? Also who are you using in your group? Some of the guys are REALLY subpar if you don't have their 5 star weapons (and would still be subpar if you had equivalent weapons on other people). With 4 star gear on everyone I'm not really sure what to say. That and chars in the 40s should be sufficient to clear a lot of content.

[Fleeing Coward]

Like the others said, it's probably an equipment issue.

For reference, the weps my 3 frontline characters were using that got me through normal - 4* Dancing Dagger - 59 att, 4* Nodachi - 61 att and upgraded 3* Death Sickle - 49 att.
Cloud one shots all the trash, Tyro and Kain comes close.

If your weps are much lower than that att wise, that might be why you're having problems since there's usually no need to use any abilities before boss except for a spot heal or 2.

[Starwulf]

Clearing the first round is really what's important. Blow ALL your abilities, big, little etc to clear it as fast as possible. With the rod you mentioned having your black mage should be able to one shot the enemies. Gang the rest of your guys on the second enemy and blow all their skills and they should die fairly quickly. And then just quit after the first battle. Unless you mean you can't even beat the first fight itself. I can't believe that would be the case though, unless you haven't leveled any of your black magic users (Terra, Rinoa, Vanille, even black mage really).



Phantom train elite is a level 23 dungeon and drops 4 star Dark orbs (yes the FF VI elite dungeons start high and drop low again at the phantom train). This is also a FF VI level which means a greatsword is 105 attack if maxed out. That's equal to a natural 5 star weapon. Mist Cave elite is a level 20 dungeon and drops 4 star Earth orbs. The dragon is easy to kill if you give your strongest attacker (Cloud usually, Sephiroth if you have him) retaliate and just have everyone else double cut that guy. 4 star black orbs are obtained from various elites including some of the easy ones (you probably already have enough of these if you cleared a fair number of easy elite levels). That's all it takes to make quake.

A:(and I'm addressing the last thing first) Son of a bleep! I had no idea that the FFVI elite dungeons took a nosedive for difficulty like that considering they start out far harder then I can even consider touching. B: Yeah I can clear the entire first stage of Hard. If I was dying on the first two enemies I'd positively cry.


Trick to save on stamina: get to the boss level and clear to the boss. At the boss turn off your wifi (after the fight as started). Finish the fight. If the orb drops, turn on your wifi again and continue. If it doesn't drop when you get the "cannot connect" screen, exit the app and restart it. Now instead of clicking continue, click cancel. This will use up the stamina for the boss fight, but will let you try it again. This way you only have to clear TO the boss once and then just keep doing the boss fight (at its stamina cost) until you get the 4 star orb drop. Phantom train is super efficient for this since the boss is only 5 stamina.

That's a great idea, but it's also "save-scumming" which I've moderately tried to avoid in games(I'm not a saint though, I've done it in several situations). Still I might do it here just because yeah Quake would be a MONSTROUS boost, the ability to one-shot an entire wave of just about anything would be...well Monstrous. LOL. I'd be able to finish all of the Hard Dungeons with that ability I think.(I make it usually to the last wave of the 2nd stage of Hard for the Exp dungeons for example).




What are the attack stats on your weapons out of curiosity? I'm assuming around 50ish range? How hard do your melee guys hit? Also who are you using in your group? Some of the guys are REALLY subpar if you don't have their 5 star weapons (and would still be subpar if you had equivalent weapons on other people). With 4 star gear on everyone I'm not really sure what to say. That and chars in the 40s should be sufficient to clear a lot of content.

Hmm, I'll check and post in a bit, but it'll be a different post. I don't know them offhand, and my tablet is charging atm, I don't generally take it off until about 10pm due to the fact that I can't find the "Official" Official charger for it(I've bought what people claimed were the "Official" one, it's not), and without that my tablet takes 13 hours to charge to full when it should only take 4.

I can give a quick, very loose estimate though:

Aerith has one of those 4 star rods, the more heavily MND based, maxed out at 15/15. Armor is the Hypno Crown? A natural 4* mage-based crown, 15/15. Abilities are T3 Thunder spell and Curaga. The thunder spell is a placeholder for whatever spell the dungeon requires me to hit the boss with in order to get mastery. Sits in the back row.

Cloud: Whatever weapon/armor is best for the particular dungeon, usually a 3* or 4*, either natural(3* only) or combined(4*). Not all are maxed out, but all are 10 or higher. Front row and uses Thunder Strike & Retaliate. TS is my only ability that's not honed to 4 uses because I've used so many lightning orbs on other stuff.

Rydia: The other 4* Star rod that's more magic attack based, 15/15. Hypno Crown(Yeah all my nat 4*'s are armor) 15/15. Abilities are T2 Thunder with 8 uses and T3 Blizzard(aga?) with only 2 uses(I have all but the black orbs necessary to upgrade it). Back row.

Wakka: Same as cloud, 3-4* weapons/armor depending on the realm. Abilities are Wind Strike & Venom Attack, both to 4 uses. Front row.

Tidus: Same as Cloud/Wakka 3-4* weapons depending on the realm. Holder of my only natural 5* armor, the Genji Shield. Abilities are Double Cut & Boost, both have 4 uses. Front row.

Oh and I have a fully combined T3 armor that's at 5* stars that gets use when I either have no armor for my guys that gives realm synergy, or when it happens to give realm synergy itself. My guys, when they don't have realm synergy weapon or character wise, hit for 500-800 on any stage that's considered "hard". On normal they hit about 750-1100. When they have realm synergy, they can hit upwards of 3k on normal dungeons, and about 1500 or so on "hard" type dungeons. Unfortunately I don't seem to ever have more then one weapon or character that ever has realm Synergy. I just don't like leveling up characters that I don't like. I might have to get past that so I have more realm Synergy, but I"d prefer to get my main guys to 50 first.

[Fleeing Coward]

If those are your numbers then I'm honestly not sure why you're having trouble going through normal dungeons or hard dailies. I mastery cleared all of that easily with about the same level of gear and level.

How much are you getting hit for in the normal dungeons/hard dailies?

[Starwulf]

If those are your numbers then I'm honestly not sure why you're having trouble going through normal dungeons or hard dailies. I mastery cleared all of that easily with about the same level of gear and level.

How much are you getting hit for in the normal dungeons/hard dailies?

In FFVIII and FFXIII I'm getting smacked for 2-300 a pop on my guys and 300-400 on my girls. My biggest issue is things that seem to auto-kill my guys(I just got "mastery" on the third Elite Dungeon in FFX, but the boss literally one-shotted Rydia despite all the sites I checked swearing up and down it doesn't have a one-shot. She was at full health) or they use AOE spells that hit all of my guys for 400 a shot. I end up either dying, or losing mastery because I lose 2 people and finish with everyone on low health.

In the Hard Dungeons I'm getting smacked for 700 a shot on my guys and nearly 1k on my girls ><

[Fleeing Coward]

That sounds abit on the high side but not by much. What kind of def/res are on your characters?

I just did a quick test of third elite in X and Hard daily just to see where my damage taken is at and I'm only taking a few hundred less than you.

Third Elite:
Trash - They got a single hit in on me since they usually die to 1 shots. That single hit did ~200 damage to Cloud.
Boss - His attack hit my Vanille for ~1.3k but that's just 1 Cura.

Hard Daily - Got hit once for ~550 on Tyro but again, your front row fighters should be one shotting them with auto (and definately one shotting if you're using an ability) that they rarely actually hit you.

My test party without synergy bonus:
Cloud: Lvl 44, 3310 hp, 172 Att, 154 Def, 102 Res
Kain: Lvl 44, 2964 hp, 131 Att, 174 Def, 107 Res
Tyro: Lvl 41, 2846 hp, 132 Att, 114 Def, 108 Res
Lenna (Back Row): Lvl 44, 2369 hp, 78 Def, 147 Res
Vanille (Back Row): Lvl 43, 2465 hp, 66 Def, 129 Res

If your numbers are close to that then it's probably just a case of you needing to level your characters abit more since I don't think anything else should be different.

From what I remember of the normal dungeons, it was all just simple kill the boss before they kill you and I never had any trouble achieving that. Closest I got to failing was Dollet due to the 4 stage boss and I think Odin where I beat the Doom timer by like 3 seconds.

[Starwulf]

Alrighty I'm finally on, here are my official stats!

Aerith: Level 37 2011 HP, Atk 67 Def 70 Mag 117 Acc 113 Res 139 Eva 124 Mnd 164 Spd 110. Equipment is Light staff 15/15 Hypno Crown 15/15 Talisman.
Cloud: level 35 2742 HP Atk 140 Def 118 Mag 41 Acc 110 Res 79 Eva 123 Mnd 50 Spd 114 Equip is Falchion 15/15 Mythril Mail 17/20 Hyper Wrist
Rydia: Level 38 1805 HP Atk 80 Def 62 Mag 179 Res 116 Mnd 111 Acc 113 Eva 125 SPd 110 Equpment is Light Rod 15/15 Silver Bangle 10/15(I had it on for XIII, normal is Hypno 15/15) Earring
Wakka: level 38 2320 HP Atk 113 Def 118 Mag 61 Res 80 Mnd 61 Acc 115 Eva 123 Spd 113: Air Knife 10/10 Diamond Armor 10/15 Hero's Ring
Tidus: Level 39 2997 HP Atk 152 Def 147 Mag 56 Res 109 Mnd 56 Acc 113 Eva 136 Spd 141 Equp is Warrior's Sword(Hey I do have a nat 4*) 12/15 Genji Shield 16/20 Hyper Wrist.

Oh and for Quake I need 2 Greater Earth Orbs and 3 Greater Dark Orbs. I have all the Greater Black Orbs(11 actually, twice as many as I need).

[Chen]

Without tricks like resetting the app when you get a bad roll in a fight (like those disastrous AoEs) the game is significantly harder. Similarly farming greater orbs is insane if you don't use the trick I mentioned. I think the drop rate is something like 20% chance. That means without the trick the earth orbs are going to take around 185 energy each (average). The dark orbs are going to take 145 energy each on average.

[Fleeing Coward]

Yeah, looking at those stats, it probably is just equipment holding you back abit from progressing.
All my weps now and most of my armour are natural 4* and it makes a big difference compared to upgraded 2/3*.

[Starwulf]

Yeah I'm just really hoping for a relic draw event that has something for Cloud or Tidus or Wakka in it. I have about 70 Mythril(I did have over 100, but used 50 at the start of the Locke event. That's apparently where I got that 4 star weapon from) and I will happily burn through every bit of it.

[Suichimo]

Reddit says the Buster Sword is coming back up, Starwulf.

[Mr.Sandman]

Whelp, just loaded up for the morning and it looks like some cool updates are coming down the pipe. Unfortunately my wife will have the phone for the next week as she visits family, but luckily it looks like the next event is Tidus again, who I already have and thus won't miss out on. For those wishing the new Friend Code of a vastly underleveled and undergeared me, it is 95HA, rather ironic as I was briefly a Stand-up Comedian. No clue what it does yet, but it looks interesting.

[Suichimo]

My FC is 9Qce.

That'll get ya a low 30s Vanille with a Binding Staff, Mirage Veil, a necklace I forget the name of, and using Deprotega.

[Infernally Clay]

Did a bunch of those quests in the new update and actually got a lot out of it. Lots of mythril and was even able to get Locke and Vanille up to the same level as Cloud, Rydia and Kain.

Pretty glad they buffed Kain, too. Mine now has 130-something attack, which is great. My level 31 Cloud is still sitting at 180 though my roaming warrior version has 188.

My friend code is 9uVh if you want to add me.

[DiscipleofBob]

My friend code is ef9h.

I didn't know characters got patched as well. Anyone know specifics yet?

[Forbiddenwar]

Friend code: QFWA
Use it to summon level 50 Kain double jump with 235 attack. (He has a Max Nat 5 spear and other attack boosting items.)

Any idea how to get memory crystals yet? I may gave missed it.

[tyckspoon]

e3iN is me, Sentinel Grimoire with associated Soul Break.

Memory Crystals aren't available just yet; event characters will have them in the event they come from (so this upcoming round of Tidus will be our first possible Memory Crystal), normal characters will get them in higher difficulty Elite dungeons that haven't been loaded to our version yet - the post I found listing locations from JP indicates those levels are still 2 or 3 waves on from what's live for the rest of us.

[Starwulf]

GUtu is me, Tidus is my Roaming Warrior with 164 attack and his standard Soul Break.

Btw, why does the Free relic draw screen show Cloud and Aerith and Wakka and a few others relics being able to be drawn, but yet there is no option to actually draw for them?! I'd much rather spend my Mythril drawing for those. If I can't though I'm extremely tempted to do one for Tidus' relic draw right now.

[Forbiddenwar]

GUtu is me, Tidus is my Roaming Warrior with 164 attack and his standard Soul Break.

Btw, why does the Free relic draw screen show Cloud and Aerith and Wakka and a few others relics being able to be drawn, but yet there is no option to actually draw for them?! I'd much rather spend my Mythril drawing for those. If I can't though I'm extremely tempted to do one for Tidus' relic draw right now.

Its just showing what you could draw. Every draw, even the free draw, has a chance of getting those relics. The event draws just increase the chance of getting the event relic over the others.

Edit. I drew the brotherhood sword! The new question gives your mithril back when you do a rare draw, I I took it and got brotherhood. U changed my roaming warrior to tidas if anyone wants to see it.

[Chen]

Its just showing what you could draw. Every draw, even the free draw, has a chance of getting those relics. The event draws just increase the chance of getting the event relic over the others.

The chance is absymally low when the events are not on though. Something on the order of 0.001% or something for a char specific relic when it's not on the boosted event list.



Edit. I drew the brotherhood sword! The new question gives your mithril back when you do a rare draw, I I took it and got brotherhood. U changed my roaming warrior to tidas if anyone wants to see it.

Yeah a good heads up to everyone that there's a quest to do a rare relic draw. Rewards 5 mythril so its a free draw. Also the "Get a char to level X from realm Y" quests all end with one to get someone to level 50 and rewards a mythril as well.

I got Wakka's memory crystal this morning and the next fight (on normal) I got his second record materia. Guess it has a really high drop rate or I got crazy lucky. With 2 uses of Wakka's status reels from a friend summon I suspect I should be able to beat that red dragon to death using a Vit0 strategy now. Just need to craft protect and go finish that for the Pheonix summon.

There is also some pretty decent gear in Tidus' challenge this week. Two armor pieces and a nice weapon on the elite levels. Firaja too which is nice, though I'm not sure how tough the fight to get it will be. Apparently there should also be a "boss rush" level after you finish the elite ones. 5 bosses in a row or something with Valefor summon as a reward.

[Infernally Clay]

Seems like it'd be worth breaking Tidus' level cap even if you don't intend to use him. His first Record Materia grants Haste once per battle when the character with it equipped is low on health. That's pretty awesome considering any character can equip any Record Materia.

[Chen]

Seems like it'd be worth breaking Tidus' level cap even if you don't intend to use him. His first Record Materia grants Haste once per battle when the character with it equipped is low on health. That's pretty awesome considering any character can equip any Record Materia.

The problem with those low health ones are that I think it means when they're in that kneeling status. Which frankly is not super common. I mean I'll make sure to pick up his memory crystal so in the future I can unlock it, but that materia isn't one of the better ones. Considering we should be getting the dungeons to unlock many of the main chars memory crystals soon we should be in a good spot record materia wise. Probably want to focus on white and black mage, as well as bard (for the quasi blade blitz attack). Cloud's is kinda nice damage boost (10% with swords) and Tyros can be quite strong (10% damage boost when targeting weaknesses).

[Infernally Clay]

Apparently Balthier's first Record Materia is Auto-Haste. That's definitely on my to get list.

[Chen]

Apparently Balthier's first Record Materia is Auto-Haste. That's definitely on my to get list.

That definitely sounds like a good one. Shame we don't even have Balthier yet :P

[DiscipleofBob]

I edited the OP to include what I hope is all the Friend Codes posted so far.

[Deadline]

My FC is: esWa

That'll get you a lvl 50 Rydia Shiva summon that should drop for 9999 on most content (maybe only 7-8k for some Hard and high level Elites).

[Calemyr]

I've got a lvl 47 Cloud. Code: Gmfa

[Chen]

Everyone should really do this event. The number of 3 star orbs from rewards is quite large. And there's some excellent gear dropping. I also just finished the third to last normal mission and it gives Power Break skill for mastery which is an excellent skill.

[Fleeing Coward]

My FC: qxZD
I've had no luck with relic draws yet so all I have to offer is my lvl 49.5 Cloud with his generic SB, 196 attack.

[DiscipleofBob]

The new Quests are a great source of Mythril, but I'm having trouble finding a comprehensive list of all 111 quests and their rewards, specifically to try and find all the Mythril hiding away? I might actually be able to get an 11 relic draw at this point.

[Starwulf]

Beyond the regular quests, what are/how do you get the "Bonus Quests"?

I'm loving the Tidus event. So many 3* star orbs has allowed me to refine my Thundaga and Blizzaga both. Absolutely loving it. Not to mention the free Fire strike and as someone else mentioned the Power-Break. Best event yet as far as I'm concerned, the power gains I'm making should propel me on past some of the stages I've been struggling with.

On another note, my bad luck with relic draws continues. Did that "Free" rare draw from the quests, yet another 3* rod ><

[Infernally Clay]

I'm running through all the Elites now. I think this event is meant to help new players catch up or something 'cause the drops are fantastic and it's not very difficult to master all the classic stages, either. Even the Elites are pretty easy.

[Chen]

Bonus quests are usually during events. They usually let you get characters you've missed. So like in the next FFVII event there'll probably be a bonus quest to let you get Sephiroth again.

The elite quests ramp up in difficulty towards the end again, just like the last event. Speaking of which I destroyed the Red Dragon using a friend Summon Vanille with deprotega and the Vit0 strategy (cast protect, use friend summon, cast protect again, voila all physical hits deal close to 9999). Had double cut on 3 guys with Celes using water strike. Killed it in about 3 rounds of combat. The trash leading up to it was harder frankly.

Today's daily is the power and black orb one so I suspect I'll be doing a bunch of that. Can never have enough power orbs.

[Mr.Sandman]

Ga, hope the event doesn't end before I get a stab at it. My wife still has my phone until friday night, and all I asked her to do was grab the log in stuff.

[Infernally Clay]

This is my Cloud so far. With his current gear he'll hit 235 attack by level 50. I've just got to figure out how to go higher. If other people can get Wakka to 350 then I must be missing something.

http://i.imgur.com/rZlHrpX.jpg

[Chen]

The only way to get anyone that high would be with realm synergy weapons and armor and maybe even accessories. Maybe with 7 star weapons but even those should only add another 10 levels to the weapon which shouldn't be that much higher stats. Realm synergy tends to add 30 or 40 levels to the gear depending on how high the gear is itself. Possibly even 50 for natural 5 star gear.

[Fleeing Coward]

Finally had some luck on my third 11 pull - Brotherhood, Danjuro and Soldier's Sabre means I quadrupled my number of 5* items :smallbiggrin:

[Starwulf]

Lmao, for some strange reason I decided to blow ALL of my exp growth eggs on Tidus and managed to level cap him at 50(from 40!). Now I need to hit that elite dungeon that gives me his memory crystal so I can break his level cap. Fortunately, that was the very next Elite dungeon that I needed to do, so all is well and good in the world ^^

Gotta say though, it was honestly kind of worth it. 20 attack more, 13 or 15 more defense, 600 more HP, and a decent raise to all his other stats, he's going to be quite a pain to kill now, might let me coast through some dungeons :)

Also, I am now at 88 Mythril! I'm thinking of doing an 11 pull for Tidus' relic, is his new one particularly worth it? I mean he is my strongest guy and likely will be for some time(I went through 3 5* eggs, 22 4*, 68 3* and 3 2*, it will be a long time before I get that many collected again), kinda feels like it might be a good idea to supercharge him even further if possible.

Edit: Uhhh, hey guys, quick question...when they changed the daily dungeons...did they reset all the rewards for completion? Because I know I at least "completed" the Hard Gil dungeon before, because I remember burning a mythril on it because I got 2 of the...big worm things(can't remember it's name) that drops max gil back to back in the last stage and I didn't want it to go to waste. And yet it's showing that I've NEVER completed it. This could be very useful to go back and re-do them all if that's true.

Edit2: It would appear I was right, they did reset all the rewards! Yay free Mythril :) This will end up putting me over 100 now.

[Chen]

Every couple of days now there's going to be a new multi relic banner pull. Current one is Wakka, Rinoa, and both Cecils. Not sure what the others are but if you're waiting for a particular relic waiting for these to go through might be good. Also they reduced the price for the first single pull with real money to 100 crystals instead of 300 crystals. Means you can spend $0.99 for a single pull on each of these banners which is quite a good deal IMO.

[DiscipleofBob]

They changed some of the music with the last update too.

Before the update, we'd get the same victory music no matter the realm. Now they've updated the victory music to be game-specific.

[Infernally Clay]

I did three mythril pulls and a gem pull yesterday because of the promotion. Got three 3* items (one of which is a duplicate I can use to get a 4*) and a 5* Dark Helm. Not too shabby, really, although I had hoped for the other Dark Cecil gear since the Soul Break is better.

Doesn't seem much point saving up 50 mythril but I'll try. I'll probably blow it all whenever the promotion has Cloud's or Sephiroth's weapons on it. I missed out on Sephiroth during the event but his sword still has the best attack in the game and Cloud can equip it.

[Klaatu B. Nikto]

My FC is qZaG

Cloud, level 38
Dark Helm (Dark shot - dark damage to 1 target)

Time to farm some mithril and try my luck at the Elite levels! Well, after trying to Master that last level that netted me Tidus.

Edit: got 100 gems and pulled netting my only 5* item, the Dark Helm.

[Forbiddenwar]

What is everyone strategy for the final event elite dungeon? Are there any good tips?

My plan is to grind until I broke tidus 50 cap, then go in with tidus, wakka, cloud with two fira strikes and rinos with 2 firajas, with Lenna with protectga and curaga honed to 8 uses. But should I just leave wakka behind? His only contribution is to not die.

I was able to do the second to last dungeon without any strategy, but it was difficult.

I guess there is a bonus dungeon after this, but one dungeon at a time.

I'm pretty focused as this may be the first event I'd finish

[Calemyr]

I love the "Huge drop change increase" they brag about. I still get nothing but 3 stars.

[Starwulf]

So is it my imagination, or has the exp necessary to level more then doubled to get from 50 to 51 as it was from 49 to 50? It's something like 118k exp necessary to level to 51 once you break the level cap(btw, Tidus' memory thingie isn't very useful. It's Haste gained when on low health).

[Chen]

I love the "Huge drop change increase" they brag about. I still get nothing but 3 stars.

http://www.reddit.com/r/FFRecordKeeper/comments/33g3mn/relic_draw_item_drop_rates_provided_by/

The link at the bottom has the full item list for all the banner pulls.

Basically the "huge increase chance" raises the chance of getting a char specific item from 0.001% chance to 1%. So yeah 1000x the drop rate is a huge increase. It's just that the chance itself is quite low to begin with. The overall chance for any 5 star item is 10%. That seems pretty constant throughout all the banner pulls, it's just the individual chance per item that seems to change.

[Forbiddenwar]

, Tidus' memory thingie isn't very useful. It's Haste gained when on low health).

The Record materia, and as far as I can tell it is not Tidas's. It is just the first one you unlock. The next record materia you unlock is high scorer no matter who you use to unlock it.

[Chen]

The Record materia, and as far as I can tell it is not Tidas's. It is just the first one you unlock. The next record materia you unlock is high scorer no matter who you use to unlock it.

High scorer is definitely linked to Tidus. You can get it by breaking the level cap for Tidus and then it's a random drop from FFX content. Just like Wakka's Blitz-Eye. If you don't break the level cap for Tidus, you can't get the High Scorer Materia. The haste one is also linked with Tidus, it's his default one when you break his level cap. Wakka gets a different one that allows pre-emptive strikes.

[Starwulf]

Well, wish me luck all, I'm about to do my 2nd 11 pull, going to go with the current Tidus relic event, I really like the look of the sword, plus it gives Tidus a Soul Break that hits all targets which I'm a fan of(really dislike single target ones, and his Delay attack almost never works on the later bosses).

On another note, I feel the urge to reiterate how much I love this Tidus event. I have gained so much strength from this event, I've been able to hone multiple abilities(all my 3*spells have 4 uses now, and I could raise one of them to 6 if I wanted to), I've gotten some decent armor as well, and now I'm collecting 4* orbs from the elite dungeons.

Edit: Well, I got two 5*, neither anything I wanted though. Genji Armor, and some staff >< As if I don't already have enough staves.

[Infernally Clay]

Made my first 11x relic pull. Kinda hoped to get the Masamune since Cloud can equip it and it has such high attack.

http://i.imgur.com/3Wf2GdQ.jpg

Ended up getting three 5* relics. No character specific stuff, sadly, but at least the Murasame has a hit-all Soul Break. Also meant I could give the Zantetsuken to Locke, giving me two characters with 200+ attack. Kain is quite a bit stronger, too, thanks to the new lance (was using a 4* axe until now) and the Genji Shield.

So I guess it worked out nicely.

[tyckspoon]

Made my first 11x relic pull. Kinda hoped to get the Masamune since Cloud can equip it and it has such high attack.


Ended up getting three 5* relics. No character specific stuff, sadly, but at least the Murasame has a hit-all Soul Break. Also meant I could give the Zantetsuken to Locke, giving me two characters with 200+ attack. Kain is quite a bit stronger, too, thanks to the new lance (was using a 4* axe until now) and the Genji Shield.

So I guess it worked out nicely.

You didn't mention your best pull - you got a really stylish vest! (And that's the FFV spear with the shared Soul Break, isn't it? That's probably a fair bit more useful than Kain's default SB, too.)

[Forbiddenwar]

Well I give up on this event. Apparently a team of levels 50 (tidus is even higher) with 5* weapons and armor can't get passed the first boss of command center. Jerk does 1000 damage to everyone every single turn. And he is immune to attacks.

[Starwulf]

Well I give up on this event. Apparently a team of levels 50 (tidus is even higher) with 5* weapons and armor can't get passed the first boss of command center. Jerk does 1000 damage to everyone every single turn. And he is immune to attacks.

Damn that sucks, guess that means I'm just about done, I'm one stage away from the Command bosses. Honestly didn't have to much issue with the other Command stages since they are all single target attacks, but if that boss dishes out that kind of damage I don't stand a chance. I'm assuming you are using Armor that gives synergy?

[Forbiddenwar]

Damn that sucks, guess that means I'm just about done, I'm one stage away from the Command bosses. Honestly didn't have to much issue with the other Command stages since they are all single target attacks, but if that boss dishes out that kind of damage I don't stand a chance. I'm assuming you are using Armor that gives synergy?

Armor doesn't seem to make a difference. It seems to be nonelementsl magical damage, and without a mass shell spell ( if there is one, I can't find it) that's the damage period. I too had zero problem until this point, running wakka and tidus alone through elite, one shotting everything.
I tried the suggestion of the guides to paralyze the boss and rush him down, but I can't even get intimidate to hit him.

[Starwulf]

Is the stage you're trying to do right now the one that rewards Firaja for completion? It's tempting to try it and just blow a few Mythril if necessary, a 4 star spell would be amazing.

[Fleeing Coward]

He's talking about the bonus stage after you've mastered all the other elites for Valefor.

[Infernally Clay]

Given his stupidly high attack, I decided to give Josef a spot on my team in Vanille's place. Seems to be working out relatively well in spite of his comparatively low level. I may end up having to swap Rydia out for Vanille, though, since Protectga and Curaga seem really important and I won't be able to use them otherwise.

[Chen]

Armor doesn't seem to make a difference. It seems to be nonelementsl magical damage, and without a mass shell spell ( if there is one, I can't find it) that's the damage period. I too had zero problem until this point, running wakka and tidus alone through elite, one shotting everything.
I tried the suggestion of the guides to paralyze the boss and rush him down, but I can't even get intimidate to hit him.

Keep closing and opening the app until Intimidate hits. It's a 50% chance so it really shouldn't be that bad. You're talking about the Chocobo eater right? Alternatively blow a friend summon a Tyro's sentinel grimoire (those are much more useful later but you can refresh em with a mythril if you really want Velefor).


Given his stupidly high attack, I decided to give Josef a spot on my team in Vanille's place. Seems to be working out relatively well in spite of his comparatively low level. I may end up having to swap Rydia out for Vanille, though, since Protectga and Curaga seem really important and I won't be able to use them otherwise.

I think Lenna makes a better white mage than Vanille. The regen SB is pretty nice on long fights. Joseph is generally kinda weak though. His defense is terrible. I think with Kain's buff he's a better choice now.

On another note next set of bonus pulls is probably the best set of pulls I've ever seen. Both Tyro's books, Terra's Enhancer, Sephiroth's Masamune and things like Kaiser shield (party wide protect SB) and Gaia blade (quake!). I burned 100 mythril and one of those $0.99 pulls and ended up with a great set: 2 gaia blades, 1 kaiser shield and both of Tyro's books. Also got a crystal helm as a 4 star that's pretty nice. I actually ran out of gil to upgrade everything :P Guess I'll need to run the next gil dungeon a bit.

[Starwulf]

I actually ran out of gil to upgrade everything :P Guess I'll need to run the next gil dungeon a bit.

Yeah gil is definitely a major concern for me now as well. I went through and did today's daily dungeons(It's so nice they wiped everyone's clears so we could get more mythril for completion) and discovered they majorly upped the drop rate(I get drops from nearly every single monster now) and quickly ran out of money upgrading stuff and I had 150k sitting on me. Gonna have to farm like 1mil gil if I want to upgrade all the stuff I have waiting now.

[DiscipleofBob]

I think I need to stop saving up for 50 Mithril.

Last time I did, thanks to all the Quests and reset Daily Dungeons, all I got was a 5* no ability spear, which I guess at least means I can use Kain without sucking.

First time I used just 5 Mithril, I got a 5* Monk's Robe, which while not ideal could certainly be useful. Point being maybe I should just keep trying my luck with normal 5* draws and hoping for the best.

I really need some decent thrown weapons, preferably a Valkyrie, so Rinoa can be a bit more useful.

[tyckspoon]

On another note next set of bonus pulls is probably the best set of pulls I've ever seen. Both Tyro's books, Terra's Enhancer, Sephiroth's Masamune and things like Kaiser shield (party wide protect SB) and Gaia blade (quake!). I burned 100 mythril and one of those $0.99 pulls and ended up with a great set: 2 gaia blades, 1 kaiser shield and both of Tyro's books. Also got a crystal helm as a 4 star that's pretty nice. I actually ran out of gil to upgrade everything :P Guess I'll need to run the next gil dungeon a bit.

Lucky. I put 15 draws on that set (an 11 pull, the discounted gem pull, and another 3 pull with remaining mythril) and got no 5 stars. Although I'm not sure if that's better or worse luck than what could have happened.. getting a 5 star and having it be a 3rd copy of the Sentinel Grimoire (upside: 7-star weapon for Tyro. Downside: n1curr about Tyro's attack stats, and since it's a Core item there really aren't relevant dungeons to take advantage of the high synergy bonus it would have.)

[Starwulf]

Lucky. I put 15 draws on that set (an 11 pull, the discounted gem pull, and another 3 pull with remaining mythril) and got no 5 stars. Although I'm not sure if that's better or worse luck than what could have happened.. getting a 5 star and having it be a 3rd copy of the Sentinel Grimoire (upside: 7-star weapon for Tyro. Downside: n1curr about Tyro's attack stats, and since it's a Core item there really aren't relevant dungeons to take advantage of the high synergy bonus it would have.)

Speaking of "Core", I wonder if they are ever going to release Core dungeons. Would be nice if they did, I mean we have quite a few core characters and core items, yet no dungeon to take advantage of that fact. Does anyone know if the JP servers have any?

On another note guys, the Festival of GOld is AMAZING. Drops are frequent, and often paired with gold, and the xp just on the normal level is probably the best for the stamina cost. 12k exp for a champion clear per level. I imagine hard is 15-20k at this rate.

EDIT!!!!!! Oh wow, I was totally wrong. Hard isn't 15-20k. It's 15-20k WITHOUT the double. I just snagged 40k EXP in a single round! That's insanity. Guess I'll be running Hard of this event more or less non-stop.

Further update: Heroic isn't that much worse then Hard and gives about 60k total exp if you manage to champion it. I got super lucky and my first round had two of the rare rams, both of which dropped like 18k gold a piece. Monstrously happy, this event is going to allow myself(and pretty much everyone) to fully upgrade all my stuff.

[tyckspoon]

Speaking of "Core", I wonder if they are ever going to release Core dungeons. Would be nice if they did, I mean we have quite a few core characters and core items, yet no dungeon to take advantage of that fact. Does anyone know if the JP servers have any?


One or two of the Daily dungeons are Core realm, but AFAIK I know none of the actual Classic/Elite realms are. Which is why I said no relevant dungeons. Would be neat to see a Core-focused event... maybe a Record Materia or special accessory that made Core classes/items always count as matched Realm? Or even just getting half-Synergy would be cool if they thought that was too good.

[Chen]

Speaking of "Core", I wonder if they are ever going to release Core dungeons. Would be nice if they did, I mean we have quite a few core characters and core items, yet no dungeon to take advantage of that fact. Does anyone know if the JP servers have any?

On another note guys, the Festival of GOld is AMAZING. Drops are frequent, and often paired with gold, and the xp just on the normal level is probably the best for the stamina cost. 12k exp for a champion clear per level. I imagine hard is 15-20k at this rate.

EDIT!!!!!! Oh wow, I was totally wrong. Hard isn't 15-20k. It's 15-20k WITHOUT the double. I just snagged 40k EXP in a single round! That's insanity. Guess I'll be running Hard of this event more or less non-stop.

Further update: Heroic isn't that much worse then Hard and gives about 60k total exp if you manage to champion it. I got super lucky and my first round had two of the rare rams, both of which dropped like 18k gold a piece. Monstrously happy, this event is going to allow myself(and pretty much everyone) to fully upgrade all my stuff.

Heroic mobs have less than 1000 health. My level 26 Tidus with a 5 star weapon was one shotting them with double cut (thus possibly killing two things). Using heroic to level is super easy. Also the big mob has a chance of dropping greater growth eggs too. Best event ever.

[DiscipleofBob]

This is the first event where I can Auto with a party of level 30s-40s (well, except for a level 52 Wakka with a 4* bow, but that hardly counts as anything special).

[Starwulf]

Man I love this event so much. I just managed to fully upgrade all of the 5* stuff I had(both the few naturals I had, and the ones I made by combining), and all of my 4*. I'm going to start working on 3* Stuff so I have it for Synergy bonuses. This is just freaking awesome :)

[Fleeing Coward]

Yeah, every single stamina I have is going to be pumped into this new event.
Heroic is an absolute joke. You can auto your way to champion easily.

[T.G. Oskar]

Hmm...I dunno if it's just plain dumb luck, impressive coincidence or what, but...

Figuring that this was the best choice of picks for character 5-star items, I used my 50 Mythril in hopes of getting my waifu's Terra's relic weapon (the Enhancer). Sadly, that wasn't the case...but I ended up getting the Healing Grimoire for Tyro, plus one of the shared 5-star relic items (the Kaiser Shield, which grants a minor Protectga effect), making it for two 5-star character-related relic weapons on just 3 rolls (plus 2 single-shot rolls).

Got a lot of 3-star items, tho; at least two of them were repeated, one of them being a spare Dancing Dagger and another a spare Rune Blade, which I used to boost those weapons.

And yeah - Festival of Gold is kinda easy. Seems to me that these last events have been a bit too easy - same with a pal of mine. He was telling me that since the Locke event, and also with the Tidus event, but now with Festival of Gold being pretty easy on Hard (don't have enough to go Heroic, tho), it makes me think they reduced the difficulty a bit. Sure, it's also the loads of new equipment, but even then, I feel they gone a bit soft since the last update.

[Fleeing Coward]

I think they're just gearing it towards the newer players to keep them interested. The final few elite dungeons are still pretty hard for newer players like me but been able to complete most of any event when you just recently hit the endgame lures you in and makes you want to just gear up that little bit more so that you can complete the whole thing. I know plenty of people who would gladly spend a couple of bucks if they think getting a bunch of new gear is what's needed to get them over that final hump.

[Infernally Clay]

Wait, whaaaaaaaaaat? They're giving away a Zantetsuken, Thundara Strike and Pound? I'll actually have a 6* weapon tomorrow. 😮

http://i.imgur.com/RB8PBcC.jpg

Seems my Cloud got summoned 25 times since yesterday as well. I guess that Soul Break is really popular.

[Fleeing Coward]

Quick question, I just got another 50 mithril saved up. Is this phase the best of the lot or should I wait for one of the other ones to blow my 11 pull?

[Forbiddenwar]

I think they're just gearing it towards the newer players to keep them interested. The final few elite dungeons are still pretty hard for newer players like me but been able to complete most of any event when you just recently hit the endgame lures you in and makes you want to just gear up that little bit more so that you can complete the whole thing. I know plenty of people who would gladly spend a couple of bucks if they think getting a bunch of new gear is what's needed to get them over that final hump.

QTF. One reason I like this game over other f2p games, like hearthstone. Easy on newer players. Hearthstone always felt like if you haven't played every day since beta you were wasting your time.

[Infernally Clay]

Seems I can get through the Heroic difficulty of the new event pretty easily. I think I'll just keep running it over and over, see if I can't max out the levels of a bunch of characters. Cloud is already at 50 and I've got another six at 40+.

[Starwulf]

Le'sigh. As much power as I've gained from the Tidus and Festival of GOld event, I still can't beat the first boss on the elite dungeon that gives Firaja >< Those stupid minions constantly wipe out one of my guys immediately(literally, I've loaded and reloaded 18 times and EVERY SINGLE TIME I've lost either Rydia or Aerith in their first round of attacks. It's insanity!).

[Fleeing Coward]

The start is the hardest part, after you kill 2, just paralyse the 3rd and the boss becomes a joke as it can't actually kill you alone. Try it with 1 healer only maybe.
I did it with a team of Lenna/Cloud/Tidus/Wakka/Tyro with virtually no trouble at all. Slow it down to 1/2 speed and reset until you have 1 or 2 of your guys getting an attack off so that at least 1's down before they could attack.

[DiscipleofBob]

If we were using the JP event schedule as a baseline to try and predict the next character, Squall should have been next. Instead, we got the second person on said list, Garnet. Not sure how I feel about that. As much as I want all the characters and love IX, yet another mage seems like she'll have a hard time fitting in outside of specific realms, and I'd rather get Squall so he can use my Blitz Sword.

[Infernally Clay]

I'm really, really hoping that we can get Vivi in the next event. Apparently some of the secondary objectives involve him not dying, so maybe we will. He'd be much more useful than Garnet, at any rate, since you still can't compete with Lenna as far as white magic is concerned.

edit ;; ...and now I'm a gillionaire! Just broke a million gil. Wonder how much I'll have by the time this event ends.

[Starwulf]

The start is the hardest part, after you kill 2, just paralyse the 3rd and the boss becomes a joke as it can't actually kill you alone. Try it with 1 healer only maybe.
I did it with a team of Lenna/Cloud/Tidus/Wakka/Tyro with virtually no trouble at all. Slow it down to 1/2 speed and reset until you have 1 or 2 of your guys getting an attack off so that at least 1's down before they could attack.

Unfortunately I have no paralyze. I did lower the speed down and killed 2 and left the third live, and I won! Didn't champion it though, was one medal off(lost 2 from damage taken and 1 from turns taken).

Edit: Sigh, second boss and Rydia dies in first two attacks. Why in the hell do those things insist on targetting my peeps in the back row for?! GRRRRRR.

Ack, this one is going to be a million times harder. The boss hits hard as hell >< Yeah screw it, FIraja is not worth this headache, I have no chance in hell, it's minions take like 10k HP to kill, I summoned a level 50 Cloud with his Buster Sword and it only dished out 5k damage, and it still took me everyone elses attacks plus one person another round just to kill it. Meanwhile I lost Cloud and Wakka in the process. So, yeah, I'm not bothering. I'm wasting stamina by constantly resetting and trying to clear this set of stages(I didn't do anything but try to kill this stuff yesterday).

Double Edit: yeah I should have known how bad my luck was and not done an 11 pull for the Buster Sword ><. I only got 2 freaking 4*'s, and no 5*'s. The game hates me today.

[tyckspoon]

FF IX Vivi event! (Also Garnet is part of it, so I guess you may as well get her too.) Sadly Vivi doesn't look like he'll be all that useful unless I happen to luck into his Soul Break item, so he'll probably stay benched in favor of Vanille as my go-to Black Mage; better equipment options, more useful default SB, broader ability options.

[Infernally Clay]

Vivi will replace Rydia for me. He has a ridiculous Magic stat and can use literally any Black Magic, so as long as I give him the right abilities he should tear through any bosses.

[DiscipleofBob]

Let's see...

Vivi has the new best Magic score in the game, but is just as squishy as Rydia, is more limited in usable equipment, and can't use anything other than Black Magic. His base SB is... meh? I guess its theoretically more useful than something weak like a Chocobo summon, but still nothing to write home about.

Garnet: Has excellent Mind and Magic, even if her Magic is limited to Summons that's not necessarily a bad thing. The right weapon choice for her will be difficult if you want both stats to be well-represented. She's basically a White Rydia, but with slightly better bulk. Support 2 gives her a few more options. No ranged weapon choice though. I was kind of hoping they'd give her rackets. That base SB though... Sooo good. Just imagine a team of four heavy-hitters and Garnet at boss time.

[Hatevah]

Looking for advice on who to focus on for my party -
I've been using Kain, Cloud, Wakka, White Mage, and Rydia - they're all at ~29. Of the non-generics, I also have Josef, Tidus, Cyan, Vivi, and Garnet (just unlocked). Who do I work on, levelwise? I was thinking to swap out Rydia/WM for Vivi/Garnet, and I feel like Wakka should go for Tidus, but I...don't really feel like I have a sense for who works in a realm-agnostic party. My only 5* is the daily reward (almost ready for my second 11-pull, hoping to get something better then 4* armor and a 4* dagger this time).
I'm currently partly (mostly?) through FF4 in the Core dungeon - up to (and haven't yet attempted) "The Feymarch" presently. I have Wakka's memory crystal, but none of the other 3 presently available, and none older.
Anything in particular I should look for/work on?

For completeness - friend code is 2P55 if you want a lvl 29 Cloud with Zanketsuken/Diamond Bangle.

[DiscipleofBob]

Looking for advice on who to focus on for my party -
I've been using Kain, Cloud, Wakka, White Mage, and Rydia - they're all at ~29. Of the non-generics, I also have Josef, Tidus, Cyan, Vivi, and Garnet (just unlocked). Who do I work on, levelwise? I was thinking to swap out Rydia/WM for Vivi/Garnet, and I feel like Wakka should go for Tidus, but I...don't really feel like I have a sense for who works in a realm-agnostic party. My only 5* is the daily reward (almost ready for my second 11-pull, hoping to get something better then 4* armor and a 4* dagger this time).
I'm currently partly (mostly?) through FF4 in the Core dungeon - up to (and haven't yet attempted) "The Feymarch" presently. I have Wakka's memory crystal, but none of the other 3 presently available, and none older.
Anything in particular I should look for/work on?

For completeness - friend code is 2P55 if you want a lvl 29 Cloud with Zanketsuken/Diamond Bangle.

Your ideal party mostly depends on your available equipment. The Zantetsuken helps, but also remember that a lot of the events these days give you enough copies of items to turn a 3* into a 5*. They're not as good as actual 5* equipment, but you take what you can get.

Try some of the Elite dungeons if you haven't already. If nothing else you should be able to pick up a 4* Staff and Rod from some of the early dungeons.

Besides that, the only other thing to keep in mind is that as long as you can manage to get their Record Materia from the Elite event dungeons, Tidus, Wakka, Vivi, and Garnet are currently the only ones who can break the level cap, but hopefully that'll change in the near future.

[Chen]

Unfortunately I have no paralyze. I did lower the speed down and killed 2 and left the third live, and I won! Didn't champion it though, was one medal off(lost 2 from damage taken and 1 from turns taken).

Edit: Sigh, second boss and Rydia dies in first two attacks. Why in the hell do those things insist on targetting my peeps in the back row for?! GRRRRRR.

This is why you use Terra instead of Rydia as your black mage. More HP, better armor AND can use Support 4. Way better.


Ack, this one is going to be a million times harder. The boss hits hard as hell >< Yeah screw it, FIraja is not worth this headache, I have no chance in hell, it's minions take like 10k HP to kill, I summoned a level 50 Cloud with his Buster Sword and it only dished out 5k damage, and it still took me everyone elses attacks plus one person another round just to kill it. Meanwhile I lost Cloud and Wakka in the process. So, yeah, I'm not bothering. I'm wasting stamina by constantly resetting and trying to clear this set of stages(I didn't do anything but try to kill this stuff yesterday).

Double Edit: yeah I should have known how bad my luck was and not done an 11 pull for the Buster Sword ><. I only got 2 freaking 4*'s, and no 5*'s. The game hates me today.

For the buster sword thing make sure you're summoning from someone in the front row. If the summon is a melee attack and someone in the back uses it, it gets hit by the damage reduction for being in the back row.

[Suichimo]

This is why you use Terra instead of Rydia as your black mage. More HP, better armor AND can use Support 4. Way better.

That requires having Terra. :(

[Forbiddenwar]

IMHO, wakka is a joke. Dump him. I got him up to level 55 with a 5 star weapon and he still does less damage than tidus ( and every other fighter) he barely does more damage than the mqges. he is only useful if you have a 5 star ranged weapon and you are fighting a boss who can only be hit by ranged items.

In my party, cloud was doing more damage without the record synergy and having less levels.

[Calemyr]

IMHO, wakka is a joke. Dump him. I got him up to level 55 with a 5 star weapon and he still does less damage than tidus ( and every other fighter) he barely does more damage than the mqges. he is only useful if you have a 5 star ranged weapon and you are fighting a boss who can only be hit by ranged items.

In my party, cloud was doing more damage without the record synergy and having less levels.

Comparing pretty much anyone to Cloud is a joke, I'm afraid. The guy has great stats, great gear options, and spellblade attacks, allowing him to do absurd damage and exploit vulnerabilities. All while being the first major recruit in the game. Even characters who are nominally more powerful than him (like Josef) can't keep up with him.

I will agree Wakka is pretty feeble, but I wouldn't put him on par with most mages. Most mages couldn't survive in the front row and few would have the strength to match him (though some fighter/mages like Celes or Gordon have a fair chance). His affinity for thrown weapons lets him be a moderate contributor while enjoying the defensive boost of being in the back row. It's not that he's bad, it's just that there are so many people who are simply better than him and nobody counts the people who are worse than him. He's just pretty baseline: an early fighter with a bit more versatility than most but not exceptional in any category.

Also, I really want Terra, myself. VI remains my all-time favorite Final Fantasy and Terra my favorite character in it, with her only real competition being Setzer.