Arena Discussion Thread (inc. Assault)

[Birdy]

5 hours ago, Vaximillian said:

My newest highest score is now 4,494!

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My previous score of 4,410 was worth rank 24,444. Let's see how far will I climb now! (Is 4,500 achievable for me? I hope it is!)

EDIT: 11,402! Oh wow. An increase of 84 points means a rank increase by more than a half. I couldn't have guessed.

Yeah, a loooooot of people seem to be in the 4.400 - 4.650 bracket. I just went from 4.550 to 4.619, a 69 point increase, and went from rank 4.649 to rank 1.140

 

Edited April 2, 2017 by Birdy

[eclipse]

1 hour ago, GuiltyLove said:

I actually swapped out Est for M!Robin and gave him Bowbreaker :P I also just replaced Michalis with Camilla since I don't need to use more than one bonus unit. It's a little strange having Robin with three other fliers but I do need to deal with Takumi... I dunno. I'm bad at team composition.

 

Should I give Caeda Swordbreaker so she can deal with sword users who might be too fast for Palla? My Palla is only 4* :(

Caeda + Goad Fliers = 41 Speed, assuming a neutral nature.  With Darting Blow, it's something like 45.

Thus, no, since the only swordie that hits more than 40 is vanilla Lon'qu, due to Speed +3.  Sneak another speed buff on your team, and that's "no one, full stop".

Edited April 2, 2017 by eclipse

[Ryu Yuki]

I'm currently in Rank 969 with a score of 4624. It almost makes me regret not running Fury on anyone at all, because my score would have probably been higher enough that I'd probably stay within the top 1000 by the season's end. But I've tried it before and it paired me up against crazy x4 40+10 teams; it also became kind of really hard to win on the lava map in particular. Oh well, it would have been a waste of SP once the April Update rolls in anyway, so I guess it's not too much of a loss. If this is anything like my previous seasons, I'll probably be 100Xth by the time this one ends.

Spoiler

 

Edited April 2, 2017 by Ryu Yuki

[GuiltyLove]

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

Caeda + Goad Fliers = 41 Speed, assuming a neutral nature.  With Darting Blow, it's something like 45.

Thus, no, since the only swordie that hits more than 40 is vanilla Lon'qu, due to Speed +3.  Sneak another speed buff on your team, and that's "no one, full stop".

Ok thanks! Hmm I realized I probably shouldn't use Caeda for melee units too much since she seems fragile and is better at tanking magic hits.  Should I get Palla to fight other sword users or is she too weak? Caeda's Rally Speed will boost Palla's speed enough to not get doubled by 5* Lucina most of the time, I think

[Othin]

1 hour ago, Ryu Yuki said:

I'm currently in Rank 969 with a score of 4624. It almost makes me regret not running Fury on anyone at all, because my score would have probably been higher enough that I'd probably stay within the top 1000 by the season's end. But I've tried it before and it paired me up against crazy x4 40+10 teams; it also became kind of really hard to win on the lava map in particular. Oh well, it would have been a waste of SP once the April Update rolls in anyway, so I guess it's not too much of a loss. If this is anything like my previous seasons, I'll probably be 100Xth by the time this one ends.

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To be fair, Fury still seems to be a plenty powerful skill in its own right.

[Robert Stewart]

Managed a score of 4400 at last...Using Ursula has really been bad for my score this season. Still haven't gotten ANY defense wins.

Based on the bonus heroes for next season, it looks like I'll have to bench Minerva to make room for Michalis. :/

[Vaximillian]

4 minutes ago, Robert of Normandy said:

Based on the bonus heroes for next season, it looks like I'll have to bench Minerva to make room for Michalis. :/

Too bad it's not really viable to keep all three Macedonian siblings in a team.

[Robert Stewart]

22 minutes ago, Vaximillian said:

Too bad it's not really viable to keep all three Macedonian siblings in a team.

Indeed. It would be nice if Michalis used lances like he does in most of his appearances, but it's not to be I guess.

Or wait for the meta to become more lance dominated.

Edited April 2, 2017 by Robert of Normandy

[Birdy]

34 minutes ago, Othin said:

To be fair, Fury still seems to be a plenty powerful skill in its own right.

It probably will be when the April patch hits, for now it's a liability in Arena. It makes it more fun because of the difficulty however, though =).

[Thor Odinson]

Now that Michalis is lv 40 I did another test run of the arena with Ryoma, Nino, him, and Jaffar. Repos Michalis actually works a bit better than Olivia on the lava map and bridge map, because he can just fling Nino out of the way after she's done with someone across the lava. Thinking of giving him Axebreaker so he can take Camilla face on since they both ignore terrain. On more open maps I prefer Olivia, since she lets Nino get two turns to kill things, whereas I either have to get Ryoma to step in if a red is too close or retreat because Nino can't take hits from anyone that isn't Robin/Linde/Nowi, but Michalis still does the job well enough.

Even at 4* He does have significantly more BST than Olivia, so that is good for my score.

 

[Ryu Yuki]

37 minutes ago, Othin said:

To be fair, Fury still seems to be a plenty powerful skill in its own right.

Well, I guess Fury could be a powerful skill in the right hands, but it just doesn't mix with my team that well. Mostly because I rely on Young Tiki and Nowi's bulk to hold the enemy at bay and kill them over time. Those two are capable of tanking several hits, but Fury just reduces their lifespan significantly faster. Being totally honest, Lucina probably could have used it better since she's not meant to be taking hits, but I ran out of Fury to give to her. To be honest, it's not a bad skill in itself, but the most damning factor about it is that combined with my manakete team's high natural base stats, it artificially pumps up the 'tier' of my team. The end result is me facing off against teams that are literally nothing but 40+10s. Like, even with the team I have now, I'm facing 1-2 40+10s every single match. But with Fury, it just pumps the difficulty level up so much further that deathless wins become especially hard in movement-limiting maps (I'm looking at the lava map in particular). My only merged units are 40+6 Nowi and 40+2 Lucina mind you, so the odds kind of become stacked against me. I probably wouldn't actually mind these mismatched pairings if the lava map wasn't like 80% of my arena matches...

3 minutes ago, Birdy said:

It probably will be when the April patch hits, for now it's a liability in Arena. It makes it more fun because of the difficulty however, though =).

Yeah, I find that it can be a pretty big liability with certain teams. At the very least, using Fury on a manakete team will tend to result in super-whale teams of four 40+10s being thrown your way. I actually wouldn't mind the challenge and I can still do a deathless run rather feasibly on most maps... except on this one, where the terrible starting positions and linear pathing just screw me over so unbelievably hard. It becomes difficult to properly handle Julia without sacrificing someone due to how everyone is forced to line up and a square formation becomes literally impossible. I can sometimes force the AI to split their team which makes it way more manageable, but when I can't, and I'm facing a totally loaded team of 40+10 Lucina(s) and Julia(s), I am in for the fight of my life.

[Othin]

37 minutes ago, Birdy said:

It probably will be when the April patch hits, for now it's a liability in Arena. It makes it more fun because of the difficulty however, though =).

Right now, it makes the arena more difficult but also makes it possible to reach higher scores. When the patch hits, it won't affect scoring but it should make the arena easier, at least when equipped to characters that can get good use out of it.

[Birdy]

5 minutes ago, Othin said:

Right now, it makes the arena more difficult but also makes it possible to reach higher scores. When the patch hits, it won't affect scoring but it should make the arena easier, at least when equipped to characters that can get good use out of it.

I know, but you were saying that it was a powerfull skill in it's own rights regarding to @Ryu Yuki's comment on how she could have used Fury units to up her BST xD. 

15 minutes ago, Ryu Yuki said:

Yeah, I find that it can be a pretty big liability with certain teams. At the very least, using Fury on a manakete team will tend to result in super-whale teams of four 40+10s being thrown your way. I actually wouldn't mind the challenge and I can still do a deathless run rather feasibly on most maps... except on this one, where the terrible starting positions and linear pathing just screw me over so unbelievably hard. It becomes difficult to properly handle Julia without sacrificing someone due to how everyone is forced to line up and a square formation becomes literally impossible. I can sometimes force the AI to split their team which makes it way more manageable, but when I can't, and I'm facing a totally loaded team of 40+10 Lucina(s) and Julia(s), I am in for the fight of my life.

Yeah, I'm running into similar lvl.40+10 stuff when I use three Fury units. Using two Fury units I can reliabily clear it deathless, but three Fury units seems like it might be too much for now, mainly because I didn't have enough SP on those characters to get more than their inherited Fury skill ;_;. The lava map is indeed pretty annoying at times, though I'd take that one over the previous one that made you spawn two units bottom left and top right of the map.

Edited April 2, 2017 by Birdy

[Othin]

30 minutes ago, Birdy said:

I know, but you were saying that it was a powerfull skill in it's own rights regarding to @Ryu Yuki's comment on how she could have used Fury units to up her BST xD.

My intention was to address the "it would have been a waste of SP once the April Update rolls in anyway" concern, not the rest of it; I guess I wasn't very clear about that.

[Okigen]

Might be a stupid question but... how do we recognise a hacked account? I just ran into a team with Lucina+10, Robin+10, Azura vanilla and Takumi+10. Now thinking about it, that Takumi sounds suspicious because how rare he is. Plus its owner didnt bother putting any inheritance on it, rather strange if you whaled so hard to have +10 units.

I'm too stupid not to take pics!

[Ryu Yuki]

2 minutes ago, OKigen said:

Might be a stupid question but... how do we recognise a hacked account? I just ran into a team with Lucina+10, Robin+10, Azura vanilla and Takumi+10. Now thinking about it, that Takumi sounds suspicious because how rare he is. Plus its owner didnt bother putting any inheritance on it, rather strange if you whaled so hard to have +10 units.

I'm too stupid not to take pics!

Being totally honest, the vanilla Azura almost makes it look legit. Don't underestimate whales; if a certain character ever had a focus summon, you will see legit 40+10 versions of them running around. Heck, our resident super-whale Ice Dragon regularly blows thousands of dollars on each of the banners, and he has like two 40+10 Lucina(s), a 40+10 Julia, and a 40+10 Ninian with 6 more unmerged versions of her left over. If you see a 5* exclusive character that's at 40+10 and has never had a focus summon before (Like Azura or Hector), then that is suspicious as all hell. Not impossible, but is infinitely more unlikely than a 40+10 of someone that's had a focus summon. The most unlikely scenario however, is a 5* exclusive 40+10 red unit that's never had a focus summon. One example being a 40+10 Ryoma. If you ever see something like that running around, then that is almost certainly a hacker because you'd need to whale in the tens of thousands to roll that many of a specific 5* red (There's a lot of reds in this game so rolling a particular one by sheer chance is very hard, even when spending $1000+). But yes, otherwise, 40+10 isn't a surefire indicator that someone hacked. I regularly run into 40+10 players all the time, and my own Nowi is almost reaching 40+10 through sheer effort (I played from Day 1 and spent $75 total on the game). Lucina, Robin and Takumi all had focus summons before, so if Azura is a vanilla, then that player almost sounds legit. It is kind of strange about the inheritance, but whales don't necessarily translate to hardcore players that care about builds, so it's not too out there. I've seen plenty of 40+10s that barely changed the hero's default skill set.

You generally can't tell if someone is hacking, but 40+10 5* exclusive characters that never had focus summons is generally a safe enough warning that you can report the player to the devs. The only real way you can tell a hacker though, is if they are stupid enough to use 40+10 versions of characters that really shouldn't be able to have them (Like Anna, Alphonse, Sharena, Narican, Ursula, F!Robin and Michalis).

[Rezzy]

15 minutes ago, OKigen said:

Might be a stupid question but... how do we recognise a hacked account? I just ran into a team with Lucina+10, Robin+10, Azura vanilla and Takumi+10. Now thinking about it, that Takumi sounds suspicious because how rare he is. Plus its owner didnt bother putting any inheritance on it, rather strange if you whaled so hard to have +10 units.

I'm too stupid not to take pics!

Short of units that can't legally be +, like Anna or going beyond their limit, like a +3 Michalis or something, there's no way that I know of.

+10 units are suspect, but possible if you blow a ton of money on the game.  All three of the units that you mention were Focus units at one point, too, which makes them more likely.  If there was a +10 Azura for instance, would most likely be hacked, since she was never a Focus, but still theoretically possible.

[Okigen]

I see. Thanks guys. The power of whales is truly terrifying xD

[Dual Dragons]

3/29/2017 - offense 4,546; rank 1,434 (1:05AM PST) [deathless]
3/30/2017 - offense 4,568; rank 1,935 (3:06PM PST) [deathless]
3/31/2017 - offense 4,568; rank 2,408 (5:58PM PST) [deathless]
4/1/2017 - offense 4,568; rank 2,806 (2:20PM PST) [deathless]
4/2/2017 - offense 4,568; rank 3,200 (12:53PM PST) [deathless]

Team:
(all Level 40 and 5*)
+Atk/-Spd Ninian (163)
+Res/-HP Ryoma (173; +Vantage 2)
neutral Sharena (177; +Threaten Spd 3)
+Def/-Spd Minerva (174; +Draconic Aura)
BST: 687

Testing out Fury 3 Spring Chrom in Minerva's slot. I have Ninian to help for positioning but if I didn't, I'd probably be scrambling on the bridge map at the very least. Still unfortunate to not get extra copies of Swap. I only had a death because I didn't see an opponent's Hector have -Def. Ryoma one-rounded him naturally and got promptly killed by the Effie behind Hector. Least I know now that Ryoma can do that to any -Def Hector...

[XeKr]

Choked a deathless streak twice, due to misclicks and not paying attention, so it took a while for a perfect run. I'm usually patient enough to wait for the daily swords/crests unless it's nearing the end of the round. Did back out of a few teams with Eirika (usually has Nino+other blades)/Horse (Brave mages with buffs are scary)/Dancer leaders late in the streak.

1 death is around 4500 for my team and it was rank 8997 at last update. 0 deaths is 4564 which is rank 3517. It might stay under 5k. I've seen some 4600 fall outside the top 1k, so I don't think Fury 2 to my other characters will help. 

10 Defense wins again, like the past 2 weeks, which seems to be a trend. At this range I think a dangerous combination like melee w/ buff skills + very offensive ranged unit, and Draw Back to keep them together, can sometimes kill at least 1 character which causes a number of forfeits. I lead with Linde so not like I'm hiding much. 

Will probably use 4* Palla next week? Ruby Sword can beat some 5* Greens, and not that much stat total loss compared to Robin(M). +Linde+Eirika(Fury 3)+Anna(Fury 2) probably, unless the matchmaking changes significantly. Should get around 4530 or so, which is probably barely outside 5k but eh. 

Edited April 2, 2017 by XeKr

[chirp]

2 hours ago, Ryu Yuki said:

The most unlikely scenario however, is a 5* exclusive 40+10 red unit that's never had a focus summon. One example being a 40+10 Ryoma. If you ever see something like that running around, then that is almost certainly a hacker because you'd need to whale in the tens of thousands to roll that many of a specific 5* red

There are big whales out there...

Like, really, really b.i.g.

[Ice Dragon]

4 hours ago, Ryu Yuki said:

Being totally honest, the vanilla Azura almost makes it look legit. Don't underestimate whales; if a certain character ever had a focus summon, you will see legit 40+10 versions of them running around. Heck, our resident super-whale Ice Dragon regularly blows thousands of dollars on each of the banners, and he has like two 40+10 Lucina(s), a 40+10 Julia, and a 40+10 Ninian with 6 more unmerged versions of her left over. If you see a 5* exclusive character that's at 40+10 and has never had a focus summon before (Like Azura or Hector), then that is suspicious as all hell. Not impossible, but is infinitely more unlikely than a 40+10 of someone that's had a focus summon. The most unlikely scenario however, is a 5* exclusive 40+10 red unit that's never had a focus summon. One example being a 40+10 Ryoma. If you ever see something like that running around, then that is almost certainly a hacker because you'd need to whale in the tens of thousands to roll that many of a specific 5* red (There's a lot of reds in this game so rolling a particular one by sheer chance is very hard, even when spending $1000+). But yes, otherwise, 40+10 isn't a surefire indicator that someone hacked. I regularly run into 40+10 players all the time, and my own Nowi is almost reaching 40+10 through sheer effort (I played from Day 1 and spent $75 total on the game). Lucina, Robin and Takumi all had focus summons before, so if Azura is a vanilla, then that player almost sounds legit. It is kind of strange about the inheritance, but whales don't necessarily translate to hardcore players that care about builds, so it's not too out there. I've seen plenty of 40+10s that barely changed the hero's default skill set.

@OKigen

Really, the only way to be certain that an account is hacked is if they have a truly impossible combination of units. For example, a Michalis with 2 other units with Iote's Shield is a clear red flag.

A +10 Takumi is in no way suspicious because Takumi was a focus character at one point as well as the only colorless unit in that focus, making him not as rare as you may think he is.

Furthermore, being a vanilla unit at +10 merge is also probably not as uncommon as you may think. I'd wager there are a good number of Mega Wishiwashis like me who are perfectionistic and want to make sure a unit has exactly the best skill set possible with no mistakes and/or are simply waiting for the meta to settle down to make such a set.

I, for one, will not be touching the skills on my +10 Nowi and my soon-to-be +10 Ninian until I see what the "equippable items" are that are coming in the April update. I want my dragons to be absolutely perfect. My +9 Julia, +9 Lucina, and +10 Lucina on my arena defense team are also completely vanilla right now because I'm horribly indecisive about my perfect builds (not to mention I don't have enough spare Hectors to make the Distant Counter builds that I'd like to run). I actually only have a grand total of 2 units where I have used inheritance, the +10 Robin (M) on my arena defense team (Close Counter and Quick Riposte 3) and my Gwendolyn (Swap, Bonfire, and Quick Riposte 3).

 

As for +10 merges for 5-star exclusive characters that have never been a focus character, they aren't quite that rare for heavy spenders to obtain. I'm sitting here with 13 copies of Hinoka as well as 8 copies of Azura, though these are largely a result of focusing on blue pulls (also known as "Ninian") for a large number of pulls. I'd imagine anyone who truly wanted a +10 Ryoma and spent as much money as I have could reasonably have one by now. I haven't truly focused on red for quite some time, but my own Ryoma is currently +4.

 

5 hours ago, Ryu Yuki said:

ck, our resident super-whale Ice Dragon regularly blows thousands of dollars on each of the banners, and he has like two 40+10 Lucina(s), a 40+10 Julia, and a 40+10 Ninian with 6 more unmerged versions of her left over.

That's a level 40+10 Lucina, 40+9 Lucina, 40+9 Julia, 1+9 Julia, and 5 Julias left over (because I haven't done calcs to decide on the nature I want for her).

A 40+10 Ninian with 6 left over is actually 17 and not 16, but that's now almost correct because I pulled a 17th Ninian from the current focus set. I haven't actually done the merges yet (been rather busy running calcs and playing Monster Hunter XX for the past week or so), so it's still 1 level 40 Ninian (that will end up being merged) and 16 level 1 Ninians (one of which still needs to be trained to level 40).

[Ryu Yuki]

6 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

@OKigen

Really, the only way to be certain that an account is hacked is if they have a truly impossible combination of units. For example, a Michalis with 2 other units with Iote's Shield is a clear red flag.

A +10 Takumi is in no way suspicious because Takumi was a focus character at one point as well as the only colorless unit in that focus, making him not as rare as you may think he is.

Furthermore, being a vanilla unit at +10 merge is also probably not as uncommon as you may think. I'd wager there are a good number of Mega Wishiwashis like me who are perfectionistic and want to make sure a unit has exactly the best skill set possible with no mistakes and/or are simply waiting for the meta to settle down to make such a set.

I, for one, will not be touching the skills on my +10 Nowi and my soon-to-be +10 Ninian until I see what the "equippable items" are that are coming in the April update. I want my dragons to be absolutely perfect. My +9 Julia, +9 Lucina, and +10 Lucina on my arena defense team are also completely vanilla right now because I'm horribly indecisive about my perfect builds (not to mention I don't have enough spare Hectors to make the Distant Counter builds that I'd like to run). I actually only have a grand total of 2 units where I have used inheritance, the +10 Robin (M) on my arena defense team (Close Counter and Quick Riposte 3) and my Gwendolyn (Swap, Bonfire, and Quick Riposte 3).

 

As for +10 merges for 5-star exclusive characters that have never been a focus character, they aren't quite that rare for heavy spenders to obtain. I'm sitting here with 13 copies of Hinoka as well as 8 copies of Azura, though these are largely a result of focusing on blue pulls (also known as "Ninian") for a large number of pulls. I'd imagine anyone who truly wanted a +10 Ryoma and spent as much money as I have could reasonably have one by now. I haven't truly focused on red for quite some time, but my own Ryoma is currently +4.

 

That's a level 40+10 Lucina, 40+9 Lucina, 40+9 Julia, 1+9 Julia, and 5 Julias left over (because I haven't done calcs to decide on the nature I want for her).

A 40+10 Ninian with 6 left over is actually 17 and not 16, but that's now almost correct because I pulled a 17th Ninian from the current focus set. I haven't actually done the merges yet (been rather busy running calcs and playing Monster Hunter XX for the past week or so), so it's still 1 level 40 Ninian (that will end up being merged) and 16 level 1 Ninians (one of which still needs to be trained to level 40).

I'm not jealous of your +10 Nowi or your soon-to-be +10 Ninian. Or your +10 Julia(s) and Lucina(s) for that matter. Nope, totally not.

*Cries in a corner*

Huh... And here I'm still underestimating the power of a Mega Wishiwashi even though I quite literally told someone else not to do so. To be honest, I kind of recall you mentioning that you had 2-3 Hector(s) or something, so I assumed that 40+10 versions of 5* exclusive characters without a focus summon was something relatively rare even for the +$1000 spender. But looking at those statistics... Holy meep, the infinite potential of the Mega Wishiwashi race is starting to frighten me. Still, for someone to attain something like a 40+10 Ryoma, I do wonder how hard they must whale for something like that... 

Also I couldn't remember your exact lineup, but I did recall you had at least two Lucina(s) that were either at or close to 40+10. Also good point about the number of unmerged Ninian(s); I didn't actually think about that detail. And on that note, congratulations on your 17th one; you may now rest in peace knowing that I'm going to be forever envious and  jealous of your dragon bonanza. 

[salinea]

Man this arena season has been a disaster for me. I haven't managed deathless run, even with the "easy" team of Ursula, Julia, Eirika, Klein (I experimented with others for highers BST earlier in the week) and lost a couple of times badly. A score of 4,200~ has me in the lower tier of score for peanut feathers :(

Skill transfer is kind of kicking my ass. I think I need to put some skill on my crew to keep up, but I'm too indecisive to do so with some suboptimal sacrifices.

[Alfred Kamon]

@Ice Dragon Apologies for the inappropriate question, but I'm legitimately curious (with no malice or ill intention at all): just how rich are you? Or are you just so bored of life that you seek perfection in this gacha game? kinda looks like Oliver Again, I hope I'm not offending anyone by asking this, I just want to understand better why people are eager to spend that much on this game.

 

I really... don't know what focus unit to pick for the next Arena season. They're all kinda mediocre, honestly...? I have all of the bunnies, even a +Spd -Def Spring Lucina, but I doubt she can replace Nowi effectively on my team. Nor can Spring Chrom replace Anna, as he can't tank magical hits, or a hit from Lucina, or double +10 Ephraims consistently. Hmm... What is even a good build for Spring Lucina? She needs Fury 3 to increase her BST, but aside from that, I don't know. So perhaps the standard set with Desperation is what I should go for?

I had this build I came up with the other day for my +Spd - HP Spring Lucina. With -HP, she has exactly 32 HP at lvl40, meaning that after initiating a battle and using Ardent Sacrifice, she'd get -16 HP, bringing her to 50% of her total HP and allowing her to teleport with Escape Route. Not bad, but still meh.