How To: Character Building for Tyrants/Superbosses
Mar 2, 2016 4:20:14 GMT -5
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Post by Primulus on Mar 2, 2016 4:20:14 GMT -5
Well, here it is. A breakdown of fighting tyrants, sharing everything I know in this thread. Naturally, please ask if I leave anything unanswered, or if there are additional questions. I'm going to split this up by a number of different short "chapters", hidden by spoiler text, for digestibility. Each chapter will be titled accordingly, and go through the basics before getting to some of the endgame builds Zipzo, Sinamoi and I have run, among others who have successfully killed superbosses.
As a note, I will not be tying any builds to using Core Crusher, however, I may advise that some certain builds use Core Crusher, such as in builds that heavily use arts that are ether.
CHAPTER ONE: Introduction to Resistances
CHAPTER TWO: Tyrants
CHAPTER THREE: Evaluation of Each Weapon Type
CHAPTER FOUR: Character Builds
As a note, I will not be tying any builds to using Core Crusher, however, I may advise that some certain builds use Core Crusher, such as in builds that heavily use arts that are ether.
CHAPTER ONE: Introduction to Resistances
This is an important concept in fighting at endgame. Understanding how resistances work is pretty important, and getting a working build that doesn't rely on Ghostwalker pretty much depends on it. Even Reflect needs to stack resistances, because Telethia and other big tyrants all have access to special reflect-piercing attacks, however most of their attacks will be reflected normally. Still, you'd need to stack resistances in those areas that pierce reflect, or else you'll just get one-hit-killed. At no resistance, Pharsis' reflect-piercing attack can strike you for damage in seven digits, so there's no getting around it.
I'm going to assume you, the reader, already know all about the attribute types and debuff types in the game. By the time you should be reading this, you should be well-acquainted with early to mid endgate, but want to know how to truly survive some of the nastiest things enemies have to throw at you. In any case, though you surely know what the six attributes are, what do these numbers mean? It appears, on scrutiny, that there is a loose percentile effect of damage reduction in each resistance. 25 resistance to Physical is -25% from the damage done, and 65 resistance to Ether is -65% from the damage done. It's pretty simple and straight forward, at first.
Now it gets far more complex. For managing endgame challenges, you're going to want to gather a lot of endgame armor parts from a lot of resistance stacking. You'll also be looking for specific traits on the equipment you're picking up. For most purposes, you don't even need yellow quality stuff, green will often suffice, although it can be an utter pain in the ass to hunt for piece with two very specific traits, let alone three, and sometimes your needs will push you in that direction, sadly. In any case, I will also assume you've gone to the trouble of building a skell for farming. Maybe an Ares 90? Come back when you've gotten a good farming skell. Okay, you got it? Good. You may want to familiarize yourself with what armor carries which attributes, and now note that arm pieces of dropped, highest level armor can have (Attribute) Resistance Up XIV as a native trait, and this can be upgraded to XX. Arm pieces are highly important, and it is vital you collect those with resistance bonuses.
When building resistances, however, 100 resistance is often not enough for the big tyrants. Despite the fact that 100 is enough for all other purposes, tyrants can and often do carry with them utterly devastating attribute resistance down debuffs, some of which have an effect of -50 resistance on the attribute they affect. In some cases, aiming for 150 resistance is quite prudent. This aim of 150 upwards of resistance can be made less important by using weapons with arts that carry debuff removal effects - this includes the Knife, the Photon Saber, the Gatling Gun and the Raygun, or by healing effects if you can take the damage and heal it back quickly enough. Most endgame tyrants only inflict one resistance down debuff though, usually of their main attribute. Getting the right balance of resistances can be a matter of trial and error.
Before I move on to the other type of resistance, please note that the stage V buff from Attribute Resistance Up battle probes on the FrontierNav network will give you +15 resistance to all attributes. Auras which give a resistance to an attribute will normally grant 40 resistance to that attribute, and 50 when secondary or tertiary cooldown bonuses are triggered. Astral Protection in particular is very effective in this regard as a result, granting up to 50 resistance in all attributes. Buffs such as Clarity Ray, Gravity Cloak, Flame Cloak and Lightning Cloak give an additional resistance count of about 30 in their respective attribute. Chrome Armor may be in the range of 40-50 resistance added, though I have not personally confirmed this.
Sadly, there's another type of resistance you will often need to stack as well, and that is the resistance of debuffs. Unlike attributes, it would appear that the value of 200 is the minimum sufficiency to resist most debuffs in the game, with as much as 300 to resist some of the primary debuffs belonging to the tyrant using them. The 300 count primarily appears to apply to only six tyrants, however - Telethia, Pharsis, Nardacyon, Vortice, Luciel and Dadaan. Stacking debuff resistance accordingly, through skills, arts and equipment is going to be necessary to proceed. You may often find yourself wanting head or leg equips that can give additional resistance to a status effect a particular tyrant uses. (Yes, often, for the five or six biggest and baddess tyrants, you will likely need to put together equipment specific for that tyrant. Planning is a highly important phase here.)
As a final note here, skills such as Brain Wall and Stand Strong are invaluable.
I'm going to assume you, the reader, already know all about the attribute types and debuff types in the game. By the time you should be reading this, you should be well-acquainted with early to mid endgate, but want to know how to truly survive some of the nastiest things enemies have to throw at you. In any case, though you surely know what the six attributes are, what do these numbers mean? It appears, on scrutiny, that there is a loose percentile effect of damage reduction in each resistance. 25 resistance to Physical is -25% from the damage done, and 65 resistance to Ether is -65% from the damage done. It's pretty simple and straight forward, at first.
Now it gets far more complex. For managing endgame challenges, you're going to want to gather a lot of endgame armor parts from a lot of resistance stacking. You'll also be looking for specific traits on the equipment you're picking up. For most purposes, you don't even need yellow quality stuff, green will often suffice, although it can be an utter pain in the ass to hunt for piece with two very specific traits, let alone three, and sometimes your needs will push you in that direction, sadly. In any case, I will also assume you've gone to the trouble of building a skell for farming. Maybe an Ares 90? Come back when you've gotten a good farming skell. Okay, you got it? Good. You may want to familiarize yourself with what armor carries which attributes, and now note that arm pieces of dropped, highest level armor can have (Attribute) Resistance Up XIV as a native trait, and this can be upgraded to XX. Arm pieces are highly important, and it is vital you collect those with resistance bonuses.
When building resistances, however, 100 resistance is often not enough for the big tyrants. Despite the fact that 100 is enough for all other purposes, tyrants can and often do carry with them utterly devastating attribute resistance down debuffs, some of which have an effect of -50 resistance on the attribute they affect. In some cases, aiming for 150 resistance is quite prudent. This aim of 150 upwards of resistance can be made less important by using weapons with arts that carry debuff removal effects - this includes the Knife, the Photon Saber, the Gatling Gun and the Raygun, or by healing effects if you can take the damage and heal it back quickly enough. Most endgame tyrants only inflict one resistance down debuff though, usually of their main attribute. Getting the right balance of resistances can be a matter of trial and error.
Before I move on to the other type of resistance, please note that the stage V buff from Attribute Resistance Up battle probes on the FrontierNav network will give you +15 resistance to all attributes. Auras which give a resistance to an attribute will normally grant 40 resistance to that attribute, and 50 when secondary or tertiary cooldown bonuses are triggered. Astral Protection in particular is very effective in this regard as a result, granting up to 50 resistance in all attributes. Buffs such as Clarity Ray, Gravity Cloak, Flame Cloak and Lightning Cloak give an additional resistance count of about 30 in their respective attribute. Chrome Armor may be in the range of 40-50 resistance added, though I have not personally confirmed this.
Sadly, there's another type of resistance you will often need to stack as well, and that is the resistance of debuffs. Unlike attributes, it would appear that the value of 200 is the minimum sufficiency to resist most debuffs in the game, with as much as 300 to resist some of the primary debuffs belonging to the tyrant using them. The 300 count primarily appears to apply to only six tyrants, however - Telethia, Pharsis, Nardacyon, Vortice, Luciel and Dadaan. Stacking debuff resistance accordingly, through skills, arts and equipment is going to be necessary to proceed. You may often find yourself wanting head or leg equips that can give additional resistance to a status effect a particular tyrant uses. (Yes, often, for the five or six biggest and baddess tyrants, you will likely need to put together equipment specific for that tyrant. Planning is a highly important phase here.)
As a final note here, skills such as Brain Wall and Stand Strong are invaluable.
CHAPTER TWO: Tyrants
Here begins a list of each tyrant, and the attributes to the attacks they use, and which status effects are notable. Many of these tyrants do have additional, more minor status effects, as in the case of Telethia.
1. GRADIVUS, THE HEADLESS EMPEROR
This tyrant is the most annoying one to break down, because he has so much at his disposal. Gradivus has three different modes (or "dispositions") during combat that he'll switch between at random, each of which give him a different set of arts to use. However, he does seem to have a collection of arts universal to his current disposition/mode, so I will begin there before explaining what he does in each mode. His universal arts include a Gravity attribute stomp and tail swipe, carrying with them Launch and Topple effects that can be quite brutal. 200 Resistance to Topple and Launch are necessary to resist these, although I would identify the Topple as the more important one. He also has access to a breath attack that is Physical attribute, which deals high damage and inflicts Blackout and Physical Res Down. With insufficient resistance, the Physical Res Down can make a subsequent breath attack utterly deadly.
Gradivus' first "mode" grants him a barrage of ranged Ether attacks. These can also do significant damage, and inflict Ether Res Down. Gradivus' second "mode" grants him a barrage of Thermal attacks, which do moderate damage (compared to his other attacks) and inflict Blaze. Gradivus' third "mode" grants him a barrage of Electric attacks, which do low to moderate damage (compared to his other attacks) and inflict Shock. In addition to all of these, whenever Gradivus changes his mode, he will spawn a Parasite Gerrid - it is vital that you kill it immediately, because the parasites spawned can inflict Control otherwise, leading to an effective instant death.
Final notes regarding Gradivus include Enrage, a buff he can add to himself later in the fight that causes him to become immune to all debuffs and gain a significant damage boost. He is not immune to Topple and Sleep (if he's not Enraged), however you will need a lot of Resistance Reducers to inflict either on him, but both are popular means of taking him down - just note that speed is of the essence to give him less chance to Enrage. Furthermore, if you inflict a debuff an enemy is already suffering from, it can sometimes upgrade it by one stage, causing you to be unable to overwrite this status effect and leaving Gradivus to wake up/get up and instantly Enrage later in the fight. Precise timing is particularly advised for Topple builds, in which you want to wait for Gradivus to go through the animation of getting back up before you topple again. Also make note to stand directly in front or directly behind Gradivus if you intend on toppling him, or else he might fall on top of you and cause you to be launched.
Summary: Uses Physical, Gravity, Ether, Thermal and Electric. 200 Topple resistance is a recommended measure.
2. DADAAN, THE STRONGEST PRONE
Dadaan is much simpler than Gradivus, which is strange considering Dadaan is considered to be the superboss of Oblivia. In any case, Dadaan has three phases that go in order, and we'll cover them paragraph by paragraph. Beginning in his first phase, Dadaan appears to stick solely to Physical type attacks, inflicting Stagger and Topple with them. In fact, all of his attacks in this phase appear to Stagger, making him quite a pain to fight. You'll need as high as 300 resistance to Stagger (although maybe it's only 200, it's been a while since I've done this one) to fully keep up with Dadaan and not get pushed around constantly. Luckily, building total resistance to Stagger will also make you immune to his Topple as well, since his Topple seems to only work if he's inflicted Stagger already.
In the second phase, Dadaan will become immune to all damage and numerous enemies will spawn on top of you. You will need to clear out the entire group of enemies, who seem to exclusively use Beam attribute attacks, before the fight with Dadaan can continue. It is quite easy to die here if you're fighting solo and do not have sufficient resistances and healing.
The third phase resumes the fight with Dadaan, and while he keeps the same attacks he had before, he gains powerful Thermal attacks to resist as well. More to the point, however, he also appears to have a Thermal attack that cannot be resisted, and is an instant kill, dealing damage exactly as high as your max HP regardless of resistances. He does not use this instant kill immediately, but it is enough of a threat that you should consider disposing of Dadaan immediately and not draw the fight out.
Summary: Uses Physical, Thermal and Beam. 200-300 Stagger resistance is a recommended measure.
3. LUGALBANDA, THE WANDERER-KING
This guy is a kitchen sink of debuffs, throwing everything at you until you're exhausted and had enough. While he does have three phases, my experience is to just burst him down and not draw the fight out any more than necessary. Still, you're going to need to know what he uses, and honestly, I don't remember that well. I remember Physical, Beam and Thermal attacks, but you may have to adjust accordingly if I am mistaken. What I can tell you with certainty, however, is that he has a nasty Blackout (paired with absurd evasion on his part) and a truly devastating Control, as well as numerous other status effects. I would recommend building 200 Control resistance, and perhaps 200 Blackout resistance as well, before attempting to build resistances to his attacks. Fortunately, he doesn't hurt quite as hard as some other tyrants on this list, and most of the pain comes from the status effects he inflicts.
Summary: Likely uses Physical, Thermal and Beam. 200 Control resistance is a recommended measure. Requires high Accuracy and possibly 200 Blackout resistance as well.
4. LUCIEL, THE ETERNAL
Luciel seems to be one of the tyrants that really frustrates people who are trying to ween themselves off of Ghostwalker. With Ghostwalker, you can avoid many of Luciel's mechanics quite easily, whereas without, even using Reflect or Astral Protection, Luciel's mechanics are in full play, and without adjusting to them, Luciel will absolutely kill you. Luckily, Luciel only has one phase, and it's basically a variant of the Thermal mode of Gradivus. High Thermal damage, moderate-high Gravity damage, moderate-high Physical damage, so only three attributes to build resistances to. So what's the problem?
Every single one of Luciel's attacks inflicts Topple, and unlikely all other tyrants in the game, Luciel's Topple goes through reflects, meaning she will topple lock you into oblivion. You will need 300 Topple Resistance to fully resist it and stay in the fight. However, if you can achieve the balance between suitable resistances to her attacks (60-75+ to each with an adequate source of healing should suffice) and the 300 Topple Resistance necessary, you can beat her. (Note that much like Gradivus, topple her from directly in front or directly behind, and time your topples accordingly. Luciel also appears to only Enrage if you break one of her appendages - it doesn't seem to matter which one.)
Summary: Uses Physical, Gravity and Thermal. 300 Topple resistance is absolutely necessary without Ghostwalker.
5. VORTICE, THE DEIFIC BLAST
The hardest part about Vortice is honestly getting him down to an altitude where you can actually fight him on foot. While Vortice has three phases, I'm not going to bother detailing all of them and everything Vortice does, because by the third phase, everything Vortice is doing is what Vortice has been doing before, and so once you're prepared to the third phase, you're prepared for everything. In any case, to begin this fight, you'll want to lure Vortice to the ground, which usually involves slowly descending to the lowest point down the mountain side, to the southwest of M'Gando's pillar of ash, near some railings. Eventually, Vortice will descend to a point about level to those railings, where you can then move up to in your skell before disembarking and beginning the fight on foot.
Vortice uses only two attributes in his attacks, so he is quite easy to cover in that regard. Electric and Thermal. Both can hit quite hard, however, particularly the Thermal at low resistances, while some of his attacks do have an Electric Res Down effect on them. Still, this is the least demanding of the biggest four superbosses, so it shouldn't be a significant issue to cover these. The bigger problem, however, comes down to the debuffs at Vortice's disposal. While he has Electric Res Down, this isn't what you need to worry about. If you are fighting on one of the railings or some other narrow space, take heed, because Vortice has a powerful Launch that requires 300 Resistance to stand against it. In addition, Vortice also has a Stun and will use it often, and this requires 200 Resistance to ward off. You will also find yourself inflicted with Flinch, Shock, Blaze, Knockback and Fatigue, however these can be muscled through, while the Stun and Launch can be absolutely devastating.
Summary: Uses Electric and Thermal. 300 Launch resistance and 200 Stun resistance are recommended measures.
6. NARDACYON, THE SHADOWLESS
Nardacyon is quite a difficulty spike from Vortice. To begin with, when you start the fight, you'll be up against Nahum, the Red Hare, a Milsaadi Female who summons Nardacyon when she is at low health. Nahum is comparatively very easy, but can give you a bit of trouble, inflicting Virus often. She seems to primarily use Beam attacks, and is quite a simple enemy overall. When at low health, Nardacyon is summoned in her place, and the true battle begins. Note before going into this fight that Nardacyon has the highest evasion and accuracy in the game. Evasion builds will not work on her, and you will need an absurd amount of accuracy to hit her reliably, especially late into the fight. Attempt to stay in the center of the platform, due to her Launch and Knockback abilities.
Nardacyon's attacks draw from three attributes. Beam, Electric and Thermal. Interestingly, the Thermal attack can be disabled by destroying her tail, although it's difficult to do, due to appendage hardness and HP. The biggest threats are her Beam and Electric attacks, so prioritize those in your resistance stacking. In her first phase, she has access to all three attributes, though you will see Beam the most. Her Beam attacks inflict Beam Res Down, Launch, HP Recovery Down, Fatigue and Knockback. None of these are significant enough to worry, however. The status effects on her Electric and Thermal attacks, however, can be debilitating - Stun + Shock and Blaze, respectively. Stun in particular is nasty, and 200 Stun resistance is recommended.
The second phase will begin with an aura that Nardacyon uses on herself. She will gain enhanced accuracy and evasion, the ability to reflect Gravity attribute attacks, and a counter spike that applies Beam damage as well as Beam Res Down whenever you deal damage to her. The Beam damage can be reduced through Beam Resistance, and with sufficient resistance it will do only 1s even with the debuff active. She gains some new attacks in the second phase, but nothing you'd be unprepared for just yet.
The third phase, all appendages of Nardacyon break off automatically. She gains a tremendous buff on her damage, evasion and accuracy, as well as maintaining the Beam damage spike and Gravity reflect from before. Her electric attacks will do far more damage than before, and she gains access to Berserker Claw, an ability that inflicts a crippling Beam Res Down debuff that is far more effective than the normal variants you've been dealing with. Curing the debuff after Berserker Claw or just simply having enough Beam resistance (~150 total) is advised for this point, unless you can simply out-heal the spike damage that results from Berserker Claw's debuff. She also gains use of an art that inflicts Slow Arts, which is also quite devastating if you're attempting a no Overdrive run.
Summary: Uses Beam, Electric and Thermal. Thermal can be disabled, all attack attributes are or can be very high damage. 200 Stun Resistance is a recommended measure, as well as Accuracy as high as you can pump it up.
7. PHARSIS, THE EVERQUEEN
On ground, Pharsis can seem pretty easy compared to Nardacyon and Telethia. To initiate combat, you will want to provoke her, and then draw her to the entrance of her cave, getting out of your skell and starting combat once she's reached you. Pharsis appears to use the same two arts at the beginning of each fight, so the beginning is very predictable at least. She opens with a powerful Ether attack, and then follows up with a tail swipe that inflicts Knockback and Time Bomb. While under the effect of Time Bomb, you will not be able to exit your skell until the timebomb detonates, which will then either destroy your skell, or allow you to exit. Whichever the case, this is when the fight should begin.
Pharsis uses three attributes. Gravity, Physical and Ether. Most of her attacks are gravity type, and deal massive amounts of damage. I have seen Pharsis deal damage in the millions with her reflect-bypassing gravity art, making this the most important thing to build resistances to. The normal sweet spot for killing Pharsis appears to be somewhere in the area of 130 to 140+ Gravity Resistance, which may seem daunting, but is quite possible with the right balance of equipment, or defensive arts and skills to reduce damage further. All three types of damage will be present in the first phase, and while Physical damage can also be quite high, her Ether damage seems a bit lowish, enough that some builds don't even need any base resistance to it if they can quickly recover from damage - however the Ether attack can be disabled by destroying her back appendage. In the first phase, you will also be dealing with Topple (200 resistance fully wards this off), Knockback, Flinch, Fatigue and Slow Arts, as well as more Time Bomb. Time Bomb deals damage based on your Gravity Resistance, and it will be an instant kill at lower resistances. (Sinamoi once recorded 7,500 damage with 94 Gravity Resistance, Astral Protection and a full set of Attribute Resistance Probes, however I didn't have quite so much trouble with it. Still, you can destroy the tail to disable the art that inflicts this debuff.)
In phase two, a few small changes occur. Pharsis activates an aura that raises her evasion and gives her a Gravity damage spike, much like Nardacyon's Beam damage spike. More importantly, however, it is at this point Pharsis gains access to Dark Ray, which can do millions of damage without any resistances to Gravity. Dark Ray also inflicts a strong Gravity Res Down debuff, which is why, in addition to Time Bomb, that you typically need 130 to 140+ Gravity Resistance in this fight.
Phase three brings more subtle changes. She gains a new aura which increases her damage, and gains an attack called Supernova. It has the same animation as Dark Ray, but deals even more damage. However, it does not appear to inflict Gravity Res Down as well. As her health drops below 30%, she also gains access to an art called Regeneration, which heals her health by 25% her maximum HP every time she uses it. This is one of the toughest DPS checks in the game, and you need a decent amount of DPS to overcome her healing.
Summary: Uses Gravity, Physical and Ether damage. 200 Topple Resistance is a recommended measure. Time Bomb resistance to an adequate amount to resist is optional, but probably ultimately unnecessary. May also require accuracy augments.
8. TELETHIA, THE ENDBRINGER
The biggest, baddest tyrant in the game, and a bit on the same level as Nardacyon in overall difficulty. Like Nardacyon and Pharsis, she's going to require accuracy augments, to about 525 accuracy. Figuring out this fight is a process in trial and error, as you have to start it at the top of a mountain Telethia flies over, and between each phase you'll need to hop in your skell and move to the next location, then hop out of the skell and proceed with the fight as before. Telethia was assuredly not meant to be fight on foot, I don't think, so this is the highest accomplishment, taking down this one on foot. If you can't do it, there's no shame in it.
To begin with, Telethia is best engaged while still in mid air, just before she reaches an area with two mountain peaks. (Note: I may amend this post later with a screenshot to demonstrate the exact position.) When engaged, Telethia will actually slide to a stop, so your aim is to engage it before it reaches the mountain tops, so it'll slide to a position right over them. Watch for the very first art Telethia uses, which will either be Reflect Elements or Reflect Photon. The effect of this art will last throughout the fight, and each art contains a set of three attributes Telethia has selected to reflect. Going from memory*, Reflect Elements is Physical, Gravity and Ether, while Reflect Photon is Thermal, Electric and Beam. Obviously, you'll want to retry if Telethia uses a reflect of an attribute you'll be using. After, you should land on the one closest to Telethia and start the fight. Throughout, you'll also notice Telethia regenerates at a rate of about 50,000 HP every five seconds. This never changes, and it becomes significant later on.
This is a rather calm and relaxed first phase. During this phase, Telethia has only Ether attribute attacks, and inflicts a variety of status effects, namely Sleep and Launch as the most important ones you need to be worried about. Launch can push you off of the mountain and end the fight, however if you're launched off the right way, you can actually climb back up to the top of the mountain and continue the fight. Sleep isn't too bad for now, but it will be devastating later, and you will need 300 resistance to Sleep to fully resist it. When the phase ends, Telethia becomes immune to damage and will fly down to the ground in Divine Roost. Follow in your skell to continue.
For phase two, Telethia fights very differently. It first gains an Ether Res Down and Ether damage counter spike, much like Nardacyon and Pharsis. It also gains Physical and Electric attacks, both of which can be quite devastating, however you may not need to build resistances to Electric attacks. It also loses access to its Sleep attack in this phase, however the Physical attacks can inflict Control and Topple. 200 Resistance to Control is necessary to ward it off, while you'll also need 200 Resistance to Topple to resist that. Neither the Control nor the Topple pierce reflect effects, so these can be avoided through reflects or even Ghostwalker if timed well, however the barrage of Ether attacks make Ghostwalker difficult to use here. As for the Electric attack, Telethia will only use this attribute if it manages to inflict Topple you in this phase (or Sleep you in phase three), so if you build adequate debuff resistances, you will never have to worry about Electric attacks. Other status effects like Flinch, Knockback and HP Recovery Down are also in play, as well as Ether Res Down (this one appears to require 300 resistance). When phase two ends, Telethia will go invulnerable again, and fly back up into the sky. It will then wait for you to ascend to it in your skell.
Beginning in phase three, Telethia gains a self-buff from an art called Soul Read. Those who remember Xenoblade Chronicles' Telethia will instantly remember what this does, although this Soul Read is a little different. More importantly, however, you'll need to get Telethia on the ground (or down to the petal) through pulling it down, before continuing the fight. This is the hardest part which requires a lot of trial and error, but it can be done. Once you get back into range, which can be time consuming, you'll notice its passive regeneration have made it recover quite a bit of HP. In fact, it may be that phase three increases its rate of regeneration, I'm not quite sure. In any case, you'll notice all your attacks miss because of the effects of Soul Read, and no matter how long you wait, it'll never seem to go down. This is because Soul Read in this game is actually a massive decoy effect, like Ghostwalker. To remove Soul Read, you must endure numerous misses (the number is in the hundreds) before Soul Read is disabled, and then Telethia will get a new buff - Telethia Rage. This increases its attack power, dramatically. All the while, you're still having to deal with Telethia's attacks.
Telethia's attacks in phase three are similar to phase one. Aside from one art, it's exclusively Ether, and inflicts many of the same debuffs, such as Sleep, Ether Res Down, Launch, HP Recovery Down, and so forth. When it successfully inflicts Sleep, the Electric attack will be used, and even at ~95 to 105 resistance, this can hit for as high as 8,000 damage during Telethia Rage. Periodically, Soul Read will be reused and Telethia Rage will end, forcing you to bring down Soul Read again before you can continue doing damage. This is a long haul and will take some time to get through, more so than the first two rounds, even combined. Stick with it, however, and you just might win.
Summary: Uses Ether, Physical and Electric attributes. 200 Control Resistance and 200 Topple Resistance is highly recommended. Very high Electric Resistance or 300 Sleep Resistance, one or the other, is also recommended, though both together are unnecessary.
1. GRADIVUS, THE HEADLESS EMPEROR
This tyrant is the most annoying one to break down, because he has so much at his disposal. Gradivus has three different modes (or "dispositions") during combat that he'll switch between at random, each of which give him a different set of arts to use. However, he does seem to have a collection of arts universal to his current disposition/mode, so I will begin there before explaining what he does in each mode. His universal arts include a Gravity attribute stomp and tail swipe, carrying with them Launch and Topple effects that can be quite brutal. 200 Resistance to Topple and Launch are necessary to resist these, although I would identify the Topple as the more important one. He also has access to a breath attack that is Physical attribute, which deals high damage and inflicts Blackout and Physical Res Down. With insufficient resistance, the Physical Res Down can make a subsequent breath attack utterly deadly.
Gradivus' first "mode" grants him a barrage of ranged Ether attacks. These can also do significant damage, and inflict Ether Res Down. Gradivus' second "mode" grants him a barrage of Thermal attacks, which do moderate damage (compared to his other attacks) and inflict Blaze. Gradivus' third "mode" grants him a barrage of Electric attacks, which do low to moderate damage (compared to his other attacks) and inflict Shock. In addition to all of these, whenever Gradivus changes his mode, he will spawn a Parasite Gerrid - it is vital that you kill it immediately, because the parasites spawned can inflict Control otherwise, leading to an effective instant death.
Final notes regarding Gradivus include Enrage, a buff he can add to himself later in the fight that causes him to become immune to all debuffs and gain a significant damage boost. He is not immune to Topple and Sleep (if he's not Enraged), however you will need a lot of Resistance Reducers to inflict either on him, but both are popular means of taking him down - just note that speed is of the essence to give him less chance to Enrage. Furthermore, if you inflict a debuff an enemy is already suffering from, it can sometimes upgrade it by one stage, causing you to be unable to overwrite this status effect and leaving Gradivus to wake up/get up and instantly Enrage later in the fight. Precise timing is particularly advised for Topple builds, in which you want to wait for Gradivus to go through the animation of getting back up before you topple again. Also make note to stand directly in front or directly behind Gradivus if you intend on toppling him, or else he might fall on top of you and cause you to be launched.
Summary: Uses Physical, Gravity, Ether, Thermal and Electric. 200 Topple resistance is a recommended measure.
2. DADAAN, THE STRONGEST PRONE
Dadaan is much simpler than Gradivus, which is strange considering Dadaan is considered to be the superboss of Oblivia. In any case, Dadaan has three phases that go in order, and we'll cover them paragraph by paragraph. Beginning in his first phase, Dadaan appears to stick solely to Physical type attacks, inflicting Stagger and Topple with them. In fact, all of his attacks in this phase appear to Stagger, making him quite a pain to fight. You'll need as high as 300 resistance to Stagger (although maybe it's only 200, it's been a while since I've done this one) to fully keep up with Dadaan and not get pushed around constantly. Luckily, building total resistance to Stagger will also make you immune to his Topple as well, since his Topple seems to only work if he's inflicted Stagger already.
In the second phase, Dadaan will become immune to all damage and numerous enemies will spawn on top of you. You will need to clear out the entire group of enemies, who seem to exclusively use Beam attribute attacks, before the fight with Dadaan can continue. It is quite easy to die here if you're fighting solo and do not have sufficient resistances and healing.
The third phase resumes the fight with Dadaan, and while he keeps the same attacks he had before, he gains powerful Thermal attacks to resist as well. More to the point, however, he also appears to have a Thermal attack that cannot be resisted, and is an instant kill, dealing damage exactly as high as your max HP regardless of resistances. He does not use this instant kill immediately, but it is enough of a threat that you should consider disposing of Dadaan immediately and not draw the fight out.
Summary: Uses Physical, Thermal and Beam. 200-300 Stagger resistance is a recommended measure.
3. LUGALBANDA, THE WANDERER-KING
This guy is a kitchen sink of debuffs, throwing everything at you until you're exhausted and had enough. While he does have three phases, my experience is to just burst him down and not draw the fight out any more than necessary. Still, you're going to need to know what he uses, and honestly, I don't remember that well. I remember Physical, Beam and Thermal attacks, but you may have to adjust accordingly if I am mistaken. What I can tell you with certainty, however, is that he has a nasty Blackout (paired with absurd evasion on his part) and a truly devastating Control, as well as numerous other status effects. I would recommend building 200 Control resistance, and perhaps 200 Blackout resistance as well, before attempting to build resistances to his attacks. Fortunately, he doesn't hurt quite as hard as some other tyrants on this list, and most of the pain comes from the status effects he inflicts.
Summary: Likely uses Physical, Thermal and Beam. 200 Control resistance is a recommended measure. Requires high Accuracy and possibly 200 Blackout resistance as well.
4. LUCIEL, THE ETERNAL
Luciel seems to be one of the tyrants that really frustrates people who are trying to ween themselves off of Ghostwalker. With Ghostwalker, you can avoid many of Luciel's mechanics quite easily, whereas without, even using Reflect or Astral Protection, Luciel's mechanics are in full play, and without adjusting to them, Luciel will absolutely kill you. Luckily, Luciel only has one phase, and it's basically a variant of the Thermal mode of Gradivus. High Thermal damage, moderate-high Gravity damage, moderate-high Physical damage, so only three attributes to build resistances to. So what's the problem?
Every single one of Luciel's attacks inflicts Topple, and unlikely all other tyrants in the game, Luciel's Topple goes through reflects, meaning she will topple lock you into oblivion. You will need 300 Topple Resistance to fully resist it and stay in the fight. However, if you can achieve the balance between suitable resistances to her attacks (60-75+ to each with an adequate source of healing should suffice) and the 300 Topple Resistance necessary, you can beat her. (Note that much like Gradivus, topple her from directly in front or directly behind, and time your topples accordingly. Luciel also appears to only Enrage if you break one of her appendages - it doesn't seem to matter which one.)
Summary: Uses Physical, Gravity and Thermal. 300 Topple resistance is absolutely necessary without Ghostwalker.
5. VORTICE, THE DEIFIC BLAST
The hardest part about Vortice is honestly getting him down to an altitude where you can actually fight him on foot. While Vortice has three phases, I'm not going to bother detailing all of them and everything Vortice does, because by the third phase, everything Vortice is doing is what Vortice has been doing before, and so once you're prepared to the third phase, you're prepared for everything. In any case, to begin this fight, you'll want to lure Vortice to the ground, which usually involves slowly descending to the lowest point down the mountain side, to the southwest of M'Gando's pillar of ash, near some railings. Eventually, Vortice will descend to a point about level to those railings, where you can then move up to in your skell before disembarking and beginning the fight on foot.
Vortice uses only two attributes in his attacks, so he is quite easy to cover in that regard. Electric and Thermal. Both can hit quite hard, however, particularly the Thermal at low resistances, while some of his attacks do have an Electric Res Down effect on them. Still, this is the least demanding of the biggest four superbosses, so it shouldn't be a significant issue to cover these. The bigger problem, however, comes down to the debuffs at Vortice's disposal. While he has Electric Res Down, this isn't what you need to worry about. If you are fighting on one of the railings or some other narrow space, take heed, because Vortice has a powerful Launch that requires 300 Resistance to stand against it. In addition, Vortice also has a Stun and will use it often, and this requires 200 Resistance to ward off. You will also find yourself inflicted with Flinch, Shock, Blaze, Knockback and Fatigue, however these can be muscled through, while the Stun and Launch can be absolutely devastating.
Summary: Uses Electric and Thermal. 300 Launch resistance and 200 Stun resistance are recommended measures.
6. NARDACYON, THE SHADOWLESS
Nardacyon is quite a difficulty spike from Vortice. To begin with, when you start the fight, you'll be up against Nahum, the Red Hare, a Milsaadi Female who summons Nardacyon when she is at low health. Nahum is comparatively very easy, but can give you a bit of trouble, inflicting Virus often. She seems to primarily use Beam attacks, and is quite a simple enemy overall. When at low health, Nardacyon is summoned in her place, and the true battle begins. Note before going into this fight that Nardacyon has the highest evasion and accuracy in the game. Evasion builds will not work on her, and you will need an absurd amount of accuracy to hit her reliably, especially late into the fight. Attempt to stay in the center of the platform, due to her Launch and Knockback abilities.
Nardacyon's attacks draw from three attributes. Beam, Electric and Thermal. Interestingly, the Thermal attack can be disabled by destroying her tail, although it's difficult to do, due to appendage hardness and HP. The biggest threats are her Beam and Electric attacks, so prioritize those in your resistance stacking. In her first phase, she has access to all three attributes, though you will see Beam the most. Her Beam attacks inflict Beam Res Down, Launch, HP Recovery Down, Fatigue and Knockback. None of these are significant enough to worry, however. The status effects on her Electric and Thermal attacks, however, can be debilitating - Stun + Shock and Blaze, respectively. Stun in particular is nasty, and 200 Stun resistance is recommended.
The second phase will begin with an aura that Nardacyon uses on herself. She will gain enhanced accuracy and evasion, the ability to reflect Gravity attribute attacks, and a counter spike that applies Beam damage as well as Beam Res Down whenever you deal damage to her. The Beam damage can be reduced through Beam Resistance, and with sufficient resistance it will do only 1s even with the debuff active. She gains some new attacks in the second phase, but nothing you'd be unprepared for just yet.
The third phase, all appendages of Nardacyon break off automatically. She gains a tremendous buff on her damage, evasion and accuracy, as well as maintaining the Beam damage spike and Gravity reflect from before. Her electric attacks will do far more damage than before, and she gains access to Berserker Claw, an ability that inflicts a crippling Beam Res Down debuff that is far more effective than the normal variants you've been dealing with. Curing the debuff after Berserker Claw or just simply having enough Beam resistance (~150 total) is advised for this point, unless you can simply out-heal the spike damage that results from Berserker Claw's debuff. She also gains use of an art that inflicts Slow Arts, which is also quite devastating if you're attempting a no Overdrive run.
Summary: Uses Beam, Electric and Thermal. Thermal can be disabled, all attack attributes are or can be very high damage. 200 Stun Resistance is a recommended measure, as well as Accuracy as high as you can pump it up.
7. PHARSIS, THE EVERQUEEN
On ground, Pharsis can seem pretty easy compared to Nardacyon and Telethia. To initiate combat, you will want to provoke her, and then draw her to the entrance of her cave, getting out of your skell and starting combat once she's reached you. Pharsis appears to use the same two arts at the beginning of each fight, so the beginning is very predictable at least. She opens with a powerful Ether attack, and then follows up with a tail swipe that inflicts Knockback and Time Bomb. While under the effect of Time Bomb, you will not be able to exit your skell until the timebomb detonates, which will then either destroy your skell, or allow you to exit. Whichever the case, this is when the fight should begin.
Pharsis uses three attributes. Gravity, Physical and Ether. Most of her attacks are gravity type, and deal massive amounts of damage. I have seen Pharsis deal damage in the millions with her reflect-bypassing gravity art, making this the most important thing to build resistances to. The normal sweet spot for killing Pharsis appears to be somewhere in the area of 130 to 140+ Gravity Resistance, which may seem daunting, but is quite possible with the right balance of equipment, or defensive arts and skills to reduce damage further. All three types of damage will be present in the first phase, and while Physical damage can also be quite high, her Ether damage seems a bit lowish, enough that some builds don't even need any base resistance to it if they can quickly recover from damage - however the Ether attack can be disabled by destroying her back appendage. In the first phase, you will also be dealing with Topple (200 resistance fully wards this off), Knockback, Flinch, Fatigue and Slow Arts, as well as more Time Bomb. Time Bomb deals damage based on your Gravity Resistance, and it will be an instant kill at lower resistances. (Sinamoi once recorded 7,500 damage with 94 Gravity Resistance, Astral Protection and a full set of Attribute Resistance Probes, however I didn't have quite so much trouble with it. Still, you can destroy the tail to disable the art that inflicts this debuff.)
In phase two, a few small changes occur. Pharsis activates an aura that raises her evasion and gives her a Gravity damage spike, much like Nardacyon's Beam damage spike. More importantly, however, it is at this point Pharsis gains access to Dark Ray, which can do millions of damage without any resistances to Gravity. Dark Ray also inflicts a strong Gravity Res Down debuff, which is why, in addition to Time Bomb, that you typically need 130 to 140+ Gravity Resistance in this fight.
Phase three brings more subtle changes. She gains a new aura which increases her damage, and gains an attack called Supernova. It has the same animation as Dark Ray, but deals even more damage. However, it does not appear to inflict Gravity Res Down as well. As her health drops below 30%, she also gains access to an art called Regeneration, which heals her health by 25% her maximum HP every time she uses it. This is one of the toughest DPS checks in the game, and you need a decent amount of DPS to overcome her healing.
Summary: Uses Gravity, Physical and Ether damage. 200 Topple Resistance is a recommended measure. Time Bomb resistance to an adequate amount to resist is optional, but probably ultimately unnecessary. May also require accuracy augments.
8. TELETHIA, THE ENDBRINGER
The biggest, baddest tyrant in the game, and a bit on the same level as Nardacyon in overall difficulty. Like Nardacyon and Pharsis, she's going to require accuracy augments, to about 525 accuracy. Figuring out this fight is a process in trial and error, as you have to start it at the top of a mountain Telethia flies over, and between each phase you'll need to hop in your skell and move to the next location, then hop out of the skell and proceed with the fight as before. Telethia was assuredly not meant to be fight on foot, I don't think, so this is the highest accomplishment, taking down this one on foot. If you can't do it, there's no shame in it.
To begin with, Telethia is best engaged while still in mid air, just before she reaches an area with two mountain peaks. (Note: I may amend this post later with a screenshot to demonstrate the exact position.) When engaged, Telethia will actually slide to a stop, so your aim is to engage it before it reaches the mountain tops, so it'll slide to a position right over them. Watch for the very first art Telethia uses, which will either be Reflect Elements or Reflect Photon. The effect of this art will last throughout the fight, and each art contains a set of three attributes Telethia has selected to reflect. Going from memory*, Reflect Elements is Physical, Gravity and Ether, while Reflect Photon is Thermal, Electric and Beam. Obviously, you'll want to retry if Telethia uses a reflect of an attribute you'll be using. After, you should land on the one closest to Telethia and start the fight. Throughout, you'll also notice Telethia regenerates at a rate of about 50,000 HP every five seconds. This never changes, and it becomes significant later on.
This is a rather calm and relaxed first phase. During this phase, Telethia has only Ether attribute attacks, and inflicts a variety of status effects, namely Sleep and Launch as the most important ones you need to be worried about. Launch can push you off of the mountain and end the fight, however if you're launched off the right way, you can actually climb back up to the top of the mountain and continue the fight. Sleep isn't too bad for now, but it will be devastating later, and you will need 300 resistance to Sleep to fully resist it. When the phase ends, Telethia becomes immune to damage and will fly down to the ground in Divine Roost. Follow in your skell to continue.
For phase two, Telethia fights very differently. It first gains an Ether Res Down and Ether damage counter spike, much like Nardacyon and Pharsis. It also gains Physical and Electric attacks, both of which can be quite devastating, however you may not need to build resistances to Electric attacks. It also loses access to its Sleep attack in this phase, however the Physical attacks can inflict Control and Topple. 200 Resistance to Control is necessary to ward it off, while you'll also need 200 Resistance to Topple to resist that. Neither the Control nor the Topple pierce reflect effects, so these can be avoided through reflects or even Ghostwalker if timed well, however the barrage of Ether attacks make Ghostwalker difficult to use here. As for the Electric attack, Telethia will only use this attribute if it manages to inflict Topple you in this phase (or Sleep you in phase three), so if you build adequate debuff resistances, you will never have to worry about Electric attacks. Other status effects like Flinch, Knockback and HP Recovery Down are also in play, as well as Ether Res Down (this one appears to require 300 resistance). When phase two ends, Telethia will go invulnerable again, and fly back up into the sky. It will then wait for you to ascend to it in your skell.
Beginning in phase three, Telethia gains a self-buff from an art called Soul Read. Those who remember Xenoblade Chronicles' Telethia will instantly remember what this does, although this Soul Read is a little different. More importantly, however, you'll need to get Telethia on the ground (or down to the petal) through pulling it down, before continuing the fight. This is the hardest part which requires a lot of trial and error, but it can be done. Once you get back into range, which can be time consuming, you'll notice its passive regeneration have made it recover quite a bit of HP. In fact, it may be that phase three increases its rate of regeneration, I'm not quite sure. In any case, you'll notice all your attacks miss because of the effects of Soul Read, and no matter how long you wait, it'll never seem to go down. This is because Soul Read in this game is actually a massive decoy effect, like Ghostwalker. To remove Soul Read, you must endure numerous misses (the number is in the hundreds) before Soul Read is disabled, and then Telethia will get a new buff - Telethia Rage. This increases its attack power, dramatically. All the while, you're still having to deal with Telethia's attacks.
Telethia's attacks in phase three are similar to phase one. Aside from one art, it's exclusively Ether, and inflicts many of the same debuffs, such as Sleep, Ether Res Down, Launch, HP Recovery Down, and so forth. When it successfully inflicts Sleep, the Electric attack will be used, and even at ~95 to 105 resistance, this can hit for as high as 8,000 damage during Telethia Rage. Periodically, Soul Read will be reused and Telethia Rage will end, forcing you to bring down Soul Read again before you can continue doing damage. This is a long haul and will take some time to get through, more so than the first two rounds, even combined. Stick with it, however, and you just might win.
Summary: Uses Ether, Physical and Electric attributes. 200 Control Resistance and 200 Topple Resistance is highly recommended. Very high Electric Resistance or 300 Sleep Resistance, one or the other, is also recommended, though both together are unnecessary.
CHAPTER THREE: Evaluation of Each Weapon Type
Before we get into actual builds, I'd like to go over each of the weapons and what they offer for killing high end tyrants, one by one. In addition, I'll also list a number of skills which are very valuable to these tyrant fights.
1. LONGSWORDS
Offensive Stance is broken, pure and simple, but because of the nature of it, unless you're using Ghostwalker, it's not going to work against any of these superbosses or other high end tyrants. However, Blossom Dance is still a fantastic art for melee-focused characters, as well as the TP-gain area arts in Tornado Blade and True Stream Edge. However, the Longsword also has Defensive Stance, which is highly potent and can permit lower resistances through its damage reduction abilities and constant healing effect. The Longword and Defensive Stance aura is an excellent approach if you're considering a ranged-focus build dedicated to killing tyrants.
2. ASSAULT RIFLES
Assault Rifles are... interesting. They work great in Topple Lock builds, but you can't topple the four biggest superbosses. However, they do contain some interesting arts. Power Dive allows you to completely avoid all attacks during its animation, and Medic Free grants auto-revival and +100 Debuff Resistance (all debuffs) at Secondary Cooldown. What does auto-revival mean, though? Well, if any attack would take you down to 0 HP or lower, it immediately sets your HP to half max, and the aura ends. You remain in Overdrive (if you were already in Overdrive) and lose no other buffs (or debuffs, as it happens). It's highly demanding for skill, however, and since no attribute resistances or damage reduction is offered through Medic Free, you may need to pair it with another defensive weapon to properly utilize it.
More to the point, however, Assault Rifles are also essential for the Evasion build developed by Sinamoi and myself. This is because of Medic Free, but also because of the Flash Grenade art, which inflicts Blackout. Blackout is vitally important to the build, as one cannot normally have enough evasion without it.
3. SHIELDS
One of the best weapons for fighting tyrants, easily. Shields do so much! Supershield reduces incoming damage and has Physical reflect properties, you have Mindstorm for healing and potential buffs, Flame Cloak for ~30 extra thermal resistance, Iron Prison for ~40-50 physical resistance, and most importantly, the skills Shield Screen (a flat -30% damage) and Stand Strong (+100 resistance to Topple, Launch, Knockback and Stagger while using a shield). There's a lot you can do with a shield, and even better: shields can also come with Attribute Resistance Up traits natively attached to them, allowing you for even more resistance stacking. Oh, and great Topple Locking as well, due to Wild Down. The only thing Shields aren't good at is doing melee damage, although they do decent TP art damage with Drum Roll.
4. GATLING GUNS
One of the most potent ranged weapons in the game for sheer damage, above Sniper Rifles and Rayguns ultimately, it would turn out. However, the biggest draw of the Gatling Guns for killing tyrants is what they can do for you defensively. The Gatling Gun has Cool Off, which is an art that consumes your aura, but refunds you TP (I think this is about 2000?) and cures your debuffs. Just the fact that you have this is, added to the absurd damage you can get off a Gatling Gun, is enough to justify its use in a build.
5. DUAL SWORDS
This is probably one of the most disappointing weapons for soloing tyrants endgame, due to most of their arts being positional - it's impossible to get those positional attacks off on Telethia, Pharsis or Vortice. It is great as a DPS weapon, and will work as your primary source of damage, but you'll need a ranged weapon with something to protect you from enemy attacks and debuffs if you use this weapon type.
6. DUAL GUNS
Ghostwalker? Well, there is that. Sadly, I sooner qualify this as a DPS weapon rather than a defensive weapon, as all it offers is Ghostwalker. (Early Bird on a pure evasion build is untested, though.) Supercharge into Zero Zero is amazing, however, and Executioner is a very strong TP art.
7. JAVELINS
With Raijin, there's little doubt Javelins have one of the best auras in the game. Raijin carries with it Reflect (Electric), Arts Heal and increased critical rates. While this is the only real art that can be used as a defensive art in their list, it pairs extremely well with plenty of ranged weapons, especially Dual Guns and Gatling Guns, but I'm sure Assault Rifles, Sniper Rifles and Rayguns work well too. I'm uncertain how Javelin and Psycho Launcher might work together at current state, however. (Javelin also has the strongest TP art, if you're willing to blow up your skell first. This would work great on Telethia during phase three.)
8. SNIPER RIFLES
Like Dual Guns, Sniper Rifles get nothing defensively, and they are outpaced by Gatling Guns in terms of ranged damage superiority, both on TP arts (Hellfire vs. Afterburner) and normal damage arts. This is one of the hardest weapons to get to work, and needs a powerful ranged weapon paired up with it. It doesn't help that the low hit count on all of its arts (with Afterburner being a mere 5) makes it extremely difficult to bring down Telethia's Soul Read.
9. KNIVES
Knives are easily one of the best weapons in the game in so many ways, and that's before you count their Mind Control abilities. Relevant arts for killing tyrants are Full Specs for ~40-50 Ether Resistance, Chrome Armor for an estimated ~40 Physical Resistance, Smooth Recovery for healing and evasion buffs (more on this later), and Repair for debuff removal. Offensively it may be lacking, although it is really fun to stack up debuffs on an enemy, applying Supercharge through Power Dive, and then stabbing away with Black Bane. (Core Crusher is recommended to boost Black Bane's damage higher.)
Knives are also the second part of the evasion build, and require the evasion buff from Smooth Recovery to operate properly. In other words, the only way we ever got evasion builds to work at all combined this with the Assault Rifle, using a combination of Flash Grenade, Medic Free and Full Specs with as much evasion as we could possibly stack (and an Extend Blackout XX augment).
10. RAYGUNS
Rayguns are, for one of the more offensive weapons in the game, pretty good at supporting. Between Gravity Cloak and Clarity Ray, it almost seems made for Pharsis and Telethia, in fact. Gravity Cloak adds ~30 Gravity Resistance, and Clarity Ray adds ~30 Ether Resistance and removes all debuffs when applied. While it has many other obviously useful arts, these two are the most essential, with Beam Bomber and Beam Barrage being its best choices in arts. Beam Bomber and Beam Barrage allow you to prioritize ranged attack rather than potential, and can achieve a much stronger rate of damage than Ether Blast can. (Beam Bomber and Beam Barrage also have no forced attribute types, so you can use whatever attribute you want.) The only significant weakness on the part of Rayguns is that it is lacking in multi-hit arts, Beam Bomber hitting for 6, Beam Barrage for 3 and Ether Blast for 5, making it harder to take down Telethia's Soul Read, especially when paired with the Knife.
11. PHOTON SABERS
Photon Sabers have been pretty hard to figure out, but I'll open this up by saying that due to the disappointing attack power of Starlight Duster, it actually seems better to build up melee attack power and focus on the Starfall combos for damage. However, the Photon Saber is very potent when it comes to defensive options against superbosses, as well. Geolibrium adds ~40-50 Beam Resistance, which is tremendous on Nardacyon, and Astrolibrium enables a boost in your Beam damage as well as grants Beam Reflect. When we, on GameFAQs, say "No 3" or "No Decoy, No Reflect, No Astral Protection" we mean Astrolibrium (as well as aforementioned Raijin and Supershield) in that middle one. In any case, Astral Cure is a fantastic debuff remover, too, and Astral Heal works great in a pinch.
12. PSYCHO LAUNCHERS
The weirdest weapons in the game, and one of my favorites. Looking at the defensive arts belonging to this weapon, it becomes clear that this is the superior defensive weapon in the game, along with the shield. (Pairing them both leads to greater hilarity!) Astral Protection is an aura which grants 40~50 Resistance to all attributes, with the greatest effect at secondary and tertiary cooldown. In addition, Astral Protection grants 10% Max HP healed for every art you use. And if Astral Protection wasn't enough for your defenses, you also have Lightning Cloak, a buff that adds ~30 Resistance to Electric attributes. Offensively, it doesn't work great as a ranged weapon due to the low power of Stellar Ray and Shooting Star, but Gravity Lunge is a fantastic art that can supplement a melee gravity build of just about any weapon, provided a prioritization of TP arts over the melee attack stat.
13. SKILLS
Among many of the debuffs you see among the high end tyrants, you'll notice Topple and Control. Luckily, we have some skills we can equip that can counter those, among many of the other debuffs and attributes tyrants will use against us. Here are some good skills you might consider using, but I will try to keep dependence on these skills to a minimum in the build outlines, so you can customize it to your own tastes.
- BRAIN WALL: 100 Resistance to Control, Sleep and Slow Arts as long as you have an aura up. You'd be a fool not to use this for Telethia or Lugalbanda.
- STAND STRONG: Already mentioned in the Shield entry, this gives 100 Resistance to Topple, Launch, Knockback and Stagger when you have your shield out.
- SHIELD SCREEN: Already mentioned in the Shield entry, this gives -30% damage total (applied as a flat reduction after resistances are calculated).
- UNSTOPPABLE: Similar to Stand Strong, this grants 100 Resistance to Topple, Launch, Knockback and Stagger when you're dashing. If you use this, you're going to have to start dashing in reaction to enemy topple and launch arts, requiring impeccable reaction time.
- FORTIFIED FLESH: +50% HP is significant, especially if you have armor and a right arm augment with additional HP bonuses on their traits!
- WEAPON GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Physical when you have your melee weapon active.
- ELECTRIC GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Electric when you have your melee weapon active.
- BEAM GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Beam when you have your ranged weapon active.
- ETHER GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Ether when you have your ranged weapon active.
- GRAVITY GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Gravity when you have your ranged weapon active.
- HEALING AURA: Recovers 20% Max HP every time you activate your aura.
- FLEET FEET: +30% evasion when your melee weapon is active. Necessary for the evasion build.
- AGILE GUNSLINGER: +20% evasion when your ranged weapon is active. Necessary for the evasion build.
- CORE CRUSHER: +150% damage (applied as an independent, multiplicative modifier instead of an additive one) when targeting an appendage and using Ether type attacks.
- AURA ASSAULT: +30% damage and accuracy when using melee attacks and arts. Like Core Crusher, this is an independent modifier and will often provide a much higher damage boost than other +50% or +100% damage skills due to most of those being additive modifiers.
- SUPREME SWORD: +100% damage when using arts in a melee combo. This is an additive modifier, unlike Core Crusher or Aura Assault. What this means is that the 100% damage is stacked onto other additive modifiers, like the Overdrive bonus (so +500% and +100% damage become +600%, not +1000%).
- COMBO GUNNER: +125% damage when using arts in a ranged combo. Like Supreme Sword, this is an additive modifier.
- FAST FORWARD: Halves arts cooldown for arts used in a melee combo. Simple, and very useful.
- TRIGGER HAPPY: Halves arts cooldown for arts used in a ranged combo. You get the idea, right?
- SECONDARY ACCELERATOR: Halves the time for arts to go through secondary (and tertiary) cooldown.
1. LONGSWORDS
Offensive Stance is broken, pure and simple, but because of the nature of it, unless you're using Ghostwalker, it's not going to work against any of these superbosses or other high end tyrants. However, Blossom Dance is still a fantastic art for melee-focused characters, as well as the TP-gain area arts in Tornado Blade and True Stream Edge. However, the Longsword also has Defensive Stance, which is highly potent and can permit lower resistances through its damage reduction abilities and constant healing effect. The Longword and Defensive Stance aura is an excellent approach if you're considering a ranged-focus build dedicated to killing tyrants.
2. ASSAULT RIFLES
Assault Rifles are... interesting. They work great in Topple Lock builds, but you can't topple the four biggest superbosses. However, they do contain some interesting arts. Power Dive allows you to completely avoid all attacks during its animation, and Medic Free grants auto-revival and +100 Debuff Resistance (all debuffs) at Secondary Cooldown. What does auto-revival mean, though? Well, if any attack would take you down to 0 HP or lower, it immediately sets your HP to half max, and the aura ends. You remain in Overdrive (if you were already in Overdrive) and lose no other buffs (or debuffs, as it happens). It's highly demanding for skill, however, and since no attribute resistances or damage reduction is offered through Medic Free, you may need to pair it with another defensive weapon to properly utilize it.
More to the point, however, Assault Rifles are also essential for the Evasion build developed by Sinamoi and myself. This is because of Medic Free, but also because of the Flash Grenade art, which inflicts Blackout. Blackout is vitally important to the build, as one cannot normally have enough evasion without it.
3. SHIELDS
One of the best weapons for fighting tyrants, easily. Shields do so much! Supershield reduces incoming damage and has Physical reflect properties, you have Mindstorm for healing and potential buffs, Flame Cloak for ~30 extra thermal resistance, Iron Prison for ~40-50 physical resistance, and most importantly, the skills Shield Screen (a flat -30% damage) and Stand Strong (+100 resistance to Topple, Launch, Knockback and Stagger while using a shield). There's a lot you can do with a shield, and even better: shields can also come with Attribute Resistance Up traits natively attached to them, allowing you for even more resistance stacking. Oh, and great Topple Locking as well, due to Wild Down. The only thing Shields aren't good at is doing melee damage, although they do decent TP art damage with Drum Roll.
4. GATLING GUNS
One of the most potent ranged weapons in the game for sheer damage, above Sniper Rifles and Rayguns ultimately, it would turn out. However, the biggest draw of the Gatling Guns for killing tyrants is what they can do for you defensively. The Gatling Gun has Cool Off, which is an art that consumes your aura, but refunds you TP (I think this is about 2000?) and cures your debuffs. Just the fact that you have this is, added to the absurd damage you can get off a Gatling Gun, is enough to justify its use in a build.
5. DUAL SWORDS
This is probably one of the most disappointing weapons for soloing tyrants endgame, due to most of their arts being positional - it's impossible to get those positional attacks off on Telethia, Pharsis or Vortice. It is great as a DPS weapon, and will work as your primary source of damage, but you'll need a ranged weapon with something to protect you from enemy attacks and debuffs if you use this weapon type.
6. DUAL GUNS
Ghostwalker? Well, there is that. Sadly, I sooner qualify this as a DPS weapon rather than a defensive weapon, as all it offers is Ghostwalker. (Early Bird on a pure evasion build is untested, though.) Supercharge into Zero Zero is amazing, however, and Executioner is a very strong TP art.
7. JAVELINS
With Raijin, there's little doubt Javelins have one of the best auras in the game. Raijin carries with it Reflect (Electric), Arts Heal and increased critical rates. While this is the only real art that can be used as a defensive art in their list, it pairs extremely well with plenty of ranged weapons, especially Dual Guns and Gatling Guns, but I'm sure Assault Rifles, Sniper Rifles and Rayguns work well too. I'm uncertain how Javelin and Psycho Launcher might work together at current state, however. (Javelin also has the strongest TP art, if you're willing to blow up your skell first. This would work great on Telethia during phase three.)
8. SNIPER RIFLES
Like Dual Guns, Sniper Rifles get nothing defensively, and they are outpaced by Gatling Guns in terms of ranged damage superiority, both on TP arts (Hellfire vs. Afterburner) and normal damage arts. This is one of the hardest weapons to get to work, and needs a powerful ranged weapon paired up with it. It doesn't help that the low hit count on all of its arts (with Afterburner being a mere 5) makes it extremely difficult to bring down Telethia's Soul Read.
9. KNIVES
Knives are easily one of the best weapons in the game in so many ways, and that's before you count their Mind Control abilities. Relevant arts for killing tyrants are Full Specs for ~40-50 Ether Resistance, Chrome Armor for an estimated ~40 Physical Resistance, Smooth Recovery for healing and evasion buffs (more on this later), and Repair for debuff removal. Offensively it may be lacking, although it is really fun to stack up debuffs on an enemy, applying Supercharge through Power Dive, and then stabbing away with Black Bane. (Core Crusher is recommended to boost Black Bane's damage higher.)
Knives are also the second part of the evasion build, and require the evasion buff from Smooth Recovery to operate properly. In other words, the only way we ever got evasion builds to work at all combined this with the Assault Rifle, using a combination of Flash Grenade, Medic Free and Full Specs with as much evasion as we could possibly stack (and an Extend Blackout XX augment).
10. RAYGUNS
Rayguns are, for one of the more offensive weapons in the game, pretty good at supporting. Between Gravity Cloak and Clarity Ray, it almost seems made for Pharsis and Telethia, in fact. Gravity Cloak adds ~30 Gravity Resistance, and Clarity Ray adds ~30 Ether Resistance and removes all debuffs when applied. While it has many other obviously useful arts, these two are the most essential, with Beam Bomber and Beam Barrage being its best choices in arts. Beam Bomber and Beam Barrage allow you to prioritize ranged attack rather than potential, and can achieve a much stronger rate of damage than Ether Blast can. (Beam Bomber and Beam Barrage also have no forced attribute types, so you can use whatever attribute you want.) The only significant weakness on the part of Rayguns is that it is lacking in multi-hit arts, Beam Bomber hitting for 6, Beam Barrage for 3 and Ether Blast for 5, making it harder to take down Telethia's Soul Read, especially when paired with the Knife.
11. PHOTON SABERS
Photon Sabers have been pretty hard to figure out, but I'll open this up by saying that due to the disappointing attack power of Starlight Duster, it actually seems better to build up melee attack power and focus on the Starfall combos for damage. However, the Photon Saber is very potent when it comes to defensive options against superbosses, as well. Geolibrium adds ~40-50 Beam Resistance, which is tremendous on Nardacyon, and Astrolibrium enables a boost in your Beam damage as well as grants Beam Reflect. When we, on GameFAQs, say "No 3" or "No Decoy, No Reflect, No Astral Protection" we mean Astrolibrium (as well as aforementioned Raijin and Supershield) in that middle one. In any case, Astral Cure is a fantastic debuff remover, too, and Astral Heal works great in a pinch.
12. PSYCHO LAUNCHERS
The weirdest weapons in the game, and one of my favorites. Looking at the defensive arts belonging to this weapon, it becomes clear that this is the superior defensive weapon in the game, along with the shield. (Pairing them both leads to greater hilarity!) Astral Protection is an aura which grants 40~50 Resistance to all attributes, with the greatest effect at secondary and tertiary cooldown. In addition, Astral Protection grants 10% Max HP healed for every art you use. And if Astral Protection wasn't enough for your defenses, you also have Lightning Cloak, a buff that adds ~30 Resistance to Electric attributes. Offensively, it doesn't work great as a ranged weapon due to the low power of Stellar Ray and Shooting Star, but Gravity Lunge is a fantastic art that can supplement a melee gravity build of just about any weapon, provided a prioritization of TP arts over the melee attack stat.
13. SKILLS
Among many of the debuffs you see among the high end tyrants, you'll notice Topple and Control. Luckily, we have some skills we can equip that can counter those, among many of the other debuffs and attributes tyrants will use against us. Here are some good skills you might consider using, but I will try to keep dependence on these skills to a minimum in the build outlines, so you can customize it to your own tastes.
- BRAIN WALL: 100 Resistance to Control, Sleep and Slow Arts as long as you have an aura up. You'd be a fool not to use this for Telethia or Lugalbanda.
- STAND STRONG: Already mentioned in the Shield entry, this gives 100 Resistance to Topple, Launch, Knockback and Stagger when you have your shield out.
- SHIELD SCREEN: Already mentioned in the Shield entry, this gives -30% damage total (applied as a flat reduction after resistances are calculated).
- UNSTOPPABLE: Similar to Stand Strong, this grants 100 Resistance to Topple, Launch, Knockback and Stagger when you're dashing. If you use this, you're going to have to start dashing in reaction to enemy topple and launch arts, requiring impeccable reaction time.
- FORTIFIED FLESH: +50% HP is significant, especially if you have armor and a right arm augment with additional HP bonuses on their traits!
- WEAPON GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Physical when you have your melee weapon active.
- ELECTRIC GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Electric when you have your melee weapon active.
- BEAM GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Beam when you have your ranged weapon active.
- ETHER GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Ether when you have your ranged weapon active.
- GRAVITY GUARD: Adds 20 Resistance to Gravity when you have your ranged weapon active.
- HEALING AURA: Recovers 20% Max HP every time you activate your aura.
- FLEET FEET: +30% evasion when your melee weapon is active. Necessary for the evasion build.
- AGILE GUNSLINGER: +20% evasion when your ranged weapon is active. Necessary for the evasion build.
- CORE CRUSHER: +150% damage (applied as an independent, multiplicative modifier instead of an additive one) when targeting an appendage and using Ether type attacks.
- AURA ASSAULT: +30% damage and accuracy when using melee attacks and arts. Like Core Crusher, this is an independent modifier and will often provide a much higher damage boost than other +50% or +100% damage skills due to most of those being additive modifiers.
- SUPREME SWORD: +100% damage when using arts in a melee combo. This is an additive modifier, unlike Core Crusher or Aura Assault. What this means is that the 100% damage is stacked onto other additive modifiers, like the Overdrive bonus (so +500% and +100% damage become +600%, not +1000%).
- COMBO GUNNER: +125% damage when using arts in a ranged combo. Like Supreme Sword, this is an additive modifier.
- FAST FORWARD: Halves arts cooldown for arts used in a melee combo. Simple, and very useful.
- TRIGGER HAPPY: Halves arts cooldown for arts used in a ranged combo. You get the idea, right?
- SECONDARY ACCELERATOR: Halves the time for arts to go through secondary (and tertiary) cooldown.
CHAPTER FOUR: Character Builds
Example builds, but I encourage you to take what you learn in this topic and construct your own. Please note that I will continuously update this section for some time after this posting, as I'm in the process of gathering example builds.
1. SHIELD/PSYCHO LAUNCHERS
Might as well start with what I run, shouldn't I? For starters, my arts, skills and equips change constantly to adjust to the enemy, but I'll identify common factors that you'll see throughout all my variations despite such adjustments. To begin with, Primula's signature build is Shield + Psycho Launchers. Her usual arts are Astral Protection, Mindstorm, Shield Wall, Trash Talk, Drum Roll and Gravity Lunge, and typically I have her built to do either a mix of Physical and Gravity, or just pure Gravity damage. A Bastion Warrior, her skills are usually set to Fortified Flesh, Shield Screen, Aura Assault and Supreme Sword, though I shuffle around her skills as needed. However, on Telethia, I was forced to shift her to Drifter, and took the skills Fortified Flesh, Brain Wall, Secondary Accelerator, Supreme Sword and Stand Strong.
Equipment varies a lot, but I typically have a lot of arm pieces with (Attribute) Resistance Up XIV~XX, head pieces with Potential Up XIV~XX and Potential Boost XIV, Psycho Launchers with Potential Up XX and Potential Boost XX, and a number of shields with (Attribute) Resistance Up XV~XX, and sometimes also Potential Up XV~XX. Also important are leggings, usually Sakuraba or Meredith for Resist Topple XX or Resistance Reducer XX, or Six Stars for Resist Launch XX, as well as any with Max TP Up XIV~XX where I can get it. As far as augments go, they're often set to Arts Gain TP XX*3 and Weapon Attack Up XX*3, but I often drop an Arts Gain TP XX for an Overdrive Count Up XX, and replace Weapon Attack Up XX augments with Melee Accuracy Boost XX augments until I've hit a sufficient accuracy threshold for what I'm fighting.
The result of this build is one of the most resilient builds I've ever seen in the game, if not the most resilient. Stands up to everything the game has to offer and more, and there is nothing it cannot beat, however it is very low DPS, and might be akin to the Tortoise in the "Tortoise and The Hare" story.
2. LONGSWORD/PSYCHO LAUNCHERS
This is based on Sinamoi's build, which involves Longsword/Psycho Launchers. Much like the previous build, it is centered around using Astral Protection, although Sinamoi often did not use Overdrive, and instead used Fast Forward to keep Astral Protection up. In any case, for this build, key arts are Astral Protection, Lightning Cloak, True Stream Edge, Tornado Blade, Blossom Dance and Gravity Lunge. Bastion Warrior and Drifter are both valid classes, with Bastion Warrior being suitable if you want plenty of HP. (The more HP you have, the better Astral Protection's healing effect is.) His skills were often Fast Forward, Supreme Sword, Fortified Flesh, with many other skills adapted for the situation.
Equipment often reflects the previous build's equipment, so I will not repeat it all. Similar Psycho Launchers (Saboteurs with Potential Up XX and Potential Boost XX optimal), especially. In place of the shield, however, this build may want to use the Galaxy Chief (dropped from Dadaan) with suitable traits and focus on gravity damage. Otherwise, it is very similar, although due to the lack of Stand Strong, it may need additional Resist Topple or Resist Launch XX augments that the previous build wouldn't otherwise need.
3. KNIFE/ASSAULT RIFLE
The build Sinamoi and I worked on together, this build in particular is kind of crazy. It centers around the arts Medic Free, Power Dive, Flash Grenade, and Smooth Recovery, with many other arts capable of being integrated into the build as needed, the offensive arts may largely fall on your preferences alone. To achieve this build, we used the Full Metal Jaguar class and added the Fleet Feet and Agile Gunslinger skills. On very tough enemies, we concluded that the remaining skills needed to be dedicated to Fast Forward and/or Trigger Happy, in order to maintain rapid cooldowns at all times. Unstoppable is also useful, on enemies with Topples especially. Alternatively, you can anticipate topple attacks and use Power Dive to avoid them.
Equipment is a bit tricky to get, admittedly. For leg armor, the best results are to hunt for Terenty, the Blademaster in Cauldros, and get legs that have the traits Resistance Reducer XIV and Focused Evasion XIV. Additionally, Evasion Boost XIV may be possible with the other two, but is prohibitively rare. For headgear, you're going to want to craft a True Cords armor piece, the head only, and upgrade the Resistance Reducer X effect on it to XX, as well as the Resistance Reducer effect on the legs to XX. Arm and body pieces you can adjust to your needs. Augments are Evasion Boost XX*4 and Extend Blackout. Due to the way Resistance Reducing works, you may want multiple Overdrive Count Up XX augments to quickly hit the required reduction to inflict Blackout on powerful enemies such as Pharsis.
While this build has a high skill floor (meaning it is not easy to use), it has been proven to be capable of killing all of the superbosses except for Nardacyon, the Shadowless. In general, it appears more effective to focus ranged attack power and use attacks such as Quick Cannon and Furious Blast, however I've personally found Black Butterfly and Black Bane quite fun and works well in conjunction with Flash Grenade, Quick Cannon, Decoy Round or Screamer.
4. SHIELD/RAYGUN
Another variant of the first build listed, this build is a master of resistance stacking for Telethia and Pharsis in particular. It centers around use of the arts Iron Prison (and/or Supershield, if you wish to go Reflect as opposed to stack resistances), Mindstorm, Flame Cloak (situational), Gravity Cloak (situational), Clarity Ray, Beam Barrage and Beam Bomber. Other arts can be traded around as needed, although Trash Talk is also recommended. For this build, using the Drifter class with Fortified Flesh and Stand Strong gets the best results, with the three remaining skills left to your personal judgment (however, Brain Wall is necessary for fighting Telethia). It primarily works through the resistance bonuses granted by Clarity Ray (~30 Ether), Gravity Cloak (~30 Gravity), Flame Cloak (~Thermal) and Iron Prison (~50 Physical), as well as the 100 resistance to Topple and Launch while actively using a shield. This build has a considerable edge in resistance stacking.
Defensive equipment follows the same approach as builds #1 and #2, however please note that this particular one does not need as high potential as the Shield/Psycho Launchers variant build has. It gets its damage primarily through ranged attack rather than potential, due to the potency of Beam Barrage and Beam Bomber, and how lacking Ether Blast ultimately is. Generally the same approach though, with Arts: TP Gain, Overdrive Count Up, Ranged Accuracy Boost and Ranged Attack Up/Boost as major augments and battle traits to consider for the build's weapons.
5. KNIFE/RAYGUN
(Coming soon!)
6. JAVELIN/DUAL GUNS
This weapon combination was the very first to be confirmed capable of killing Telethia, the Endbringer on foot. An immensely potent combo, if built for damage it has been recorded to achieve 7,000,000 damage on a single Zero Zero (700,000 per hit) while soloing against Gradivus. Key arts for this build include Raijin, Hairtrigger, Primer and Zero Zero, filling the others as you see fit. The key strategy in battle is to use Raijin defensively, reflecting enemy attacks while taking advantage of its critical boost effect. Hairtrigger, Primer and Zero Zero are used in either the listed order or in the order of Primer, Hairtrigger and Zero Zero depending on whether you have Combo Gunner (former) or Supreme Sword (latter). The trick here is that Hairtrigger's Supercharge buff (which normally significantly boosts the first hit of the next art used) applies to all hits of Zero Zero, which is a peculiar, quirk of how the two arts work together. Primer does not consume Hairtrigger's buff, since it does no damage, making it ideal for placing between Hairtrigger and Zero Zero when are using Combo Gunner.
Because this is a reflect build, acquiring appropriate Reflects, especially Reflect: Ether, Reflect: Gravity, Reflect: Physical, Reflect: Beam and Reflect: Thermal is necessary to use this build properly. However, you generally do not want all of these equipped simultaneously, but instead switch out the reflects you need for the tyrant you are presently killing. (Not only do you need to grind the superbosses just to make this build work, but you will still need to resistance stack to fight against the superbosses when using this build, due to reflect-piercing attacks. However, this build is capable of using Decoy and completely bypass the need to resistance stack in some cases, particularly such as Pharsis.) In addition to this, one prioritizes ranged attack here, however if you can fit Potential Up and Potential Boost remaining augments slots, then there is no harm in doing so, and thus Executioner can be a potent source of damage, in addition to Zero Zero. As usual, Arts: TP Gain XX, and Ranged Attack Up are strongly advised, however if you are using Core Crusher, you may wish to obtain a Javelin with Appendage Crusher as a native trait, and then use numerous Appendage Crushers (no more than four) on the augment slots of your two weapons to greatly increase your damage.
This build is very strong and a "safe pick", and may be a bit too powerful of a choice for some players.
7. JAVELIN/GATLING GUN
(Coming soon!)
8. PHOTON SABER/DUAL GUNS
This build will be presuming the use of Astrolibrium and being primarily a reflect build. With that out of the way, the concept of this build is a melee attack-focused combo build that emphasizes critical attacks and gains its defenses primarily through Reflect and relevant resistance stacking. The arts featured as a part of this build include Astrolibrium, Primer, Zero Zero, Starfall Blossom, Starfall Blade and Starfall Rondo. Remaining arts can be filled in as one pleases, however as an alternative to resistance stacking, Ghostwalker is an effective buff here, as long as you don't mind doubling up on two of the most powerful defensive arts in the game. If not, you will need to build resistances to attacks that pierce Reflects, though these are few and far in between. Many debuffs cannot pierce reflect (except for Luciel's Topple and other special exceptions) and all superbosses appear to only have their primary attribute attacks have the capability of piercing reflect as well. (Ether for Telethia, Gravity for Pharsis, Beam for Nardacyon and Electric for Vortice.) Drifter or Bastion Warrior is recommended as the class, and relevant skills include Supreme Sword, Fast Forward, Secondary Accelerator and Aura Assault. (Core Crusher is optional, if you want to use Ether Photon Sabers.)
The equipment should be adjusted to match the enemy primary attribute (listed in the previous paragraph), with Reflect: (Attribute) augments and armor battle traits to cover all of the attacks the enemy happens to be using. If you are using Ghostwalker, however, you may want to focus on arm pieces with traits that increase melee attack power, and upgrade those. Front Attack Up is also handy. (Even if you are resistance stacking, however, numerous tyrants may give you the opportunity to do this.) Focus your weapon augment slots on melee attack and/or melee accuracy (against particularly evasive superbosses) whenever possible. This build may be overall low-maintenance as far as TP goes, so you may have the opportunity to stack additional augments as you please, or place Appendage Crushers on multiple augment slots if you are going Ether.
It is likely that if you stack Astrolibrium and Ghostwalker with the appropriate augments that you will become untouchable in a fight you have adequately prepared for, however, making this build more powerful than it needs to be in terms of survival. Future revisions of this document may contain additional Photon Saber builds that do not take advantage of Astrolibrium's reflect.
9. LONGSWORD/GATLING GUN
(Coming soon!)
1. SHIELD/PSYCHO LAUNCHERS
Might as well start with what I run, shouldn't I? For starters, my arts, skills and equips change constantly to adjust to the enemy, but I'll identify common factors that you'll see throughout all my variations despite such adjustments. To begin with, Primula's signature build is Shield + Psycho Launchers. Her usual arts are Astral Protection, Mindstorm, Shield Wall, Trash Talk, Drum Roll and Gravity Lunge, and typically I have her built to do either a mix of Physical and Gravity, or just pure Gravity damage. A Bastion Warrior, her skills are usually set to Fortified Flesh, Shield Screen, Aura Assault and Supreme Sword, though I shuffle around her skills as needed. However, on Telethia, I was forced to shift her to Drifter, and took the skills Fortified Flesh, Brain Wall, Secondary Accelerator, Supreme Sword and Stand Strong.
Equipment varies a lot, but I typically have a lot of arm pieces with (Attribute) Resistance Up XIV~XX, head pieces with Potential Up XIV~XX and Potential Boost XIV, Psycho Launchers with Potential Up XX and Potential Boost XX, and a number of shields with (Attribute) Resistance Up XV~XX, and sometimes also Potential Up XV~XX. Also important are leggings, usually Sakuraba or Meredith for Resist Topple XX or Resistance Reducer XX, or Six Stars for Resist Launch XX, as well as any with Max TP Up XIV~XX where I can get it. As far as augments go, they're often set to Arts Gain TP XX*3 and Weapon Attack Up XX*3, but I often drop an Arts Gain TP XX for an Overdrive Count Up XX, and replace Weapon Attack Up XX augments with Melee Accuracy Boost XX augments until I've hit a sufficient accuracy threshold for what I'm fighting.
The result of this build is one of the most resilient builds I've ever seen in the game, if not the most resilient. Stands up to everything the game has to offer and more, and there is nothing it cannot beat, however it is very low DPS, and might be akin to the Tortoise in the "Tortoise and The Hare" story.
2. LONGSWORD/PSYCHO LAUNCHERS
This is based on Sinamoi's build, which involves Longsword/Psycho Launchers. Much like the previous build, it is centered around using Astral Protection, although Sinamoi often did not use Overdrive, and instead used Fast Forward to keep Astral Protection up. In any case, for this build, key arts are Astral Protection, Lightning Cloak, True Stream Edge, Tornado Blade, Blossom Dance and Gravity Lunge. Bastion Warrior and Drifter are both valid classes, with Bastion Warrior being suitable if you want plenty of HP. (The more HP you have, the better Astral Protection's healing effect is.) His skills were often Fast Forward, Supreme Sword, Fortified Flesh, with many other skills adapted for the situation.
Equipment often reflects the previous build's equipment, so I will not repeat it all. Similar Psycho Launchers (Saboteurs with Potential Up XX and Potential Boost XX optimal), especially. In place of the shield, however, this build may want to use the Galaxy Chief (dropped from Dadaan) with suitable traits and focus on gravity damage. Otherwise, it is very similar, although due to the lack of Stand Strong, it may need additional Resist Topple or Resist Launch XX augments that the previous build wouldn't otherwise need.
3. KNIFE/ASSAULT RIFLE
The build Sinamoi and I worked on together, this build in particular is kind of crazy. It centers around the arts Medic Free, Power Dive, Flash Grenade, and Smooth Recovery, with many other arts capable of being integrated into the build as needed, the offensive arts may largely fall on your preferences alone. To achieve this build, we used the Full Metal Jaguar class and added the Fleet Feet and Agile Gunslinger skills. On very tough enemies, we concluded that the remaining skills needed to be dedicated to Fast Forward and/or Trigger Happy, in order to maintain rapid cooldowns at all times. Unstoppable is also useful, on enemies with Topples especially. Alternatively, you can anticipate topple attacks and use Power Dive to avoid them.
Equipment is a bit tricky to get, admittedly. For leg armor, the best results are to hunt for Terenty, the Blademaster in Cauldros, and get legs that have the traits Resistance Reducer XIV and Focused Evasion XIV. Additionally, Evasion Boost XIV may be possible with the other two, but is prohibitively rare. For headgear, you're going to want to craft a True Cords armor piece, the head only, and upgrade the Resistance Reducer X effect on it to XX, as well as the Resistance Reducer effect on the legs to XX. Arm and body pieces you can adjust to your needs. Augments are Evasion Boost XX*4 and Extend Blackout. Due to the way Resistance Reducing works, you may want multiple Overdrive Count Up XX augments to quickly hit the required reduction to inflict Blackout on powerful enemies such as Pharsis.
While this build has a high skill floor (meaning it is not easy to use), it has been proven to be capable of killing all of the superbosses except for Nardacyon, the Shadowless. In general, it appears more effective to focus ranged attack power and use attacks such as Quick Cannon and Furious Blast, however I've personally found Black Butterfly and Black Bane quite fun and works well in conjunction with Flash Grenade, Quick Cannon, Decoy Round or Screamer.
4. SHIELD/RAYGUN
Another variant of the first build listed, this build is a master of resistance stacking for Telethia and Pharsis in particular. It centers around use of the arts Iron Prison (and/or Supershield, if you wish to go Reflect as opposed to stack resistances), Mindstorm, Flame Cloak (situational), Gravity Cloak (situational), Clarity Ray, Beam Barrage and Beam Bomber. Other arts can be traded around as needed, although Trash Talk is also recommended. For this build, using the Drifter class with Fortified Flesh and Stand Strong gets the best results, with the three remaining skills left to your personal judgment (however, Brain Wall is necessary for fighting Telethia). It primarily works through the resistance bonuses granted by Clarity Ray (~30 Ether), Gravity Cloak (~30 Gravity), Flame Cloak (~Thermal) and Iron Prison (~50 Physical), as well as the 100 resistance to Topple and Launch while actively using a shield. This build has a considerable edge in resistance stacking.
Defensive equipment follows the same approach as builds #1 and #2, however please note that this particular one does not need as high potential as the Shield/Psycho Launchers variant build has. It gets its damage primarily through ranged attack rather than potential, due to the potency of Beam Barrage and Beam Bomber, and how lacking Ether Blast ultimately is. Generally the same approach though, with Arts: TP Gain, Overdrive Count Up, Ranged Accuracy Boost and Ranged Attack Up/Boost as major augments and battle traits to consider for the build's weapons.
5. KNIFE/RAYGUN
(Coming soon!)
6. JAVELIN/DUAL GUNS
This weapon combination was the very first to be confirmed capable of killing Telethia, the Endbringer on foot. An immensely potent combo, if built for damage it has been recorded to achieve 7,000,000 damage on a single Zero Zero (700,000 per hit) while soloing against Gradivus. Key arts for this build include Raijin, Hairtrigger, Primer and Zero Zero, filling the others as you see fit. The key strategy in battle is to use Raijin defensively, reflecting enemy attacks while taking advantage of its critical boost effect. Hairtrigger, Primer and Zero Zero are used in either the listed order or in the order of Primer, Hairtrigger and Zero Zero depending on whether you have Combo Gunner (former) or Supreme Sword (latter). The trick here is that Hairtrigger's Supercharge buff (which normally significantly boosts the first hit of the next art used) applies to all hits of Zero Zero, which is a peculiar, quirk of how the two arts work together. Primer does not consume Hairtrigger's buff, since it does no damage, making it ideal for placing between Hairtrigger and Zero Zero when are using Combo Gunner.
Because this is a reflect build, acquiring appropriate Reflects, especially Reflect: Ether, Reflect: Gravity, Reflect: Physical, Reflect: Beam and Reflect: Thermal is necessary to use this build properly. However, you generally do not want all of these equipped simultaneously, but instead switch out the reflects you need for the tyrant you are presently killing. (Not only do you need to grind the superbosses just to make this build work, but you will still need to resistance stack to fight against the superbosses when using this build, due to reflect-piercing attacks. However, this build is capable of using Decoy and completely bypass the need to resistance stack in some cases, particularly such as Pharsis.) In addition to this, one prioritizes ranged attack here, however if you can fit Potential Up and Potential Boost remaining augments slots, then there is no harm in doing so, and thus Executioner can be a potent source of damage, in addition to Zero Zero. As usual, Arts: TP Gain XX, and Ranged Attack Up are strongly advised, however if you are using Core Crusher, you may wish to obtain a Javelin with Appendage Crusher as a native trait, and then use numerous Appendage Crushers (no more than four) on the augment slots of your two weapons to greatly increase your damage.
This build is very strong and a "safe pick", and may be a bit too powerful of a choice for some players.
7. JAVELIN/GATLING GUN
(Coming soon!)
8. PHOTON SABER/DUAL GUNS
This build will be presuming the use of Astrolibrium and being primarily a reflect build. With that out of the way, the concept of this build is a melee attack-focused combo build that emphasizes critical attacks and gains its defenses primarily through Reflect and relevant resistance stacking. The arts featured as a part of this build include Astrolibrium, Primer, Zero Zero, Starfall Blossom, Starfall Blade and Starfall Rondo. Remaining arts can be filled in as one pleases, however as an alternative to resistance stacking, Ghostwalker is an effective buff here, as long as you don't mind doubling up on two of the most powerful defensive arts in the game. If not, you will need to build resistances to attacks that pierce Reflects, though these are few and far in between. Many debuffs cannot pierce reflect (except for Luciel's Topple and other special exceptions) and all superbosses appear to only have their primary attribute attacks have the capability of piercing reflect as well. (Ether for Telethia, Gravity for Pharsis, Beam for Nardacyon and Electric for Vortice.) Drifter or Bastion Warrior is recommended as the class, and relevant skills include Supreme Sword, Fast Forward, Secondary Accelerator and Aura Assault. (Core Crusher is optional, if you want to use Ether Photon Sabers.)
The equipment should be adjusted to match the enemy primary attribute (listed in the previous paragraph), with Reflect: (Attribute) augments and armor battle traits to cover all of the attacks the enemy happens to be using. If you are using Ghostwalker, however, you may want to focus on arm pieces with traits that increase melee attack power, and upgrade those. Front Attack Up is also handy. (Even if you are resistance stacking, however, numerous tyrants may give you the opportunity to do this.) Focus your weapon augment slots on melee attack and/or melee accuracy (against particularly evasive superbosses) whenever possible. This build may be overall low-maintenance as far as TP goes, so you may have the opportunity to stack additional augments as you please, or place Appendage Crushers on multiple augment slots if you are going Ether.
It is likely that if you stack Astrolibrium and Ghostwalker with the appropriate augments that you will become untouchable in a fight you have adequately prepared for, however, making this build more powerful than it needs to be in terms of survival. Future revisions of this document may contain additional Photon Saber builds that do not take advantage of Astrolibrium's reflect.
9. LONGSWORD/GATLING GUN
(Coming soon!)
