Welcome to the thread!
Brave Exvius is a new Final Fantasy game, in the style of the SNES titles (IV, V, VI). That said, the game plays considerably different from the SNES titles, outside of combat. Combat in FFBE is equivalent to the Wait Mode ATB in these games (everyone acts individually in their team's turn before the opposing team gets their turn). In story and event modes, the player's team always goes first. In arena mode, the team that goes first is randomly chosen at the beginning of each new turn.
There is an original story with original characters. As the game is meant to last for several years, the story is considerably drawn out and may appear to be very slow moving (it at all) at first. As one progresses farther in Story Mode, the story becomes considerably more interesting. Please keep in mind that the story really doesn't begin to really get rolling until four or five islands into the game (Dirnado Isle or Olderion Isle), which can be a considerably long time for a new player. Please bear with the story until then.
The game belongs to a genre known as gacha, or lottery-style game. In this game, not only are there original characters, but the player also has the be ability to pull characters from other Final Fantasies (both heroes and villains) to join them on their team. This is a major draw of the game. On the flip side, as a lottery-style game, the more desirable or popular characters are often quite hard to obtain, and attempts at pulling for them cost a premium currency (lapis) in the game. A fair amount of lapis given to players over time for various events in the game (Brave Exvius is unusually generous in this regard compared to other games in this genre). Addiitional lapis can be purchased for real-world currency to fund additional activities in the game (refilling energy) or for more attempts at pulling rare units from the slot machine.
Various activities are also inserted into the game from time to time, that offer unique equipments, materia, spells, and so on that are not found in the story mode of the game. These can take the form of a dungeon from another Final Fantasy, an exploration of some kind, or a trial against a powerful boss (which is what everyone in the thread is passionate about at the moment as that is this week's challenge).
In this regard, you could think of this as a single-player MMO, as new content is constantly added to the game weekly and new chapters are being added to the story monthly.
Brave Exvius Basics
Units
There are several types of ways to acquire units. The first are the story units. These are
forced upon you, I mean
The second is the standard summon. The combat of the game has you using five units + a unit from someone else's game. When you use this unit you gain 10 friend points if that person is on your friends list, and 5 points if they're not. Furthermore, every day you can receive 10 friend points from the people on your friends list through daily gifting. Once you have 200 friend points you can spend these to acquire a 1-3★. These units are not that powerful long term, but some of them come with some great Trust Masteries.
The third method is the rare summons. This is the true gacha pool, and allows you to summon units from 3-5★. The greater the rarity the lower the odds are of summoning a unit of that rarity, but these units are usually more powerful on a fundamental level.
The current rates are :
Single summon :
The "+1" in 10+1 or 5+1 summon :
Summoning these units costs Lapis, the in game currency, or rare summon tickets. Every Friday a new "banner" is added to the game that lasts two weeks. These banners increase the chances of acquiring the units displayed. The 3★ and a 4★ base unit that is on the banner has a 25% chance of occurring if that colored crystal drops, and the 5★ base has a 33% chance. However these increases are split if there are multiple units of the same base rarity on the banner. There is also a default banner that has no rate up, and is available at all times.
Summons cost 500 lapis or 1 rare summon ticket. Each day you can make 1 summon for 250 lapis. You can also make an 11 unit summon for 5000 lapis, which guarantees the first crystal to be at least yellow. Do not this game like to do free summon campaigns, either directly with a free-to-pull banner or by giving special tickets for free.
The forth way to acquire units is through events. The conditions for obtaining the unit will vary with each event.
Finally, there is special tickets, "UoC" or Unit of Choice, called "Select Summon Tickets" in-game, you gather 10 of them and then can choose a base 5★ unit you desire, limited and collab units are however not available with thoses.
It's also important to mention that units can be upgraded, and are not stuck at their base level. Currently the highest a unit can go is 7★ for base 5★ ones. If you wish to know the maximum rarity of a unit use the Exvius wiki (linked below).
Awakening an unit to 7★ is a bit different, you need a level 100 6★ unit and its prism, which is a same dupe unit converted to an awakening material (star rank doesn't matter), only to be used by the same unit name. For more information, see the useful link section below.
It'll also unlock that unit's Super Trust Mastery which require 2 more 5★ or 6★ of the same unit to be fused to it, or one 7★. /!\Do not convert them to prisms for the Super Trust Mastery reward, it is only need for awakening /!\
Lapis
Lapis is the in game currency. You can acquire this via:
- Daily Quests. Everyday there is a list of quests that you can complete for certain rewards. If you complete 5 of the 6 challenges you will be given 50 lapis.
- Daily Logins and special Logins Event. Everyday you get various stuff including Lapis and Summon Ticket, from time to time there will be additionnal login event with special rewards. Sometime there is even a "Lapis summon" banner in which you can get 50 to 10k Lapis for free.
- Missions. These are challenges that come with every quest.
- Reward Wheel. Everyday you can watch 5 ads to get Lapis or Energy Bottle (1 bottle restore 10 energy)
- Trophies. These are challenges that you will complete by doing generic tasks throughout the game. These are usually long terms challenges, but the reward for completing each one is 500 lapis.
- Real World Currency. The reality is that this is a gacha game, and in order to obtain a substantial amount of lapis in a short period of time you will need to spend money. It is very possible to be F2P and be able to complete all the content, but remember that it's important to spend your lapis wisely.
Every Friday a new event is added to the game. These usually follow the theme of the new banner and also last 2 weeks.
Mog King Events are a grind type event. You take on a boss and every time you defeat it you gain a special event currency. This currency can be traded into the mog king for prizes. Materials, tickets, exclusive gear, the list goes on. Having the corresponding banner units in your party will give you a bonus amount of event currency upon completion.
Story Events. You follow a short story about the featured units, in those event you go through cutscenes, normal and boss battles. You can also test those featured units as they'll be available to pick up in the friend selection. The second week of those events have bonus stages with a lot of ability awakening crysts (see below)
Raids. Currently we have only had one of these. They are not your typical MMO style raid, and are closer to the Mog King events. You simply have to defeat the boss, but rather than obtaining currency you gain points. Prizes are given at set total point thresholds, and there are two prize ladders. One for your individual point total, and one for the point total of everyone currently playing.
Steel Castle Melfikya. Basically Item World if you happen to know about Disgaea, you choose a weapon and go into 10 battles to gain advantage like more stats, the higher you go, the higher the chances to get good attributes. If you die, you'll lose what you got in the current run but you can leave the Castle anytime and keep what you got on your weapons. Rerunning the event with the same weapon will ask you at the end to either get the new attributes or keep the old ones.
Because of the weekly events and banner changes there is usually maintenance every Thursday.
Trust Masteries
You'll notice that each of your units have a percentage that occasionally goes up after a battle. This is their Trust Mastery. These are can be powerful items, spells, or abilities, and as such some units are sought after purely for their trust mastery. Units have a 10% chance to gain a 0.1% increase every battle. This is not something you need to worry about too much early game.
There is also special units called "Trust Moogle" that can increase the trust of one of your unit by 1%/5%/10% if fused to it.
Ability Awakening
As the game progresses older and less powerful units become outclassed by the newer and stronger units. However Ability Awakenings allow older units to increase the power of some of their abilities. In order to do this you need Ability Awakening Crystals and Gil. The crystals range from 5 levels and come in various colors. The level 1-4 crystals can be farmed from the Chamber of Gems in the Vortex of Desires, and the level 5 crystals can be obtained through various events. Each unit and move will require different gems to awaken them.
Useful Links
We're a friendly community here, so any information that you cannot find simply ask and someone will provide you with the information you require.
Exvius Wiki
FFBE Reddit
Official 7★ Awakening guide
Unit Builder
GL and JP Weapons and Armors List
Official Thread 1
Last edited: