Should You Pull (October 20, 2017)

Original Post / Discussion: [https://reddit.com/r/FFBraveExvius/comments/77gc8o/defianthermits_should_you_pull_halloween_banner/ DefiantHermit's Should You Pull? Halloween Banner - Oct 20]

Hello everyone, /u/DefiantHermit here for the second time today, now with the Halloween banner analysis!

I... really have nothing to say here aside from wishing y'all a great Halloween, both in game and IRL! So without further ado, here's the analysis!

Limited Banner Disclaimer
Just leaving this up here. The units, like last year, are time limited and will be removed from the pool once the Halloween event ends. Consider that when analysing whether to pull or not!

Grim Lord Sakura
The third 5★ of the Halloween units is coming after a year and on an entirely different meta, so let's see how she fares! Base 158 MAG (+30 with pots) is fantastic and there's up to +60% MAG from passives, due to her Vicious (+30% MAG w/ Fire Weapon & +30% HP w/ Dark Weapon) passive, which goes along extremely well with her TMR.

Equipment selection is great for her role, as she's able to wield Daggers, Rods, Bows, Spears, Whips and Maces and wear Robes, Clothes and Hats. Her TMR and skillset heavily favours a single wielding build and her armour selection compliments it nicely. There's no swords for shenanigans, but a TDH centered built makes up for it and still allows her MAG stat to skyrocket.

As for her skillset, we'll start with the remaining relevant passives: Dark Spirit (+20% MP & +100% Poison, Sleep and Virus Resistance) offers some neat ailment immunities and Overlord (+20% SPR & +100% Silence and Confusion Resistance) adds another batch of them, totalling 5! complete immunities.

Heart of Darkness (+50% Equip HP when single-wielding, including 2-handed weapons) is the first of its kind and thus its value is not immediately obvious. Equipment with flat HP bonus is… almost non-existent aside from her own TMR. This means that while the skill isn't bad, it currently “only” gives her +333 HP due to her Scythe.

Another Doublehand-like passive is Enigmatic (+100% Equip MAG/SPR when single-wielding, including 2-handed weapons), providing a massive offensive and defensive boost to Sakura, literally doubling a weapon's MAG stat and any other piece of equipment she might have.

Finally, copying Exdeath, Sakura has access to Supremacy (+50% Magic Damage vs Humans, Demons and Undead), which provides a valuable damage boost against 3 common races.

Looking now to her offensive skillset, some of her “old” toys include an innate Dual Black Magic (Use Two Blue Black Magic) in case you want to use her as a Thundaja (200% AoE 1 Hit Lightning Magic Attack & +100% Damage Increase per cast, up to 5) finisher/solo attacker.

As for the new toys, oh boy, where to start? Sakura's main gimmick is based around “Grim” skills, that can all be dual cast using Grim Lord (Use Grim Skills twice in one turn), setting her apart from pretty much all other mages, except Enhanced Trance Terra. The Grim skills can be divided into support and damage.

Support ones include Grim - Siphon (Set one ally's HP, except caster, to 0 & Self +50% HP/MP), which kills one of your units to recover half of Sakura's HP and MP. It's… okay, but there aren't any obvious synergies that benefit from this and I believe you're just much better off using a standard healer/mp battery. Aside from that, there are 4 Status-on-a-Stick: Grim - Shock/Light/Dark/Fire Blade (170% ST 1 Hit Lightning/Light/Dark/Fire Magic Attack & 100% Paralyze/Blind/Virus/Confuse, respectively) which might have their niche uses, but are nothing spectacular.

Damage-wise, and Sakura's main selling points are 2 skills: Grim - Soul Barrage (200% AoE 10 Hit Magic Attack + Ignore -50% SPR - normalized to 400%), provides fantastic 10 hits for chaining, albeit fixed elementless and a great modifier to go along with it. Frame data is extremely consistent (10-frames between hits), but immediate chaining partner is just a copy. Frame data suggests this can continuously chain with itself for a 39-hit chain, so if you're just normal chaining, the global modifier is x2.88, while spark chaining leads to a x3.51 modifier. This is extremely similar to Enhanced Trance Terra's chaining, but since Soul Barrage's base modifier is significantly lower, the maximum modifier Sakura outputs with this is going to be 2808%, which… is not that great, but has its uses since it's fixed elementless.

Much more interesting, though, is Grim - Eldritch Flames (300% ST 5 Hits Fire & Dark Magic Damage & 3 Turns -50% Fire & Dark Resistance Debuff). It has a lower modifier and less amount of hits, but comes with 2 innate elements and Imperil for both of them. Frame data is also consistent, at 10-frames between hits, but you'll still only want to chain with a copy. Everything also suggests perfect linking and a 19-hit chain at the end, which, due to the dual elemental nature of this, will have a global chain modifier of x3.48 when normal chaining and x3.63 when sparking. These modifiers lead up to a total possible output of 300% * 2 * 1.5 * 3.48 = 3132% or 3267% when sparking.

While those numbers are certainly better than Soul Barrage and can be further boosted by stronger Imperils (don't forget to average them out if you're only applying a better Imperil for 1 element!), they're ~25% lower than what most 5★ physical chainers can output. That said, Grim Lord Sakura should have huge MAG stat that it's fully applicable for both casts, unlike physical damage dealers. There's the obvious caveat that if an enemy resists one of the two elements, your damage output also sinks.

We're done with the Grim skillset, but Sakura has a few extra tools in her sleeve. Undying Fervor (3 Turns AoE +100% ATK/DEF/MAG/SPR Break Resistance & 3 Turns AoE +100% Paralyze and Confusion Resistance), adding another source of break resistance and some ailment immunity for your party members (also making Sakura immune to all ailments when coupled with her passives). There's also Thunder's Protection (3 Turns AoE +50% Lightning, Light and Dark Resistance), granting some neat elemental resistances that also go along well with her innate +50% Fire and Light Resistances and nullifies her -50% Dark Resistance (weird, isn't it?).

Finally, there's Sacrificial Barrier (Set Self HP to 1 & 3 Turns AoE +100% DEF/SPR & 3 Turns AoE +50% Fire Resistance), providing a fantastic defensive buff for your party and fire resistance at the cost of Sakura's HP. It can be easily healed back, as this can't kill her and the buff is extremely valuable. Also, Rise Again (ST 3 Turn 80% HP Auto-Revive), provides a fantastic, on-demand ST Auto-Revive that unfortunately can't be dualcast.

To top everything off, her LB is Phantom Fury (420% -> 660% AoE 9 Hits Magic Attack & 1 Turn +150% -> 270% MAG to Self), providing a MASSIVE MAG boost for the next turn and consistent 4-frames between hits (except for the last) for chaining with a copy. It's not expensive at all (18 crysts only) and her TMR helps it go off!

Global Trust Mastery Rating: - +666 HP, +66 MP, +33 ATK, +100 MAG, +36 SPR, Fire & Dark Element and Grants Death Awaits to Grim Lord Sakura - 2-Handed Spear - S Rank

Oh boy, where do we start? Awesome HP boost (~20%!), great MP help, solid MAG stat and SPR sprinkled as bonus. The dual elemental nature of this means it procs Sakura's Vicious while still allowing her to benefit from her stupid TDH skills. The granted skill is Death Awaits (+3 LB Crystals per Turn), which makes using her LB even easier.

Very likely the best (if not one of the best) weapon you can give Grim Lord Sakura, even though applications outside of her might not be currently existent.

Why would you want Grim Lord Sakura?: She has an absurd amount of MAG due to her TDH nature and TMR, deals a load of chainable magic damage, can be used as a finisher, has a killer LB and comes with quite a few supporting skills too.

Grim Lord Sakura's ability set is a piece of art, as she has pretty much a bit of everything and most of her skills are relevant. Yes, there's the odd Grim - Siphon or the Grim - Blades, but everything else is extremely solid. Her modifiers are great both for elementless and elemental chaining, her equipment selection is not lacking and, once again, her MAG stat is massive. Being able to dual cast her Grim skills is really what sells this unit and even though she might not be at the top end of damage, she's such a cool and strong unit that you'd be super happy about pulling.

Pirate Jake
Ahoy, matey! Jake's taking a Pirate approach this halloween with a pretty damn nice sprite to boot. Base 155 ATK (+34 with pots) is huge for a 4★ unit, and even stronger than most 5★s. It is further backed up by +60% ATK due to his Yo Ho Ho! (+30% ATK & +100% Petrify Resistance) and I am the captain now! (+30% ATK w/ Gun & +30% HP w/ Sword) passives.

Equipment selection is… a huge mess. It has decent theoretical weapon support on Daggers, Swords, Greatswords, Spears and Guns, but armour selection doesn't back that up at the moment, with only Clothes, Light Armour and Hats. Due to his Aye Aye! (Dual Wield Swords and Guns) passive, and the aforementioned I am the captain now!, you'll have quite a few conflicting options for building him.

The remainder of his relevant passives include Brew Tolerance (+20% HP/SPR & +100% Poison and Virus Resistance) completing his ailment immunities, Planking (30% Chance to Ignore fatal damage when above 50%, 1 time per life) (no, not that planking, the pirate planking) offering some nuke resistance and Booty (+50% Item Drop Rate) as Placebo Effect +1.

There's also a crisis buff on Heave Ho! (+80% ATK/DEF when HP drops below 60%) with a very fair threshold and great permanent buffs; there's Paul X Marks the Spot (+100% Gil Obtained) for Raid farming and a stupid female cover in Hahaha, let's dance! (20% Chance to Protect a Female Ally) because lore.

His supporting skills are a bit weird, with Hornswaggle (Escape battle) being a free Paul TMR for explorations, Walk the Plank (180% ST 1 Hit Physical Attack & 3 Turns -45% ATK/DEF Debuff) as a Warrior of Light-Level physical break and… Avast Matey! (Self 3 Turn 100% Chance to Protect an Ally against Physical Attacks (w/ 50% Physical and Magical mitigation)) because he's totally built as a tank. In all seriousness, while he certainly lacks innate dodge or tank stats/equips, this is a very interesting skill, because you're targeting the ally you want to cover, which definitely opens up some interesting situations.

Offensive-wise, there's only 2 relevant skills: a finisher and a chainer. The finisher is Parrley! (200% AoE 1 Hit Lightning Physical Attack & 3 Turns -50% Lightning Resistance Debuff), with very mediocre modifiers, but an AoE Lightning Imperil that allows a Sparky build to shine, even without outside support.

The chainer is Feed the Fishes (350% ST 6 Hits Physical Attack & 3 Turns -50% Water Resistance Debuff). The modifiers are great for a 4★ unit, it comes with a built-in Imperil and the element is not locked. It also has consistent 5-frames between hits, but unfortunately the hitcount kinda craps on the potential it could've had. Tidus owners had a brief period of joy when they knew the frame data but not the hitcount. Still, it might be possible to get a TDH Tidus to chain “perfectly” with this, but it definitely needs testing.

In any case current chaining partners include Hallowed Bolt from Orlandeau + Knight Delita (Jake can even provide the Imperil with Parrley!), and 2B's R050: Spear, but the starting frames for both cases differ, so the chain might not gap between 2 DW casts.

The safe bet is chaining with a copy and making full use of Camille's so you can properly benefit from the Imperil. Perfectly forming a 23-hit chain will give Jake a global modifier of x3.31, leading to a final 3475% modifier, ~15% less than Orlandeau's, but exceptional for a 4★ unit.

Global Trust Mastery Rating: - +20 DEF/SPR, +25% HP, +1 LB Crystal per Turn & +20% LB Fill Rate - Accessory - S Rank

Fantastic accessory, providing a great flat DEF/SPR bonus, an all-time high +% HP boost and extra LB support to boot. This is excellent on tanks, support units and anything that needs extra survival bonus.

Why would you want Pirate Jake?: Jake's an interesting unit, but most of his value as one depends on how well his chaining potential ends up being.

His supporting kit is not bad, but most of his options are not new, rare or even unique to him, leaving just Avast Matey! as new toy, which just seems incredibly niche in of itself. Damage wise, if the chaining does pan out, he becomes a solid option for future TDH Tidus owners to chain on 10-man trials (before Camille is awakened) and even for 2B owners.

If the inter-unit chaining ends up failing, while he's definitely not a bad chainer with a copy, he's a limited unit and you just won't find many players keeping a Pirate Jake up as friend, so you'll be relying on obtaining (it's another double gold banner >_>) and gearing 2 Jakes. If you really need some chainers, he'll do the job just fine, but you do still need a copy and that won't be easy to reliably get.

In any case, his TMR is just fantastic, so you won't be sad at all for pulling some P.Jakes!

Illusionist Nichol
Ever since people got wind of his ability to grant AoE Cover to a unit, I.Nichol has been hyped as all hell on the sub, so let's see how his complete set goes! Nichol will be used as a support unit most of the time, but he has quite a bit of MAG support and can perform decently as a damage dealer if need be. Anyways, base 123 MAG (+30 with pots) is horrible, but, as I said, there's a surprisingly solid +60% MAG due to his Power of Deception (+30% MAG/SPR) and Illusionist Gate (+30% MAG w/ Hat & +30% SPR w/ Clothes) passives.

Equipment selection is mage's default with a twist, as he's able to wield Daggers, Rods, Staves... Throwing Weapons? and… Knuckles?. Yeah, I got no clue either. His armour selection is great, with Robes, Clothes, Hats and Small Shields.

There's only 2 other relevant passives on his kit, but they're certainly interesting. Absorb MP (Drains 100% of the MP consumed by Enemy Spells when taking damage) is only shared by Kuja and it provides an interesting, but rather unreliable way to replenish your MP. The other one is Phantasmal Wards (Cast AoE 3 Turns 50% Chance to Counter Physical Attacks with 150% ST 1 Hit Physical Attack at the Start of the Battle), first of its kind, granting a short, free counter chance for all of your party. It definitely seems great to boost LB generation at the start of a battle, but the benefits of this also seem incredibly niche, which might also be extremely detrimental on some fights.

Like I mentioned, Nichol has some serious mage support, even though nothing really stands out. He has access to Blizzaga and Waterga (180% AoE 1 Hit Ice/Water Magic Attack, respectively) and Barblizzara and Barwatera (AoE 3 Turns +50% Ice/Water Resistance Buff, respectively). The -agas are just too outdated and not helped by his low MAG stat, while the -aras are a solid option for specific fights still.

Similarly to Grim Lord Sakura, Illusionist Nichol has a “Illusion” skillset that's backed up by Master Illusionist (Use Illusion skills twice in one turn). Illusion - Doppelganger (ST 3 Turns Dodge 2 Physical Attacks) can be used to grant an ally 4 dodge instances, which has some serious potential to turn provoke tanks into 100% dodge tanks or just save one of your units from a barrage of physical hits.

Illusion - Terrifying Visions (ST 2 Turns -45% ATK/MAG Debuff & 30% Confuse) is a shorter, Warrior of Light-level defensive break and Illusion - Phantasmal Forces (200% ST 7 Hits Magic Attack +100% per cast, up to 4 times) is an interesting chaining skill. While the initial modifier is okay (first cast is 300%), after turn 2, you'll be landing heavy 600% hits twice in a turn. Even though it's fixed elementless, it has consistent 8-frames between hits, but a rather unfortunate hitcount.

Current partner is really just a copy, even though CG Fina has a skill with matching frames, but diverging starting frame. In any case, since this is fixed elementless, without sparking, global modifiers will be… bad, more specifically, x2.4 bad, as it doesn't even reach the cap. Sparking, things are much brighter, at a global x3.30. This means that I.Nichol will deal 1680% (normal) and 2310% (spark) on the first turn, 2640% (normal) and 3630% (spark) on the second, 2880% (normal) and 3960% (spark) on all other turns.

While those modifiers are not bad at all (Orlandeau's datum is ~4100%), it takes 3 turns for it to reach its final potential and requires 2 Illusionist Nichols with poor MAG stat too. It also cannot benefit from Imperils and it's extremely reliant on your ability to spark.

Finally, the most anticipated skill is Illusion - Redirect (ST 2 Turns 100% Chance to Protect All Allies from Physical Damage (w/ 30% physical and magical mitigation)), a fantastic 100% AoE Cover that can be given to any ally. It greatly increases the potential and versatility of a few tanks, namely Wilhelm and Demon Rain, while also making anyone a Cover Tank. Slap this on a 100% dodge unit and you'll have one hell of a tank on physical fights.

Finally, there's one support skill that's not an illusion, Disenchant (200% ST 1 Hit Magic Attack & ST Remove All Status Effects) as a dispel on a stick. His LB is also pretty neat: Phantasmal Respite (AoE ~480 -> ~1200 HP Heal w/ x8 -> x14 Mod & Recover ~12 -> ~24 MP w/ x0.2 -> x0.44 Mod, both split over 3 Turns & 3 Turns AoE Dodge 2 Physical Attacks). At 300 SPR, I.Nichol will heal 560 -> 1800 HP and recover 14 -> 30 MP per turn, for a measly 16 crystals, even without innate support. This is very significant, basically a curaja and 2/3rds of Ace's Spirit hand per turn at max level, with only 300 SPR, with things getting a lot more interesting with the more SPR you give him.

Global Trust Mastery Rating: - +45 MP, +25 MAG, Auto-Refresh & Recover 1 LB Crystal per turn - Hat - A Rank

This is a rather interesting Hat, giving a pretty great MAG boost and a nice MP boost in the form of raw MP and Auto-Refresh. The Auto-Limit it gives is a nice little bonus too, but a very minor one.

Why would you want Illusionist Nichol?: Because he provides quite a few unique support skills that might make specific fights much easier and make some units more relevant.

While the real prize here is Redirect, allowing not only dedicated Provoke tanks to become 100% Cover tanks, but any unit really, notably 100% dodge ones, the other Illusions are not bad either. Doppelganger is certainly useful on physical based fights to ease your tank's job or even save a crucial unit from a few physical nukes.

Terrifying Visions provides a great, albeit short, defensive break and if you really need it and Phantasmal Forces even allows him to deal some great magic based damage if you have a copy. His LB compliments his set with a great HoT and Mana Battery too!

Black Cat Lid
Our lovely Lid is finally getting a 6★ awakening and she's quite good! Along the way you'll see quite a few similarities to our boy Firion, too. Starting with her abysmal base 130 ATK (+30 with pots) and mediocre total of +20% ATK from passives backing it up.

Her equipment selection is rather weird for a physical damage dealer, with very little weapons with supporting masteries: Rods, Staves, Bows, Axes, Hammers, Guns and Maces. Her armour selection is not bad, though, with Clothes, Light Armour and Hats. Due to one of her enhanced skills, you'll definitely be wielding a hammer, but it doesn't leave many relevant options on the off-hand.

While BCL's kit is extremely varied, most of her skills are completely useless prior to her 6★ awakening. The only notable ones are the amazing Hex Strike (130% ST 1 Hit Physical Attack & Inflict 3 Random Ailments (30% chance, 100% Petrify)) that allowed us to cheese so many content. It's still quite a decent skill when ailments are relevant and this gets an extremely cheap, albeit not gamechanging, enhancement.

Aside from that, there's Ultimate Blow (250% ST 1 Hit Physical Attack & Ignore -35% DEF - normalized to 385%), which was quite the nuke for a puny 5★ and that now can be enhanced to a very respectable 600% modifier, bringing Lid in line with most dedicated finishers. Giving a hand on that matter is, similar to Firion, a myriad of innate killers: Undead Killer (+50% Physical Damage vs Undead), Machine Killer (+50% Physical Damage vs Machines) and the brand new Nature Protector (+50% Physical Damage vs Demons, Machines and Undead). This last skill can be further enhanced to provide 75% killers and a muuuch needed +100% ATK w/ Hammer, backing Lid's terrible base ATK.

Another interesting toy is Weakening Scratch (250% ST 1 Hit Physical Damage & 3 Turns -40% All Element Imperil), providing a slightly reduced Imperil, but one that encompasses all elements. Great not only for Lid but any units that you might have that don't have an Imperil to use.

The remaining 2 6★ skills are all passives: Sturdy Cat (+20% DEF & +100% Poison and Paralyze Resistance) provides BCL some neat ailment immunities and can be further enhanced to grant her +50% HP and +30% DEF (on top of the 20% already there), giving her a huge boost in survivability. Finally, there's Lucky Cat (+10% Physical Dodge & 90% Chance to Ignore Fatal Damage when above 50% HP (once per life)), giving her some minor dodge rate and a fantastic nuke survival boost.

Spell-wise, Lid god Barthundaga (AoE 3 Turns +70% Lightning Resistance) as an excellent resistance buff and the Protectga/Shellga duo (AoE 3 Turns +40% DEF/SPR, respectively), which is nice, but a bit outdated.

Global Trust Mastery Rating: - +25 MP, +15 DEF, +20 MAG, +20 SPR, +100% Silence Resistance - Hat - B Rank

Pretty decent hat, offering a bit of each defensive stat, some MAG and some MP, alongside Silence immunity. It's not gamebreaking, it's not much better than other event/free gear, but it's just a solid piece of equipment.

Why would you want Black Cat Lid?: Because Lid rocks! No, seriously, I truly like her and have awesome memories of her from last year, but while she's definitely a solid unit, she's not breaking any barriers here.

If you lack dedicated finishers, BCL is basically Firion against monsters that Firion can't do damage against. 600% nuke, a lot of innate killers against 3 races and a dope +100% ATK mastery.

But that's really all she does. Her equipment selection is currently not good due to a serious lack of support and her skillset is limited to nuking and Hex Strike, which has limited usability. Anyway, you can certainly use and have a lot of fun with her (I certainly will!), but she's not much more than just a solid unit.

Should You Pull?
I'd suggest you do pull, yes. While the new units (aside from Sakura) don't seem to be breaking any barriers, they're simply not bad units at all and have perfectly fine TMRs too!

The 3★ is a great choice for people lacking a dedicated finisher or people that only have Firion and want to have a finisher for the monster races he sucks against. Hex Strike still might become relevant from time to time, but we already have other options.

The 4★ duo are an interesting bunch. While Jake can certainly output some solid damage, his most notable traits are the probable possibility of chaining with TDH Tidus and 2B, allowing some partners for players that own these units on 10-man trials. He also has an interesting 100% Cover that can be directed on a single unit and his TMR is fantastic for anyone that needs a serious survivability boost.

Illusionist Nichol certainly looks like a niche unit, but when that niche can be exploited, he'll definitely make his spot worthy. 100% AoE Cover that can be granted to any ally allows Provoke tanks and dodge units to have a major role in AoE heavy fights and his skill that grants 4 Physical Attack Dodges seems pretty great to slap on your tank or valuable unit on ST intensive fights. He also breaks and outputs some damage if you really need him too!

For whales, we're getting a serious 5★ mage, with an exquisite TDH focused build, providing her a massive MAG and SPR stat and two available "DC" chaining skills: one with 2 elements and the other elementless. While her modifiers might not be breaking new limits, her stat and extremely diverse kit more than backs her up. She can function as a finisher and has a variety of supporting options to help your party!

If you're not a whale and pulled Grim Lord Sakura, yaaaaaaaaaaaaay!