re: Transcendent Proto-Ultima
This 29.36 victory was brought to you by fict hanaji and, more directly, RNG. Huge thanks to
Kumagoro for pointing his run, which you can see here:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=wHrt2wWAZpw&feature=emb_logo. Didn't bother with water like I was planning, since I could just xcopy the earth team used. Still took 90 minutes to get a win.
Bartz (LMR1+LM2): R5 Tremor Strike, Earth DMG+ RM (USB1/AASB)
Tyro (LMR+LM2): R5 Wrath, R5 Entrust, DMT (USB4)
Tifa (QC LMR+DC LMR): R5 IronFist Earth, Scholar's Boon (AASB/SASB*)
Galuf (QC LMR): R4 Quake Strike, R5 Grand Charge, Ace Striker (CSB)
Elarra (LM1+LM2): R4 Passion Salsa, R5 Enfeebling Jitterbug (USB/AASB)
Titan (HP+Healing Boon) as main magicite .Rest were Madeen (ATKx2), MAdeen (HP+Healing), Phoenix (Blade/Spell Ward) and Adamantoise (Empower Earth x2)
With two exceptions, I just followed the fict hanashi's turns. So solo healer works, but it's actually
very RNG to win this way. With this team, you not only have to push to Phase 3 before Dissipation, it is pretty much mandatory to push to phase 3 before Turn 18 Transcendent Holy. T.Holy itself doesn't do that much damage (I wore Odin accessories on slots 1/3/5 as in the vid; it does seem to be better for this type of run), but the problem is that it does just enough damage such that one of the important characters (Tifa, in my case) won't survive Phase 3 Turn 1 Transcendent Antimatter. This kept screwing me up over and over.
Even when RNG was on my side with the same multi-cast that fict had, for some reason i was a whole half-second behind his turn order, so skipping T.Holy was next to impossible for me.
My winning run was pure RNG. Right at the phase change, after T.Holy, Bartz did quad-cast Tremor Strike, Tifa did Iron Fist Earth x2 and then Overstrike chase. This left Proto-Ultima with about 20% left. Tifa and Galuf bought it to T.Animatter after, and Tyro got KOed to something else, but not before entrusting to Elarra. Next turn, Elarra did AASB, bringing back all KOed characters. Tifa had gauge and some IronFist hones left, so I dropped SASB. I wasn't looking to sub-30, just get a damn win, and another turn of Tifa SCMD1 would have sealed it.
But Bartz had other ideas, cause this time he did
quint-cast Tremor Strike and basically obliterated the rest of Proto-Ultima's HP by himself, ending the fight just under the wire at 29.36. Tifa SASB ended up doing chip damage, really.
Speaking of which, to prove that most SASBs are indeed sidegrades to their AASBs outside of 6* magicites, I tried using Tifa SASB in place of her AASB and it never worked out. The damage was roughly comparable, but the AASB started out with higher damage which made pushing to phase 3 before Dissipation less RNG. Furthermore, using the AASB made penetrating far into Phase 3 before the physical screen easier with the guaranteed Overstrike chase. So that's that.
Extremely glad to have this one done. For a second it looked like I might have to skip it and come back later. The fight made a mockery of my Cloud wind team, the first non-magicite fight to have done so in over two years, and my super water team didn't far any better. Maybe I could xcopy Kumagoro's water team, but this was already hard enough and RNG-prone with Titan and an earth team; I can't see running a water team without Leviathan being anything but pain (pun intended).
