#follow up dive tank or dive DPS???

[jayjj7]

chapter 6. game day

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a/n: bye i wrote too much yk damn well this is NOT PROOFREAD

before you guys were given the green light to go on stage and take your places on the respective pc’s, you and your team were waiting in the lounges. you and sakura were studying map rotations while chaewon and eunchae were eating the snacks provided. yunjin was off talking to hanni in the hallway. you honestly were not that stressed for the tournament because you believe that you guys had gotten a good amount of time to prepare and have won for the past two years.

“you guys should listen to me and yn’s plan!” sakura calls out to chaewon, eunchae, and yunjin in the distance. her eyes still glued onto the screen, scanning for any new routes.

“these cookies are really good hold on” eunchae tries to dismiss sakura

“yunjin get an inside on the enemies plans!” you yell purposely loud so hanni could hear. you didn’t have anything against them and it was an honest attempt to create friendly banter.

“minji would gladly tell you!” a faint voice returns. yunjin turns her head to look at you and silently laugh which was cut short with a security guards loud voice from outside the rooms.

“le sserafim! you guys are on in 3 minutes, hurry and follow me” his voice spiked adrenaline within you, all the previous nervousness vanished.

1st game

after greeting the opposing team and the audience you all sit down and converse for one last moment before you all start competing.

“i’ll go dive while dps flank from the left of point” sakura who is sitting in the middle of your teams row.

“chaewon you cover yunjin and kazuha while i heal sakura and eunchae” you look at chaewon, making sure she listens to the plan. not wanting a repeat of what happened last year where chaewon had misheard you and ended up on the other side of the map, still winning somehow.

“and now they have 40 seconds until the game will officially start” the announcer says over the loudspeaker, the audience cheering louder.

the first 3 minutes of the match were pretty easy, you were up against a newly formed esports team, no chemistry between them if you were honest. it was point capture and you were more than 50% done with capturing the first point, you shot reassuring glances to your teammates to assure your guys stance. the other teams efforts were definitely there but there was a lack of communication between them. every small observation you all made was voiced in the voice chat, there was always constant chatting. but from the opposing team, near dead silent. though that just meant an easy win.

eunchae shrugging, “a win is a win” followed by yunjin laughing and sukura nudging eunchae’s arm.

after the round both teams stood up and waved to the crowd while they cheered.

2nd game

you as a team (chaewon) came to the conclusion that following the same game plan as the last game was a poor decision, to be fair, it wouldn’t hurt to use a new plan.

“yn follow eunchae and get behind their team so me and kazuha can kill them off from the front and sakura can come from the side” yunjin announces while everyone messes around in the lobby before the game officially starts.

“yunjin they have a roadhog main could you pick someone besides bastion?” yunjin was notorious for being hooked off map when playing bastion due to his low mobility. it was an honest and harmless suggestion that you didn’t think yunjin would take into consideration.

“yn don’t start with me girl” she laughs as the doors open and everyone rushes out.

you always hated being commentated over and especially with hundreds of people watching.

“yn approaches close behind tank while the other teams is avoiding point” you could barely hear the announcer slightly through your headphones.

going against this team was definitely harder than the last, yet not challenging enough for you guys to break a sweat. as much as you loved trash talking with kazuha you had to resist when watching the enemy team make careless mistakes.

capturing the first point was a breeze, chaewons plan was pretty smart considering the enemy team had tried to counter your routes from the last game, but this only meant that for the next and final game of the day you would have to come up with a different route.

the second and final point to capture was fortunately more difficult to secure.

“shit guys ramattra has ult, chaewon use your sleep dart when he ults” you call to everyone’s attention.

“yeah i’m up on the railings here he doesn’t see me yet” she responds.

and just as you called, their ramattra ults unfortunately killing eunchae. the crowd screams as they believe this is the teams chance to turn the game around but chaewon shuts this down by sleep darting him, cancelling the ult. the crowd screaming louder as their teams gets wiped for a team kill. this was enough to get to 100% on the second point and winning the game.

once again standing up to wave and take in the applause only this time you noticed yunjin was waving extra hard and jumping. you tried to see who she was waving at and saw newjeans in the front row where other teams could watch the matches. she was waving at hanni based on how hanni was copying her enthusiasm. you looked at the rest of them and waved to show your respect because you knew you’d eventually face them and once you meet eyes with minji you can’t help but smile. it was funny to remember her attempts of getting at you and her awkwardness, you never turned her down, though your friends speculate differently.

3rd game

it had been your third game and though you and sakura would stay up for hours playing, this was exhausting. the adrenaline was wearing off and all you wanted to do was sleep but you still had such a long day ahead.

unfortunately your team did not capture the first point. kazuha sitting up in her chair and chaewon adjusting her volume. this meant that you had to capture the next and win the tie breaker. losing this match would mean le sserafim would be disqualified and you did not promote this event as much as you did to lose on the first day.

“guys regroup and go in from the left eunchae has ult” you order hoping to lighten the pressure amongst yourselves.

“just shake it off we got this play right here” yunjin sits up as she tries to land as many shots on the enemy tank as possible.

your biggest concern at the moment was keeping everyone alive, then getting a team kill can and will give them an advantage to win.

“eunchae ult when they turn the corner they’re bunched up!” you say leaning closer to the monitor.

as eunchae is told, she ults receiving a team kill. crowd cheering and screaming from the unexpected play. at that moment everyone got back in the zone and eased up.

“it all comes down to this last point! who will take home todays victory?” the announcer hypes up the crowd, all of newjeans crossing their hands together staring at the big screen. of course you can’t see but minji is focused in your character only. was it a way to have an advantage if you guys go against each other? or does she still have plans to ask you out at the first after party? who knows.

after the team kill the enemy team was out of their groove and fell apart due to desperation of getting on point and holding for as long as possible. a terrible way to go out but as eunchae says, “a win is a win”

you stood up for the last time and took in the applause, soaking in your victory. you could see kazuha and yunjin hugging and sakura taking a much needed water break. the announcer promoted both teams to shake hands and after some talking and reflections you guys headed back into your lounge.

taglist: [ @modanisgf @haknom @gayforalll @gtfoiydlyj @hotluvlet @imahallucination11 @ajjilhan @acegaydar @chaelvxs @phbrook @saysirhc @emotionallyrin @alexxeey @bunniscx @sixflame438 @multikpopstanneer @pandafuriosa60 @yeetaberry127 @inosfavgf @edamboon @sunshinez4 @emphobics ] taglist is open

[enderwolf91]

Alright I do this every season now but I wanna talk about the s13 skins. It's not full of negativity, I promise, just me rambling about each of the skins they've shown us cause I wanted to do a deep dive into them

**Spoilers to the s13 trailer, go watch it if you want a better look at the skins/some extra things I don't touch on here

1. Widow Mythic

Lowkey. Love this skin. It's actually so well made and cute and detailed. As a Widow player km happy with this skin. Was I hoping Ramattra (or another tank) to get the mythic this season? Yes, absolutely. But I read a comment somewhere that gave a decent reasoning to why there's been more dps mythics; because there's more dps.

Looking at it as a bigger picture, if Blizzard were to stick to the rotation idea they had originally, then we'd go through the tank roster in just a couple of seasons, then we'd go through the support, and we'd have a large chuck of time of only dps mythics until a new tank or support was added to the game. Do I like that they did 3 dps in a row? No, not really, I feel like this season could have been a tank and maybe next a dps or whatever, but from now on I'm expecting there to be 2-3 seasons in a row of dps mythics because there's a larger amount of them than the other two roles.

2. BP Skins pt 1

Okay. For starters, in case anyone can't immediately recognize who each character

Ana, Sojourn, Sigma, J. Queen, Torbjorn

First off, Gnome Torb is not at all what I was expecting but sends me into a fit of giggles every time I see him.

Secondly, necromancer-esqe JQ skin is awesome. Love the design and color scheme for her.

Sigma, interesting skin compared to the rest but I've come to accept that BP skins don't always (any at all) follow the BP theme. (at least this theme pretty much all the skins do somehow fit the theme, and I can see some arguments made for Sigma here). Not to say this is a bad skin though, I actually really like it; a lot more than the sailor skin honestly.

Sojourn looks a bit... flat out of them. There just isn't as much detail going on compared to the other four, which is unfortunate but maybe it's because of the camera angle/pose she's in that hides more details. 100% love the gun design though. I'm glad they gave Sojourn a skin too.

Okay. I genuinely could not tell who the first person was. I fully thought it was Junkrat because of the crouch/hunched over pose. But then I saw everyone calling them Ana, and then I saw another photo with them stand straight up and with Ana's gun. So apparently that's Ana. Great skin, I just wish they chose a different pose for this photo cuz it's hard to tell who it is (for me at least).

3. BP Skins pt 2

There's a lot here so I'll keep it short (and go in order)

Winston. I like it, it's a nice skin though a bit hard to see fully since he's in the back. I'm just kinda glad they didn't recolor his werewolf skin.

Mercy. If I you are new to my account, I am a Mercy main. Fully and wholeheartedly. I feel like this skin is a bit... unneeded at the moment. Given she's gotten a handful of skins recently but that's just common for this game so I'm not gonna talk into a brick wall. I'm not huge fan of this skin visually, idk just doesn't appeal to me but I'm sure it does to others.

Tracer. Not gonna talk about Tracer getting a BP skin and a collab skin in the same season. Good skin as well, though i feel like they felt the need to just, slap on some animal ears? I don't really see the point in them I feel like the skin didn't need the ears but sure.

Symmetra. My girl is slaying front and center. I feel like they tend to make really good skins for Sym, when she does get a skin. Also, I'm questioning the kitties with her and JQ. New Victory poses maybe? I love that they're matching either way.

Kiriko. Genuinely, its decent. Definitely not her best skin, but I can see people using it. (shes getting 3 skins this season everyone :D)

Illari. Not a fan of the hair...? it looks like they gave her a bob cut from the front, but I'm pretty sure it's supposed to be like a braided crown? Correct me if I'm wrong? I love the dress though. Love that they're giving the sun based character such a dark and gloomy appearance, it fits her personality sm despite literally radiating the sun.

Ashe. My honest opinion, and maybe a hot take idk, I don't look at Ashe skins for Ashe. I look at them for Bob. Sure some of them Ashe looks good, but for me it's Bob that carries the skins. It's literally the reason I didn't get the Ashe mythic despite playing her. I'd have only gotten it because of Bob. I like the color scheme of this skin, and in this one Ashe does look really cool, but like Sojourn it's a bit lacking compared to the rest. To me it's only compelling aspect is the neon color, it's the only feature that draws me to the skin tbh.

4. Recolors

I'm gonna keep this brief. Cool, variants to already existing skins. I'm not spending the same amount of coins for a recolor as I did for the original, I hate that that's normal.

Anyone can make a recolor, I can make one. You can make one. They shouldn't cost as much as the original if all your doing is picking new colors and maybe adding/removing a small feature of the original.

There's been an influx of recolors with the magma and ocean bundles that were in the shop, to this season, and I'm sure plenty of more coming soon. I just want them to be discounted a bit, maybe if the original costs gold coins, have the recolor cost white instead idk.

5. New Tank

So maybe no mythic, but tank players will be getting a new hero added to their roster; so I hope they aren't super mad (I genuinely don't know how to feel about it I have barely over 10 hours on tank I'm being so fr)

I'm hoping they shake up the game (in a healthy way). With Orisa back in rotation and Hog/Mauga sitting to the side ready to ruin the game at a moments notice again, I'm hoping this new tank is balanced and fun to play for tank players, and doesn't get hard countered by a majority of the roster (or just Sombra) and makes them unplayable.

-=+=-

Okay, I think that's it. Idk if I'll add more once we see the full bp, probably not tbh I feel like it'll be redundant. I didn't talk about the gamemode or map changes cause I wanna see more about them before commenting about them.

For now tho, the gamemode looks interesting, I'll be happy to try it. I'm so glad they're doing more map changes, I hope along with them they add more seasonal variants to newer maps but I'll wait and see.

I can't believe I have to add this as well, but with how last szn trailer went I'm going to for the sake of my sanity and people who interact with this post;

**Please consider that these are all my opinions and thoughts after watching the s13 trailer and seeing photos on twt. Don't hate just because I don't agree with your opinion. You are entitled to your own opinions as I am to mine. I don't want to see any hate/targeted comments or dms this time.

I actively chose not to mention Venture in the main post because I already know doing so will attract people to make negative comments. I am aware they didn't get a skin, and I'm not expecting (but hoping) for them to get anything in the BP. Last time I made a post on a szn trailer and included Venture I had people being bigoted and disrespectful, and have since blocked them;

I will continue that notion for anyone who follows their footsteps, don't be negative or disrespectful to me or anyone active on this post. (Please feel free to comment/reblog your thoughts in a positive, non-abrasive way, don't not attack or out right reject others opinions for your own.) Thank you.**

[crystalelemental]

Did you know there's a tier list maker for Unicorn Overlord classes now? Time to have opinions no one else agrees with!

For context: I am ranking this solely based on combat performance that I achieved. There are classes I have seen people rank far above what I do, and whether that's because they understand something I don't, or they had particular setups I didn't piece together and got better results out of it, it doesn't matter. I am rating this on how I experienced the class playing through twice.

The highest I beat was Tactical. I did try Expert, and beat the maps just fine, but I have this known brain problem where anything timed starts to stress me out if it runs too close, and I was constantly running too close. I never lost a map through the 8 or so hours I played it, but I couldn't stand the time pressure and kicked it down to have a more relaxed time of my life. Make of that what you wish.

S-TIER

Breaker. I feel like the surest indication of an S-tier classification is not having to think about it at all. While some will argue for the best possible performance being the indication of tier, I argue the opposite. I don't think many people are going to dig into the game that hard, and thus many aren't going to see the glory of incredibly fine-tuned tactics that let you beat Arena at level 15 with like three guys. Most are playing normally, and encounter stuff that just naturally works, and that, to me, is the surest sign of potency for a class, because there is nothing hidden that makes it good, you feel it right away. That in mind: Breaker is the most mindless win condition in the game, and my personal assertion for best class. Enrage is dirt cheap at 1PP, stacks, includes accuracy for consistent hit rates, counters armors, and has a row-wide attack that can't even be blocked or guarded. Once armor is removed, Assaulting Blow will recharge 1AP for every KO they land, potentially sweeping the entire enemy team, with no more support than "make sure they don't get hit." Anyone with cover and the tactic of "prioritize Highest Phys Atk" will do the job.

Gryphon Master. Gryphon Master is a bit more dynamic than Breaker, but no less devastating. Row-wide damage for 1AP is exceptionally strong, and they don't suffer the Berserker's accuracy penalty either. Add in cav effectivenss, and they're unspeakably strong. Being flying, they can front row dodge tank. Late in the game, they can pivot to Fatal Dive, dealing true damage to foes and denying guard, which can easily annihilate back-row foes and chip bulkier targets enough for follow-ups to finish. Griyphon Master has so much going for it, and very few legitimate flaws. So long as arrows are covered, they excel.

High Lord. Alain is ridiculous. Not because of anything offensive, but because defensively, he is unparalleled. Blocking is a huge deal to me, I like covering for squishier allies, and Alain's access to specific equipment giving him a much easier time hitting 4/4 means he adds a lot of defensive backbone, without suffering poor Mag Def, and contributing some DPS through anti-cavalry tech and row-wide offense. That anti-cav tech also removes AP and PP both, while inflicting Guard Seal, which is exceptionally potent. His potential to disrupt and defense a team cannot be understated.

Featherbow. At time of writing...this is my favorite class. Consider this bias if you must. Featherbow is S on utility. Row-wide Blindness in response to an attack leaves little room for foes to counter. She is not bound by the Rogues need to hit, and is instant enough that removing this status is impossible prior to them attacking. Photon Arrow hits two targets for -50% Phys Def and Passive Seal, which is devastating if aimed correctly given her high initiative, potentially shutting out a healer completely. Even Saint's Shot can be devastating, just removing 1PP from a target, or 2 if they're non-flying. As a flier themselves, they have evade potential on the front row, and can use their own blind effect to deny archers specifically. Featherbow is a metric ton of fun, and can really disrupt entire teams with good play.

Snow Ranger. Snow White Strike. That alone gets this an S. Follow-up attacks are generally good, accounting for typical shaky accuracy, but Yunifi defies that will solid bow accuracy and a devastating Freeze effect. This is an excellent way to keep an opponent locked down, and the damage doubles if someone else freezes for her. Triple Counter can be devastating as well with enough evasion on her; a full power retaliation that hits three opponents is amazing. Yunifi is interesting in that it really is her passives that make her tick, but Glacial Rain can be used on the back line to really hammer an enemy team with full AoE damage and a freeze effect that shuts down everything. The accuracy is shakier, but to my understanding, only one arrow has to hit for freeze to work. Yunifi is fantastic, and I adore using her.

Dark Marquess. I admit, my first run, I did not really respect Berengeria. I get it now, though. On-entry passive that cuts the initiative and attack of all foes is excellent. So long as foes are afflicted, she recharges PP on multiple attacks, including a 1PP follow up move for infinite regain that also heals her. When she's attacked, she boosts Atk/Initiative and gets 1AP back. She has row-wide offense that inflicts Stun. While it requires afflictions to be present, which can be slightly restrictive, she still has strong options even without that condition met. Dark Marquess is just very persistent and incredibly strong, with a powerful opening move, and it's hard to go wrong with her presence.

Elven Augur. The elf girls are very, very strong, but Augur is definitely stronger. Offensively, an on-entry row-wide attack that inflicts stun if it doesn't kill is great. Much like Sibyl, Augur has a good synergy between skills. Primus Edge restores 1PP if at 100% HP, even if it misses. Elemental Impetus will use 2PP to recharge 1AP, making this a good, steady source of recharge. The main draw, however, is Elemental Roar, a 3AP move that hits all foes and gets stronger with more active fairies. Her opening skill is strong by default, but adding a fairy into an AoE burst is outstanding. Very little investment needs to go into Augur for their magic to devastate, and they even pack a little recovery that can specifically heal up a Cleric-type if they get hit with status, keeping your team rolling without a care.

A-TIER

Shieldshooter. Again, I like blocking. Shieldshooters can block while recovering HP to allies. Shieldshooters also have competent offense in Heavy Bolt, making them a good two-skill focus unit. Their follow-up is fairly weak, but can be nice as I believe it cannot be interrupted, finishing off units that get Holy Cradle or otherwise barely survived. As a bow user in the front, she can aim specifically for back row as well, taking out core supports or big threats with hilarious precision. If anything holds Shieldshooter back, I'd say it's that they don't quite excel at what they aim to do. Heavy Bolt is good damage, but she lacks the same kind of hilarious disruption as Alain does against cavalry, or the row-wide offense he can pack, leading to her being more about sniping a particular target in a match and otherwise existing for defense. Still one of my favorites, though.

Swordmaster. One of my favorites. Swordmasters are about precision removal of specific enemies. By default, this is Scout. In some situations, it can be the fliers. With Runic Sword and some backup with Inspiration, it can include Armor, which legitimately feels like their best utility. But Swordmasters rarely carry. Their damage can be good with proper support, but maintaining that is difficult. And without it, their damage drops precipitously. I do compliment their anti-meta properties, like Meteor Strike being the easiest way to just blow through Galerius' Dark Armor, but they have trouble answering as much as they counter. Outside of Runic Sword, which is a one-time item, they have no means of getting around armor or guards. They're evade tanks whose Parry doesn't work on range, so arrows can break them, and truestrike remains a problem. Their PP generation is a bit challenging as well. Two swords means less flexibility on accessories. But for the sheer depth of what they can do for a team, and how well they can be crafted to serve any comp, A feels right.

Wyvern Master. Look, I don't know why I like Gryphon Master better. I think better early tools, but Fire Breath doesn't take long to unlock and is arguably stronger. Column-piercing is really good too, easily slapping someone out of commission on the back row. I think Wyvern Master is fantastic, but for some reason it just never felt like it worked as well as Gryphon Master, despite having comparable tools. Maybe I'm just biased. Maybe I just really liked Fatal Dive. I cannot give a satisfying answer, because they do rule.

Druid. Druid's great. Probably the strongest on-entry skill in the game, coupled with immediate debuffing of a target's offense as they attack. Defense Curse wildly improves damage and prevents Guard entirely, which is exceptional for offensive cores. I think the only reason I don't respect Druid more is that I didn't use Druid more. Their kit is truly excellent, if hard countered by Clerics.

Prince. Buffing alternative to Druid. Seriously, it's the same thing but reversed. Buffs initiative on entry instead of debuffing, buffs attack instead of debuffing defense, grants truestrike instead of inflicting Guard Seal. Prince does fantastic back-row work. I think I value Druid just a little more, solely because I think the entry skill is stronger, and Guard Seal slightly more valuable than a truestrike.

Elven Sibyl. She's a healing version of the Augur, whose on-entry skill is a heal that provides a nullification to one debuff for a row. She also has Primus Edge/Elemental Impetus, allowing for fantastic generation. However. My problem lies in her AP skills. Elemental Roar remains the boom it is on Augur, but her 2AP skill goes entirely to waste using it, and it's a row-wide heal that provides nullification of one attack to a whole row. To put it bluntly, this is insanely good. Evade tanks have a backup that can now prevent certain death, solely because Eltolinde was present to provide it. And yet...this comes at the cost of Elemental Roar. I talked about this positively in other classes, having strong variability, and I think that's Sibyl's strength too. You can use her as either Elemental Roar AoE damage for a wipe, or you can use her as a healer with built-in blocks to damage for an entire row. But you cannot do both. And that's why she's down here in A. Because the S class options? They can do everything they want in one set. Eltolinde cannot. She makes much harder concessions.

Valkyria. I wish I could put this higher, but I do think it's fairly limited at times. Boosting team defenses and guard rate on entry makes the entire team a lot stronger, and 50% guard rate is percentage points, meaning even your frail back row has better than average odds to guard and reduce a lot of damage. This is not what sells her. What sells her is Maiden's Hammer, a Truestrike move that deals better damage the lower her HP, and is a counterattacking move. This is an excellent utility move. Combined with her natural ability to hit Flying with Vertical Edge, she's like a heavily defensive variation on Swordmaster. But. Swordmaster has that magic attack to blast armor apart, being much more offensively competent. Valkyria relies on Brandish, which is expensive and never deals as much as you want. She can eventually break through, but definitely needs support to see it happen.

Dreadnought. I feel like Dreadnought is a boring, overly straight-forward damage class with exactly one interesting tool. Unfortunately for me, that one interesting tool is hilarious and extremely powerful. When a foe guards an attack, Dreadnought kicks them in the face, inflicting Stun and Guard Seal. That is. EXTREMELY good. It turns a lot of offensive focus options from middling and in need of support, to potentially just blowing right through armors. With her self-buff to get truestrike and sure crit, she's able to obliterate pretty much any individual enemy she sets her sights on. And with greatshields, even in the back row, she tends to be excellent on defense. Initiative can be a problem, but just kicking open a guard for allies is a massive boon.

High Priestess. This may seem a bit mean, but I don't consider Scarlett as potent as other unique classes. Her healing leaves a bit to be desired, and while her main attacks remove buffs, the fact they can miss creates issues. It's not like her damage is exceptional either. What keeps Scarlett in A is really just how rare buff removal is, and how nice having a shield to halve incoming damage while denying status can be in good hands. But the later you get, the more allies can find items that make them immune to status anyway, and thus her shield goes largely to waste. This is especially true for evade tanks, who just...move out of the way of the attack, rendering that shield moot. Scarlett has good tools mired by problems that kept haunting me, but I fully acknowledge what she brings.

B-TIER

Bishop. Standard healer. What gets Bishop in my good graces is Refresh being row-wide, and access to some good AP skills from staves, most notably Lyrical Wand. Most of their AP skills are pretty whatever, so the wand skill is free, and recharges AP of a target. I do think Bishop can be a little finicky, though. Specifically targeting what you want and when can be a challenge on the tactics, with their default sets healing every single hit no matter how minor resulting in consumption of 1PP. It's a necessary class, but not an exceptional one.

Featherstaff. Featherstaff has some solid traits, but I feel like initiative is their worst enemy. Unless they get Overheal or Holy Cradle up right away, it's easy for opponents to just slap something and ruin your plan. Holy Cradle in particular feels like shit outside of PvP/Arena contexts. It's 2AP that could go into just keeping you from dying, and very little in main game can threaten to one-shot you. They're overly specific for single matches, which is why I put them below Bishop.

Wereowl. Very fun but very finicky. Wereowl has basically one truly good trait, and that is granting 1PP to an ally after they use one. This combos into some hilarious shit, especially when you look at things like Featherbow's row-wide blind response, or sustaining healing or guarding, or counterattacks, etc. That said, getting that PP where you want it to go and not having them burn through all of it is very, very challenging. I will give credit for having pretty whatever AP skills. I think they're another that really likes the staff effect to be their primary, though Night Vision for huge accuracy buffs is nice.

Feathershield. What if your tank could dodge? Feathershield is fun because they are flying armor, which means they both take hits well and can evade, making them excellent at sticking around. That said...is it just me, or are there like no greatshields that have passive abilities to shield allies? Is no one else bothered by this? It's like the one fatal flaw. If I could get this guy to both reflect spells and jump in on attacks against the healer, I think we'd be set. I do want to specifically complement synergy with Valkyria. Iron Will with his buff to Mag Def for the entire party makes for some outrageously tanky units.

Great Knight. Cavalry Call. That's basically the class in a nutshell. They have a great buff that applies to all cavs, and are able to rush a column both with their base move and with a follow-up. In addition, they pack the usual AP recovering stuff, but with two different forms of attack, including a 2AP multi-hit move. Great Knights have a lot in their favor. I don't really respect them. I feel like a lot of their utility relies entirely on a full cav team that makes them hysterically easy to counterpick. I think they put so much in offense that every comp tends to lack wildly for defense, and their results in a map are either a clean sweep of massive damage, or getting half the team killed. I think without someone to proc boosted initiative or debuff foe's initiative, they tend to move too slowly and eat a lot of damage. They live attached to Selvie. Outside of cav comps, while they have decent tools, their offenses are significantly less pronounced, and I feel like they falter. They're really fun and have one of the more mindless overall setups, but it's such a hit and miss tactic that's so, so easy to counter.

Doom Knight. I don't really favor sacrificing HP for power. I admit they have a good system going, as well as good bulk and potential to recover damage they do take. I recognize their fire-base AoE move is tremendous damage with a lot of benefits. I just can't put them higher than this. Similar deal to the Great Knights, I think they tend to be easily bowled over at times. Tactics matter a lot, and if their conditions aren't in place, they falter wildly. Without a Cleric, or at least some means of active healing, they're very easily KOd. I like them well enough, but not all that much.

Sergeant. Granting Sure-crit can be specifically tailed for Maximum Funny. Granting 1AP to any ally at the cost of 2PP is also really nice. Sergeant doesn't have the best offensive profile, but column-piercing and cav effectiveness isn't bad, and they add some response to fliers as well. They're a decent all-arounder with no particularly outstanding traits, but some really fun concepts to play with.

Elven Archer. Ice Arrow is one of my favorites, I love freeze and they have the initiative to back it up. I've also seen talk of their on-entry skill resulting in Scarlett granting a PP back with some healing, kicking off their party-wide heal and instantly recovering the team to full not matter how battered from the last encounter. It's something! But I feel like Elven Archer often fails to dazzle. Damage isn't great, they don't have the same truestrike as base archers, their on-entry skill is nice but not one of the better options out there, etc. I do like them a lot, though.

Elven Fencer. Similar deal but worse. They rely heavily on evasion, and can sure-dodge, but only when conditions occur that grant the effect. Otherwise, they have sub-par evasion for a frontline tank, and are always hoping to recharge AP on successful dodges. They rely heavily on allies to set conditions for dodging, and are as easily bopped by truestrike as other evade tanks. At least they have really good and fun offense that has a magical edge, allowing them to hurt armor types.

C-TIER

Sainted Knight. This one would get me killed on Reddit. I don't think Sainted Knight is all that good. I think the blocking of magic can be divine, and the combo with Legionnaire is obviously decent. But I think their problem is often passivity, and being too cluttered with AP. Yes, they can deal hilarious magical damage. If they aren't using Row Heal. But then you need someone else dedicated to healing. Which causes its own problems. But keeping healing means they don't do much in the way of attacks, and that magic potential goes to waste. But also there's only two magical swords in the game and Swordmaster is way more proficient about removing armor, while their attacks seem to fail to KO anything with reasonable Mag Def. Even in just general runs, I use Sainted Knight often for mobility and reduction of magical assist attacks used against us, but their teams are extremely hit and miss by effectiveness. I struggle to see a situation in which they feel as good as many claim.

Legionnaire. I like blocking, so here they are. I do think they're highly passive, lacking for damage or healing or literally anything but guard. But it's nice to have someone to just block attacks and take like no damage, you know?

Feathersword. Kinda middling. Yes, ranged attack, decent self-buffing, but their kit is kinda whatever. No particularly great attacks, buffs literally everything but stats you really want like straight Atk, Discharge is their only means of offense but it removes literally every other form of buff. They have a Truestrike but its 2AP, and their lack of sheer crit rate means Gambler's Coin isn't even salvaging them. I have yet to feel like Feathersword truly does all that much.

Landsknecht. What if you were a follow-up class, but your follow-up missed? What if Berengeria were kinda bad? Bastard's Cross is huge damage, but easily guarded and then rendered unimportant. Landsknecht does have good damage potential, and the AP regeneration of Breaker and Great Knight, but it tends to fall way behind on every other metric I care about.

Warlock. On the one hand, row-wide move that can stun, and great follow-up and counter attacks with generalized magic. I do think the shaky 90 accuracy is a problem, as is general initiative woes and frailty. Pure magic classes tend to heavy invest in just their magical offense and everything else is kinda whatever. As a result, Warlock can do some nice stuff, but I rarely consider them exceptional.

Sniper. I barely used them. I kinda dislike them, to be honest. I got one to work in the Virginia/Feathershield team comp I used, but I feel like the biggest issue they have is that damage output feels limited. They're kind of another precision removal tool, in that they can aim wherever they want and are specifically good against fliers, but only okay when it's a wyvern without crits. Taking out back row stuff also relies heavily on what the enemy team's composition is. They can work, but they're not a favorite, for reasons that are slightly difficult to parse. I don't think they're that bad, but I've never had good success with them.

Sorceress. This has to be my most contentious opinion. I think Sorceress kinda blows. Stupid frail, horrendous initiative, magic can get completely hard countered by two class types, getting conferrals to land where you want when you want is an exercise in pure frustration, status conferrals take 2PP and a whole accessory slot which is demanding, and while their freeze is an excellent status, I pretty much never see it because the rest of the team does its job first or the witch dies immediately. They can be good. Devastating, even. But I feel like they're very often a liability. Also now that both are on here: I don't respect Trinity Rain. Way, way too much investment of a team's resources for something that can (1) miss, (2) be blocked, and (3) be entirely shut down by Feathershields and Sainted Knights.

D-TIER

Vanguard. They're just not too useful. I give some credit for Arrow Cover blocking flying attacks as well, and being useful alongside Swordmasters and fliers for the specifics of what it does. But that's about all I can really praise it for. Neat concept, very lacking outcomes. There's a reason they're a 25 Honor promotion.

Werelion/Berserker. They are the same goddamn class and I don't like them. Row wide and then full party AoE damage should be great, but their offense is surprisingly low by raw stats, and all of their attacks are base 80% accuracy. Which is, as it turns out, bad. The only good stat they have is HP, and fun fact: no situation in any game I've ever played has allowed high HP but bad defenses and evasion to work out. Ever. I feel like this could be a way better class if their other stats were a little stronger in some places, but as it stands, very underwhelming.

Werebear. I tried, but never found much interest in them. A greatshield class that can't block anything, and instead specs into attempts at offense that are inaccurate, or completely miss anything not on the ground. Wholly unimpressed.

Viking. Their on-entry skill should be a favorite. There's so much that should be fun with this. I have never, even once, found a situation where I think it's worth it. Other on-entry skills just offer a lot more bang for your buck, and letting everyone bypass guard, while nice, often isn't necessary to taking down armor. There are other approaches. Like magic. Even half-magic like the Elven classes will do a better job than bringing a Viking's low initiative and inaccurate shenanigans. I want to respect them, I really do, but I've never found a significant use.

Werefox. Let the broad opinion being: I do not respect units whose life is evasion. "But you like Swordmaster." For the offense. For its ability to remove, with incredible precision, several different types of opponents as you see fit. Werefox does not do that. It has some offensive utility I'm willing to acknowledge, but I didn't have a great time using them ever.

F-TIER

Werewolf. Werewolf is one I wanted to like. A row-wide 15% Phys Atk buff with no other conditions is fairly unique, and they have means of restoring AP for further moves. Unfortunately...I just never encountered success. This feels unfair, I feel like something could've happened if I just found something I liked. But the one (1) time I made a team with one that actually started to work out? It was the Virginia/Fodoquia team. And it turned out the best results for that team? Was dropping the Werewolf for a Cleric. I dunno man! Results don't lie! Maybe I'm using it wrong, but I've yet to see this class accomplish literally anything.

Rogue. _Lucille_ on Reddit has some excellent takes on classes, and some fantastic strategy. They're the kind of person who can beat Arena before breaking level 20 on the highest difficulty, something I legitimately could never piece together. So when they say that dodge tanks are better than physical tanks, and that Rogue is very good, I'm inclined to believe this is true. Evasion likely is more successful overall if outfitted correctly. But personally? I consider tier based on ease of access as much as anything. If something is stupid broken busted, but only once you've been playing for a while and have a working meta knowledge of tactics and how to specifically counteract all the things that otherwise beat you? That to me isn't success. That requires niche knowledge for success. And on that note: Rogue sucks. Getting it to work is an unending nightmare. So many enemies have Truestrike, and the only means of not dying horribly is knowing AI patters and how to avoid being the target of attacks that threaten, and nothing else. Even outside of this, just letting one (1) attack land the low percentage to hit is instant death, and in general maps, you're encountering so many swings that eventually that 10% will land. It requires a level of precision and calculation that I feel is way beyond what is reasonable as a more casual fan of the game. While their skills feel exciting, I never once found them significant. Row blindness is done infinitely better by Featherbow, and even Druid if you want to use the staff for it. Stealing AP is only ever 1AP despite the translation, and fails entirely if guarded. PP steal can also be guarded against, ruining the attempt. Someone mentioned using them with Viking's War Horn to ensure hits, stealing PP and using that on accessories to buff allies constantly. Great plan! That also cuts into their evade rate because less equipment goes to it, so you get hit more often. Evade stops working the instant archers are introduced, because they just hit you through it. Their bulk is so bad, anything that touches them kills. Their passive skills are bad, with an on-entry that just inflicts Guard/Passive seal on one (1) target, which sucks, but is likely to go first given their high initiative, ruining much better options because only one goes off. I have active contempt for Rogue. I would love to get it to work, just to see what others are seeing, but I feel like their utility ran out before I even finished the demo. I get that no damage is better than chip damage, but you know what's even better than that? Not dying immediately because you failed a roll.

Paladin. I think the basic fact that nothing seems to outline the skills on a Paladin should tell you what you need to know. The class itself is good enough, but Josef is so gimped in the stats department that once you leave Cornia, and start fighting things closer to his level? He's easily overwhelmed on the frontline and contributes very little to a backline. There's no reason to use Josef past the opening. At least the Rogues can be outfitted with something going on, Josef just feels like a burden.

[thetoxicgamer]

Overwatch 2 Lifeweaver Abilities, Ult, and Tips

The Overwatch 2 Lifeweaver skills, which combine healing with control powers that can help or hinder both teammates and adversaries, have the capacity to completely alter how you approach the battlefield. Lifeweaver makes his debut as part of Overwatch 2 season 4, and is available to unlock as part of the battle pass for the season’s duration. Like Kiriko and Ramattra before him, the sheer versatility of his kit blurs the lines between the core Overwatch 2 roles. Lifeweaver promotes kindness and inclusivity, but he’s certainly no wilting flower, so here’s some useful tips on how to maximise his abilities. Overwatch 2 Lifeweaver abilities Lifeweaver is a long-range support healer first and foremost, but he offers bags of utility geared towards repositioning enemies and allies. It’s pretty easy to get to grips with his kit, but the scale of what you can do with it during a match means that you’ll have to refine your situational awareness before you hit Lifeweaver’s skill ceiling. Like all Overwatch 2 support heroes, Lifeweaver has an additional passive that allows him to automatically regain health over time, which adds to his overall survivability. Healing Blossom Lifeweaver’s primary fire is Healing Blossom, a healing burst that serves as the core of his kit. Its efficacy depends on how long you charge it. It’s possible to unleash rapid-fire shots of Healing Blossom, though this only restores a sliver of health at a time. It’s far more beneficial to take the second or so required to charge Healing Blossom fully, which restores a chunk of health in a single burst. Either way, Healing Blossom requires a reload after 12 shots, so be sure to keep it topped up so you don’t lose more time on top of charging. Thorn Volley Thorn Volley is Lifeweaver’s alternate primary fire and consists of a stream of rapid-fire thorns that offer the opportunity to go on the offensive when required. You can unleash 60 thorns before requiring a reload, and their respectable damage output means they’re ideal for defending against flankers and other opponents looking to pick you off. They also have a decent range, allowing you to follow through on those opportune moments when vulnerable enemies disengage from the short-to-mid-range Overwatch 2 DPS heroes on your team but remain susceptible to your thorns. Be sure to aim for the head as much as possible if you’re looking to take them out quickly. Petal Platform Lifeweaver’s Petal Platform has the potential to be the most disruptive force on the battlefield, allowing you to interrupt the positioning of enemies and allies. The Petal Platform is pressure-sensitive, rising up into the air when a hero from either team steps on it. This provides the perfect opportunity to disrupt ultimates or help less mobile Overwatch 2 tank heroes reach new heights, which is perfect for a dive team composition. The Petal Platform comes with its own health bar, so you can also use it to block corridors to slow down pursuers while making an escape. If you’re looking to make the most from Petal Platform’s verticality, remember to jump at the apex of its ascent to gain additional height. Rejuvenating Dash Rejuvenating Dash does what it says on the tin: it’s a pretty straightforward dash that also provides a modest amount of self-healing. This makes Lifeweaver a bit more robust during engagements, which can mean the difference between life and death if you’re forced to go on the offensive against hardier foes. It goes without saying that Rejuvenating Dash is a boon for Lifeweaver’s ability, but you can also pair it with Petal Platform to traverse high ground at speed. Life Grip Lifeweaver’s Life Grip allows you to abruptly reposition your allies, pulling them towards your location while also shielding them for the duration. Life Grip has a wide variety of uses, the most obvious being the ability to pull your teammates out of harm’s way when they’re in dire straits. To make the most of it, we recommend positioning yourself near a health pack or within the perimeter of a restorative ultimate. Alternatively, you can cast Life Grip from an elevated position to prevent melee pursuers and restore their health using Healing Blossom. It’s also possible to use Life Grip offensively as well. Are you being hassled by a flanker? You can put a tank between yourself and your aggressor in a matter of seconds. On the subject of flankers, you can also manipulate the position of ultimates like Reaper’s Death Blossom. There are so many ways you can employ Life Grip to suit your needs, and once you’ve mastered this ability, you never have to be a bystander during engagements again. Parting Gift Death comes to us all eventually in Blizzard’s FPS game, and Lifeweaver is no exception. True to his nature, he drops a gift upon death that can be picked up by players on either team for a restorative health boost. Parting Gift’s position on the field can potentially bait enemies into a small skirmish, distracting them from the match at large, but it’s good practice to make those final seconds count and position yourself as close as you can to an ally so they can reap the benefit of your loss. It’s worth mentioning that, while Lifeweaver’s powers are tech-based in lore, the gift itself can’t be hacked – sorry, Sombra mains. Tree of Life Finally, Lifeweaver’s ultimate allows him to place a Tree of Life anywhere within Overwatch 2 maps. This enormous Biolight tree instantaneously heals all allies within its vicinity once planted, and continues to provide periodic bursts of healing over time for the duration it remains on the field. While this is of enormous benefit to your team alone, the Tree of Life also sports a massive health pool, making it extraordinarily difficult to destroy. Consequently, we recommend thinking strategically when it comes to placing it. You might consider blocking a choke point to give your team a brief reprieve when defending a fixed position or obstructing the sightlines of long-range adversaries. That’s the full suite of Overwatch 2 Lifeweaver abilities, as well as some handy tips on how to best utilise his kit. Be sure to check out our Overwatch 2 tier list to see how Lifeweaver fares when stacked up against his fellow heroes. Finally, we’ve got a list of the best Overwatch 2 heroes per role if you’re looking to dramatically switch up your playstyle ahead of the upcoming season. Read the full article

[anonthefold]

I'm having a lot of fun with season 2 so far. I like most of the cosmetics and battle pass stuff which is giving me so drive to work towards. Balances feel like balances. Even though Doomfist got a huge buff in low comp I don't think he's being played as well as his ceiling allows. Plus Moira likes to snack on dive tanks and Lucio can just move everyone else around away from him.

Played with my friends in the evening and I had a lot of fun. I like playing lucio with a Hog a lot because I can kind of bring up hogs weakness of low mobility while adding the extra damage to hooks. I was also able to peel to the others and not worry about Hog just exploding into little pineapple bits. My other support friend has been running Bap a lot and honestly I am all for it. She's doing much better with the hitscan and heals from him and lamp has saved our butts quite a few times. The issue we faced was our damage pick ups had a hard time following through with picks sometimes and other times they were just out doing their own thing. We have had some real nice dps at times though and those missions went very smoothly.

I need to improve my roster of support hero's so that I am better with them as well. I feel like I'm ok with Lucio in a supporting manner but I could improve my accuracy and boop control. With Kiriko I need better suzu control and more tp awareness. I need more confidence with Ana because I panic that I'll quickly get out of LoS and I won't be able to do anything about it. And I need more acc with Zen to provide any support. I also need to work on being more vocal on what I see.

It was such a delight playing with my friends though. I have such a great time playing with them that it fills me with a sense of happiness I'm so not used to that it drains me emotionally.

[pannacottawarrior]

shout out to that dude that was flipping out over me being Lúcio and yelling/cursing at me to switch and barely a minute into the comp game, they start complaining when we all died because half the team went different directions on Horizon but we still won in the end and i didn’t change once

love ya man

[fleetingfigures]

Mitigation made Manifest - A Scholar Analysis

Hello everyone, and welcome to the first part of my analysis series! Today we're going to be taking a look at the titular Scholar job, as well as delve into how it works, what it excels at, what it comes short on, and how well it is designed!

In an effort to keep everything organized, I'll section off this post into 4 main portions. If you're on a computer, you can use ctrl+f (or command+f if you're on a mac) to search for the following headings:

[ Basics ] [ How Scholar Works ] [ Gameplay, Tips and Design ] [ Final Evaluation ]

With that out of the way, let us begin!

[ Basics ]

Before we dive into Scholar, I believe I must go over a few things, the first being the issue of Scholar’s origin. Scholar, and by extension, its sibling, Summoner, have a unique system wherein they originate from the same base class, Arcanist, and also share each others’ levels (i.e if you level Summoner to 71, your Scholar will also be 71). As per most jobs, many of the base class’ actions translate to its advanced jobs, but the issue comes in its respective role - Arcanist is a magical dps. For Summoner, this is a fine transition as they share this role, but for Scholar, it is a tad awkward. At no point in your time as an arcanist are you ever really taught how healing in FFXIV functions, nor is it ever your ‘job’. The only real healer you can even start the game with is Conjurer, and beyond that, if you want to pick up a healer on the side without a level skip, only Astrologian and Conjurer are healers right out of the gate. As such, It’s hard to recommend Scholar as someone’s first healer as its levelling experience does not translate to how healers are played effectively.

Though, on this topic of effective healer play, I also feel the need to describe XIV’s healing design. At its core, a healer’s job is to obviously keep the party, and most importantly their tank, from dying. But, this is where some issues arise. In higher-end content, a healer is expected to also carry their weight in terms of DPS, and should have comparable RDPS (Damage taking into account buffs/debuffs applied) to that of a party’s tanks. This brings me to the focus of XIV’s healer philosophy: One is to balance the healing they must do with the damage they output. Spending all of your MP on healing is forsaking your duty to at least deal some damage, and only doing damage will obviously cause your party to die. Healing is essentially a game of ‘how low can I go?’, and as you gain more experience and comfort in the role, you can push that threshold lower and lower.

As for more general terms to be aware of, I shall make a small list!

DPS/ADPS/RDPS: Damage per second/Actual damage per second/Raid-contributing damage per second. These are terms used mostly by raiders to quantify how much damage is contributed. For classes that have buffs and debuffs, their DPS/ADPS do not accurately show their true damage, but their RDPS takes into account the bonus damage their buffs and debuffs have granted. Slidecasting: A term describing the leniency that cast times are given in this game because of server connection. For all spells, you do not have to be sitting through their entire cast bar, as they can instead be cut short so that one can still move while in the last bit of their cast. When one can slidecast a spell is dependent upon the cast time of the spell and the spell speed of the individual. HoT/DoT: Heal over time, Damage over time. GCD/OGCD: Global Cooldown/Off-Global Cooldown. Spells and weaponskills operate off of something called a ‘GCD’. A GCD is essentially a lockout until you can cast your next spell/weaponskill. For spells, as they have a cast time equivalent to their GCD, you can cast another right after you finish the first. By default, this GCD is 2.5 seconds for every class, and is reduced by abilities and skill/spell speed. But for weaponskills/spells that are classified as instant, that GCD lockout can instead be used to move or to use OGCD’s, namely abilities, that aren’t constricted by the GCD. The use of OGCD’s during a GCD lockout is called... Weaving: Using OGCD’s during a GCD lockout. Using just one in this timeframe is referred to as a single weave, and using two is referred to as a double weave. For SCH, you want most weaves to be double weaves. Ghosting: The bane of all arcanist-based classes. Unfortunately due to the AI of pets in this game, there is a delay between when you input an action and when your pet performs it, and a general delay in all pet actions if you are moving and they have to catch up. Sometimes when inputting abilities too quickly or using a demi-summon as actions are queued (like Summon Bahamut, Phoenix Trance and Summon Seraph), the queued action will either be delayed or never go off, but will still go on cooldown. Hence the term ‘ghosting’.

[ How Scholar Works ]

Now with the basics made clear, we can get to the actual meat of this analysis! In FFXIV, there are two denominations of healers: Shielding and Pure. Scholar falls into the prior classification as most of its kit is themed around the prevention of damage. Adloquium and Succor, for example, heal less than White Mage’s Cure II and Medica II, but apply a shield equivalent to 125% of the health restored. As such, Scholar is less of a reactive healer, but more of a proactive one; they set up their resources in advance so that the fight flows with less chaos. Scholar’s base kit is as follows:

Ruin/Broil I, II, and III: Your standard damage spell for a healer. Cast this when you’re not healing. Bio/Bio II/Biolysis: Your standard DoT spell for a healer, ticks 10 times over 30 seconds. Make sure to always have this on the enemy, that is unless the enemy is about to go away, or will die in 15 seconds or less. if this spell sticks to a target for more than 15 seconds, then it technically has outdamaged 1 broil, thus making it a theoretical gain! Physick: The basic heal for a healer; heals for about 400 potency. Once you get to a higher level, you should realistically never touch this heal again. Adloquium (Lvl 30): Scholar’s ‘big single target heal’; heals for 300 potency while erecting a shield equivalent to 125% of the healing done (technically 675 potency in total). Shields generated by this are denoted by the ‘Galvanize’ buff. If this crits, bonus shields will be added as another buff called ‘Catalyze’. This shield does not stack with itself, Succor, Seraphic Veil, or Nocturnal AST’s shields. Succor (Lvl 35): Scholar’s AoE heal; heals for 180 potency and erects a shield equivalent to 125% of the healing done (technically 405 potency in total). Shields generated by this are denoted by the ‘Galvanize’ buff. Like Adlo, it does not stack with what was listed above. Ruin II (Lvl 38): An instant cast version of ruin. It’s potency upgrades as you level, capping at 200 at level 72. This spell is mostly used to weave OGCD’s, or to just generally move while not missing too many casts. Art of War (Lvl 46): Your standard AoE spell for a healer. Deals 160 potency to all enemies in 5 yalms and is instant. Unlike Holy, this spell is a DPS gain on 2 targets or more. Deployment Tactics (Lvl 56): As an OGCD, spreads the target’s Galvanize buff to all nearby allies within 10 yalms. Does not spread Catalyze. Emergency Tactics (Lvl 58): Transforms the shields from Adlo and Succor into a flat heal. Useful in a pinch, hence its name, and gives Scholar a chance at outputting fat heals. Chain Stratagem (Lvl 66): Where Scholar’s RDPS comes from. Applies a debuff to a target that increases the chance they receive critical hits from all allies hitting it by 10% for 15 seconds. Multiple of these cannot be applied to the same boss, and will overlap. Keep in mind its 120 second cooldown as it is crucial to getting better at Scholar! Recitation (Lvl 74): Your next Succor, Adloquium, Excogitation, or Indomitability will always crit. In the case of Succor and Adlo, they will also not cast mana. In the case of Excog and Indom, they will not require an aetherflow stack. Mostly used to cast excog/indom through a double weave, and is immensely useful to make healing easier. 90 second cooldown.

To build off of my last point of resources, it’s high time to introduce two of Scholar’s best friends: Eos and Selene! Eos and Selene, as per SCH’s Arcanist base, are the pets for this job. Unlike carbuncles and egis, they do not deal damage, but instead use their actions to heal, and are crucial to Scholar’s gameplay. Also like the other pets, their action potencies scale differently as opposed to the player’s. For example, Eos/Selene’s Whispering Dawn skill has a listed regen potency of 120, meanwhile WHM’s Medica II regen has a listed potency of 100. One would think that Whispering Dawn would tick for more than Medica II, but through my testing, it is only about 86.8% as effective (due to number variation in FFXIV, this percentage is subject to change). The factor in which pet scaling affects your fairy’s heal is about 64%. With that little disclaimer out of the way, the Faeries’ kits are as follows:

Embrace (Lvl 1): A 150 (96 with pet scaling) potency single-target heal. This is what your fairy will do with its free time. Whispering Dawn (Lvl 20): A 120 potency regen over 21 seconds (537 potency heal in total with pet-scaling). Due to FFXIV’s server ticks, HoT’s and DoT’s hit every 3 seconds, and as such, WD translates to about 840 potency (in terms of your pet’s scaling that is). This ability is activated by the player as an OGCD. Fey Illumination (Lvl 40): A buff that reduces magic damage taken by all allies in range by 5% and increases their healing received by 10%. Lasts 20 seconds. Dissipation (Lvl 60): Munch on your Fairy to gain 3 aetherflow charges and +20% healing magic. This does NOT AFFECT THE POTENCY OF YOUR OGCD HEALING. Your fairy will automatically respawn after the 30 second duration. Aetherpact & Fey Union (Lvl 70): Designate an ally as an OGCD to form a tether between them and your fairy. Your Fairy gauge will then deplete by 10 every 3 seconds to apply a 400 potency (256 potency with pet scaling) heal. This tether will break after the target is 15 yalms away, if you cancel it by using aetherpact again, or if you use another fairy skill. Fey Blessing (Lvl 76): As an OGCD, spend 10 Fairy Gauge to have your Fairy perform an aoe heal of 350 potency (224 potency with pet scaling). Summon Seraph (Lvl 80): As an OGCD, replace your fairy with Seraph. Embrace now becomes Seraphic Veil, a 200 potency (128 potency heal with pet scaling) heal + shield. Consolation (Lvl 80): Essentially Fey Blessing, but only available during Seraph. Heals for 300 potency (192 potency with pet scaling), and shields for the same amount. Has 2 charges per every Seraph summon, and the shield stacks with your own shields as well as a nocturnal Astro’s shields.

Now that those are out of the way, you must be thinking, “The fuck is fairy gauge and aetherflow?” Well, I’m glad you asked, as they’re both intrinsically tied to each other! Starting at level 70, every time you spend an aetherflow stack, you gain 10 fairy gauge, pretty simple, yea? As for aetherflow itself, every 60 seconds you can cast the skill named, well, Aetherflow, to gain 3 stacks of it and recover 1000 MP. These Aetherflow stacks can be used on the following OGCD abilities:

Lustrate (Lvl 45): A 600 potency heal. Very straightforward, and often not used because of the value of the other options. Energy Drain (Lvl 45): A 100 potency damaging OGCD. If you don’t need to heal, and you don’t think you need to heal for a bit, this is your go-to aetherflow dump. Also, if you’re attempting parses on Scholar, have fun using all your aetherflow on this. Sacred Soil (Lvl 50): Create a bubble that reduces damage taken by all allies inside by 10% for 15 seconds. At level 78 this upgrades to offer a 100 potency heal (500 potency heal in total). Only costing 1 aetherflow gauge, having a 30 second cooldown, and lasting 15 seconds, this skill is INCREDIBLY GOOD, especially after the level 78 upgrade. Indomitability (Lvl 52): A 400 potency AoE heal. Straightforward, but very effective because of its numbers. Excogitation (Lvl 62): An 800 potency heal that triggers when the target falls under 50% HP, or if its 45 second duration ends. While it feels awkward to use for beginners, its usefulness is immeasurable. It is technically a higher potency version of Lustrate, with a slight cooldown and delay, but fills a more ‘fire-forget’ niche. Very useful inside of all settings but remember, it will not proc if the target will outright die to the damage before it triggers (i.e if a tank takes a tankbuster at 51% health, and the hit does 60%, excog will not proc.)

[ Gameplay, Tips and Design ]

Scholar, as I have stated, fills the role of a preemptive healer, especially with all of the mitigation present in its kit, as well as the existence of Excog. As such, this job sees a greater increase in effectiveness as you yourself learn a fight compared to a pure healer such as WHM/Diurnal AST. If you know when the party/raid-wide damage is coming, and you prepare accordingly with... Say, A sacred soil and a succor, that is a good chunk of damage you or your co-healer won’t have to heal, thus affording both of you more time to deal damage. Inside of higher end content, like savage raids, having said mitigation is both invaluable for progressing through fights, as well as streamlining and perfecting them. For a while, because of that fact, SCH was the unofficial ‘king’ of healers for a very long time, especially considering there used to be a lot more damage inside of SCH’s kit (rest in peace almost everything that made it unique lol). The start of Shadowbringers was when SCH was finally taken off of its throne, not by AST like many would think (also because it took quite the hit), but by WHM of all things. Thankfully through a series of buffs since 5.0, SCH would begin to see themselves slowly climb back and situate in a comfortable position, but while Scholar is in a good spot now, that does not mean it’s perfect.

Scholar’s ability to heal pure HP is a bit lacking, especially so when dealing with attacks that place the party or specific players at 1 hp. SCH’s find themselves having to use multiple resources in trying to recover that lost HP, often losing much more damage uptime in comparison to WHM or AST (Which is why the ideal healing composition involves 1 pure healer and 1 shield healer). This usage of multiple resources also makes SCH a fair bit more punishing to inexperienced healers than AST or WHM. With the HP recovery of fairies being nerfed in Shadowbringers, much more of the agency is placed back upon the player, who in turn must pay attention to everything that the class has to offer. Obviously not all content is going to necessitate OPTIMAL PLAY, but with all the moving parts present within its kit, Scholar demands a bit more attention to be paid towards it and its skills.

Outside of a learning curve and lack of pure healing, Scholars are punished heavily for dying. Not only must they spend a GCD in resummoning their fairy, all fairy gauge and aetherflow stacks are also lost on death, and if aetherflow was on cooldown at the time, A SCH is going to not have a majority of their kit for awhile on top of having reduced healing due to weakness/brink of death. This once again lends itself to Scholar being less beginner-friendly as opposed to the other healers, even with the existence of freebie heals from your fairy.

Hell, speaking about fairies, therein lies an issue itself - Scholar being a pet class. Conceptually it’s awesome, but with how FFXIV handles pets/demi-summons and their AI, it’s also quite the hassle. Like I mentioned above, ghosting is a problem when it comes to pet classes, and if you don’t properly adjust around it, some of your cooldowns can simply just go poof. Weaving both Whispering Dawn and Fey Illumination in the same double weave will cause the one that’s cast later to cast quite a bit later. On top of that, if you’re moving while you’re weaving them, there’s a chance you’ll have to wait for the fairy to catch up to you to finally cast them (which is why placing your fairy pre-battle is very useful). And as a general rule of thumb, never use summon seraph right after you use Whispering Dawn or Fey Illumination. Wait until after you see the buff apply on everyone as using Seraph will cancel the queued action.

With all that being said, however Scholar is still highly effective in what it does, it just requires a bit of experience. While I can’t offer tutorials on every fight, there are a few general tips I can give for aspiring scholars out there!

[ Tips ]

(General Advice + Combos)

Double weaving on Scholar is rather straightforward, but if you're using Ruin II to do so after your Broil, it will be a technical DPS loss if you do not use an energy drain within the weave window! Broil III has a potency of 290, Ruin II has a potency of 200, and Energy Drain has a potency of 100. In weaving without the use of energy drain, you will lose 90 potency in comparison to if you were to cast another Broil III. Using Energy Drain will add another 100 potency, thus gaining you 10 potency overall. Of course you shouldn't always dump an aetherflow on energy drain when you're weaving, but it is something to keep in mind when you are aiming to do more damage!

- Healing Combos -

[Single Target] If you are AoE'ing, replace ruin II/Biolysis with Art of War!

[AoE Mitigation] (Shield + 5% magic damage mitigation + 10% all damage mitigation)

[Panic AoE Healing] (1029 potency AoE Healing) As a bonus little tip in regards to this, remember Scholar's AoE healing spell/ability priority! The above combo is when you cannot afford time for a regen, but if you can, follow this list. 1. Whispering Dawn (if you can afford time for the regen) 2. Fey Blessing 3. Sacred Soil (if you can afford time for the regen) 4. Indomitability 5. Succor + Emergency Tactics 6. Succor

Scholars luckily have a wonderful mobility tool in Ruin II which allows them to position easily, though at the cost of DPS. However, this loss is minimal compared to its cohorts, wherein WHM either has to clip their Dia or use a lily, and AST either has to use Lightspeed, or slowly shuffle over with Malefics. This makes Scholar a bit easier to navigate when learning fights! Don't be afraid to use Ruin II if you're looking to push for a clear or learn a mechanic better, as a dead scholar is worse than one that is losing dps.

A crucial part of Scholar's kit is actually Chain Stratagem. While it loses much of its usefulness in public groups, or those who do not exactly care for proper rotations, when you can coordinate buffs and opening combos, it provides a large boost in DPS for the whole party. Typically, the ideal time to use Chain Stratagem is upon your 4th GCD, and everytime it comes off cooldown after, but this can change depending on your group. Here is an example 4th GCD Chain opener.

(Dungeons)

While AoE’ing mob packs, you can keep your focus target on the tank. It will make it much easier to heal them in a pinch.

Sacred Soil is essentially a free 15 second long cooldown for the tank, that ALSO heals at level 78 and above. It’s very, very useful.

Using Excog and adlo between pulls will allow you to spend more time AoE’ing mobs

Don’t forget about your fairy skills, especially fey union. Lazy mode is using fey union after whispering dawn, fey illumination and sacred soil and then proceeding to press art of war until the cows come home.

(Trials/Raid)

Recitation + Excog on your main tank pre-pull. Many use recitation+Adlo and then spread the shield with deployment tactics, but you don’t need to use recitation for that! Catalyze is the bonus shielding a crit adlo creates, and cannot be spread. Therefore save your recitation for a free excog and use a normal adlo+deployment tactics afterwards.

Please, please, PLEASE, if you are in a static or raid environment, make sure you allies stand in Sacred Soil when they can. It makes all of your lives easier.

Pre-placing your fairy in the center of the arena is a good habit to get in, but if you need your fairy AoE’s while you’re away from the center, make sure to press heel on your fairy hotbar to make it follow you again.

[Design]

Outside of all that, there is a collection of miscellaneous things that I do want to prattle off in relation to this category, mostly being some design choices and ideas I had for the class going forward. So, let’s begin!

Why does Fey Blessing not become Consolation when you have Seraph out? They are essentially the same thing, and you CAN’T EVEN USE FEY BLESSING WHEN YOU HAVE SERAPH OUT. WHY IS FEY BLESSING AND CONSOLATION SEPARATE BUTTONS. ANSWER ME SQUARE ENIX, TELL ME WHY.

There should be another way to dump Fairy gauge. It would make the system a bit more interactive (A lot like how lilies got an AoE version as well as Afflatus misery with SHB).

We should be able to cancel fey union in the middle of a cast. Breaking the tether does not have an animation nor any animation lockout, and in my eyes is technically not an OGCD. With this change, cancelling fey union can be done on the fly and not require a weave so as to not lose uptime.

The delay upon shield application is a tad annoying, especially so in the use of deployment tactics. Sometimes, if you cast too late, the boss’ Aoe will eat the heal, but not the shield. And in the case of the latter, if you use deployment tactics too quickly, you’ll spread nothing.

Bring back fairy uniqueness ;-;

[ Final Evaluation ]

Now comes time for my final grading.

Going forward with these Class Analyses, I will grade the class upon a set of categories unique to their role (DPS, Tank, Healer). As such, in my grading of Scholar, I will judge it based on the following categories, on a scale of F-S:

Damage (Personal) - The damage they bring to the table by themselves. Damage (Raid setting) - The damage they bring based upon their RDPS potential Accessibility - How easy is it to pick up and play? Mitigation - How well can they prevent damage? Healing - How well can they heal damage? Fun - Well, is it fun? Fantasy fulfillment - Does it fit the class aesthetics/lore?

Damage (Personal) [7] - While not as powerful alone as White Mage, Scholar is not entirely dependent upon team mates for damage like Astrologian.

Damage (Raid Setting) [8] - The addition of chain stratagem to Scholar’s already decent damage takes that one extra step beyond.

Accessibility [4] - Starts as a DPS in Arcanist, has many unique functions and is punished heavily if they die in the middle of a battle.

Mitigation [10] - They’re the originator of shield healers, and definitely keep the crown. Sacred soil is always going to be ridiculous.

Healing [6.5] - Scholar’s pure healing is a bit lacking, but with Square’s fight design, any healer should be able to make it through a fight. Therefore, I cannot rate Scholar all too low in this category.

Fun [7.5, almost 8] - Keeps you engaged, but lacks the pizzazz of Astro and the oomph of White Mage. Still a fun class at the end of the day, though!

Fantasy Fulfillment [9] - As tactical geniuses in the lore, the feel of Scholar gameplay fits that ideal! Through your mitigation, pre-planned abilities, and setting up of fairy abilities, you definitely feel like a tactician controlling the flow of battle, though it does falter a bit with a lot of their old options being removed in SHB.

[ End ]

And with that, we are done with this analysis! As for my personal conjecture with Scholar, it’s one of my mains, and used to be my go to raid healer, that is until my static needed a bit more upfront healing for e12s prog awhile back. If you were to look at my FFlogs, you’d probably see an absolute deluge of WHM parses since it’s uhh... Kinda technically my new healer main, but I still love SCH I swear! Another thing that made me switch from SCH to WHM was the inclusion of a DRK in our static. The ability to instantly remove Walking Dead with one button is so much easier than blowing cooldowns on both healers. Though, technically, from a savage perspective, the highest damage team setup is SCH + AST (Mostly because boosting teammate damage will always do more than just being good yourself, especially this late in the tier).

Anywho... This is the REAL end of the analysis. Hope you enjoyed and if you have any suggestions, questions or things to address, just comment and let me know!

Yabi, out~

[talesfromaurea]

I realized that I never talk much about how the Tales from Aurea characters are actually built/play in game so let’s change that!  For the curious and the folks who are also into DnD/Pathfinder...  All characters just turned level 11 in the campaign 😊

Kaja

Draconic sorcerer (white dragon)

Gets a debuff to her strength and constitution for being a child but a buff to her dexterity

Weirdly powerful??? Like guys she’s honestly one of the most powerful of the PCs I don’t understand it. She has literally shot dragons out of the sky with her spells

I only teach her spells that I think it would be lore-y for her to know (ends up being mostly cold element spells). This makes it even weirder that she’s so strong... but I guess she wields the secret “power of the protagonist” lmao

Jo

Barbarian (using Pathfinder Unchained rules because vanilla Barbarian rules in Pathfinder are flat-out unusable)

Easily the highest DPS of anyone, she wields a two-handed warhammer as a single-handed weapon because she’s Large size and does a bonkers amount of damage with it

We actually made custom rules for her sabercat beast form but she rarely shifts except in very specific circumstances.  But it’s, uh, really Scary when she does (she once charged and mauled an enemy - he went from full health to dead in one turn)

Sakrattars

Wizard (School of Divination)

While Kaja is the damage-dealing spellcaster, Sakrattars mostly has support spells or spells useful for solving puzzles/dungeon diving

But he does cast a mean lightning bolt

He gets a huge initiative bonus (the idea is that he can “foresee” the battle coming and is Ready) but he also just rolls really well.  He almost always goes first when combat starts

Leif

Fighter

Tank/damage sponge - he has great AC and high HP.  He usually fights side-by-side with Jo, absorbing attacks while she dishes them out

Utterly incapable of confirming a critical hit.  It’s such a meme at this point that my partner actually incorporated it into his character - in his backstory, Leif is confirmed to be a clumsy excuse for a soldier in his youth

Amale

Ranger

Doesn’t really... do much in combat... he mostly helps with non-combat related gameplay and chipping away at enemies with his bow from a distance

Has a pet hawk named Koa who is a very Brave Bird and a certified Good Boy.  Koa won’t appear in the story for several more sessions though

Sigrid

Paladin (I think she’s level 8?)

Technically Leif’s follower, she joins the party much, much later in the story

Sworn to the goddess Aegis, Demon’s Bane.  As such, she’s one of the few party members who can hold her own against Fallen.  Everything about her is specifically designed to hunt and kill demons

She also heals Jo a lot... because Jo gets hurt... often... and badly... *sigh*

[capsicrew]

semi-live reactions to the LL;

Okay well, I think I'll just summarize.

All notes below the cut.

As expected, the live letter is focusing on job adjustments and additions. -They're trying to make major abilities across all jobs maintain a 60 or 120-second cooldowns, with some exceptions. With the intention being to align more of those "burst windows," in parties, especially in endgame raiding/content. -They re-emphisize that not all abilities will be on these 2 timers and YoshiP specifies Ley Lines will remain 90 seconds and regrets BLM being "neglected" lmao. "Everybody gets their burst, then I come in 30 seconds later with my lay lines"

Okay, job action video before they get into specifics, lets see what I can spot lmao;

[originally I had all my reactions to the trailer here, to keep organized, I'm combining that with the specific job notes]

That was a lot, sorry lmao. I think instead of typing more, I'll just add notes about the jobs as they go in depth after my first impressions above ^ Sounds like Summoner has the most hype with the audience. They made a comment that Summoner is now Ultima Weapon lmao.

Job Class notes: Tanks; -I guess using certain buffs in combination with certain skills increases their benefit? Not very specific, but I guess an incentive to think more about which cool downs you use and when and in concert with other skills. -Combo chains will no longer be broken when using ranged attacks. Nice! Sounds like this is being added to melee dps as well. -Looks like both Phys and Magic Damage will differ and be an important aspect? They sure talk a lot about this but I'm not sure the practical application. I guess just in determining to use tank skills that decrease either phys damage or magic damage? I guess they just adjusted some stats through the game and are just saying the numbers will be different so raiders don't piss themselves.

YoshiP is a cat boy lmao. Yoshi-nyan dskjfl lmao "I'm 48 years old!"

-Paladin: Trailer: [Looks like updates to skills and attacks with new graphics, or just new skills. Don't know PLD well enough to say for sure. Looks like Passage of Arms also included an attack of some sort while the PLD was immobile. 3 new attacks that look like AOEs that rain swords down on the enemies in various forms.] -Requiescat is no longer depending on MP value. -Ah, the sword-rain is a new 3-part combo starting with Confiteor (the level 80 PLD skill) -Gap closer is now 20y instead of 15y. -No drastic changes otherwise. About what you can expect from ShB with just other tweaks to match overall gameplay changes.

-Warrior: Trailer Reaction: [Has a cooldown that gives you little fire embers aesthetically. Looks like base combo attacks might get buffed.] -Abilities that increase damage are now extended (and even triggered) by the AOE combos. (instead of having to weave-in, like, Storm's Eye in the middle of a combo, especially for AOE combos) -Onslaught and Upheaval no longer drain the Beast Guage. They're now on a charge-use basis, I guess? And Onslaught will have a new combo move. -New skill being added when using Inner Release. Inner Release now has 60s cooldown, increasing use-frequency.

-Dark Knight: Trailer: [New/updated aoe attack, and can cast a shield on a single party member. Frey summon looks more in synch, but I haven't used that a lot so idk if that's different.] -Salted Earth will now just be placed at your feet (instead of being a placable aoe), and now combos into a new move. YoshiP admitted to having a macro to do this pre-EW, so they all decided that was silly. -lmao, Fray/simulacrum will also be sure to learn new skills as the player does. -Single-target defense buff. -Delirium cooldown decreased to 60s. -Gap closer also increased to 20y, like PLD.

-Gunbreaker: Trailer: [Either I don't play GNB enough or most of it looked the same except one cartridge aoe skill at the end lol. They do have a 3rd cartridge that can be stored, though.] -The Gnashing Fang+Savage Claw+Wicked Talon (lvl 60 skills that use a cartridge for the first skill) combo will now be reduced to a single action that switches between the 3 skills, to reduce the space it takes on the hot bar. -Continuation will now (only?) follow Burst Strike. I'm not 100% sure if they're saying Continuation is getting an additional action to follow Burst Strike and will also combo with the Gnashing Fang combo, or if it's JUST Burst Strike, now. -Getting a 3rd cartridge, as I noticed. -Gap closer also increased to 20y.

Melee DPS: -Feint will now decrease both physical and magical damage on the target, but the physical debuff will be more potent. (sounds like Addle will get a similar change) -Again, combos will not be broken by using ranged attacks. Consideration for when phys dps needs to move away from targets for aoes and such.

-Dragoon: Trailer reaction: [Got some flasy moves that look like new aoes, but mostly just new attacks looks like. Summons two dragons for some kind of ultimate end-combo move. And has a flowery attack that reminds me of FF9's dragoon flavor with Freya] -Increasing the AoE rotation. A lot of jobs could use this, so this was on my hopes list for EW. -Adding new actions if you do your base rotations right. lmao They comment on how flashy they are, which is true. -Sounds like many skills are being increased in power rather than adding a bunch of new skills to fill our hotbars. -Blood of the Dragon will now be a trait, rather than a skill that needs to be kept up constantly. (nice!) -Spineshatter Dive (DRG's earliest gap closer) will now have 2 charges instead of the one use, for increased mobility. -Lance Charge (self damage buff) has recast time decreased to 60s. Battle Litany (party crit buff) recast decreased to 120s.

-Monk: Trailer: [Has a new gauge added to its other, but no greased lightning gauge. Collecting more stickers ala BRD and SAM. Looks like their gap closer was updated to stack or be used multiple times quickly. Impressive looking attacks and aoes, but I don't play MNK enough to comment much lmao. Hope its less tedious!] -DAMN LOOK AT THAT JOB ART -Greased Lightning gone forever, so; -Chakras unlocked at a lower level. -New system; After using Perfect Balance, the player can use a new skill called Masterful Blitz. How the Blitz executes and what it does will change depending on what skills the player uses while using Perfect Balance. (much in line with Sabin's Blitz skill in FF6, it sounds to me). -Sounds like the player needs to use skills with some thought to maintain a balance of yin and yang chakras. Sounds like the translator is trying her best, but I think it'll come across better with some practice or seeing it in action better than the job trailer. -Oh, they are going to show a video-- -Showin off Thavnarian a little bit, lol -Each skill seems to have a specific association when used in Perfect Balance, that then add to either Yin or Yang (not final names sounds like). And if you get a charge of each, the next use of the skill unleashes a larger attack. I guess it's similar to trying to get three specific suits as AST. -I guess more/better info to come during the media tour. -Perfect balance with have a 2-stack charge, charging every 40s. -Sounds like some or more MNK skills will have their directional requirements removed to make this new system more manageable. -Shoulder Tackle (gap closer) is being removed, and is being replaced with a new gap closing action. Sounds like it wont do damage, but can be used to close the gap between both enemies AND allies (like Aetherial Manipulation with BLM). It comes with 3 stacks! Thats a lot of movement at once, with 30s recharge per charge.

-Samurai: Trailer: [Looks like Meikyo Shisui (the buff that lets you use your sticker-granting skills without doing the full combo) either has a massively reduced cooldown, a way to refresh it faster or just a second charge. Looks like the same is true of Tsubame-gaeshi (the skill that lets you use a sticker-using skill a second time)(I swear I don't have these names memorized, I only know their pictures. I'm looking them up). Possibly a new attack that uses meditation stacks, or I just forget what the level 80 skill looks like. Finishes with some kind of massive attack. So just lots of deeps for SAM.] -Mid-combo attacks that grant buffs can now also be obtained from aoe skills as well, like WAR. So that you don't either have to perform a single-target combo in the middle of fighting multiple targets, or don't have to just go without those buffs. -I was correct; Meikyo Shisui and Tsubame-gaeshi now each have 2 stacks. -You also get the mid-combo buff if you use the final move of a combo under the effect of Meikyo Shisui. Nice nice! Exactly things I wanted for SAM.

-Ninja: Trailer: [omg, a skill that grants auto-Huton I love it <3. Either Bushin now ends with a finisher skill (like automaton queen), or NIN has a new ranged attack. Oh shit!! A gap closer that actually does damage! Looks like it combos off of Raiton (lightning ninjutsu). Oooh, and there's a second follow-up lightning attack as well! NIN is gonna be interesting!] -New actions linked to Raiton (lightning ninjutsu), Doton (dot ninjutsu) and Huton (that ninjutsu you need to have on all the time for decreased weaponskill cooldown) being added. -Single action to apply the effect of Huton added * 0* <3 <3. Both applies it and resets the timer. -Additional actions added while under the effect of Bunshin (the level 80 skill). For just ninjutsu, I think? -Tried to not get the ninjutsu actions even more complicated. No 4th sigil lol. -Shadow Fang (ogcd dot skill) is removed :(

-Reaper: Trailer: [Starts with some kind of charge attack? Gap closer leaves behind a portal (very neat!). Guage looks like a combo of MCH+DRK. You need 50 of the "heat guage" to summon the void monster. The monster didn't come out of the portal that was left behind, but it disappeared when the monster appeared. Oh, the gap closer is more like NIN's Shukuchi, or maybe like SAM's movement options. The Reaper teleported "backwards" and left another portal, used a couple ranged attacks then TP'd right back to the portal. Very neat. Looks like the monster never stays out permanently, but is summoned in a few ways, finishing with a timer that upgrades attacks. Kinda like DRG with dragon imagry.] -Reiterates that attacks are done with the scythe and the avatar in combination, or "serve as the avatar's vessel" to use more powerful attacks. -Has party utility, granting a buff or two. -"Unique and specialized actions give them an edge in specific combat situations" ??? Seems to refer specifically to the portal movement skill. Shukuchi+Aetherial Manipulation. -MCH-like UI tracks two guages: the Soul Guage on top in red, which slowly fills and is used to use attacks in tandem with the avatar. The Shroud Guage is on bottom in blue, and fills as attacks using the soul guage are used. Once it fills up, it allows you to become the avatar's vessel to do even bigger attacks. Very similar to the Automaton Queen in use, it sounds like. -The one I called the DRK-looking seems to actually be more like SMN's Bahamut gauge, and simply acts as a timer to tell you how long you'll have the avatar using you as a vessel. -Switched to the video. Tiny Lala reaper lmao. -Looks like the portal ability works like DNC's An Evant--you charge in a single direction for a set distance, but Reaper has the ability to port back to it for a certain amount of time. Looks like 15 seconds with maybe an additional effect if you do it within 10 seconds? -Oh! The movement skill is actually two actions that allow you to "en avant" forward OR backwards, then teleport back -Looks like the character very visually changes form while acting as a vessel for the avatar, including equipment and some evil eyes. More than just the glowing eyes WAR has for inner beast. -Mentioning that with the gauges, the job isn't really one you charge up to a burst like others, but is rather just a building crescendo. -They're not talking about it, but it looks like the "you are the vessel" gauge either expires based on a timer OR the execution of a certain number of big attacks. -There's gonna be a couple positional-based skills, but just ones involving the avatar. Similar to DRG which only has, like, 2. -Sounds like a fun job, I'm please looking forward to it. -No LB3 shown yet. YoshiP comments that the "big flashy move" Zenos uses in the Benchmark trailer is basically the Reaper's LB3.

--break time--

Ranged DPS: -Just the comment about phys dps # values changes that they've already been saying. -Timers on Troubadour, Tactician and Shield Samba have been decreased to 90s.

-Bard: Trailer: [New addition to their gauge, looks like 3 icons that keep track of what songs have been played. The gauge also says what song is currently playing, though idk who needs that. New cone aoe, looks like--Maybe an aoe version of Refulgent Arrow? Some kind of buff or party skill that uses the 3 saved icons from playing each song once, no indication of what it does. Finishes with either a new move or one that combos off of Apex Arrow, the last skill brd learns in ShB.] -Why does she look so surprised in the art? -As I noticed, playing each of the 3 songs once each grants a new action for a party-wide buff. -New action to follow-up Apex Arrow, as I also noticed. -Battle Voice cooldown reduced to 120s (from 180 :o! ) She also says Wanderer's Minuet, but that's one of the base songs already on a timer of 80s?? That doesn't seem right.

-Machinist: Trailer: [Some kind of large shotgun! Looks like an ocg aoe, but they used it very shortly after bioblaster, so its not on the same cooldown as air anchor/bioblaster. Standard combo might have slightly new animation--the bullets look like they're hitting harder or smth but it might just be a trailer thi--there are cars behind him lmao tHEY HAD CARS IN GARLEMALD THIS WHOLE TIME. Anyway... OH SHIT It looked like they just shot a bunch of BUZZ SAWS!  Oh, and they just used Drill. They have Drill AND Air Anchor. Oh, Queen Automaton's final move looks bigger.] -New Skill; Chain Saw! (many folks were expecting this after they started theming many of the MCH skills after Edgar's skills in FF6. Chain saw was basically the only one missing) -As I noticed, new action for Automaton Queen. No word on the missing Bishop... -Reassemble will have 2 charges (!) They then specifically advice to keep it constantly in use lmao -Job is mechanically the same, but there will be some ability updates (like that shotgun).

-Dancer: Trailer: [Looks like they get some kind of scremin berd that does some feather attacks but doesn't cost a feather guage. Looks like a follow-up combo with Saber Dance as well. Improvisation seems to have a follow-up or possibly a new effect when it ends. Not clear what it does.] -Instead of the single-target and aoe skills having separate effects, they will be shared between the two versions. (presumably; originally you needed different weaponskill buffs to execute Reverse Cascade (single) or Rising Windmill (aoe), but now their combo moves can activate a buff to use either of them). -New actions added after successfully using Technical Finish, Improvisation and Devilment. -Again, job is mechanically the same--mostly just some tweaks and evolution into level 90. -AoE weapon skills will transform into the dance step buttons the way the single-target ones do. -Espirit gauge will fill more consistently rather than randomly.

-brief complaint about BRD's songs not applying to the BRD themself. They've gone with "no comment at this time." YoshiP-lease

Casting DPS: -Like Feint, Addle has been changed to reduce both magic and physical damage dealt by the target, with the magical debuff being more potent.

-Black Mage: Trailer: [Has a new addition to the guage that looks like a larger fire/ice needle. Activated when they switched to Astral Fire from Umbral Ice via Fire 3. Looks like they used it to cast some very nice looking fire/ice attack that refreshed the timer on Astral Fire. The special new needle also activated when they switched from A.Fire to U.Ice. The Ice move they used to switch was also new, though they still had Blizzard 3, which they opened with. Looks like Freeze granted 3 ice needles instead of 1. The new fire/ice move was also used in U.Ice mode and refreshed the timer. New fire move transitioning back to A.Fire, which they use instead of Fire 4 in standard rotation--new aoe? Flare, Despair and Xenoglossy appear to be the same.] -Enochian is now a trait! It is automatically applied when under the effect of either A.Fire or U.Ice! Rejoice! Apparently this was a long-ruminated decision. -As I noticed, new actions are available while switching correctly between A.Fire and U.Ice. Apparently its more than just the fire+ice attack. -BLM is considered "pure dps" like SAM, so they focused on its attacking ability rather than other party utility. They specify "no raise" lol -Firestarter/Thundercloud procs have had their timers extended. -Fire 2 and Blizzard 2 are each going to get buffs, increasing AoE damage. They joke about the japanese names for what is basically now Fire 5 and Blizzard 5 and what their offical names are, lmao. They had to go to the "FF Brand Committee" to nail-down the japanese names of these spells, with no precidence of spells of this level. Sounds like he's leaning towards High-Fira and High-Blizzara rather than, like... Firgyo or something completely different, lol. -Sharpcast now has a second charge.

-Red Mage: Trailer Reaction: [Has 3 buttons added to magic meter, which filled with melee attacks (both the aoe one and the normal single-target combo). Jumped back with what looked like a brief healing bubble. All 3 charges spent on what looks like an aoe version of verholy/verflare (verdispair?). Verholy looks like it was buffed, or is possibly an aoe version, and Scorch (the final rdm combo) looks updated as well, and is followed by a big aoe-lookin move that does damage in a wide row between the rdm and the target, similar to DRG's Nastrond.] -New action coming after Scorch, as I pointed out. Lots of thorns. -Verflare, Verholy and Scorch will now all be AoE attacks, added as part of the AoE rotation [in addition to their current use?] -Adding a party-wide defense buff. Probably that verassylum-looking skill I noted. Apparently its just called "Magic Barrier" rather than something fancy or ver-y, lol -Amount of mana in the guage used for weapon skills has been reduced. Manafication seems to add a full use of the melee-skills for free, rather than affecting the mana gauges. -Potency of Displacement and Engagement will become the same value, so there's no dmg loss in making the right choice.

-Summoner: Trailer: [Right off the bat I see they have a carbuncle instead of an egi? Curious about the update to the Bahamut gauge which looks like it has a stop-light of gemstones under it--same colors as ifrit, titan and garuda. Standard attacks with some updated graphics, so just, like, Ruin 5 or smth. Summoned Bahamut right away, no "Dreadwyrm Trance" phase. Bahamut seems to have a new attack. oh SHIT OH SHIT. NO EGI, MOTHERFUCKER JUST SUMMONED GARUDA REAL. Garuda appears briefly and uses a big attack. She's gone, but the emerald button is now Garuda and has a timer--all of the summoner's attacks look different, and the carbuncle is using the garuda-themed attacks. Summoned Titan now! Uses Landwaster, and now all the summoner's attacks are earth-themed. I Think I know where this is going-- Yeah, there's Ifrit with Hellfire, and now all fire-based attacks, which appears to include a gap-closer and a follow-up melee attack. Carbuncle stayed the same color throughout, so I think we'll still keep the carbuncle glamors, maybe get more colors I hope? Summon Phoenix looks the same.] -Summoner completely reworked for the 4th expansion in a row apparently, they can't keep getting away with it-!! -DoTs GONE! No Bio. No Miasma. I guess too many people complained about it. -As mentioned, Egis are gone, and the summoner now fully summons Ifrit, Garuda and Titan. Okay, they are not literally the Primals, but are nicknamed; Ifrit-Ruby, Garuda-Emerald and Titan-Topaz. Just mostly for lore-compliance... summoning is bad in this world. -Again, as I noticed; the Summoner's abilities are augmented depending on which has been summoned. -I guess they largely wanted to address the down time between summoning bahamut and phoenix where you're just standing around casting Ruin 3. -Base rotation is as I outlined above; You summon Demi-Bahamut, which gives you the power to summon the 3 primal-gems in turn, augmenting attacks as you go, then ending with the summoning of Phoenix, which lets you then summon the three primal-gems again, then back to Demi-Bahamut. No more 50-step opener or w/e lmao -Order doesn't matter--they did Garuda, then Titan then Ifrit in the trailer, but they can be summoned once each in any order. They emphisize planning on when you want to have each summon (including Bahamut and Phoenix) during fights and different phases. -Actions on the hotbar will change automatically as each primal is summoned, rather than needing 4 or so different set-ups, lol. -Summoner will keep Resurrection. But apparently it only just BARELY survived. -Display size is customizable for the carbuncle, but is only client-side. Also for each of the summons. YoshiP has some very small primals. Tiny-Titan is especially good, lol -Sounds like all glamors for the carbuncle/egi will remain, including the primal egis. The Emerald Carbuncle is used in the trailer and the live letter video because its what YoshiP likes most. -Each summon has 2-stacked special skills executable while summoned, such as Ifrit's gap-closer and melee move. -Summoning the primal-gems has a little bit of casting time to offset the amount of power behind them. Sounds like Ifrit has a longer cast time than the others, so maybe they're each slightly different. -All of Titan's attacks are instant-cast, while Garuda leaves an aoe floor dot at the target (which was an egi skill previously). -apparently did their best to not turn SMN into BLM 2 lmao

Healers: -Adding single-target buffs to all healers. -Reduced cast time for offensive spells (!!!) -Limit break area has been increased to 50y lmao, then the guy applauds it. As someone who has suffered the shorter range... I get it. -As they said before, they're splitting between 2 "pure" healers (WHM and AST) and 2 "barrier" healers (SCH and SGE) -Decreased cast time for certain healing skills, nice!

-White Mage: Trailer: [Glare II. Oh, looks like they planted some kind of flower on the battlefield? WHM Earthly Star, maybe? Looks like it explodes in a wide range of healing magic either periodically or with certain triggers (looks like it took damage from an enemy aoe and responded with an auto-medica or something). Finally an update to Holy that isn't *quite* as blinding. ...okay, now I watched it again and its still pretty blinding lmao] -Adding a "functionally and visually distinct" restorative field action. So... Earthly Star for WHM. -Beyond the global changes, though, little is changing about WHM, it will be relatively the same, being the base "pure healer." -Update to Holy, which also helps add lillies to the job gauge. -Fluid Aura, if you remember that, has been removed lmao. -Divine Benison is gaining a charge.

-Astrologian: Trailer: [Looks Minor Arcana just draws one of the 2 minor arcana cards, rather than "transforming" a currently drawn card. This card has its own space on the guage, so it can be held while continuing to draw/use regular cards. Oooh, a very nice looking buff to Gravity, which is followed by an attack(maybe also a buff like Assize?) that looks like shooting stars overly a wide range--very pretty. Some kind of shield or delayed heal--looks similar to SCH's Excognition.] -Being changed into a "pure healer," as has been discussed. -Diurnal and Nocturnal Sect are both being removed, and actions that were affected by this will now only have their Diurnal Sect effect. -Neutral Sect (level 80 skill) will have its effect slightly adjusted to add barrier effects to the adjusted skills. -Divination is receiving some adjustments. Now it can be used under "normal circumstances" ??? -I guess its including new enhancements for the user depending on the seals used? Not very clear on these points. -Redraw is no longer a charge action, and can only be used once after using Draw. -Adjustment to Minor Arcana, as I noted above. -New AoE spell that heals allies and damages opponents (the shooting star skill). Largely to balance with WHM having a great aoe in Holy, but making it different enough that the 4 different healers still have individuality.

-Scholar: Trailer: [My main. Adlo either gets buffed or might have a new animation. Looks like they used Sonsolation without transforming the fairy into Seraph. Updated basic attack, Broil III or w/e. Looks like a new aoe heal/shield or update to Succor. Power/animation update to Art of War. ... that's it??] -Oooh, a new ability that increases the party's movement speed--like Pelotan, but keeps its effect during battle. They don't say exactly how much faster compared to Sprint and Pelotan, but says it wont stack with Sprint. Apparently the base action is meant to be a damage reduction buff with the added benefit of speed increase. -SCH was aleady their base for "shield type" healers, so it's largely the same with more focus on the shields and barriers. -Getting a "powerful enhancement" that can be cast on a single party member. -That's it. :(

-Sage: Trailer: [Not sure what to say since this is new. Appears to use a gauge resembling a cross between BRD's and AST. Graphics on attacks look very nice. Cool beam attack! Ooooh, and a gap closer?? Looks like they also have an instant-cast aoe that damages opponents and heals party members.] - "Possesses all the actions essential for a barrier healer." Thanks. -Seems to have increased number of skills that attack and heal/shield allies simultaneously. Seems to work similar to AST's Synnastry--you specify a party member and when you attack, that party member gets passive heals. -Has a DoT that... applies when it feels like? -Adder's Gaul. Some charge in the job guage that powers instant-cast skills. -Also the gap closer. They say it's a very technical job and difficult to explain in just words. -Looks like the Sage's gauge is passively filling constantly, even outside of battle, until it fills 3 charges. -The Synnastry-like skill (Cardia) can target the self as well. Like a constant Regen as long as you're dpsing. Useful for solo-play. -I guess you have the one base attack, but can press a button that augments it into the DoT version. And it seems it can augment other attacks as well--looks like changing one skill from a base healing move to a shielding move or adjusting how aoe heals or attacks appear. -Looks like it's a decent amount to memorize and use, but no more than some other jobs, and it looks pretty fun in that technical aspect! -Lots of comparisons to Gundam from the chat regarding the sfx, lol

Huh, nothing about BLU. Weird.

-YoshiP about choking seeing how long it took them to get through the first part lmao

--break time--

-Reiterates/clarifies that Summoners will retain their egi glamors.

Battle Adjustments: -Raid Finder for Savage duties will specifically search for one pure healer and one barrier healer each. -Normal Duty Finder will remain the same, regarding healers (just one healer queue).

-In the Party Finder, people making parties can specify pure/barrier healers for the party they're making. -Addition to Party Finder to filter for players that have "yet to receive weekly completion rewards." -Searching for parties will now exclude parties you cannot join due to their "one player per job" requirement. Based on YoshiP's experience playing lol

-"Trials with weapon drops will now drop a weapon coffer in addition to the original weapon reward." Folks will still get a direct drop of the weapon, but also there will be a coffer for folks to vote on loot for weapons. -Final parts of hard raids up to 3.5 (Bahamut normal and Savage and Alexander Savage) will drop a weapon-specific coffer in addition to its original loot -High-end raids through SB will drop gear coffers as well in the same way Eden Savage does.

-"Conditional enhancements" can be separated in their own category on the HUD. Proc-type buffs (firestarter, straight shot, etc.) These elements can also have their sizes changed individually if you want them to be more noticeable.

-Improvements to "ground target functionality." -Includes an option to prevent the target from moving beyond it's placable range. We play with controllers, so idk how much this applies.

-New HUD element in the party list that shows which letter target (or # ally) the party members are targeting when they cast spells/abilities. -They specify its main uses are to see which target in a group the party is targeting easier or; -even better; can show which party member a healer is currently hard-casting Raise/Resurrection/Etc on so the other healer can know they're being raised and target another party member or w/e. -Doesn't work for instant spells/abilities because the element wouldn't have enough time to show up, lol

-players with 0% HP will have an empty health bar above them, which originally only showed if someone had the "always show health bar" UI setting, rather than "only when HP is below 100%"

-Unreal trials going away for a bit. Oh no, I'm very concern... -Just because of the raised level cap and the job adjustments, before they tweak the unreal trials to fit the new changes. -Planned to return in 6.1 -No comment on the rewards only available from doing this.

-Belts gone. Can't wear 'em. Can't get 'em. No new notes on this. -The Very Special Belt you can get in Eureka: Pagos for a speed boost will be replaced with a ring and can be exchanged for the belt. -After 6.0 releases, you can no longer extract materia from spriritbound belts; buy or sell belts; use belts for leves or supply missions or use coffers that contain only belts (from quest rewards). -But you can still RETRIEVE fused materia in belts. Belts can still be sold to npc vendors, be desnythesized, used for expert deliveries or be... thrown away. -PANTS FRALL DOWN NOW -More Downscaling of values. I don't really care about this.

-HQ Item Removal??? -"Prevents the unintended procurement of HQ items via gathering and other activities, reducing overall inventory bloat." -Gathered items, enemy drops, Tokens and Non-craftable materials "obtained from certain content" will no longer come as HQ. -Pre 6.0 HQ items will stay HQ, but they will no longer provide bonuses when crafting. -Crafted items (including crafted items only used for crafting, like flour or ingots) and Gear will still be available as HQ. These HQ items will remain functionally unchanged. -Gatherer skills that used to increase HQ will now be adjusted, mostly to affect item yield instead. Fishers will be adjusted as well. The catch's size will still be taken in consideration. -And, of course, Quests, challenge log entries and achievements that require HQ items will be changed accordingly -More details in next Live Letter

-Aethernet Updates: :o -Adjustments to teleportation fees. -No more upper limit to teleportation fees. :) pain -Teleporting across the world will be over 1200 gil, but teleporting to Norvrandt, the fees will be cheaper -Fees to nordvrant are considered via map distance between mor dhona and the crystarium -Other fees have been reduced, so closer teleports will be much cheaper. -In game economy. [ancientaliensmeme.jpg] -Updates to the Aethernet UI, sure. Will include a more detailed list and a map to help with navigation. -Progress towards Fisher's Intuition will remain even after logging out. Fair. Weird time to log out, but things happen.

-Data Center travel system scheduled to come after 6.0 but before 6.1.

[digimon-digital-adventures]

Roles, Minmaxing, and Party Synergy; a mechanics ramble

So this is something that’s been a bit of a long time coming in general but a recent signup for a raid in the main server has brought up some concerns with how people may be playing.

This will be under a read more tag but before we even dive in I do want to say there’s still no outright wrong way to play DDA. You can build however you want and if you’re having fun that’s what matters in the end. This is more about party synergy and pulling the most out of the system that you can and really bringing things together.

Either way click to see my incomprehensible ramblings about building for DDA

So we should probably start at the beginning, at character creation. Your starting stats give a good idea of what your build can do, and Bonus DP can be talked about later. But the major thing that should be done is discuss with your group what everyone is playing. Talk to each other, make sure redundancies are taken care of, make sure that nobody’s build feels like they’re being walked over because someone else has the same Qualities. A big one I see a lot of is people taking the same Effect tags over and over; a wide range of Effects is much, much better for a party because it not only makes everyone feel important as their Effects won’t be overridden, but it also mechanically makes the party stronger as that lets most Effects stack (bar some like Poison and Burn which are explicitly made to not stack). Personally I recommend leaving Exploit and Fury to Effect Warriors then discussing what else everyone else can take, but this is something for your party to speak on.

Additionally, I’ve seen a few scenarios where one role is popular and then everyone plays that role. Again, there’s nothing wrong with that but it can make things hard to balance when the whole party is made of tanks who rely on retaliation damage to hit.

People also seem to have missed that having high stats have increasingly diminishing returns; to use an example from the current raid being ran on the Discord server; a boss at Ultra level with the party at 35 bonus DP will probably have average stats of 20-30 give or take. This makes having insane armor stats of 40+ redundant at a certain point, because even if the boss rolls amazingly well odds are that you’re only taking 1-3 damage at most unless it pulls out a Tankbuster. Those stat points after that would be better spent elsewhere, especially if you have any buffers in the party that can boost armor. And remember, no matter how high your armor is you will always take damage if you’re hit and the attack has a damage tag; you are still vulnerable to a death by a thousand cuts if you lack dodge.

But perhaps more importantly something I see is that people have seemed to miss that your defensive stats directly impact how effective the rest of your party can be.

To explain; your Health directly impacts how high your White Mage’s Accuracy can be before they’ll struggle buffing; meaning if you have a White Mage in a party of low-health allies, you’ve effectively made a scenario where they can only single-target buff because they have to keep refreshing their buffs, or they can’t attack because they have to have as low accuracy as possible to hit everyone with AoE’s. Your Dodge directly impacts how high the Tank’s Dodge can be; if your Tank’s taunt does not make you notably harder to hit while at least in neutral stance if not offensive stance, they have to spend time Interceding and they can’t increase their dodge; making them increasingly vulnerable to Effects. And if you’re running a dodge tank, they don’t want to Intercede as often as they usually have less armor than other tanks, and if their goal is to not be hit while drawing aggro off of you, they still need to be theoretically easier to hit than you are. And Tanks with low dodge means the White Mage has to keep spending actions to Cleanse any Effects they get hit with instead of buffing, healing, or attacking. Similar things can be said of Armor; if you have low Armor and people need to keep taking hits for you to survive it only hurts the party as they’re using their actions to keep you alive instead of doing their main job. That can quickly end with people feeling frustrated, and that they’re not getting the most out of their build.

So what does this have to do with starting stats?

RKD has laid out a great guideline for high/low stats. Starting at Rookie each stage has average stats they should generally be at once they’re done; 3-4 for Rookie, 5-6 for Champion, 7-8 for Ultimate, 9-10 for Mega, then 11-12 for Ultra. If you have a stat that’s more than 3 points above or below the average, you’ve got a spiked stat spread. I would personally consider any starting stat, especially a defensive stat, that is higher or lower than your Stage Bonus in comparison to the starting averages is probably such a big swing that you’ve begun to outright hurt the rest of your party’s effectiveness to what I would consider a selfish degree. Effectively; having a Dodge, Armor, or Health stat that’s below 2 at Rookie, 3 at Champion, 4 at Ultimate, 5 at Mega, and 6 at Ultra, is probably doing far more harm to your party than it’s doing good for your build, and inversely having a starting stat above 5/8/11/14/17 is going to have increasingly diminishing returns. You could probably still have Accuracy and Damage above that level but that’s at least a bit more build dependent and won’t hurt party synergy quite as hard if you’ve got the right build.

Now for Bonus DP: I like to think in frames of blocks of 10 Bonus DP; it’s easy to visualize and break down and see exactly what you need per chunk. It also works well with most games that implement DP caps because those tend to also work in numbers divisible by 10. But no matter your build, you really should put at least 1 point into every stat for every 10 Bonus DP. I also generally consider Dodge and Accuracy to be stats you want to keep even to get the most out of stances, so most builds should want to add 2 to each of them per 10 Bonus. The following are examples for general builds but for every 10 Bonus I would consider the following stat increases normal, but they could always be adjusted as you see fit (for example a White Mage could potentially have a slightly different Accuracy/Damage or an Armor Tank slightly different Dodge): Strikers: +1 Health, +2 Accuracy, +2 Damage, +2 Dodge, +1 Armor Armor Tanks: +2 Health, +2 Accuracy, +1 Damage, +1 Dodge, +2 Armor White Mages: +2 Health, +2 Accuracy, +1 Damage, +2 Dodge, +1 Armor Black Mages: +1 Health, +2 Accuracy, +1 Damage, +2 Dodge, +1 Armor Dodge Tanks: +1 Health, +2 Accuracy, +1 Damage, +2 Dodge, +1 Armor Each of these spreads should still leave you a few points to buy Qualities you need to round out your build, or to increase other stats per block of 10 Bonus DP, keep your role distinct, and still make sure the rest of your party can do their jobs without having to babysit you.

So now that we’ve gotten a good ramble about stats and at what point they really just spike too hard. What does this mean for each role?

Strikers: don’t neglect your defenses. Having good Health, Armor, and Dodge lets your Tanks and White Mages do their job without having to babysit you. Instead of entirely neglecting your Dodge; try to aim for 4/6/8/10/12 and use your Stances to get the most out of your Accuracy and Dodge instead. Try to make sure your Armor and Health are at least at 3/5/7/9/11 so you can take a solid hit, meaning the Tank won’t have to keep wasting actions to Intercede. And if you plan to dip into a bit of support; take a look at what the White Mages and Black Mages took. They’re likely to have better Spec Values than you, so it’s just a good courtesy to take Effects that they don’t have instead of taking ones they do. Focus on progressing your Accuracy and Damage, but don’t neglect your defenses. When playing; use Stances to your advantage. Offensive is likely your go-to Stance but don’t stick in it if you see yourself getting hit soon. And keep your Health high; a White Mage’s buffs being reliable and long-lasting on you only lets you do your job better. By having low Health you’re only hurting yourself and your White Mage. Armor Tanks: don’t neglect your dodge. You want to be easier to hit than the rest of the party, but all you need to be is around 3 to 6 points of dodge easier to hit than your allies after Taunting and Offensive Stances. Consider this; if a Striker at Champion has 3 Dodge while in Offensive Stance, and you have 2 CPU which can be used to Taunt 4. This means you really should consider 3 or 4 Dodge as low as you should go because any lower and you’ll be incredibly vulnerable to effects, meaning the White Mages have to continually spend time healing you. But you can still justify 5 or 6 Dodge just fine as long as the Strikers have about average Dodge themselves; that’s the power of Taunting! And don’t neglect your offenses; other than just being easier to hit one of the best ways to keep aggro is to actually be an offensive threat over a big brick wall. Keep your Accuracy and Damage at about your average and you’ll be fine. White Mages: consider how strong your buffs are. If you aren’t attacking, your buffs should generally be something that makes up for you not attacking. You however are in an inherently synergetic role and thus won’t have to worry too much about stepping on any toes; just make sure you can reliably get off your buffs whether it’s by using single target buffs, being in Defensive Stance, or whatever it is you need. And don’t neglect your defenses just like the other builds. You’re probably one of the few builds that can somewhat neglect their offenses if you know the playstyle very well, but remember that Accuracy boosts your BIT too and System Boost BIT can only go so far now, and having too low of a Body score can make you vulnerable to being grappled. But remember the key thing about how math works: you add your buff values after Stances are calculated. This means that your buffs can make up for allies in Offensive Stance by buffing their Dodge to a value more comparable to Neutral Stance if not better. This means that Dodge-buffing Effects aren’t just worse than Fury, as while they don’t directly buff offense they buff it indirectly by letting your allies more safely stay in Offensive Stance. This is why despite me saying I consider Fury/Exploit to be one of the best Effect tags upfront, there are no outright bad Effects either.

Black Mages: see what I said about Strikers and White Mages: don’t neglect your defenses. Accuracy is your best stat and you want to be in Offensive Stance, but you don’t want stats that are so low that a light breeze kills you. And remember your debuffs stack with a White Mage’s buffs for the same stat counterparts; this means that combined you can create massive swings for certain combinations. At Mega, Fury 6 combined with Exploit 6 makes a whopping net 12 Accuracy 12 Damage swing in practice, and that’s an absolutely massive swing in the party’s favor.

Dodge Tanks: don’t neglect your Health and Armor. Just because you focus on not being hit doesn’t mean you won’t ever have to Intercede, and it doesn’t mean you won’t ever just get unlucky. And having good Health means the White Mage can buff you, which is always helpful.

In short; keep your stats at least somewhat balanced and talk to your party. A massive issue I’ve seen has been a complete lack of communication and people all wanting to play the same role which just becomes redundant at a certain point. The more you communicate, the more you make sure nobody’s build is redundant or struggling, the better the game will be for everyone.

Before I end this essay of a post I want to once more lay out this is not saying this is the only way to play DDA; however this is what myself and other members of the community have found to be a way to play that enhances the fun for everyone involved by making everyone feel important and letting them do what they want to do.

Thanks for reading, now go out there and roll some dice!

[losangelesvalorant]

final thoughts on games today:

Tl;dr: london is going to have Issues with a capital I, paris is fine and will be better w hanbin, boston were okay and them losing just solidifies how fucking scary and well-oiled nyxl is rather than boston being terrible. Titans, like usual, have no respect for their opponents and could be even scarier /if/ they wanted to be, valiant pops off sometimes but cant do it consistently, shock looks rusty and dallas needs to pocket decay even harder than they already are to win games.

london: i see a lot of potential in them, but until they gain confidence they’re c tier for me. They seem overcoached and lost when they aren’t unable to go through with their set plays, of which they way too many for each map. When they were able to play their game, they cycled their ults well, but were easily forced out of their comfort zone. Bernar tried his best to carry, but jmac looked lost and wasn’t able to bait nicodgh’s walls at all, that might be a problem w coordination w sanguinar for speedboost tho. babel wasn’t quick enough to get his walls out in time, though they were great when he did. Glister and highly tried their best, sanguinar seems to play very individualistically which gave london chances, but fdgod just outplayed him mostly. Once teams figure out how to play vs them they’re fucked unless the coaches move away from set plays and unless the team builds more confidence. This team is going to suffer with hero pools if they don’t fix something quick. London honestly and truly has a TON of potential, but not the coordination or confidence or coaching to utilize it.

paris: they’re gonna be scary as they get more coordinated! Can’t wait til they can run at full strength w better tanks. They made good adaptations and looked good doing it. Nicodgh’s walls were sick, nosmite looked great, fdgod is a fragger, xzi clicked heads and greyy and hyp did good too. Benbest i didnt watch. I really like what i see with this team, but we haven’t seen them at full strength so i dont feel like i have much to say about them. Definitely a dark horse for me. They should thrive with hero pools. 

nyxl: nyxl looks as dominant as ever. They’re coordinated, smart, aware, turn impossible situations around, and quickly shut down every win condition boston had before they could even execute it. Though whoru’s mei is def the weak link for me (his walls kinda suck. I think theyre just giving him stage experience here tbh. His genji slaps tho), him and sbb/nenne are a scary duo, everything that can be said abt jjonak and anamo has been said already (They are the best. They are the best. They are the best.), and mano and hotba are both doing excellently. I dont feel that this is their optimal meta, but nyxl has showed a lot of willingness to adapt to their opponents and make swaps, which i like. I’m not worried for them in hero pools, though they might stumble a bit. They’re solidly in S tier for me now

boston: This is gonna be controversial (and take this w a grain of salt cuz im plat.) but boston played better than i expected cuz im a pessimist and was expecting them to get completely rolled, and they at least showed some signs of life. They’ve clearly scrimmed a lot of different comps and looked at least vaguely competent in them, which is more than dallas valiant and london can say. They tried to go for a lot of clutches which never rly worked. they tried to adapt, but nyxl outmatched them and kinda drove them away. Axxiom and fusions were coordinated and i liked their dive, their double shield not so much. boston dps were holding their own, swimmer and myunbong were too, there’s not rly a carry on this team. axxiom i think is being slept on tho. They could definitely kite better and coordinate more, and make faster/smarter swaps, but they at least looked pretty synergized. They were clearly outmatched but they def looked better throughout the whole series than london did vs nyxl after the first 2 maps. Boston seems like a B- tier team to me, but they could be better and i do want to see them play more before im certain abt this. I’d call this a quality loss despite the scoreline

vancouver: Titans clearly didn’t prep much for this match and didn’t respect valiant as much as they should have. There’s no weak points on this team, just that all of them went for clutches they shouldn’t have and got punished for it bc they assumed valiant would be weaker than they were. Titans hate being methodical but are great when they are. When they subbed stitch in, they went for more dumb plays it seemed like, so i bet sms is the one keeping them chill. Fissure’s playing bumper style (taking space and dying for it) but quieter, which I like, bc it means they can pocket haksal harder and let twilight go for more plays. Good adaptations, great plays, great synergy, once titans got their feet under them and downloaded valiant it was over. Their dive was soooo clean. Nothing to be said about this roster that hasnt been said already (theyre the best). This is classic titans and im glad to see losing bumper hasnt completely stopped them from doing dumb shit, cuz even if it hurts me to watch its fun. They should be absolutely fine with hero pools, S tier.

valiant: Valiant only have one comp and theyre Very good at it, especially in the mirror, but theyre having trouble adapting to titans. They have very high highs and very low lows, they also try to clutch sometimes and fuck up. When the team pops off theyre sick, when they dont they… dont. Gig is a madlad. I do like that they prepped for the titan’s bap strat on lijiang and shut it down entirely, that was very good coaching, but they weren’t able to adapt to non-mirror matches after that. They might get fucked by hero pools bc they didn’t show anything successfully other than rein/dva variations, but we’ll see. I'm finding them fun to watch and I'm interested to see if they can consistently maintain their peak play. B tier, i think their weaknesses are more exploitable than boston’s but that boston would lose to them. Id compare them to hunters last year but if hunters played meta

shock: I didnt watch this match super close tbh. Shock looks strong as usual, but they stumbled far too much for my liking when they let doha and decay get value but otherwise incredibly dominant. Architect’s ana got sooooo much value as the series went on, beautiful sleeps beautiful nades beautiful nanos etc *chefs kiss.* i dont think shock prepped super hard for them, and they rly couldve adapted better on horizon and won that map, but it was overall dominant. They seemed pretty rusty honestly but theyre still good, but they should be pissed they got fullheld on horizon. I’m not going to draw any conclusions from this game when it comes to shock bc its one game and its their first game back. S tier, they’ll be fine with hero pools.

Dallas: Dallas looked way better than yesterday, when decay and doha were unleashed and it was less about taking space they were monsters. Tank play was better but not great, glad theyre not making note play rein anymore. Decay is a god and doha played around him really well and his walls were sick. When decay couldn’t play mccree and couldnt get support, there was nothing dallas could do. Gamsu… seemed a bit tilted and used ults he shouldnt have. There were also communication issues, it didnt seem like trill called some of his shatters which meant the team couldnt follow up. They weren’t able to adapt that well without set strats, and other teams will use that to their advantage. Once a team figures out how to shut down doha and decay the game is over. C tier, will struggle in hero pools

right now rankings for me go titans, nyxl shock in S tier, glads in A tier, toronto, paris, valiant, boston in B tier, dallas, london in C tier

[the-noodle-king]

So here’s a hero concept I’ve wanted to work on for a while - A 2-in-1 hero.

A lot of stats and bio under the cut.

Real Names:  Marino Rodrìguez & Noah Fieldman

Alias:  Grunt & Muscle

Role:  Tank  /  Job:  Versatile and Self-Sufficient Tanking and Damage Dealing Duo

Special:  Grunt & Muscle have separate HP pools but either dying takes them both out of the fight.  /  Buffs applied to one will not be transferred to the other on Switch Out, but the same is also true of Debuffs.  /  Their cooldowns are separate (except for “Switch Out”) but they share Ultimate charge, so when one uses their ult, the other loses theirs.  /  Grunt is the Spawn Hero of the pair, but using Switch Out in an active spawn room does not start it’s Cooldown.

-

Grunt  /  Marino

-

Hit Points:  300  /  Health:  275  /  Armour:  25 

Primary Weapon:  Light Repeater Rifle

Ammo:  30  /  Reload Speed:  1.4 Seconds  /  Rate of Fire:  6 Shots per Second

Damage:  15 - 30  /  DPS:  90 - 180  /  Falloff Range:  22 - 44M  /  Attack Type:  Hitscan

Primary Fire, Repeater Fire:  Fire bullets 1 at a time or in up-to-6 shot bursts with medium spread. After 1s of continuous fire, there is a 0.3s delay before fire can resume.

Ability 1, Switch Out:  Change places with, and switch control over to Muscle. Grunt leaves the field, where he cannot be damaged or healed but his abilities continue to cooldown.  /  Cooldown: 16s

Ability 2, Evasive Maneuvers:  Perform a dive roll in the direction you are moving, taking less damage as you do.  /  Distance: ~10M  /  Movement Speed: 12 Meters per second  /  Damage Reduction: -35%  /  Cooldown: 6s

Ability 3, Arced Grenade:  Throw a grenade in an overhead arch, which detonates after a short delay. Can be held for up to 3s to reduce the delay before throwing, which also shows it’s travel path and an aiming reticule. The grenade bounces off of walls, and bounces on the floor once before settling.  /  Delay Before Detonation: 4.5s minus hold & travel times  /  Projectile Travel Speed: 21Mps  /  Explosion Damage: 85  /  Explosion AoE: 5.5M  /  Cooldown: 8s from being thrown

Ultimate, Triage:  Fully heal both Grunt & Muscle, and apply a minor Heal Boost effect to both for 8 seconds after, which persists after a Switch Out. Triage has a 2.25s cast time during which Grunt is heavily slowed and no healing occurs, if Grunt is Anti-Healed at the end of the cast time his healing is affected by it, but Muscle’s is not.  /  Slow Effect: -50%  /  Heal Boost: +20%  /  Required Charge: 2250

Passive, Hustle:  Grunt moves from operation to operation with efficiency and speed, gaining a speed boost when Out Of Combat. Must have not taken or dealt damage for 1.75s to trigger Out Of Combat status (Damage caused by Arced Grenade does not affect this). While Hustle is active crouching does not incur a speed penalty.  /  Speed Boost: +80%

-

Muscle  /  Noah

-

Hit Points:  550  /  Health:  300  /  Armour:  125  /  Shields:  125

Primary Weapon:  Heavy Pulse Shotgun

Ammo:  4  /  Reload Speed:  1.85 Seconds  /  Rate of Fire:  1.5 Shots per Second  /  Pellets per Shot:  16

Damage Per Pellet:  4 - 8  /  Damage Per Shot:  64 - 128  /  Falloff Range: 18 - 36M  /  Attack Type:  Shotgun

Primary Fire, Pulse Rounds:  Weighty, slow-firing shotgun blasts with medium-high spread, but which are still effective at decent range.

Ability 1, Switch Out:  Change places with, and switch control over to Grunt. Muscle leaves the field, where he cannot be damaged or healed but his abilities continue to cooldown.  /  Cooldown: 16s

Ability 2, Shove Kick:  Perform a solid kick directly in front of yourself to knock an enemy back. If a hit enemy connects with a wall, or falls more than 4M off a ledge following the kick, they are also stunned for 0.45s. Deals an additional 30% of max barrier health as damage to barriers, but causes no knockback to them.  /  Knockback Distance: ~9.5M  /  Damage: 35  /  Cooldown: 7s

Ability 3, Explosive Shells:  Load a quad of special shotgun shells which ignore all forms of damage reduction, including armour, and which deal double damage to barriers. Reloading, either after expending all ammo or before, ends the effect. Base damage, spread, rate of fire and reload speed all remain unchanged during use.  /  Cooldown: 12s from end of effect

Ultimate, Intimidation:  Project a medium sized aura around Muscle which terrifies enemies within it, reducing their speed, increasing the damage they take, and preventing the activation of damage dealing abilities (Not including primary/secondary weapons fire).  /  Duration: 6s  /  AoE: 12M  /  Speed Reduction: -30%  /  Damage Taken Increase: +30%  /  Required Charge: 2250

Passive, Stonewall:  During Combat, Muscle shows no fear and gives no quarter, taking less damage as long as he is doling it out. Must have dealt 10 or more damage in the last 1.75s to maintain In Combat status.  /  Damage Reduction: -20%

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Grunt’s Ultimate Voiceline (Self & Enemies):  I’m Healing Up!

Grunt’s Ultimate Voiceline (Allies):  Cover Me!

Muscle’s Ultimate Voiceline (Self & Enemies):  (Guttural Roar)

Muscle’s Ultimate Voiceline (Allies):  Let’s Finish Them Off!

Hero Select Voiceline (Said by Grunt): Another Day, Another Job

-

Home / Base of Operations:  N/A

Nationality (Grunt):  Mexican-American  /   Nationality (Muscle):  American

Sexuality (Both):  Gay  /  Gender (Both):  Cis Men  /  Pronouns (Both):  He/Him 

Grunt’s Age:  29  /  Date of Birth: 30th of May

Muscle’s Age:  32  /  Date of Birth: 23rd of July

Height (Grunt):  5ft 6in  /  Height (Muscle):  6ft 1in

Affiliation / Allegiance:  The Highest Bidder

Backstory:  Mercenaries through and through, Marino and Noah have done their time working for every shady para-military organisation, corrupt private army, and ludicrous security firm the average mobster can put a name to: Blackwatch, Talon, Helix, they’ve been there and done it all, from guarding suspect shipments to storming fortresses. They’ve worked the odd legit job, or at least, less illegitimate ones, like being bouncers and debt collectors for still less-than-savoury folk, but what can they say, they know the work they’re good at.

The world keeps changing but the work stays the same, so they just keep working and let the world do it’s own thing. No matter how crazy things get, Omnics and uprisings, bombings and conflicts, they still have their work and each other, and so long as they have each other, they don’t really mind what the world does.

[audvidis]

Audvidis’ Top Five Players Who Should Be In OWL Season 2

so as much as we all don’t want to come to terms with it, owl’s regular season one is  over. all good things must come to an end, you see, and that’s true for all things, even the things we dont want to leave (coughAPEXcough). so, while its a good four months until free agent signing opens for all players (while expansion teams get it much sooner). lets discuss some players not in OWL right now, that deserve some love.

side note, they have to have not been in owl before, so no rascal, hooreg, woohyal, or tizi.

5. Tae-hyun “Recry” Jeong (Meta Athena)

recry’s story is sports-movie worthy. he was once one of the best hitscan players in APEX history, possibly even overwatch itself, known for his mcree and pharah. however, as comps started to move from triple tank/double hitscan into dive, he was forced into a mediocre tracer role, and went from afreeca freecs blue to meta athena, where he was pushed into a substitute role. disappointed with this position, he left meta athena to be a free agent for OWL, but didn't receive any team offers. his hand forced, he became a factory worker in his hometown of ansan, working by day, streaming at night. finally, as dive began to meet its maker, meta athena accepted recry back into it's roster for kr contenders season 2.

it is a fucking crime that recry isn't in OWL yet. he's one of the best korean dps players out there, and he had to make ends meet with dangerous factory work while waiting for offers. i hope sometime soon that we can see him on stage, because it is a huge huge huge waste of potential if it doesn't happen.

4. Randal “Roolf” Stark

many people i’ve spoken to have spoken about their disbelief that roolf hasn’t made it into OWL yet, and i have to agree with them. he is one of the best sub support players, with a history of playing with team canada and cloud9, being nominated for the former twice. i think that OWL deserves to have a top level sub support like him play on stage.

3. Ye “177″ Qianqian

177 is one of the few female players who are capable of making it to OWL, who want to become a pro player (so that cuts out barcode, eeveea, and rammy who either wish not to or don't feel capable of going pro yet). 177 is currently main support for the main Lucky Future squad, which did relatively okay this time in CN contenders, losing to their sister squad LF Zenith.

177 will be turning eighteen either during or before OWL s2, which makes her a legible pick this time around! i think she deserves a spot in OWL, but i worry about people being weird about her (during OW Premiers people were holding up “177 marry me” signs which is relatively okay until you realize she was underage at the time.)

2. Ou “Eileen” Yiliang

eileen is probably up there with diya and leave as one of the best DPS players in china. he is particularly known for his genji and doomfist play on LGD and team china in 2017, and helped lead LGD to the second place spot in OW contenders, losing a close 3-4 game to LF Zenith.

like 177 above, he will finally be eligible for owl play RIGHT AS the free agent window opens for season two. i hope that he’s picked up by a team that can help him shine as much as he has on LGD.

1. Kim “Haksal” Hyo-jun

if you’ve followed ovw esports, you probably know of runaway, one of the best APEX teams, and easily one of the most popular, behind lunatic-hai of course. haksal was 16 when he first started playing with the team, and quickly grew into one of it’s most well known players. his skill with genji is almost unmatched by any other player around, and his dragonblades are immaculate.

this signing period, all runaway players will be eligible for signing. flowervin, their manager, has said that they will only sign on to a deal if every player is accounted for. i pray to god this is their year.

Honorable Mentions (because my laptop lags when i make long posts like this): Gods, Kaiser, GodsB, jiqiren, YaoXiaoLong, Leave (please come back we miss you), and Sowhat

[trustrenta]

Soldier 76 overwatch 2

#Soldier 76 overwatch 2 full

Configuration: Recon damage increased from 20 to 25.

Configuration: Sentry and Configuration: Tank removed.

Bastion's Ironclad passive ability has been removed.

Bastionīastion is one of the heroes that has gotten a complete rework in Overwatch 2. This is because the Amplification Matrix Ultimate boosts their damage significantly, and Immortality Field prevents them from being picked off by snipers like Widowmaker or Hanzo. Though Ana will likely be the better pick in most situations because of the power of Sleep Dart and Biotic Grenade, Baptiste can be a strong alternative if you have ranged damage characters like Soldier: 76, Sojourn, Ashe, or Cassidy. Like in the original Overwatch, Baptiste is strongest when you take a defensive position on high ground with his Exo Boots jumps. You can heal groups of teammates much more with Regenerative Burst now, and the extra healing ammo in the Biotic Launcher makes it easier to effectively heal as Baptiste whenever your team isn't grouped up.

Biotic Launcher Alternate Fire healing ammo increased from 10 to 13 rounds.īaptiste's damage falloff range has been reduced to make his ability to hit enemies from afar less potent in Overwatch 2, but his Regenerative Burst healing and Biotic Launcher healing uptime have been buffed to compensate for this.

Regenerative Burst healing to allies increased from 75 to 100 HP.

Damage falloff range reduced from 25 to 20 meters.

Asheīaptiste got the following changes in Overwatch 2: The additional rounds in her Biotic Rifle also give Ana more uptime in general, which is always a good thing. Biotic Grenade's anti-heal properties are also as valuable as they ever were. Her Sleep Dart can stop deadly Ultimates like Genji's Dragonblade in their tracks, and it also gives her a defensive option against damage heroes who attempt to dive on her. Overall, Ana is one of the strongest support heroes in Overwatch 2 despite the nerfs to her abilities. Finally, Ana's primary Biotic Rifle weapon has been buffed with three more rounds in its magazine, allowing Ana to heal her teammates or damage enemies more before having to reload.

#Soldier 76 overwatch 2 full

Ana's ability to prevent the enemy team from healing with her Biotic Grenade is also incredibly powerful since there aren't two tanks that can try to block it anymore, so the duration of its effects has been reduced by a full second. This makes it incredibly powerful, so Blizzard gave it a three-second cooldown nerf to lower its uptime. Since Overwatch 2 has significantly reduced the presence of stun and boop abilities in the game, Ana's Sleep Dart is one of the last few forms of hard crowd control. Ana's Biotic Grenade duration has been reduced from 4 to 3 seconds.Ana's Sleep Dart cooldown has been increased from 12 to 15 seconds.Ana's Biotic Rifle ammo has been increased from 12 to 15 rounds.The following changes have been made to Ana in Overwatch 2: Source: Blizzard Entertainment (Image credit: Source: Blizzard Entertainment) Support heroes being able to rapidly heal after not taking damage gives them a significant self-sustaining boost, ensuring that enemies can't easily whittle them down with chip damage over time. The ability to retain a 30% Ultimate charge when swapping between damage heroes encourages DPS players to be more flexible, while the 30% knockback resistance and 50% reduction in Ultimate charge given to tanks make them harder to forcibly move around and "farm" for Ultimates. The introduction of role passives in Overwatch 2 gives each type of hero in the game distinct advantages. The last attack that fully depletes a hero's armor will have its damage reduced by that armor dynamically, with higher damage attacks being reduced less.Armor health now reduces all damage by 30% instead of flatly reducing it by 5 points.All forms of extra health from abilities (e.g., Brigitte's Inspire or Lucio's Sound Barrier) are considered Overhealth (green health bar) instead of a secondary type of armor or shield health.All supports now heal 15 HP/second after not being damaged for 1.5 seconds.All tanks now have 30% knockback resistance and provide 50% less Ultimate charge when damaged.Players retain up to 30% of their Ultimate charge when switching from a damage hero to another damage hero.

[itsthesinbin]

So You Wanna Attack Sym? (Sym 2.0 Guide)

Decided to make a Symmetra guide SPECIFICALLY for Attack! Many Sym mains want to play her on attack, but run into problems [namely people yelling at them for playing attack Sym].

In this guide, I’ll go over:

Maps: Which are good, and which are bad

Strategies

Team Compositions

General Advice

Like my first one, this is going to be kinda long. I also wanted to do this so my fellow Sym mains can achieve their dreams before the DPS rework comes out! Sym 3.0 isn’t going to come out for a long time, so this guide will still be viable for a couple months! As I said before, I’ll make a completely new guide when the Sym rework comes out and I test them extensively.

Anyway, let’s get started!

Maps: Which are Good, and which are Bad

To Preface: These are what /I/ feel are her best maps! Some attack Syms might feel differently, for many reasons. And any of those Syms who feel other maps are better than the ones I’ve listed are free to pitch in and tell me their strats for those maps! I’d happily add in their opinions with credit!

Control: Ilios Lighthouse/Ruins, Lijiang Night Market/Gardens, Oasis University/Gardens, Nepal Village/Shrine

I did list all of the Control maps, but only two each- for a very specific reason. All of these maps are /relatively/ closed in. Honestly, Torb and Sym are God Tier on Control maps, if their teams cooperate with them. But these maps are great for Symmetra because of the close proximity. You have to stay in the small, contained point with a Symmetra, and the closed-in spaces [such as Lighthouse and Night Market] are good for her turrets.

Assault: Hanamura, Volskaya Industries

Both of these maps have one thing in common- closed-in choke points for Point A. If your team isn’t aggressive, this is an issue, but it’s perfect for your ult charge! Spam your orbs at a Rein or Orisa and you’re bound to get your ult. I consistently get mine within 30 seconds on Hanamura in Competitive, because of how tightly knit the enemy likes to be. Flanking is hard due to these chokes, but once you’re in, usually you’re /in/. Turrets are good for Point A/B on Hanamura, and moreso Point B for Volskaya. Teleporter for Point B can negate the enemy spawn advantage, but make sure your team ONLY uses TP during team fights! I need to tell my team this more often. If your team is sustainable and can safely take out the enemy without constantly dying, a shield gen can allow your team to be even more aggressive. Turrets on Point B are very helpful when the enemy jumps on to contest- just make sure the pressure is off of you so you don’t get killed while in the animation!

Assault/Escort: Eichenwalde, King’s Row

Like Hanamura and Volskaya, the first choke is tight, and the enemy is bound to be at it. Bastion is popular on both of these- good ult charge for you, and your orbs will probably make the Bastion move positions, at the very least. Like with Hanamura, I consistently get my ult in under a minute on Eichenwalde. King’s Row is better for flanking as there’s the hotel you can hide in and place TP down behind them, if needed. The second stretch for King’s Row is much better than for Eichenwalde, as King’s Row’s streets are much more closed in and have better places for turrets. Part 3 for both are very good- as they’re fairly closed in, and have places to hide TPs/Shield Gens. Eichwalde’s hidden Dark Souls room [the one up the tiny stairs across from the entrance] is very good for teleporter, as the tiny hallways funnel enemies into your turrets- and respawning teammates.

Escort: Junkertown, Dorado

Both have a thing in common- first stretch is difficult for Symmetra. They’re open and the enemy can be spread out. Depending on how ground-oriented the enemy is, you might need to either flank a LOT, or get a bit carried through the first stretch. They both have pretty good hiding spots for TP/Shield Gen, though. Dorado’s underground tunnel from the attack spawn to up top is perfect for a flanking Sym. Stretch 2 and 3 of Junkertown is good, because the areas are fairly closed-in. Dorado stretch 3 is very good for Sym. Teleporter is really handy for stretch 3 of both, as the spawn advantage can be annoying.

Strategies

Control Strats:

Have your team distract the enemy off-point [such as top flank on Nepal Village] while you set up your turrets on-point. Or, at the very least, have them keep the pressure off while you set up. Communicate with your team with your needs. If you lose the point but are initiating a team fight, place turrets OUTSIDE, as enemies tend to run off point to find cover- or, your team can funnel them outside. When pushing, only use your primary if you know you can get away with going on a rampage, have backup, or there’s only a couple left and they need to Go. If the pressure is off but the team fight is still in full swing, place turrets around so your enemy is weakened/possibly killed by a stray turret.

Assault Strats:

Building your ult fast is key for Sym any time, but for bullshit 2 capture point maps, it’s critical. Shield Gen point A can be really good for keeping your team sustained during a push against, say, a Torb or another Sym. Teleporter behind the point, if you can get back there, is also powerful- as it makes the enemy confused and have to turn around, while your team is already on point. Teleporter for Point B, as I said before, can negate enemy spawn advantage. Again, tell your team to only use teleporter during team fights. I cannot stress this enough. Flank around to near the enemy spawn for point B and set up turrets as your team distracts the enemy. Your job is to take care of supports, after the turrets are up. Keep the supports from leaving spawn or assisting their teams by killing them as they respawn.

Hybrid Strats:

You might need to flank more, depending on how defensive your team is. Communicate with your team and tell them where you’re going, when you’re going in, and who you’re going after. Tell your team to push in once you engage, as the enemy is going to turn on you quickly. Place some turrets on the payload, but not all of them. Just a couple to deter flankers.

Escort Strats:

Escort is your weak point, as you’re constantly moving and having to reset your turret and ult placements. And Lord knows turret respawn time is murder. You, probably, won’t be spending much time on the payload unless no one else stays on it, or isn’t protecting your healers. Flanking is essential on escort maps. Place your turrets on enemy exits- not necessarily at spawn, but at the more popular exits people use when they exit spawn. If no one has died, make sure to tell your team to kill squishy characters- mainly, a healer or two. As nasty as it is, try and camp the enemy healers to keep them from getting back to their team. If you die, but you turrets kill the low-health squishy, you’ll get a very good trade-off.

General Strats:

If you know you’re going to die in an encounter, find the lowest-health enemy you can and try to get a trade-off.  Communication is also KEY for ANY Symmetra- but ESPECIALLY attack. You need to tell your team when you’re being attacked, who your flanking/attacking, and when they should push in. You need to be a shot-caller, if not the main one, as supports need to have the most map awareness. If you’re the type of person who gets anxious and can’t really communicate, that’s okay! If you can, at least, tell the team a general strategy and then not talk again, that’s better than nothing. If all else fails- follow your tanks, and stick by your supports.

Team Compositions

Team Composition is VERY important for a Symmetra, as you need an aggressive, sustainable team. In short, the best type of team for Sym is:

2 Healers, 2 Tanks, 1 regular DPS, and Sym taking the last DPS slot. Good combos are:

Reinhardt, Zarya, Lucio, Ana, Soldier.

Reinhardt and Zarya are good protectors, and can protect a Sym while she sets up or dives in. Earth Shatter and Graviton are perfect for Symmetra, as well. Lucio is good for the spped boost, as well as constant healing. Ana makes up the slow, constant healing with her grenades and burst shots- and as all her teammates are /fairly/ slow, they’re easier to hit. Soldier is a well-rounded DPS that can deal with farther away enemies, while you charge into the close ones.

Orisa, Roadhog, Lucio, Zenyatta/Moira, Reaper

This team values damage over range, and can be especially good for Control points. Orisa and Roadhog can pull enemies into your shots or death rooms. Once again, Lucio for speed/constant healing. Zenyatta is good for discord at the sacrifice of slower healing [although Lucio + Zenyatta is still a good combo], and Moira can deal a decent amount of damage and AMAZING burst healing. Reaper capitalizes on the enemies being pulled in, as well, if he isn’t in the backline. If he is, that saves you having to risk your ass trying to find the supports.

Winston, D.Va, Lucio, Mercy/Moira, Tracer

As annoying as Dive is, it’s REALLY good for an attack Sym. Your team rushes in and takes pressure off of you, so you can place turrets around and go after distracted squishies. Winston and D.Va are, of course, and King and Queen of Dive, and can focus whoever you decided is unworthy enough to not be in your presence. D.Va’s defense matrix can save you from some bullshit, as well, and Winston’s bubble is, of course, a good barrier. Lucio is essential for Dive- and you already know why I picked him. Mercy and Moira have good mobility and good healing. Moira has a bit more survivability than Mercy, with her healing orb, self-healing attack, and Fade, but Mercy’s damage boost on either you, or Winston, is phenomenal. Either one is a good pick. Tracer is a good backup DPS, as you’re essentially a Reaper that needs a charge-up. She can get behind them and do damage while the enemy is distracted with what’s in front of them. Dive + Shield Gen is also God Tier, if your team can utilize it correctly.

General Advice

The first one is one no Symmetra main wants to hear, but knows it to be true: if it isn’t working, you need to switch. Symmetra is a niche character, and it can be hard to utilize her on attack. If your team can’t push, or you just can’t attack anything, your Sym can’t work.

Tell your team to be aggressive as hell, but not stupid. Attack Sym can’t be utilized correctly unless your team is willing to push and attack. If need be, flank to make the enemy move back so your team is more willing to come in.

Don’t deal with Pharahs or Winstons yourself, if you can avoid it. If you need to get rid of a Pharah, try and lure her into a closed room. And unless Winston is weak, or you have shield gen + a health pack nearby, you will most likely lose against a Winston if you engage him by yourself.

Crouch-spam, if you’re fighting an enemy that can do headshot damage. It makes you much harder to hit.

[pannacottawarrior]

Me as D.VA with critical health: i need healing! Mercy, somewhere: understood! :) Me: *sees Lúcio skate by in front of me with a Reinhardt behind him who's about to cHARGE INTO HIM* Me: gET DOWN MR PRESIDENT!!!!!!!!!!!!! *literally dives myself into the charge to save the Lúcio despite being critical health and would definitely die after de-meching*