Final Fantasy: Record Keeper - Mobile Gaming Cash Grab

FF8 ultimates are out. I skipped the CM because no synergy for 8. The U++ took two tries, because first time I didn't save enough burst to finish the final round in time, so lost some medals. Second try it was fine after I saved a few limit bursts to nuke her in 2 turns. Even with basically 0 synergy, none of these ultimates seemed too bad.

Physical team I did the U++ with:

I got all the OK motes last week and never went in again lol. Oddly enough Ahriman dropped motes both times I beat him.

My FF VIII team is an interesting place because I moted a few of them to take on Ifrit, so they're generally better than my other realms. I also have mighty guard for Quistis which is Amazeballs.

I prioritized new content but spent the rest of my stamina in the Onion experience dungeon. I ended with an extra 7 Motes. It really helped to get some levels because post 80 it takes a lot.

My magic synergy for VIII is great. I've been trying for physical relics for VIII but I keep getting Mage relics. The Ultimates weren't that bad for me. I just went full Mage Meta for Seifer and, essentially, used the same strategy that I used for the Mote Ifrit CM. The Sorceresses weren't too bad. I intentionally kept one of the witches in phase 2 alive while I reset mitigation and recharged ATB gauges. Then I killed her with a bunch of abilities queued up. The countdown still hit 1 but I killed her before the Ultima.

I keep trying to make mage teams work, but it feels like unless a mage team is forced down your throat because of mechanics (physical counters, physical immunity, etc), then mage teams just can't keep up to the damage output of physical. My first clear of the U++ was a full mage team, with multiple stacking magic bonuses, but like I mentioned, it didn't have the dps to finish it fast enough (and all 3 mages had their BSB, so it wasn't like I was undergeared). The physical team cleared it like it was nothing.

Part of the problem is breaks. There's no magical based breaks, so no matter what, you have to bring at a minimum one support physical unit, but usually two for the hardest content. Same thing for soulbreaks. There's endless amounts of soulbreaks that apply stacking break debuffs, and probably 95% of them are physical based, with maybe one or two rare magical SB debuffs.

Another problem is lifesiphon. Being able to slot in lifesiphon (again, physical only) and spam limit breaks is extremely powerful. The closest thing a mage can do (a few of them at least) is cast wrath, but then you're losing out on 5,000-9,000 damage per round from the unit who could be lifesiphoning instead.

I keep reading how mage teams are the wave of the future, but I just don't see it. Unless we get magical alternatives to lifesiphon, and all of the support breakdowns, I don't see how mages can win the dps race in hard content.

Mage Meta is much more difficult than a physical team for the reasons you mentioned. To really make it work you need stacking buffs and lots of hones. Physical teams can get by with a couple of Lifesiphons and SB spam.

When I run a Mage oriented team it looks like this:

Support
Healer
3x Mages

Assuming it's not a CM, one of those mages is going to be Krile for Sheepsong. I've got Terra's and Rinoa's BSBs so they'll slot in for the other two.

But with Mages it's not as easy to SB spam and unless you've farmed hardcore you won't have many hones for the Chain Gas. Personally I have Fire at rank 4 and Ice and Thunder at rank 2. I went all in on Chain Firaga since I have a lot of Fire boosting relics. But it cost me hones of the others. I want to bring Blizzaga up to rank 3 next but I'm still short on Orbs.

In the end it's usually easier to just run a physical team or a mixed team. Onion Knight really helps mixed teams work out. But there are fights where a Mage team does better. For me Seifer was one since my VIII magical synergy is through the roof and my physical synergy sucks.

Tomorrow is a dungeon update with a LD for VI, IX, XIII, and XIV. The nice thing is that it's only SSBs and up.

Because LDs hate me I fully expect to go 1 / 11 for a fourth Fairy Flute.

pharmakos said:

On the U++, I killed the last one literally a fraction of a second after the countdown hit 0. Too annoyed to go back and master it for upgrade materials.

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Same shit happened to me, Rinoa cast Bahamut like half a second after she used Ultimate Ultima or whatever. Went back with a mage A-Team and destroyed it after that.

Edit: Problem with mage teams is they really require hones and buff stacking, but when it does hit it's plenty painful. I ran Maria with triple boost (OK RW, Faith and self buff) and her command hit 35k on the FFVIII U++. oddly enough the way I see people running it is healer / support / support / Mage / Mage, one of the support runs wrath & entrust to feed the mages, who need self sufficient BSSBs... Or fuck BSSBs and go with MM/DZ for 9999x2 every turn.

Got OK relic and level 99, but he's still a turd because I don't have a bunch of 4* motes lying around. Sad!

Yeah, I need more 4* motes too and the mote dungeons just closed About time they make those things slightly more readily available.

Once multiplayer gets out of the Beta phase 4 star Motes become a lot more common. The mote dungewill continue to open monthly as well if you haven't completed them all yet.

Finally the next Orbfest has a bunch of Motes as well. There is a roulette wheel that costs tokens to spin. Sometimes in the Orbfest dungeon a bunch of golden knights spawn which give out tokens when defeated. We also might get the bard mote dungeon as well which gives out empowered bard Motes and roulette tokens. In Japan all of this was done at once with the old 5 Dooms event included. We should get all of it except the Dooms when Orbfest lands later this month.

Would OK BSB + Full Charge be worth it? I haven't even made full charge yet, but I was thinking about prioritizing that + combat sphere on OK. Good idea/bad idea?

I'm still try to find the best way to utilize Onion Knight.

In multiplayer I like to use FullBreak to ensure we hit medal conditions and Full Charge for damage. With his BSB you can use Command 1 and get the instant FC. Not sure if there is better but it works for me.

I just tried him as a Black Mage, seems like magic burst command is better than physical for damage. I liked it.

If you use him as a support you are not utilising his burst commands, so I'm going to have others fill that role. Full charge hasn't impressed me yet, but neither has Meltdown.

I actually had a really good Lucky Draw. Normally they're terrible for me but I went 4 / 11 with only one dupe. Serah's Starseeker SSB and Lunar Stinger BSB, Kefka's Nephilum Flute SSB and Lightning's Peacemaker SSB (the dupe).

I keep getting Mage BSBs but this is my first one with an element attachment (Ice). I'm not sure when she gets her MC3 but I'll need to grab it when she does. It's available in Japan so sometime in the next 5 months.

4/11 also, with 1 dupe (wiz rod). Overall a decent pull, and it's synergy for two realms I could use more, but none of the relics are anything special. Even Noel's bsb is overall meh. Still worth it for only 25 mith though.

I just looked. Serah is part of the next batch of MC3s along with Sephiroth. I'll want both of those.

I pulled Beatrix bsb, and Kefkas ssb. Is Beatrix OK without her magic blink break? I don't have that one.

I also pulled Selphies ssb with my 100 gem pull.