Arena battle videos and discussion

[Barren]

spoiler: Barren VS Gotwald:xkkwdqdc

spoiler: Barren VS Shade:xkkwdqdc

spoiler: Barren VS Skip Sandwhich:xkkwdqdc

spoiler: Eternal248 VS PX_TimeForDeath:xkkwdqdc

spoiler: Eternal248 VS Squidgy:xkkwdqdc

spoiler: Pride VS Otabo:xkkwdqdc

spoiler: Pride VS Shade:xkkwdqdc

Hope you guys like my commentary

[FFMaster]

Now that you mention it, I am pretty sure I saw Alkaiser whiff a Repeating Fist in a test match - are we sure it's flagged unblockable?

Just looked at the FFTPatch. It is evadable, but will be fixed next version. For now, just don't use it.

The next fight! Barren vs Squidgy!

spoiler: AWESOME INTENSE FIGHTTTTTTT:1ewu714d

Barren, IP man didn't use repeating fist, and there was no "BRUURURURURURUuRTRBRUTBRTT". Disappointing.

Awesome fight though. Speed Save eventually caught up on Barren. And I agree that Cover Fire is too good right now, and will need a slight tonedown in damage and an increase in MP

[pokeytax]

Sorry, Shade, I screwed up both your teams. The new file has Earth Warriors fixed, Academy Team will have to wait.

Nice matches guys! I'm gonna run a round-robin league in divisions and maybe someone else can comment the playoffs.

[Barren]

Sorry, Shade, I screwed up both your teams. The new file has Earth Warriors fixed, Academy Team will have to wait.

Nice matches guys! I'm gonna run a round-robin league in divisions and maybe someone else can comment the playoffs.

I volunteer to comment the playoffs

[Squidgy]

Yeah, compared to Shuriken, Cover Fire wins.

[PX_Timefordeath]

I like the 36 second battle between me and Eternal.

[Barren]

Yes PX, that was quick and brutal

[FFMaster]

Wow, just watched Pride vs Shade... massive stallfest there. I really hate Lore for that reason. It slows the game down too much imo, but a very nice battle. Nice team Shade.

[Shade]

Sorry, Shade, I screwed up both your teams. The new file has Earth Warriors fixed, Academy Team will have to wait.

WTF WAS WRONG WITH ACADEMY TEAM?!?!?
Dude tell me what was wrong with my academy team?

Wow, just watched Pride vs Shade... massive stallfest there. I really hate Lore for that reason. It slows the game down too much imo, but a very nice battle. Nice team Shade.

Yeah it did not help that prides team hapens to have low faith, low fury, high evasion, and that I did not have quake(woulda helped alot!). Lore wasn't suppose to be my main attack, it was suppose to be support for my knights(like really good regen that actually also damages enemies), but it seems that it's really nice main attack higher faith enemies(160 sometimes on row, while my guys get the same amout of hp).

[pokeytax]

WTF WAS WRONG WITH ACADEMY TEAM?!?!?

I accidentally used the Earth Warrior team instead.  It'll be fixed Monday.

The spreadsheet seems to swap Quake and Tornado - Melancthon's team has Quake instead of Tornado.

[Shade]

WTF WAS WRONG WITH ACADEMY TEAM?!?!?

I accidentally used the Earth Warrior team instead.  It'll be fixed Monday.

The spreadsheet seems to swap Quake and Tornado - Melancthon's team has Quake instead of Tornado.

Are you saying they changed place?
Since Barren recorded the Academy team figthing.

[Melancthon]

The spreadsheet seems to swap Quake and Tornado - Melancthon's team has Quake instead of Tornado.

Well that's unfortunate.  Pretty much screws up the whole team.  If it can me fixed I'd love to see them in a fight, if not no big deal.  I was beginning to have doubts about them anyway and had planned on trying something different.  Good luck!

[pokeytax]

Arena League II

I was using the posted set of memory cards, so changes made after that didn't take affect.

Code Select Expand

Western Division

FIGHT! ALKAISER!    5-2
Femme Fatale        5-2
Team Ip             5-2
Counter-Terrorists  4-2-1
Ominous Sky         3-4
Another Boring Team 2-5
Electrifying        2-5
Gotwald             1-5-1

FIGHT! ALKAISER!
One superhero and some assorted backup.  Reasonably good Mime synergy with summons and Cover Fire.
Femme Fatale
Beastly Geomancy with plenty of support.
Team Ip
One superhero and some assorted backup.  Relied on charms and healing as support, rather than anyone but Ip Man killing people.
Counter-Terrorists
Still quite effective, but less able to deal with the higher level of offense this time around.
Ominous Sky
Lacked the damage output of the top teams and a bit flimsy.
Another Boring Team
Nerfed down to no longer be an unstoppable juggernaut.
Electrifying
Not enough lightning absorption/immunity or offensive punch.
Gotwald
Minimal offense outside of Lore.  Eventually provoked too many Speed Saves and HP Restores.

Code Select Expand

Eastern Division

Bloody's Angels     5-2
Xtreme Sandbagging  4-3
Mass Destruction    4-3
Secret Hunt         4-3
Salty Spice         3-4
Earth Warriors      3-4
Warriors of Might   3-4
Flames of Passion   2-5

Bloody's Angels
A balanced team with pretty fierce offense.  King of the weaker division IMO.
Xtreme Sandbagging
Not a lot of offense, but haste and plenty of, yes, sandbagging.
Mass Destruction
Absolutely annihilated a few teams with an opening salvo, but fairly vulnerable to status magic.
Secret Hunt
A failure conceptually, but pulled through thanks to a hero Squire with Yin-Yang and double Abandon.
Salty Spice
No rez or healing besides HP Restore - kinda frightening it won three matches!  Berserk is monstrous.
Earth Warriors
Like Gotwald's team, not enough offense outside Lore.
Warriors of Might
Female berserkers not a good choice.  Again, no rez or healing.
Flames of Passion
Pulled out two wins pretty much solely on the strength of Nameless Dance. Not much offense.

Code Select Expand

FIGHT! ALKAISER!   \_____
Secret Hunt        /     \_____
Femme Fatale       \_____/     \
Mass Destruction   /            \
                                 \_____
                                 /
Team Ip            \_____       /
Xtreme Sandbagging /     \_____/                          
Counter-Terrorists \_____/
Bloody's Angels    /

Good
Badasses (Ip Man, Alkaiser, Bloody and GoGoGo all dropped some bodies, a well-supported PA-based hero unit was effective)
Yin-Yang Magic (Paralyze a terrific spell against high-Faith units)
Nameless Dance (8 ticks for 2 status ailments is 3 status ailments a turn - should have been here last week, Otabo used it to great effect)
Salty Rage (neither of the berserker teams did well, but Salty Rage one-shot KOs are very strong)
Two Hands Poles (Ivory Rod is a great equip)
revival/Haste (fundamentals still apply)
Bio 2 (25% proc rate? definitely a better way to inflict Frog than casting Frog)

Bad
Wiznaibus (Lore's downsides with little upside)
Sing (hard to balance this with map size and Mimic, I know!)

Ugly
Lore (situationally effective, but is hard countered by Save/HP Restore - removing persevere probably a good idea)
Masamune (if you're hurt enough to need healing, may as well just Murasame)
My Spreadsheeting (I'll do better next time guys)

[Zaen]

Much agreed. Time to do some reworking and plenty of testing... forgot to think about damage output. I do hope Lore gets a bit of reworking; the persevere + lowish damage + elemental healing makes a lot of the fights rather tedious and makes battles rather lacklustre.

[pokeytax]

I ran some matches in order to prove to Shade that Paladins are a lil' overpowered.  Mostly, it just proved that Shade's Academy Team is pretty badass.

spoiler: Pokeytax vs. Shade:1p5wlygh

spoiler: Shade vs. Pokeytax:1p5wlygh

[Melancthon]

I think Team RAMROD is a contender.  

Issues addressed:  Fragility; sub-theme distractions; damage output.

Hopefully.

[Zaen]

The first match showed every axe hit to do MORE than projected.

It's proof more that Axe + Berserk + Fury + Compat + Possibly Attack UP + PA Boost equipment is... scary.

[Pride]

The problem isn't the Paladins imo, its Salty Rage that causes the disruption as Paladins are the best abusers of Salty Rage.

[Shade]

The first match showed every axe hit to do MORE than projected.

It's proof more that Axe + Berserk + Fury + Compat + Possibly Attack UP + PA Boost equipment is... scary.

It was neutral compat whole time...

Btw I have seen axes do very low damage like under 50 with 21wp.

Also temporary rules has been added, no more salty rage guys. Says PX.

[Skip Sandwich]

Arena axes deal a random amount of damage between slightly over 100% of straight PA * WP, up to 200% of PA * WP (aka, Two Hands damage level), with an average expected damage over time of 150% of PA * WA. with the Slasher, this comes out to being equal to PA * 18 damage over time, compared to the Defender's PA * 16 damage.

The Slasher should probably receive a WP nerf down to 10 from 12, this puts it at the equivalent of PA * 15 over time, with damage spikes of up to PA * 20.

The Giant axe would be fine if we removed it's Earth element property (and thus it's self element boost), it would still boost most geomancy effects and as such would retain its current usefulness.

the Battle axe would likewise be fine at WP 8, since it has what is basically an instant death proc.