Next grand hero battle: Zephiel

[Ice Dragon]

1 hour ago, XaosLogos said:

Cool. Well, let me know if it works.

I used 4* Ursula, Gunter, and Jagen with my Tiki strat, so 5*s would only make it better. 5* Ursula won't need the +1 Speed seal which 4* Ursula does need so it could be done without any skill seals too.

4* Jagen should be fine, he's there mostly to give the defensive buffs to other cavalry and maybe deal with the blue mage with his high res. He might be the one to finish Zephiel off here instead of Tiki.

It's crucial for Ursula to get her activation skill on him first so whatever melee unit ends up attacking him can take him out with one hit. I believe 5* Ursula would take Zephiel to 13 health if she uses Growing Thunder on him.

It can't be done with 5-star Ursula. She deals too much damage to the mage, leaving it with 17 HP instead of 19 HP when equipped with Thunder and causing the lance armor to Swap it away. It has to be 4-star Ursula for your strategy to work, and my second Ursula is still 3-star level 1.

 

I did, however, manage another 7-turn 5-star A-tier-and-under clear, no seals:

• Eliwood [+Atk, -Res] (Holy Vestiments and Spur Res 2 only, cannot be -HP or -Def)
• Alfonse [=]
• Ursula [=]
• Gunter [+Atk, -Res]

 

1. Ursula moves into the danger zone on the right. Gunter moves behind her. Alfonse moves next to her. Eliwood moves between Alfonse and Gunter.
   1. Red mage attacks Ursula and dies due to.Hone Cavalry and Spur Atk 3.
2. Eliwood moves left. Gunter moves left. Ursula moves down next to Gunter. Alfonse moves behind Gunter.
3. End turn.
   1. Lance armor attacks Gunter.
4. Move all units down 1 square.
   1. Lance armor attacks Gunter.
5. Gunter kills the lance armor from the right. Ursula moves to the right of Gunter. Eliwood moves under Gunter. Alfonse moves to Eliwood's left.
6. Ursula kills the blue mage from below. Eliwood moves in front of Gunter. Alfonse moves behind Gunter.
   1. Axe knight attacks Eliwood. Eliwood has 1 HP left.
7. Ursula attacks Zephiel with Growing Thunder. Eliwood kills Zephiel. Alfonse or Gunter kills the axe knight.

Only took me 250 stamina to get this right.

[bethany81707]

It took me a lot of tries, but I did it with 5* Klein, 4* Robin (F), Olivia and Lissa. Funnily enough, this was going to be my last attempt before I switched Lissa for Fae.

Now I really want to replace one of my Arena units with Klein.

[LordFrigid]

1 hour ago, LordFrigid said:

I might try horse power myself, actually...thinking about Leo, Gunter, Cecilia/Ursula, and Sully for that. idk though. I'd have to level Leo first, but AoE (that strangely shaped area might be a little weird though) + Savage Blow seems pretty interesting.

Welp. +Res Leo OP. Sometimes, the solution is to smack the enemy and get out before they can react. And sometimes...well, sometimes the solution is to take a Blazing Thunder to the face. 4-turned it with the following team:

4* Cecilia (+Atk/-Def; +1, see below), Sully (+Spd/-HP), Gunter (+HP/-Spd), and 5* Leo (+Res/-Def).

Cecilia got +1 HP & Atk on her merge (is this even necessary, since she's not a 5*?). She never got near 1 HP, and I downgraded her Atk +2 to Atk +1 to make up for the Atk point.

Video:

Spoiler

 

Turn by turn:

Spoiler

1. Cecilia pokes the Axe Knight. Sully draws her back. Leo goes into the Red Mage's range. Gunter moves in behind him.
   
   EP: Red Mage hits Leo on the EP, then general swapping occurs.
    
2. Cecilia pokes the Axe Knight again, and gets drawn back by Sully. Gunter gets out of the Red Mage's range, and Leo gets to the outer edge of it.
   
   EP: +Res lets Leo survive Blazing Thunder and the mage's attack with 1 HP, and gets his Blazing Light fully charged (well...this sure sounds familiar). Other movement happens.
    
3. Blazing Light is disgustingly powerful, and chunks down Zephiel while simultaneously breaking the Lance Knight's Wary Fighter, allowing Leo to KO him. Cecilia finishes the Axe Knight, leaving her in the Blue Mage's range. Sully moves in behind Cecilia. Gunter moves in behind Leo.
   
   EP: Blue Mage hits Cecilia, and gets smacked back for a good chunk of HP. He heals Zephiel, but whatever.
    
4. Gunter drops the mage (hey, he had to do something other than be a buff-bot and get rekt by Blazing Thunder). Sully took Zephiel to 1 HP, and Leo finished the job.

Interestingly, +Atk Cecilia with Hone Atk Cavalry buffs and Atk +3 has 55 Atk at 5*, which breaks the Axe Knight's Wary Fighter...so she could KO the Axe Knight by turn 2. Except that would let Zephiel escape Leo's Blazing Light range...idk, it might be worth checking out. I don't really want to jump her ahead of Anna and Alfonse in my promotion queue though.

I really wanted to see if I could use Gunter's Harsh Command, but I ended up not needing it, so w/e.

Edited April 22, 2017 by LordFrigid
Messed up the buff name...somehow.

[Arthur97]

I beat Lunatic using Spring Lucina, Male Robin, Nino, and Olivia (dance is useful even if it makes no sense). Hit and run was the order of the day.

[Ice Dragon]

46 minutes ago, LordFrigid said:

Welp. +Res Leo OP. 4-turned it with the following team:

4* Cecilia (+Atk/-Def; +1, see below), Sully (+Spd/-HP), Gunter (+HP/-Spd), and 5* Leo (+Res/-Def).

Cecilia got +1 HP & Atk on her merge (is this even necessary, since she's not a 5*?). She never got near 1 HP, and I downgraded her Atk +2 to Atk +1 to make up for the Atk point.

I just managed a 7-turn clear with 5-star Cecilia, Eliwood, Gunter, and Ursula. Now I really want to try Draw Back shenanigans with Sully. Looks like I've got 2 days to get Sully to 4-star level 40.

[LordFrigid]

24 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

I just managed a 7-turn clear with 5-star Cecilia, Eliwood, Gunter, and Ursula. Now I really want to try Draw Back shenanigans with Sully. Looks like I've got 2 days to get Sully to 4-star level 40.

Yeah, I definitely wouldn't have gotten either run completed nearly as quickly without hit & run to chip the enemies towards the Wary Fighter thresholds. That, and AoEs; now I kinda want to train up more AoE people. I initially thought about Lilina, but she had to go and be A+.

Also, thanks for putting out this challenge! I've really enjoyed it, it's probably the most fun I've had in a bit, actually.

Edit: training Sully shouldn't be bad...I got Leo from 26 or 28 to 40 in about a bar and a third of stamina iirc...Hone Cavalry Elise was hilariously useful.

Edited April 22, 2017 by LordFrigid

[Ice Dragon]

16 minutes ago, LordFrigid said:

Also, thanks for putting out this challenge! I've really enjoyed it, it's probably the most fun I've had in a bit, actually.

Just trying to raise awareness of the underrepresented and underappreciated lower tiers. I'm glad to hear people are having fun with this.

 

18 minutes ago, LordFrigid said:

Edit: training Sully shouldn't be bad...I got Leo from 26 or 28 to 40 in about a bar and a third of stamina iirc...Hone Cavalry Elise was hilariously useful.

Need to get Zephiel up to level 40 first. I wish I had an Effie trained to Smite him across the map for me.

[Vaximillian]

2 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

Need to get Zephiel up to level 40 first.

I've been a tiny bit too much focused on him, heh:

So many units to promote, so few feathers to spend.

[eclipse]

On 4/20/2017 at 0:58 AM, Ice Dragon said:

@Arcanite @MaskedAmpharos @MrSmokestack

I'd like to issue a challenge to The Strategists Three, should you choose to accept:

Most of the team compositions so far contain a strong mage and a dancer, for obvious reasons. But that's hardly a challenge.

No units tiered A+ or higher on wiki's vanilla tier list (to exclude Reinhardt and the dancers; why Reinhardt is only A+ I will never know). No skill inheritance. No merges. No items. Fox only. Final Destination.

 

I'll be seeing if I can improve on my own time. Currently at 7 turns.

Challenge accepted and finished, though my turn count blows.

Team: Leo, Lucius, Sully, Barst.  Turns: 6

Exceptions: Barst was merged (+1), but he's also 3*, so I think it still counts.  He doesn't enter combat.

Turn 1: Lucius (slot 2) moves up just outside of range, while Barst (slot 3) runs up behind him.  Leo (slot 1) moves as close to the red mage as possible, while Sully (slot 4) stays close to him.  Enemies do nothing.

Turn 2: Lucius smacks Zephiel, Barst tosses him out of range.  Leo harasses the lance knight, Sully pulls him to relative safety.  On enemy phase, the red mage attacks Leo, who gets in a considerable amount of damage thanks to Quick Riposte.  Blazing Light is now active.

Turn 3: Leo blows the crap out of the lance knight, Sully pulls him back, Lucius runs to right and heals Leo, and Barst throws Leo to safety.  Enemies continue to advance.

From here, it was mostly harassment with Leo/Lucius, with Blazing Light's proc used to break Wary Fighter.  Once that happened, it was a matter of cleaning up.

Edited April 22, 2017 by eclipse

[Ice Dragon]

2 minutes ago, eclipse said:

Challenge accepted and finished, though my turn count blows.

And here I am still unable to break 7 turns. T-T

Hopefully training Sully up will help with that.

 

Maybe I should farm some SP on Eliwood for Ward Cavalry (134 SP to go...).

[eclipse]

13 minutes ago, Ice Dragon said:

And here I am still unable to break 7 turns. T-T

Hopefully training Sully up will help with that.

 

Maybe I should farm some SP on Eliwood for Ward Cavalry (134 SP to go...).

The AoE proc skills are amazing on this map.  Because they happen before battle, they can break Wary Fighter, which speeds things up a little.

[Xaos Steel Wing]

Cool! Nice to see a variant of the horse emblem strategy I suggested worked out.

I'd love to try it myself but I don't want to make Eliwood 5* just for this. Was fun to theorycraft though.

Cecilia could be good too, I'll see if leveling her to 40 lets me do something with what I have. All the cavalry I have are 4* though which may be lacking. Except for Ursula, for whom it turns out that 4* actually works better than 5* here, huh...

14 minutes ago, eclipse said:

The AoE proc skills are amazing on this map.  Because they happen before battle, they can break Wary Fighter, which speeds things up a little.

Yes, AoEs are super useful. They are what let me clear the map on Lunatic in the first place, they let me take out Zephiel without him even getting an attack off.

[SatsumaFSoysoy]

1 hour ago, eclipse said:

Challenge accepted and finished, though my turn count blows.

 

1 hour ago, Ice Dragon said:

And here I am still unable to break 7 turns. T-T

It's okay, I'm still sitting here with my 8 turns lmao. Maybe I'd do better if I actually trained up Cecilia over F!Robin, but meh. F!Robin is so bad I almost like using her.

Maybe I'll try out Blarblade Odin... This is gonna be fun.

Edited April 22, 2017 by SatsumaFSoysoy

[Faye]

23 hours ago, Ice Dragon said:

Do you have a dancer and a strong mage? You can kite nearly endlessly with Nino (Draw Back) and a dancer. Or just any mage and a dancer, really.

I never tried a dancer strategy, so I read up on it. That really helped, thank you! I now have a 3-star Zeph. That's good enough for me. xD;

[pianime94]

9 hours ago, XaosLogos said:

 

I just tested things out myself. Some interesting interactions here with Wary Fighter, Axebreaker, and Brave weapons.
 

Eliwood attacks the knight twice, the knight attacks twice if he he initiates the attack because of the Brave weapon. So it works as you say.

With that in mind, I believe Eliwood at 5*, Ursula, Gunter, and Jagen should work. The key was whether Eliwood could perform the role that Tiki did in the video, taking on the green Knight in that spot. Since it turns out he can attack twice both attacking and being attacked, I think it would work with 5* Eliwood with the +4 atk bonus he gets from Durandal when attacking and the +6 atk he gets from Gunter's Hone Cavalry.

I can't 100% confirm because I don't have 5* Eliwood and don't want to dump 20k feathers for it but in theory I think this team would work.

Sadly Eliwood can't ORK the Green Armor even with +Atk and Hone.

Also, I might be able to clear the challenge with my horsies.

But I'll have to train up my Sully first.

EDIT: Nvm, Since I don't wanna bother with Sully atm I tried it with Subaki instead and managed to beat it in 6 turns.

I ran:

• +Atk -Spd 5* Eliwood
• +HP -Res 4* Gunter
• -HP +Res Leo
• -HP +Atk 4* Subaki
• No seals

I didn't really know what happened in the process since I did it in my first try. But the gist is have Leo bait the red mage for two turns before doing anything else.

Turn 3: Once Leo took down the Red mage on counter, he AoE everything (he AoE'd from the Armored Axe and killed it). Since Zephiel was in front of Leo, swap him with Subaki. Zephiel and Blue Mage attack Subaki.

Turn 4-5: I don't really remember what happened here but Gunter tanks the Blue Armor everyday with the help of Ward Cavalry from Eliwood and Leo helps chipping the Blue Armor.

Turn 6: Gunter ORK the blue Armor and Leo ORK zephiel whose Reprisal is already active.

I might try again and screenshot it if you guys are interested.

Eliwood is really only there for Ward Cavalry huh.....Shame.

Edited April 22, 2017 by pianime94

[Ice Dragon]

Arright. I got Sully up and running. Currently down to 5 turns.

• 4-star Sully [+Atk, -Res]
• 5-star Cecilia [+Spd, -Def]
• 5-star Gunter [+Atk, -Res]
• 5-star Ursula [=]

 

1. Cecilia attacks blue mage. Sully uses Draw Back on her. Ursula moves into the red mage's range. Gunter moves behind her.
   1. Red mage attacks Ursula.
2. Cecilia attacks axe armor. Sully uses Draw Back on her. Gunter moves to the right. Ursula moves down.
   1. Red mage uses Blazing Thunder on Ursula and gets killed.
3. Ursula attacks lance armor with Growing Thunder. Cecilia kills lance armor. Gunter moves behind Ursula.
4. Ursula kills axe armor. Gunter moves to the right. Sully uses Draw Back on Ursula. Cecilia moves behind Gunter.
5. Gunter kills blue mage. Sully attacks Zephiel. Ursula and Cecilia attack Zephiel in whatever order. Zephiel dies.

 

EDIT: Got it down to 4 turns with the same team. Different starting order.

• Cecilia
• Gunter
• Ursula
• Sully

 

1. Ursula attacks lance armor. Sully uses Draw Back on her. Cecilia moves to the left of Sully. Gunter moves to the left of Cecilia. (The positioning of Gunter and Cecilia keeps the lance armor from using Swap on the red mage.)
   1. Red mage attacks Ursula.
2. Ursula kills red mage. Cecilia attacks axe armor. Sully uses Draw Back on Cecilia. Gunter moves behind Ursula.
3. Ursula attacks Zephiel with Growing Thunder. Cecilia kills axe armor. Gunter moves to the left of Cecilia. Sully uses Draw Back on Ursula.
   1. Blue mage attacks Cecilia.
4. Clean up the mess however you see fit..

 

EDIT2: Oh god. I just realized Ursula still had Death Blow 2 equipped instead of Death Blow 3.

Edited April 22, 2017 by Ice Dragon

[Thany]

Why are you all still trying out the zephel map to get fewer turns? is there something im missing in doing a GHB map you already did with no rewards or (possibly) Experiance to gain?

[Ice Dragon]

1 minute ago, Thany said:

Why are you all still trying out the zephel map to get fewer turns? is there something im missing in doing a GHB map you already did with no rewards or (possibly) Experiance to gain?

I issued a challenge for anyone who wants to give it a shot. People seem to be having fun trying it out:

On 4/20/2017 at 5:58 AM, Ice Dragon said:

No units tiered A+ or higher on wiki's vanilla tier list (to exclude Reinhardt and the dancers; why Reinhardt is only A+ I will never know). No skill inheritance. No merges. No items. Fox only. Final Destination.

[bethany81707]

1 minute ago, Thany said:

Why are you all still trying out the zephel map to get fewer turns? is there something im missing in doing a GHB map you already did with no rewards or (possibly) Experiance to gain?

Bragging Rights. Self-satisfaction.

[predator_21476]

4 minutes ago, Thany said:

Why are you all still trying out the zephel map to get fewer turns? is there something im missing in doing a GHB map you already did with no rewards or (possibly) Experiance to gain?

They're doing it for the challenge of it. It's pretty fun to try and see what ridiculous things you can beat it with and how fast you can do it. Also theres some bragging rights for whoever wins the challenge

Edited April 22, 2017 by predator_21476

[Thany]

I see. i didnt know a challange was issued. should be fun to watch. shame we didnt get challanges like that for older GHBs. would of been cool to see what strats people would use (only exception being narcian because for a first battle he was balls to the walls hard. and also the first.)

[Ice Dragon]

Just now, Thany said:

I see. i didnt know a challange was issued. should be fun to watch. shame we didnt get challanges like that for older GHBs. would of been cool to see what strats people would use (only exception being narcian because for a first battle he was balls to the walls hard. and also the first.)

One of the other things is that now that the game has been out for over 2 months, players are starting to have fuller rosters to pick from.

[eclipse]

52 minutes ago, Thany said:

Why are you all still trying out the zephel map to get fewer turns? is there something im missing in doing a GHB map you already did with no rewards or (possibly) Experiance to gain?

This is to see how well I know my own units, and possibly learn more about what works and what doesn't.  TIL that AoE skills break Wary Fighter really quickly.

[MrSmokestack]

So, after two days' worth of grinding and heated discussion, the Strategists Three have come to present you with our results, @Ice Dragon.

Five others managed to finish the challenge before we did, though. Congratulations @SatsumaFSoysoy, @LordFrigid and @wizzard of soz! Your runs gave us quite a few ideas to work with in making our own.

Here is the album showing my iteration of the challenge, cleared in 7 Turns.

Spoiler

Ice Dragon, it would suck if we had spent a collective 25 stamina potions for nothing, wouldn't it?

Edited April 22, 2017 by MrSmokestack

[MaskedAmpharos]

@Ice Dragon Oh yeah, forgot to mention that I beat the challenge earlier yesterday (had to go out right after and had no time to post)

I did it with no skill inheritance, no seals, no merges, no A+ or higher tier characters, and no movement/reposition assists of any kind (though it took 7 turns as a result).

Team was Seliph, Frederick, Jaffar, and Priscilla.

The most important units were Frederick and Jaffar. Seliph was really just there to bait blues (he finish Zephiel off, but I could have done it with another tanky red like Alfonse), and Priscilla could have been replaced with another healer like Serra or Lissa.

The play by play is here.

@Arcanite and @MrSmokestack have both already finished as well (both before me since I spent most of yesterday training units up) but were waiting for me so that the three of us could all post at the same time <3

Edited April 22, 2017 by MaskedAmpharos