#off type clear

[crystalelemental]

Champion Stadium has updated, and now it's time for Kanto CS.  Kinda glad we're starting with an easier one, because this upgrade?  This one...does some stuff.

General Overview Oh that's right, we're having dialogue about this.  15k meta is interesting, in that its impacts depend on your tendency.  If you're clearing on-type, this is effectively a return to the 10k meta.  The inclusion of parameters under 12.5k made on-type easier, thanks to the Physical/Special reduction, and standard damage reduction.  This includes stall, as the inclusion of these parameters made Stall better than it had ever been.  The 15k meta is therefore just...add Strength +2 and Strength +3 back in, and adjust those for any shenanigans a team might pull.  I'm completely serious, it's just the 10k meta again, no distinction.

Off-typing, however, has no such benefit.  300 of those free 400 on-type points needed re-allocated, and it meant off-typing became harder while on-typing became easier.  Generally, this was a fine move.  I actually think it speaks well to DeNA's ability to balance this game mode, as the increase in points continues to apply pressure on off-type clears, while making on-type easier.  Stall suffered greatly under the 10k meta, and so the return to that for Stall keeps a fairly busted strategy under better control.

That said, off-typing is not impossible, just very very hard to do.  Depending on your angle.  Offensive parameter off-typing, I believe, is borderline dead.  Barring the obscenely heavy-hitters of the modern age, off-type suffers from having to put even more points into bulk.  Unless you're willing to pack -2 sync cooldown, which is a problem in and of itself given the approach of denials, your options are playing to extreme gimmicks like Five Stats Up/Down 3, No Stat Reduction, No Field Effects, etc.  And note, the field effect used to be the thing to switch on when you needed to lower offenses +5 to sustain better; that option no longer exists.  I say all this to point out, off-typing with offensive parameters?  Now takes +HP.  And that puts a lot of pressure on denial-focused clears.  To give an idea: none of these teams cleared under offensive parameters.  Not a single one.  Fire team might have been able to.  Might.  Grass team definitely could because SS Lyra.  But the others would not.

But it turns out, HP focused off-type?  Not that bad.  Taking strength to supplement HP is really not a bad plan of attack at all, and you get enough out of it that the only offensive boosts you'll need to take are either Sync Buff +5 or Power On Hit +1.  You can even take both if you need both forms of damage, and be fine.  I found this much, much easier to manage on the whole, although I will not, some fights were uh.  They were still tough.  The opponent's sync nuke, against teams that aren't designed to have better bulk for survival, will still KO sides.  The only thing you really need to keep in mind is to never ever select Gradual Healing At Start.  They will just heal off all your damage.  And I do mean all of it.

I'll put in a little bit extra at the end, but let's talk about the fights themselves.

Vs. Agatha Agatha starts us off, and I decided to take in Psychic Team for this one.  I'm not sure why, Bede didn't have Natural Remedy on him so this was not wise.  But I digress.  This team did alright, actually.  Caitlin's sync is still quite respectable, Anni May's Sp Atk debuffs are great for survival, and NC Bede is great for rotating Free Moves for Caitlin's sync and for setting up defensive buffs via his Buddy move.  They do quite well together, with NC Bede only going down due to poison, which also served me well because I got some extra hits in by preventing the opponent from queueing a move during a self-knockout.

Vs. Lance Fire Gals are absurdly strong, and honestly, if you thought NC Leaf was bonkers under offense parameters, wait til you get a load of HP parameters.  When Leaf can actually take hits, she's an actually fantastic tank.  Giving her the Support Cake is now honestly on my priority list, this is great.  SS Hilda is still primary damage dealer, while SS May has tremendous debuffing potential, fast-ramping, and speed control for the team.  They're all wonderful.

Vs. Bruno The hardest fight shown by a pretty wide margin.  Bruno has Impervious, which makes the debuff thing with Irida rough.  Moreover, he boosts his attack pretty sharply, and Glacia is not a defensive support.  Meaning that his sync takes down BP Candice in one shot with zero issue.  Yes, even full HP and EX, she drops.  It's not great!  Irida barely survived, which I appreciate.  Ice is a little rough over here, not going to lie.

Vs. Lorelei I mean look, until the point total is "all of them at once," SS Lyra is a win condition on her own.  So long as Interference Immunity isn't up, she's going to flinch lock the game.  Adaman is absurdly powerful, and SS Acerola helps skyrocket damage for an efficient clear.  These three are busted.

Vs. Blue So if I'd paid any attention to the parameters of these stages, the Irida fight would've been #4, for the coveted permanent field effects.  Once I realized that was there, I knew what I had to do.  It's H!Caitlin time.  Specifically, Goth Gals.  Anni Lillie has been relegated to the bench for a while now and it makes me sad.  Turns out, HP parameters with something as nonsense as permanent field effects makes H!Caitlin untouchable, and Lillie's Healthy Benefits 5 essentially means she'll weather any sync.  I think she took double-digits.  That's how hard she can take that hit under these conditions.  Renegade Cynthia, by comparison...kinda suffers here.  One of the things I had recently put together in the 12.5k meta was two-turn moves used for denials.  That doesn't work here.  HP is way too high for a two-turn move to ever seriously deal damage, so it's just all downside.  And Cynthia is pretty bad on gauges.  This team is literally held together by H!Caitlin's speed buffs.

Final Thoughts The clears were successful, with some shenanigans.  I don't know that Goth Gals would've cleared without permanent field effects, and personally think using SS Lyra is cheating.  Aside from that, nothing too major.

What I've noticed about HP parameters, however, is pretty stark.  Certain things just don't work out as well.  Tech nukes being a bit one.  Single-target nukes are all well and good, but AoE spam from sides are not appealing.  They tend to need DPS.  As a result, Sprint feels borderline useless here.  It might not be, I shouldn't be critical, but I'm specifically thinking of Nemona's approach and going...that will not work here.  That will not work here in the slightest.  Her bursts are just far, far too weak to seriously beat these threats back.  Supports also have to be a bit more selective.  If you can't buff defenses, you need offense debuffing, or the Strength stacking still poses a significant risk.  The EX is also fairly demanded, as you're called on to take a lot more hits, and the team desperately needs the firepower long-term for a safe clear.  Interesting, Field pairs seem fine.  No fight lasted through a second sync from the opponent, meaning the extended duration from a Field pair is...perfectly acceptable.  Strike is the big money winner, as it always has been for 3v3.  The spread damage on a good sync nuke is divine.  Which is gonna be real sad for Clair.

I think the upgrade has definitely put some things in an interesting position.  Specifically, on-typing is still fairly easy, and most pairs can handle that no sweat.  But off-typing has now become incredibly challenging.  I've got Nemona on the brain for no real reason, but her pair comes to mind as a very significant loser of this transition.  The burst damage she deals is nowhere near sufficient.  I had trouble getting her to really hit that hard in 300 Strength High Score, which is less HP than this.  The new 15k meta has absolutely ruined pairs like her, with limited burst potential and poor DPS.  So all she's left with is on-type.  Which is really, really easy for her.  I think that's the issue.  I'm not convinced the severe discrepancy between on-type and off-type leaves a lot of wiggle room for pairs who on-type with easy, used to off-type with difficulty, and now may not off-type at all.  Time will tell the overall impact, but it's...not my favorite at this exact second.

[yukipri]

Another mini Din & Paz

Probably shortly after Din joined the covert.

~~

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[loppiopio]

just some 🥥 related sillies i've made for that fic we all know.

[coriander-candlesticks]

I was pouring a promised libation out to Hermes, Apollo, Aphrodite, and Dionysus this afternoon (I'd asked them for help with a personal matter involving a sibling) and as I was looking up at the sky talking about the situation I saw three hawks start to circle something a little ways in the distance. Hawks aren't exactly uncommon here but it had been a while since I'd seen any, let alone three at once, so it caught my attention.

And while I was trying to figure out what type of bird they were (not an eagle, too short a neck to be a vulture, etc) one of them swooped down into a neighbor's backyard and back up along the tree in my backyard, close enough that, if a branch weren't in the way, I would have been able to see its feather markings. While hawks were somewhat usual, experiencing that certainly was not. So, of course, when I got inside I looked up if any Greek gods are associated with hawks.

And, of course, Apollo is.

I've been thinking a lot about the difference between "this is just a Thing That Happens" and a sign so it was nice to see a direct example of how something differs when it's coming from a god.

[preggomancer]

as promised... another student enrolls in Monsterpreg U! 

he’s a shapeshifting... imp... thingy, and he was unintentionally cursed with recurring spontaneous pregnancy! he gives birth every six months, only to swell up to the second trimester precisely three days after. but here’s the kicker:  he can’t tell what he’s carrying, or how many. it could be anything from twins to an eldritch horror beast! 

(essentially i just wanted an excuse to draw the same character at vastly different sizes lol)

[ultrabananapudding]

HoA gang | "What's your type ?"

Bonus greetings:

Happy New Year 🎊 新年快乐 🎊 Gott Nytt År

[unganseylike]

ok ive talked about my frustration w adam being fine after his cliffhanger at end of mi, but lest we forget that we were also baited w adam turmoil at end of cdth (not replying to any of ronans texts). i understand that tdt isnt supposed to be adam centric but pulling this TWICE is just mean :(

[crystalelemental]

Alright, back from visiting family, on to more important matters. Like playing video games.

Vs. Drake I really wanted to give this one a shot, in part so Anni Steven can contribute, but also to show off his specific contribution in Weather Wipe. It's not really talked about much, but in some of these more modern stages where the gimmick is auto-weather and high DPS, it's a good solution. Summer Liza is hilarious. I love the damage this kid dishes out. I will admit, there are some gauge issues with Steven even at +6 team speed. But not as many as you'd expect. Sincerely, I think his EX might solve it.

Vs. Glacia I initially tried a few others that were not getting the job done, then shifted to this. Look, base Liza was a super good support when I started the game, and I wanted to bring it back, this time with her brother Tate, who is...kinda ridiculous. More importantly, Darach. Darach's not a bad Tate partner, given the attack debuffing sets up innate Tech nuke, and the lowering of opponent evasion allows Thunder Wave to hit consistently. No weather combined with a free Crit Shield removal allows the team to take off enough offensive parameters that Liza isn't seriously threatened.

Vs. Phoebe At this point, I messed up using H!Caitlin entirely. I had wanted to do a bit more with her but it wasn't working out with Lodge Rosa/Colress, so I gave up and tried Anni Lillie, only to find out that right, using Ghost Zone powers up Phoebe, and Lillie's weak to Dark. So that didn't happen. Instead, we went with Irida strats. I like bringing Lorelei to an off-type match to clear. It feels like justice for her frankly atrocious grid.

Vs. Sidney You know who's not Dark weak? Caitlin. Okay, so maybe C!Bede is a little overkill, but I am in fact willing to kill on this one. Caitlin's final sync was like 20k. Which is pretty respectable for off-type, I think. DPS with the moves up next effect really chunks the stage too. Big fan of this, though sincerely Bede feels very overkill, he's so stupidly good.

Vs. Steven So then I thought hey, you know what'd be fun? Emma. Only to find out that aiming for denials prevents success entirely, because Emma's sync will not handle Steven's remaining HP. So you gotta spam. Okay, spam on him then. Oh that's still actually fairly difficult because their team is boosting defense a lot? Well then. Yeah, this one took a lot more consideration than usual. Anabel needed to do some flinch work for it to come together, but nothing too terrible. Still, it was frustrating enough that I legitimately considered Head Start on Looker or Emma to get a fast-ramp in and solve for this. Looker...gets the job done with Poison Sting, admittedly, but this is going to be a very sub-optimal team soon. Oleana's going to completely change what Emma works with optimally. I think if Looker can offer anything over Oleana, it's an easier justification to just drop CS2 for Head Start 1. Not like he does any damage off-type.

[righteousenjoymentofthunder]

stop. why... why does sirius black need to be so feminised in the fandom. why is he literally remus' long haired twink. this guy is canonically a wet dog of a man. he is 'rah rah lets go save harry from deatheaters.' he was at the top of his classes. he is canonically TALL. why is he so feminised.

[s0fter-sin]

is there any actual catharsis in the boys or is it all just suffering and scrambling for a crumb of relief

[thealogie]

i really do genuinely like and get along with my friends who work in hollywood but i only like them when i get them on their own. the couple of times i went to parties where there was a bunch of hollywood people....it was cool at first because everyone is movie/tv-pilled and it was really fun to start talking about deep cut tv/movie news (only room where you can get laughs for poking fun at the linklater merrily). but then people kept coming up to me and asking if i knew the person hosting the party from working on the current show they were producing (instead of just "how do you know them" or "what do you do for work") and also saying things like "well of course WE all have seen severance but i don't think normal people watch it"

[catt-crossing]

😳

[carnivalcarriondiscarded]

ok no im so tired but ive had this Thing a Laughingstock Concept Thing in my Brain for Days Now and its.... basically what if Barnaby adopted a lil caterpillar. like it's not sapient or anything its literally A Wriggly Puppet Prop. but he finds it in his home and it reminds him of Howdy and he keeps it. he carries it everywhere. he treats it so tenderly and names it and everything. his delusional smitten subconscious is like "omg... mine & howdy's <3" he and Howdy are not even together at this point

so Barnaby cares for this lil caterpillar and Howdy ends up getting attached as well, because he's on the same shit as Barnaby. and eventually the lil caterpillar pupates, and they watch over the chrysalis So Excited to see what lil wormie will look like as a butterfly. and it emerges and they're so proud and weirdly emotional. the butterfly takes off on its first flight and lands on a flower patch

just in time for Eddie to trip and fall on the patch, instantly crushing it And the butterfly

[thedreadvampy]

Having this weird realisation that I've spent my whole life beating myself up for not having a body type I don't even find appealing????

Like this isn't to say I don't find some thin or skinny bodies attractive, but the extreme waifish-but-feminine body type that celebrities are pushed into - flat stomach thin waist bony face smooth hips - just hits my brain wrong. It reads as unnatural on an adult woman - it's the shape of a (certain type of) teenage girl. Like I look at Lady Gaga or Scarlet Johansson at this point and I don't think 'wow beautiful' I think 'jeez what's going on there?' Especially in the face and waist - idk to what degree it's things like Ozempic and buccal fat removal and to what degree it's just the body types we uphold but everything in my brain is shouting THAT DOESN'T SEEM RIGHT FOR YOUR BONE STRUCTURE.

and like this isn't a political or moral statement, attraction is a terrible metric for Moral Goodness. but it's still maddening to realise that I'm constantly comparing myself to a way of looking that I honestly find offputting. like no I don't want to look like 2024 Ariana Grande, she looks Unwell. I don't actually want my face to be as bony and drawn as half the celebrities denying their use of weight loss drugs and facial surgery.

This isn't a moral stance but at risk of body shaming I just think that super skinny Looks Bad to me unless your body is built for it. And I don't want to look that way. But also I'm a woman living in the world so of course I also do and I look at my waist and go 'god when I was 17 I had such an hourglass figure' but a) when I was 17 with a UK size 6 waist I also thought I was fat (didn't do anything about it because I had other fish to fry and also I love food, but I did beat myself up about it) and b) honestly in that case even though it was my natural figure at the time I still look pretty drawn and uncomfortably thin in some photos from them, and c) if I met someone whose body looked like mine did then I would immediately clock them as a teenager, and I don't find that attractive in a 31 year old.

End of the day I kind of think that the obsession with a specific type of thinness - again, the flat stomach, nipped waist, smooth unlumpy hips, high breasts, narrow shoulders - is about fetishizing adolescence. Cause a lot of girls under 20 look like that - not most by any means, but it's not an unusual body type - but for most women (not all), adulthood means developing more muscle, a thicker waist and broader shoulders and hips, more definition in the hips, a bit more soft tissue over the uterus, etc. And trying to turn back the clock on that by force involves working against what your body is trying to be, which to me (personal aesthetic taste) often ends up looking odd and disjointed, like you have soft features but no fat in your face, or all the protective layers over muscle are stripped off so you're weirdly wiry.

I think what I'm drawn to aesthetically in the human body is the infinite different ways that people have a coherence between their different features, and their bodies come together as a unit, and I think it's possible to maintain that through surgical intervention and major body changes but I think the body types that are almost mandatory for women in the public eye rarely have that coherence, because they're not concerned with what looks best on a singular body but with checking boxes. and so it jangles my brain I don't like it.

[fictionadventurer]

Top 5 Arthur episodes?

D.W. Goes to Washington: It's a very close race between this one and #2, but I gave the edge to this one because almost every line here is classic. It's full of hilarious Imagine Spots and great D.W. zingers.

The Rat Who Came to Dinner: Another episode that's full of great jokes. The dynamic between Ratburn and Arthur's family is comedy gold.

The Contest: The pastiches of different animation styles alone puts this one in the top five, but it's also in service of some wonderfully absurd mini-stories with classic jokes. ("My brain was on cruise control" is the Arthur quote that gets the most use in daily life).

Buster Hits the Books: The pastiches of the different books are hilarious.

Arthur's Almost Boring Day: I had a very tough time choosing the fifth episode. I went with this one because the fighting between Arthur and D.W. reaches a hilarious fever pitch that goes beyond any other episode.

[rainingincale]

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