Aether Raids General Thread

[Landmaster]

4 hours ago, BoaFerox said:

Because it's Fire and Water season I decided it was a good opportunity to give Galeforce to these two.

 

The sets are pretty much just based on Galeforce units that I've seen used against me, so they might not be entirely optimal. Their team mates have been two Eir and Legendary Azura. Might be a bit pointless to think too much about how well this team functions considering Ephraim and Eirika will rarely be usable together like this (without sacrificing score), but I'm happy to have made some Galeforce units anyways.

I think I might need some pointers on how to use Galeforce teams effectively though, because I haven't had too much success with this one so far. I think some of it is due to me picking it at times where I probably shouldn't have, and other times I've just not been planning well enough. A problem I often have is that my Galeforcers just aren't able to survive multiple combats, so they aren't able to use the extra turn they got from Galeforce for anything helpful. I also got caught off guard by Eir's Sparkling Boost bringing me out of Wings of Mercy range a few times, probably because I'm not used to thinking about it. Is it maybe a good idea to only use one Eir on this team? I find Sparkling Boost's healing very useful on my non-Galeforce teams so I wouldn't want to unequip it if possible. Do people usually use more than two Galeforce units, and is there a typical plan of action that is followed?

Ephraim probably wants Desperation instead of WOM~ WOM can be left to Eirika~ He'll probably want to be the one you initiate with most often~ I personally recommend using Galeforce in Astra though since these two being the only WOM units means they're entirely responsible for Galeforcing the entire team~ I use my Galeforce teams in Astra so I can use my Nagas to assist with WOM so my two Galeforcers don't have to be responsible for 6 units themselves~

[Usana]

9 hours ago, BoaFerox said:

Because it's Fire and Water season I decided it was a good opportunity to give Galeforce to these two.

 

The sets are pretty much just based on Galeforce units that I've seen used against me, so they might not be entirely optimal. Their team mates have been two Eir and Legendary Azura. Might be a bit pointless to think too much about how well this team functions considering Ephraim and Eirika will rarely be usable together like this (without sacrificing score), but I'm happy to have made some Galeforce units anyways.

I think I might need some pointers on how to use Galeforce teams effectively though, because I haven't had too much success with this one so far. I think some of it is due to me picking it at times where I probably shouldn't have, and other times I've just not been planning well enough. A problem I often have is that my Galeforcers just aren't able to survive multiple combats, so they aren't able to use the extra turn they got from Galeforce for anything helpful. I also got caught off guard by Eir's Sparkling Boost bringing me out of Wings of Mercy range a few times, probably because I'm not used to thinking about it. Is it maybe a good idea to only use one Eir on this team? I find Sparkling Boost's healing very useful on my non-Galeforce teams so I wouldn't want to unequip it if possible. Do people usually use more than two Galeforce units, and is there a typical plan of action that is followed?

Hey thanks for pointing this out. I decided to try this for some matches as well. I had been meaning to try Galeforcing in AR, but I just don't like many units that are built that way. Don't like Player Phasers in general. But I do like Sacred Stone characters. Particularly the twins.

I was running Legendary Azura(WoM)/Eir/Eir/Eirika(WoM)/Ephraim. Did not go so well for me. I kept missing KOs by a bit(miscalculating on my part) which made me shuffle for a different approach so I was losing due to turn count of all things. You would think that wouldn't be a problem with a Galeforce team. Anyways like Landmaster suggested to you, I use Desperation on Ephraim. Neither of them are very bulky so I would like to use it on both, but Ephraim is the main hitter so he is the one who needs to handle multiple rounds. And while smite on Eir can help alleviate some of the need for WoM, it is still handy. Definitely won me a match. Sadly my Eirika is -DEF so she is incredibly frail and this means she can have trouble dealing with Sutr, which of course is a huge problem for my team. I basically need Eir's healing to kick in and a couple of turns to throw her at him. Ephraim often needs to run in and weaken him some as well.

Speaking of Ephraim. Is there a reason you aren't running Deathblow 3 in A and Heavy Blade in Seal? I imagine you are going to miss some important KO's. Because I am just barely securing them with my Ephraim. Then again mine is also +ATK so you might miss those KO's even with Deathblow 3. But anyways Ephraim is fun. He is the only Galeforcer I have ever enjoyed using. Though to be fair I haven't built many of them. Eirika/Ephraim/Cordelia/Roy/Clair/Celica I think are the only ones I have. Actually that is more than I realized. But the point is I don't enjoy using any of them but Ephraim, not even Eirika :(.



@Maaka@Nym Took me a while to respond. I have been looking further into Galeforcers, but my issue is I do not enjoy player phase play including galeforcing. So that puts a pretty big dampener on my motivation to build the team. And two as a casual player I am not interested in investing in units I don't like, such as Peri(sorry Nym). Anyways of the units I have to work with, Eirika and Ephraim are out due to being Legendaries and thus having limited windows of use together. That leaves Clair and Celica as probably my best bet and they are from the same game, so that amuses me. Clair because I +10'ed her to become part of my Arena Core way back when(figured she would pair well with regular Eirika) and Celica because she seems like the strongest of the remaining three(also double lion + Armorsmasher would make Sutr regret ever crossing my path I am sure). Problem is, using Ephraim and Eirika reminded me that even the 3 movers can have a hard time reaching what they need to reach. I am pretty sure I need at least 1 3 mover for a Gale team to work properly in AR. Half my matches absolutely demanded at least one of them have 3 move. Or at least I couldn't find a way around needing 3 move, not even with smite on both my Eirs. Part of that might be not leaving the right spaces empty in my back line.

Oh and I am mainly focused on Light season right now since I don't have a Naga. So I just run my light teams then. I really don't like changing up teams and seals on a regular basis if I can avoid it. Just letting you know why I am assuming only two galeforcers are going to be on the team. Though maybe a third galeforcer is better than using Legendary Azura to dance?


 

[Maaka]

2 hours ago, Usana said:

@Maaka@Nym Took me a while to respond. I have been looking further into Galeforcers, but my issue is I do not enjoy player phase play including galeforcing. So that puts a pretty big dampener on my motivation to build the team. And two as a casual player I am not interested in investing in units I don't like, such as Peri(sorry Nym). Anyways of the units I have to work with, Eirika and Ephraim are out due to being Legendaries and thus having limited windows of use together. That leaves Clair and Celica as probably my best bet and they are from the same game, so that amuses me. Clair because I +10'ed her to become part of my Arena Core way back when(figured she would pair well with regular Eirika) and Celica because she seems like the strongest of the remaining three(also double lion + Armorsmasher would make Sutr regret ever crossing my path I am sure). Problem is, using Ephraim and Eirika reminded me that even the 3 movers can have a hard time reaching what they need to reach. I am pretty sure I need at least 1 3 mover for a Gale team to work properly in AR. Half my matches absolutely demanded at least one of them have 3 move. Or at least I couldn't find a way around needing 3 move, not even with smite on both my Eirs. Part of that might be not leaving the right spaces empty in my back line.

Oh and I am mainly focused on Light season right now since I don't have a Naga. So I just run my light teams then. I really don't like changing up teams and seals on a regular basis if I can avoid it. Just letting you know why I am assuming only two galeforcers are going to be on the team. Though maybe a third galeforcer is better than using Legendary Azura to dance?
 

I haven't tried using a third galeforcer yet, just because getting galeforce to activate on all three would be rather difficult sometimes. Mainly because most of my galeforce units are highly merged, I tend to have the problem of one-shotting people and not getting galeforce to activate. There is also the issue of running into rather annoying setups where you need a dancer to get a galeforcer in the right position or just to use wings of mercy effectively. Never gave much of a thought to three galeforcers due to the need for two mythics, but I might try a team with three on it tomorrow or Monday.

[BoaFerox]

22 hours ago, Landmaster said:

Ephraim probably wants Desperation instead of WOM~ WOM can be left to Eirika~ He'll probably want to be the one you initiate with most often~ I personally recommend using Galeforce in Astra though since these two being the only WOM units means they're entirely responsible for Galeforcing the entire team~ I use my Galeforce teams in Astra so I can use my Nagas to assist with WOM so my two Galeforcers don't have to be responsible for 6 units themselves~

I'll try giving him Desperation. Thinking about it, I think that could have saved me in a few of the matches I lost.

14 hours ago, Usana said:

Hey thanks for pointing this out. I decided to try this for some matches as well. I had been meaning to try Galeforcing in AR, but I just don't like many units that are built that way. Don't like Player Phasers in general. But I do like Sacred Stone characters. Particularly the twins.

I was running Legendary Azura(WoM)/Eir/Eir/Eirika(WoM)/Ephraim. Did not go so well for me. I kept missing KOs by a bit(miscalculating on my part) which made me shuffle for a different approach so I was losing due to turn count of all things. You would think that wouldn't be a problem with a Galeforce team. Anyways like Landmaster suggested to you, I use Desperation on Ephraim. Neither of them are very bulky so I would like to use it on both, but Ephraim is the main hitter so he is the one who needs to handle multiple rounds. And while smite on Eir can help alleviate some of the need for WoM, it is still handy. Definitely won me a match. Sadly my Eirika is -DEF so she is incredibly frail and this means she can have trouble dealing with Sutr, which of course is a huge problem for my team. I basically need Eir's healing to kick in and a couple of turns to throw her at him. Ephraim often needs to run in and weaken him some as well.

Speaking of Ephraim. Is there a reason you aren't running Deathblow 3 in A and Heavy Blade in Seal? I imagine you are going to miss some important KO's. Because I am just barely securing them with my Ephraim. Then again mine is also +ATK so you might miss those KO's even with Deathblow 3. But anyways Ephraim is fun. He is the only Galeforcer I have ever enjoyed using. Though to be fair I haven't built many of them. Eirika/Ephraim/Cordelia/Roy/Clair/Celica I think are the only ones I have. Actually that is more than I realized. But the point is I don't enjoy using any of them but Ephraim, not even Eirika :(.

You're welcome! I really like Sacred Stones characters myself, and it's fun to try some new strategies with them.

I had some of the same problems with not securing KOs myself. Quite often it was simply due to various debuffs from things like Yune, Shrines and Chill Skills. I could get past that by dancing, but then I'm not able to finish off all the units in one turn and the whole strategy falls apart. I've given Desperation to Ephraim, but I'll have to grind some SP before he can learn it. I haven't had to deal with Surtr while using this team yet, but I imagine he could be troublesome. If I saw him I would probably choose another team.

The reason for Heavy Blade in the A-slot is simply that I'm using the seal elsewhere on another team, and I figured Ephraim could function with it in the A-slot due to his high attack. There probably are some KOs I'm missing out on, but if I moved the Heavy Blade seal (using it on Summer Laegjarn at the moment) I would miss out on those KOs with some other team. I'm finding Ephraim very fun myself! He and Eirika are among the first units I have given Galeforce with the intention of building them around that skill, and I'm at least seeing some results from them even though I might need more practice. Too bad you're not finding Eirika as fun, I guess the -Def might hurt her sometimes, but perhaps you'll eventually come across some situations where the defense flaw is the thing that makes her drop into WoM range?

[Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi]

So, lesson to be learned about AR defense designs: even if your setup is a hybrid Ophelia-Alm damage spam with Surtr-W!Eirika stall tanking, upgrading the Lightning Trap is a bad idea. I was able to purposefully set off the trap to do 50 damage to Surtr, which was the end of him.

[XRay]

26 minutes ago, Kuroi Tsubasa Tenshi said:

So, lesson to be learned about AR defense designs: even if your setup is a hybrid Ophelia-Alm damage spam with Surtr-W!Eirika stall tanking, upgrading the Lightning Trap is a bad idea. I was able to purposefully set off the trap to do 50 damage to Surtr, which was the end of him.

Unless the player really knows what they are doing, upgrading Bolt Traps is generally a bad idea. You want to leave it at level 1 so it is less likely to trigger Desperation, Vantage, and Wing of Mercy.

[Anacybele]

Well, I definitely won't ever be anywhere close to tier 21. It's impossible. I don't think even with all perfect wins I would've gotten there due to the defensive losses. And it doesn't appear to be possible to never lose lift in these high tiers. And I doubt I can ever get all perfect wins anyway, regardless of how many mythic heroes I might end up with in the future.

Oh well... It was nice to get as high as I already am.

Edited July 28, 2019 by Anacybele

[XRay]

3 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

Well, I definitely won't ever be anywhere close to tier 21. It's impossible. I don't think even with all perfect wins I would've gotten there due to the defensive losses. And it doesn't appear to be possible to never lose lift in these high tiers. And I doubt I can ever get all perfect wins anyway, regardless of how many mythic heroes I might end up with in the future.

Oh well... It was nice to get as high as I already am.

It does takes some luck and most likely a few tries. I did not get in until my second try and I almost always had heavy defense losses. My defense team actually did pretty well this week, but most weeks I still lose over half of my defenses. You also do not need a lot of perfect wins. I know I definitely did not have a lot of them when I succeeded on my second try. I mostly relied on having 2 Eirs to just make scoring easier, so most of my wins were 120 or 140 since I often needed to sacrifice a unit to avoid completely losing.

[Anacybele]

2 minutes ago, XRay said:

It does takes some luck and most likely a few tries. I did not get in until my second try and I almost always had heavy defense losses. My defense team actually did pretty well this week, but most weeks I still lose over half of my defenses. You also do not need a lot of perfect wins. I know I definitely did not have a lot of them when I succeeded on my second try. I mostly relied on having 2 Eirs to just make scoring easier, so most of my wins were 120 or 140 since I often needed to sacrifice a unit to avoid completely losing.

I don't have two Eirs, so I can't use that option. Maybe next time there's another light mythic or something I can do it.

[XRay]

Just now, Anacybele said:

I don't have two Eirs, so I can't use that option. Maybe next time there's another light mythic or something I can do it.

I think it costs around 100-200 Orbs to snipe a unit in a regular Focus. Not sure about Legendary/Mythic Foci though, but I do not think it would be that much more expensive.

[Anacybele]

2 hours ago, XRay said:

I think it costs around 100-200 Orbs to snipe a unit in a regular Focus. Not sure about Legendary/Mythic Foci though, but I do not think it would be that much more expensive.

I'm aware. I don't want two of the same character though, I'd rather merge or fodder extra copies. That's why I'm just waiting for more mythics.

[Diovani Bressan]

17 hours ago, Anacybele said:

Well, I definitely won't ever be anywhere close to tier 21. It's impossible. I don't think even with all perfect wins I would've gotten there due to the defensive losses. And it doesn't appear to be possible to never lose lift in these high tiers. And I doubt I can ever get all perfect wins anyway, regardless of how many mythic heroes I might end up with in the future.

Oh well... It was nice to get as high as I already am.

I know a player that reached Tier 21 with only 1 Eir, and using Yune as bonus unit in that season, which made this player score 130 at max. Some of the maps this player took like 1 hour to beat, but was able to get both pots and not lose any unit

Maybe if a good team and a good strategy, you can reach Tier 21 without 2 Mythic Heroes.

[Anacybele]

1 hour ago, Diovani Bressan said:

I know a player that reached Tier 21 with only 1 Eir, and using Yune as bonus unit in that season, which made this player score 130 at max. Some of the maps this player took like 1 hour to beat, but was able to get both pots and not lose any unit

Maybe if a good team and a good strategy, you can reach Tier 21 without 2 Mythic Heroes.

I see. Too bad I'm not that good... (not bad, but not THAT good either) Oh well. Like I said, I'm glad to get as high as I am already.

[Diovani Bressan]

Just now, Anacybele said:

I see. Too bad I'm not that good... (not bad, but not THAT good either) Oh well. Like I said, I'm glad to get as high as I am already.

Honestly, being on Tier 20 is already a great feat. I was ok being on Tier 20, but then a season with Light and Water elements and with L!Azura was a bonus ally allowed me to reach Tier 21.

[Anacybele]

2 minutes ago, Diovani Bressan said:

Honestly, being on Tier 20 is already a great feat. I was ok being on Tier 20, but then a season with Light and Water elements and with L!Azura was a bonus ally allowed me to reach Tier 21.

Yeah, true. And nice job!

[Landmaster]

Good Season, I forgot I had one Ladder left and used it on a Flier Ball this morning and lost one other match today~ I think I did 4 matches so the other 3 were perfects~ People need to stop making their dancers baitable~

More important, the new Defense Team chalked up 9 Successes and 6 Losses, only lost 140 Lift~ I made some adjustments during the week that really helped out~ Pretty well for a team I threw together out of boredom~ I should keep Top 6,000 but I could barely slip out in the new few hours~

[Anacybele]

How the fuck does a +10 female Robin with T-Adept and B Tomebreaker get completely decimated by an Ophelia? That makes zero sense. I lost today's battle because of that bullshit. How do you counter such an OP unit if this doesn't work? I specifically built female Robin to counter units like this.

Ophelia should be nerfed. This is ridiculous. Though sadly, it probably won't happen. She should have her stats reduced a bit and perhaps her kit changed, but there's gacha laws and all... 😕

Edited July 29, 2019 by Anacybele

[Diovani Bressan]

12 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

How the fuck does a +10 female Robin with T-Adept and B Tomebreaker get completely decimated by an Ophelia? That makes zero sense. I lost today's battle because of that bullshit. How do you counter such an OP unit if this doesn't work? I specifically built female Robin to counter units like this.

Ophelia should be nerfed. This is ridiculous. Though sadly, it probably won't happen. She should have her stats reduced a bit and perhaps her kit changed, but there's gacha laws and all... 😕

I don't see any problem with Ophelias. She is not hard to deal with. There are way dangerous foes than Ophelia.

Also, Female Robin is not the best candidate to go against a magic nuke like Ophelia. Her base Res is 22 (26 at +10) is not the best one, even with TA. It makes total sense for me.

Ophelia is like Legendary Alm, a foe that you shouldn't try to tank.

[Anacybele]

Just now, Diovani Bressan said:

I don't see any problem with Ophelias. She is not hard to deal with. There are way dangerous foes than Ophelia.

Also, Female Robin is not the best candidate to go against a magic nuke like Ophelia. Her base Res is 22 (26 at +10) is not the best one, even with TA. It makes total sense for me.

Ophelia is like Legendary Alm, a foe that you shouldn't try to tank.

She's always extremely hard for me to deal with because she one-shots or one-rounds near everything I send against her unless I can have a melee unit go in and one-shot her before she can do anything. But that's hard in itself because the AI always prioritizes buffing with her, so she stays behind the other enemies to buff them instead of moving close enough for me to attack her.

[Landmaster]

23 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

How the fuck does a +10 female Robin with T-Adept and B Tomebreaker get completely decimated by an Ophelia? That makes zero sense. I lost today's battle because of that bullshit. How do you counter such an OP unit if this doesn't work? I specifically built female Robin to counter units like this.

Ophelia should be nerfed. This is ridiculous. Though sadly, it probably won't happen. She should have her stats reduced a bit and perhaps her kit changed, but there's gacha laws and all... 😕

F!Robin has terrible Res~ I personally use Gronnraven Picnic Leo or V!Mist to deal with her~ Otherwise, I have Nowi or M!Kana tank her and she dies on retaliation~ Ophelia's not a hard unit to counter if you build up an appropriate tank~

[Diovani Bressan]

1 minute ago, Anacybele said:

She's always extremely hard for me to deal with because she one-shots or one-rounds near everything I send against her unless I can have a melee unit go in and one-shot her before she can do anything. But that's hard in itself because the AI always prioritizes buffing with her, so she stays behind the other enemies to buff them instead of moving close enough for me to attack her.

That's because the players know how to make a team with Ophelia. Enemy units prioritize Rally Skills, especially Ophelia which has a Rally skill that affect multiple allies. Of course she will buff her allies instead of attacking

No one would place Ophelia in a easy place for her to be killed. This is the wrong way to use her. You need to place her somewhere that she can rally her allies, and maybe get danced.

[Anacybele]

2 minutes ago, Diovani Bressan said:

That's because the players know how to make a team with Ophelia. Enemy units prioritize Rally Skills, especially Ophelia which has a Rally skill that affect multiple allies. Of course she will buff her allies instead of attacking

No one would place Ophelia in a easy place for her to be killed. This is the wrong way to use her. You need to place her somewhere that she can rally her allies, and maybe get danced.

Yeah, and players will more than likely use her and her OPness effectively. How do I counter that is what I'm asking.

3 minutes ago, Landmaster said:

F!Robin has terrible Res~ I personally use Gronnraven Picnic Leo or V!Mist to deal with her~ Otherwise, I have Nowi or M!Kana tank her and she dies on retaliation~ Ophelia's not a hard unit to counter if you build up an appropriate tank~

They don't have the proper blessings and I don't even have male Kana. Maybe in the future I'll change another blessing or two though. The Fire, Water, Wind, and Earth ones are becoming obsolete with Blessed Gardens being done.

[Landmaster]

1 minute ago, Anacybele said:

They don't have the proper blessings and I don't even have male Kana. Maybe in the future I'll change another blessing or two though. The Fire, Water, Wind, and Earth ones are becoming obsolete with Blessed Gardens being done.

You definitely want to be making use of Light Blessings, without that extra Res, tanking Ophelia is going to only become harder~

[Anacybele]

Just now, Landmaster said:

You definitely want to be making use of Light Blessings, without that extra Res, tanking Ophelia is going to only become harder~

Fair enough then.

[Ice Dragon]

24 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

How the fuck does a +10 female Robin with T-Adept and B Tomebreaker get completely decimated by an Ophelia? That makes zero sense. I lost today's battle because of that bullshit. How do you counter such an OP unit if this doesn't work? I specifically built female Robin to counter units like this.

Ophelia should be nerfed. This is ridiculous. Though sadly, it probably won't happen. She should have her stats reduced a bit and perhaps her kit changed, but there's gacha laws and all... 😕

Ophelia hits really, really hard. She's literally the best or second best nuke in the game right now (the other contender is Legendary Alm). You either need to hit her on your player phase where she can't activate Blazing Light/Wind/etc. or you need to have a huge amount of Res (in the 50-60 range).

What makes Ophelia particularly dangerous is the fact that Blazing skills ignore the weapon triangle and the damage takes place out of combat, meaning the bulk of her damage can't be mitigated by skills like Triangle Adept or combat buffs like Distant Def. Unlike Alm, who is possible to chip to death by sacrificing units, she's a complete glass cannon and is designed to kill an opponent with her first attack, meaning she either lives with full health or dies a horrible death (which also means B Tomebreaker doesn't really help much against her).

During Light season, Eir helps a lot by giving +10 magic bulk per copy of Eir, but you ideally still want to use a unit that has a lot of Res to begin with. During Astra season, though, you really just have to hope your base Res is going to cut it since we don't have an Astra-Res Mythic Hero yet.

 

25 minutes ago, Anacybele said:

but there's gacha laws and all...

No, there aren't. That's a myth. It's just bad for PR if not handled well, so most companies don't do it.