Shift tournament 2: Finals!

[superaielman]

Uryu>Elc
Heat>Airy

Hugo>Claude
Tana>Riou

Lilka>Pamela
Cordelia>Adachi


Palom>Vivi
Pepperoni>Michiah

Mojo>Maribelle
Aeris>Mint


Godlike:

Uryu (MK2) vs Heat (DDS2)

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8)


Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13)

Middle:

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2)


Division of Snow:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7)




G/HH: Wraith, Tir, Souji, Ryu4, Tana, Hugo

HH/LH: Tidus, Alicia, KOS-MOS, Dehuai, Lilka, Cordelia

LH/M: Momo, Red Mage, Odie, Flay, Palom, Pepperoni

[superaielman]

Godlike:

Uryu (MK2) vs Heat (DDS2)- Uhh

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8)- WoS+evasion and healing should do it offhand. Though to make sure: Can Hugo parry on turns he uses magic, after he casts the spell?


Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13)- Strong kneejerk.

Middle:

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2)- 4a Palom is faster, so that makes figuring out the OHKO thing moot.


Division of Snow:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7)-I think? Mojo is pretty bad.




G/HH: Wraith, Tir, Souji, Ryu4, Tana, Hugo

Souji>Tir>Ryu4>Wraith>Hugo>Tana

Wraith might be able to scrape a win against Ryu4, but I kind of doubt it offhand. None of the other fights are close outside of Hugo/Tana.


HH/LH: Tidus, Alicia, KOS-MOS, Dehuai, Lilka, Cordelia

Tidus: 5-0
Dehuai: 3-2 (Tidus, Alicia)
Cordelia: 3-2 (Tidus, Dehuai)
KOS-MOS: 2-3 (Tidus, Dehuai, Cordelia)
Alicia: 1-3-1 (All but Dehuai)
Lilka: 0-4-1

Tidus sweeps the field. KOS and Dehuai get blitzed down offhand (This is assuming Tidus can immune stone), Alicia/Lilka do not love the speed game either. Cordelia dies to E/C.  Dehuai stones Cordelia/Lilka/KOS and dies to the other two. KOS can healer buster nicely enough which lets her beat those two. Lilka feels outclassed here, and so does Alicia. Alicia does outlast Dehuai at least!

LH/M: Momo, Odie, Flay, Palom, Pepperoni


Later. Suspect that Odie is in some trouble though.

[Pyro]

I didn't play FE13 so forgive my presumption, but how does a critless falcon Knight actually kill Lilka? I guess she could use a Killer Lance but don't those kind of blow in FE13?

Though I should have changed my vote to Pamela I guess. Or abstained out of uncertainty. I had meant to ask about pamela's status rates and forgot. Probably would not have changed match.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Cordelia does a crapton of damage to those she doubles. If Lilka is seen as frail enough a Killer crit may one-shot even if she doesn't double. I haven't looked at the numbers yet though so it's entirely possible Lilka can avoid the doubling and either survive the crit or blitz with wind magic first, though.

Wraith totally beats Ryu4, he's below average speed and can't resist lightning that well.

Hugo can indeed parry after casting a spell, and can evade while charging even (which only applies to Funeral Wind attempts, but he's probably only going to use that against a sleeping target anyway).

[Random Consonant]

Cordelia's STR is actually kind of ridiculous for a falcon knight.  That said her speed is less so so I really doubt she pulls off a one-rounding here by anyone's interpretation so I'm inclined to agree barring elfmath.

stealthedit: elfboy kind of beat me to the point but it doesn't take much to dodge Cordelia doubling

actualedit: Lilka going first and doing things like buff evade doesn't really help Cordelia's case either

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Uryu (MK2) vs Heat (DDS2) - EDIT: sure, burping Elfboy sounds solid.

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8) - Hm. dat evade + Wind of Sleep may well work.

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13) - Cordelia... misses the OHKO with Killer Lance even under the lower accuracy crits -and- taking Lilka's HP as lower. And pretty much nothing else scares Lilka ever, since Cordy doesn't double.

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoncino (MK2) - Palom, using numerical speed, is actually slower than Pepperoni. If you add a constant (which I'm not sure FF4a speed -does-), he actually beats Pepperoni by a very tight sliver, but, when in doubt, I'll just tiebreak against FF4 speed. And Pepperoni indeed does OHKO.

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsborough (FF7) - Aeris' limit healing threshold involves taking more damage than she can heal and her offense is both pathetic and facing actually decent evade, for whatever CC evade is worth. I'm not sure, she's pretty damned bad.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

UPGRADE/DOWNGRADE POOLS!

Wraith, Tir McDohl, Yu Narukami, Ryu4, Tana, Hugo

Yu > Tir > Wraith > Ryu4 > Hugo > Tana, pretty straightforward. Yu actually has a case for winning a pool -team match- due to his insane mix of skillset and spoiling (and his overkill damage being MT), which is telling about what he can do to them solo. Tir... well, his most interesting fight is against Wraith, but he 2HKOs and isn't OHKOed due to Lightning resistance and high mdur (though it's close). The rest of the fighters get either OHKOed or IDed. Wraith overkills everybody else (and I'm actually amenable to seeing Gravity Blessing as ITE, which handles Tana). Ryu4 gets turns to mangle Tana and Hugo and Hugo himself handles Tana, who sucks her thumb in the corner.

Yu - 5-0
Tir - 4-1
Wrait - 3-2
Ryu4 - 2-3
Hugo - 1-4
Tana - 0-5


HH/LH: Tidus, Alicia, KOS-MOS, Dehuai, Lilka Eleniak, Cordelia

First things first, Dehuai should handle Tidus. He can't -possibly- outslug that much HP, considering Sonic Steel gets him petrified, Crimson Flare 3HKOs Tidus and Dehuai gets a hit in first. Tidus vs. Alicia is pretty perfunctory, either lol caladbolg or lol speed game from hell work. KOS-MOS... ugh. In theory, Slow should wreck KOS, but S-CHAIN does HORRIBLE things to Tidus' game. Slow? Accuracy-busting? That's not working out well. On the other hand, KOS has issues damaging Caladbolg Tidus, since, in order to sport turn one S-CHAIN, she loses turn one X-BUSTER. So, uh, I donno - EDIT: burping Elfboy. Lilka does not have time to set up us the evade bomb against Tidus, though, and Cordelia eats it to Caladbolg+Cheer prostats. Alicia... doesn't fare very well. She spoils Dehuai by blocking both Stone and Silence (Dehuai offense just doesn't really pressure her even after all the stat hits at all) and Heal+pelting until the end of time. KOS-MOS sets up S-CHAIN => Ether Limit => X-BUSTER OHKO on Alicia and we never talk about this fight again. Lilka, on the other hand, sets up a dualcast OHKO or spell+Dualcast blitz on a double at the very worst. Cordelia just one-rounds the pretty zombie princess' ass. KOS-MOS eats Petrify from Dehuai, may well have the time to set up X-BUSTER OHKO shenanigans on Lilka without even bothering to S-CHAIN and against Cordelia... hm. S-CHAIN is pretty badass, but I'm not sure KOS-MOS can finish Cordelia up in time. She actually might not, since her opening turn is so devastating. Y'know what, I may just go with Random again. Dehuai turns Lilka and Cordy into statues and Lilka already beats Cordy. Soooooooo...

Dehuai - 4-1
Tidus - 4-1
KOS-MOS - 2-3
Lilka - 2-3
Cordelia - 2-3
Alicia - 1-4


LH/M: Momo, Odie, Red Mage, Flay Gunnar, Palom, Pepperoncino

Well, this is a goddamn mess. Against Odie, weirdly, I think I'd see Momo having a defensive advantage against Odie (IIRC, healers do get an edge against him, don't they?)... and so does she if she is seen as a gunner. I suppose her MO here would be spamming one of Sleep, Silence or Confuse and hoping it hits before his limit kicks in... and, you know what, it may work, since, post-matches, Odie doesn't quite OHKO Momo even with his limit and she can speedgame it up as well. Weird that someone can actually play an attrition battle with Odie in the M/H borderline, though. Momo is also faster than Flay, but she'd need three castings of Protect to really stand up to his nonsense and I'm not sure I respect Confuse being turn one against Flay res, which it -needs- to be. I think the match goes to him. Against Palom, well, he has no Sleep resistance and she's faster. Equipping for status resistance, she should massively cut down on Palom's status bullshit and open Might season for a KO on his awful pdur. Since she can reapply Sleep at will once she lands it, she can likely just lock him down until she maxes out on Might. And Pepperoni... well, being faster is a start and Peppe's ID kinda fails against her. She can open with Speed then bait for a double, methinks, and even if Pepperoni can heal-lock with a physical (doesn't sound farfetched, Momo pdur is pretty D=), I think she can get enough openings to land Confuse. So, not a bad showing. Odie... uh Flay can't avoid that first counter and has to face match disadvantage against Odie, this is -ugly-. Palom... sheesh, status. ID should do. Pepperoni eats horrible match disadvantages and explodes. Well, Flay. Against Palom, he's actually slower first turn. The end. I suppose he does outslug Pepperoni, not much worse durability, better speed from turn two onwards, has Blocking, Last Stand and superior long-term damage. And Pepperoni beats Palom, so that's that. Weird circle here.

EDIT: So, forgot FF3 Red Mage! First, against Momo, he's hopeless: all his relevant status gets immuned and he has no pressure to speak of... while being vulnerable to Silence. Failure. Against Odie... well, I'm with Elfboy in that I don't allow the JL99 equips, so Red Mage is above average speed rather than below. I -suppose-, though, that Silence, if anything, is the deciding factor in this fight. If it's permanent, Odie loses, if not, Odie wins. I think it is, at least, so uh go RM. Against Flay... for starters, Defense Down does terrible things to RM. Second, Mini should likely do -nothing- against the timed spheres. Third, his best choice of status otherwise is like turn three. I'm really not seeing how he handles that. Against Palom, 4a version immunes the status he might be afraid of and RM has no death resistance. Bye. And Pepperoni... well, at worst, gradual petrify works. So, the updated tally:

Momo - 4-1
Odie - 3-2
Flay - 3-2
Palom - 3-2
Red Mage - 2-3
Pepperoni - 1-4

[Dark Holy Elf]

Godlike:

Uryu (MK2) vs Heat (DDS2): Excellent match.

Uryu can MT OHKO the tentacles until Makanda has been used twice.

Uryu opens with Gate and an attack which 4HKOs Heat. Heat will use Makanda followed by Regenerate, I suppose. Uryu will use MT and summon another gate. Heat repeats. Now he can't easily be killed, which is nice. Uryu will still ensure both tentacles die because a gate gets a turn now.

At this point Heat needs to start killing the Gates. Fortunately he can MT wipe them, hadn't really expected that, while using Regenerate. So from here on he can keep the gates from ever getting turns, and Uryu can't really get through the shield at all. Doubleturns will happen now and then, so Uryu can try to set up for those by leaving one tentacle alive and then using damage on the double, that will certainly work... but he needs to get 4 more of these turns (because of Makanda) and I doubt he lives the ~20 Heat turns needed for this, since Inferno Roar does enough. Heat is happy that move isn't fire like it looks!

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8): The evade keeps him alive, and he can land sleep + whatever (Funeral Wind is worth a shot, but even if you don't respect that there's Hellfire/Final Flame which should 2HKO). Sleep Staff means I can't bring myself to see Tana's evade working against Wind of Sleep, and her res isn't that special.

Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13): Isn't doubled. Can survive a killer critical. Has evade to make those even rarer. Wind magic helps.

Middle:

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2): Not much to say here.


Division of Snow:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7): CC characters are outstanding at dodging limits, Mojo can do like 55% to average on his killer turn, and evade lets him survive to set that up.


Pools later.

[Random Consonant]

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8) - Hugo facing WTD would make this kind of interesting... but yeah Tana RES not really special enough to deal with WoS and Hugo still has plenty of evade of his own.

Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13) - Per the above comments.

Middle:

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2) - Sure let's go with FF4a speed deserving flushing.

Division of LUCKY DAN:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7) - not thinking about this too hard.


G/HH: Wraith, Tir, Souji, Ryu4, Tana, Hugo

Well let's look at the 800-pount elephant that is Narukami first.  Hassou Tobi a bit overleveled to me which... likely doesn't matter here since he's still kind of hella versatile and goes before everyone so sure he likely beats everyone, though less sure on Ryu4.  Tir squeaks by Wraith and murders everyone else either either Judgment or the finger.  Wraith murders everyone else, Hugo and Tana can't handle Ryu4, Hugo is beating Tana.

Narukami - 5-0 (assuming he handles Ryu4)
Tir - 4-1
Wraith - 3-2
Ryu4 - 2-3
Hugo - 1-4
Tana - 0-5

HH/LH: Tidus, Alicia, KOS-MOS, Dehuai, Lilka, Cordelia

Dehuai straight up outslugs Tidus and petrifies everyone else, Slutbot cedes first turn to Cordelia and Tidus which puts her in a really bad spot even considering how badass S-Chain is, particularly against Cordelia who is wiping out most of her HP without burning through all her gas.  It's possible she just ends up X-Bustering Tidus to death though, so I'll split the difference and say she beats him but loses to Cordelia.  Lilka doesn't really deal with that meanwhile.  Meanwhile Tidus just Quick Hits Lilka to death and mocks Cordelia's existance.  Meanwhile Cordelia likely loses to Lilka.

Dehuai - 4-0
Tidus - 2-2
KOS-MOS - 2-2
Lilka - 1-3
Cordelia - 1-3

LH/M: Momo, Red Mage, Odie, Flay, Palom, Pepperoni

Okay, so.  Odie beats Pepperoni and Flay easily enough, but Palom resists lightning and Momo likely has type advantage here so he loses to those two.  Momo can't really stand up to Flay's nonsense but can handle Pepperoni's and Palom's.  Palom statuses out Flay who outslugs Pepperoni who beats Palom.

Momo - 3-1
Flay - 2-2
Odie - 2-2
Palom - 2-2
Pepperoni - 1-3

[SnowFire]

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8)
It's weird that Tana has just averagish Res, but sure.  (And even allowing Falcoknight doesn't help much, just +1!)

Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13)
Killer crit won't KO?  Okay then.

Also, Pyro, Killer weapons are actually quite awesome in FE13, some of the best they are in the series since enemies have enough HP for it to matter!  (But a DL assumption of Braves makes 'em bad for the very last chapter, yes.  At least less crazy damage average juggling that way.)

Division of Snow:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7)
I dunno about hyping multihit CC characters as evading FF7 limits - while I certainly don't force CC / SO2 etc. to say eat a counterattack every time, limits are pretty good at interrupting some multihit combos in FF7.  That said the evade might win it for Mojo anyway since Aeris's Healing Wind is indeed a long-term losing trade and her pressure isn't great.

EDIT: See below.

[Dark Holy Elf]

That's actually a fairly valid point about limits and CC combos. I'm somewhat less inclined to switch my views here because Chrono Cross needs the help, but definitely could be argued. CC combos could certainly be interrupted easily in-game... hmm. (But yeah, they definitely only trigger one counter at the end regardless.)

As for Tana, she smartly put all her stat points into Strength/Speed/Luck. Kinda backfires here but so it goes.

[Dhyerwolf]

I don't CC should be penalized because their game system uses a lot of hits in a string. If it was one characters that was an outlier, it might feel like a different story (Say...Double White or Double Black in FF 9 or something like that). Otherwise, we are just putting one damage type (all at once) over another when most games generally tend to use one or the other exclusively.

Of course, there are always aspects of giving one cast primacy, but I feel like penalizing all PCs in a game for the way their game structured basic damage doesn't feel right.

[SnowFire]

I agree in general, but CC enemies can interrupt you in the middle of a combo in-game (and reset your darn hit rates #$%^), and FF7 limits can interrupt the middle of multihit combos in FF7, so...  seems pretty clear-cut that CC combos can be interrupted at least (even if allowing the likes of a counterattack for every hit would be overboard).

[Dark Holy Elf]

G/HH: Wraith, Tir, Ryu4, Tana, Hugo

Tir 4-0
Wraith 3-1
Ryu4 2-2
Hugo 1-3
Tana 0-4

3x elemental magic durability, Tir? Wow. Yeah, tanks a Gravity Blessing and 2HKOs Wraith, nobody else gets a turn.
I was wrong, Ryu4 can half lightning. Still gets OHKOed! And yeah, I'm inclined to see Gravity Blessing as ITE, the physical soul crushes are and Great Magic gets around a lot of stuff in VP (reflection, absorption, small target size, etc.), so that ends what little argument Tana had.
Ryu goes for status protection against Hugo so he definitely gets a turn. He can then heal-lock Hugo with near-OHKO Kaiserbreaths, and he gets seven turns in Kaiser while Hugo can only heal five times. Against Tana, inclined to see breaths as ITE but even if not they may well wear her down before she gets super-lucky with Pierce (transformed Ryu4 pdur is dumb).
Hugo beats Tana as per this week.

Unshockingly there are no upgrades/downgrades here. Hugo/Tana are good but both have spent most of their careers in Heavy, they do not like the top half of Godlike.

HH/LH: Tidus, Alicia, KOS-MOS, Dehuai, Lilka, Cordelia

More complicated.

Dehuai 4-1
Tidus 4-1
KOS-MOS 2-3
Lilka 2-3
Cordelia 2-3
Alicia 1-4

Dehuai should outlast Tidus despite his blocking stone, I can't imagine he can be slowed so at best Tidus can use Sonic Steel, Haste, then get all the Quick Hits, which is 11 of them. This isn't especially close to killing Dehuai, and he's also probably at around his third turn now, which kills Tidus. He petrifies everyone else... except Alicia who blocks both stone and silence and laughs in his face.
Tidus uses E&C shenanigans to build overdrive and kill Cordelia, blitzes out Lilka and uses his speed game to overpower Alicia. KOS-MOS is indeed the tricky one. Assuming KOS uses turn 1 S-Chain (else she's seriously vulnerable to blitzing, and I let Tidus choose second), he comes in with Caladbolg since his HP can't be lowered quickly, Quick Hits her and waits for her turn... then overwrites her Slow with his Haste if she goes for S-Chain. Blind is kinda blah but he can come in with Blindward so yeah think he has this.
KOS-MOS builds up to a OHKO against Lilka (Ether Limit X-Buster alone probably works, if not she can probably afford an extra turn for F-Scythe?), no way do I see that as reflectable. Ditto Alicia. Cordelia she takes a ton of damage against right away, even with her evade I'm not sure she can really deal with Cordelia since she needs two R-Dragons to drop her and THOSE trigger counters, or X-Buster/F-Scythe with no ability to debuff.
Cordelia blitzes out Alicia and beats KOS as above, but loses to Lilka.
In a stallfest, Lilka holds the edge due to buffing evade.

Three-way tie at the middle. Alicia downgrades which is kinda rough but HH is mean so not a huge shock, and either Lilka or Cordelia could upgrade, or both at the expensive of KOS-MOS. I'm inclined to tiebreak against KOS-MOS > Lilka > Cordelia, though, as KOS is certainly close to wins against Cordelia and Tidus both.

LH/M: Momo, Red Mage, Odie, Flay, Palom, Pepperoni

Flay 4-1 (loss: Odie)
Momo 4-1 (loss: Flay)
Odie 3-2 (loss: Momo, Red Mage)
Red Mage 2-2 (loss: Flay, Momo; unknown: Palom)
Pepperoni 1-4 (loss: all but Palom)
Palom 0-4 (loss: all but Red Mage; unknown: Red Mage)

Okay. Typing should save Momo against Odie, and she can control the fight with Pepperoni well enough, and has faster status for Palom and Red Mage. Might not be turn 1 against RM, but neither is his in return.
Odie has counters and good typing to beat down the MK fighters, beats Palom. Red Mage can resist lightning and has lots of status and good MDef so probably wins.
Flay gets the death blitz started against Momo and Red Mage before they can really stop him, OHKOs Palom, and is largely a better version of Pepperoni.
Red Mage... actually has some serious trouble with Palom, okay. Silence will win him the match but he gives Palom a turn first. Palom will use that turn to... mm, use Stop or Sleep, then try to blitz RM down before those wear off. Palom does 61% per swing so this... probably 3HKOs, might 2HKO Red Mage of the unknown precise tankishness. So if sleep/stop last long enough, Palom wins, otherwise he gets silenced and RM wins. Red Mage should be able to turtle and land status on Pepperoni.

Regardless of the Palom vs. Red Mage match, there are no upgrades or downgrades here to me.

[Dhyerwolf]

Godlike:

Uryu (MK2) vs Heat (DDS2)

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8)- Yeah, Tana pushes WoS to turn 2 to me, but it really doesn't matter because Hugo can get around her evade to a degree and she can't say the same.
Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13)- Cordelia doesn't even have a good limit killing option. At worst, Lilka will win on endless healing and casting Evade up on doubles until Cordelia can't hit her at all.

Middle:

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2)- Palom is 90% speed turn 1, Pepperoni is 89%. Even if Pepperoni has something that increases his speed, I'm sure it will cause him to lose the OHKO. Now Palom may have slight charge times, but those should be baked into averages and he probably has some accurate status that won't put him below Pepperoni I bet. Since FF 4 used a constant, do we have a reason to think FF 4a didn't?


Division of Snow:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7)- For all that Aeris is way too much for the division since I don't see her damage as horrible, it's weirder that Mojo is here at all. He's fast (in the CC way, but that's still fast over time), is at least hovering around average on concrete durability, has some impressive (for Light, let alone Puny) evade that is generally going to let him live at least 1 extra turn against physicallers and is in the 3/4 HKO range by all the averages. Not anywhere by Middle by any means, but averagish enough overall to be a regular Light.




G/HH: Wraith, Tir, Souji, Ryu4, Tana, Hugo

HH/LH: Tidus, Alicia, KOS-MOS, Dehuai, Lilka, Cordelia

LH/M: Momo, Red Mage, Odie, Flay, Palom, Pepperoni

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2)- Palom is 90% speed turn 1, Pepperoni is 89%. Even if Pepperoni has something that increases his speed, I'm sure it will cause him to lose the OHKO. Now Palom may have slight charge times, but those should be baked into averages and he probably has some accurate status that won't put him below Pepperoni I bet. Since FF 4 used a constant, do we have a reason to think FF 4a didn't?

Every FF4 iteration not named 4DS breaks something different about its speed mechanics. For starters, FF4a ATB -does- seem more literal than FF4o's (which, in all fairness, is a pile of psyduck and actually makes a case for using SDs in a non-classic TB game). It also breaks boss speed in a way completely unlike the SNES version works and the tiebreaking is pretty funky as well. So yeah, I wouldn't really read it as if the constant remains (and, if it does, I have my doubts still works the same way).

[superaielman]

LH/M: Momo, Odie, Flay, Palom, Pepperoni


Uh. Pepperoni gets embarrassed and I'm not sure who goes down. I -think- Palom goes up? The thunder resistance he has gives Odie some issues and he's faster than Flay.

Red Mage... actually has some serious trouble with Palom, okay. Silence will win him the match but he gives Palom a turn first. Palom will use that turn to... mm, use Stop or Sleep, then try to blitz RM down before those wear off. Palom does 61% per swing so this... probably 3HKOs, might 2HKO Red Mage of the unknown precise tankishness. So if sleep/stop last long enough, Palom wins, otherwise he gets silenced and RM wins. Red Mage should be able to turtle and land status on Pepperoni.

4o Palom can block Silence with the Bard shirt (It's storebought in Mist, which Palom can access)

[Luther Lansfeld]

Godlike:

Uryu (MK2) vs Heat (DDS2)

High Heavy:

Hugo (S3) vs Tana (FE8)

Low Heavy:

Lilka Eleniak (WA2) vs Cordelia (FE13)

Middle:

Palom (FF4) vs Pepperoni (MK2)


Division of Snow:

Mojo (CC) vs Aeris Gainsbourgh (FF7)

[SnowFire]

So...   Aeris & Mojo.

No firm FF7 damage figures for Aeris, but assuming all front row (which she wants), it seems like Aeris's weapon is subtly worse than everyone else's, but the real problem is that Cloud & Red wreck the damage average with materia.  If we assume they do double average damage, that leaves everyone else with 9/11 * .4 = ~.32 PCHP damage, maybe .30 PCHP in Aeris's case due to a meh weapon (for all that Princess Guard is actually *great* in game).  Yes, Aeris, the existence of magic somehow makes you worse, Sephy runs the DL.  Mojo has above average HP and average defense, so this is a 7-8HKO in practice vs. that evade + losing some turns due to Healing Wind procs.

Mojo w/o using Elements is pretty sad, but the first Healing Wind is basically free thanks to starting with some gague, and every one afterward loses 16.4% of her health.  (Actually slightly more if Mojo can "waste" damage by nearly chipping her to the Limit, then using an element.)  Mojo's best damage for blasting past to death is .27 PCHP .  Aeris has .92 PCHP.  So with perfect chipping Mojo needs to force...  ow, 5+1 Healing Winds (1x free, 5 HWs to knock past .15*5 = .75 PCHP of health).  He has 2 elements he can use to get some "free" damage in on 2 of the limits though and nearly perfect chipping, though, so that's...  .30 PCHP more free damage?  Probably more like .25 PCHP.  So that means 3+1 HWs instead (3*.15 + .25+.27 = fatal).  Mojo's combo is 213 when using an element, or some vague amount more when not...  but this is like .20 PCHP, a 5HKO or something pathetic (we're saving the elements for right before the limit), not gonna force the Healing Winds out fast enough.  I guess if you allow cheap L1 or L2 elements that will make things better?

Anyway, seems like Aeris actually has this to me, although varying CC interps can probably make this closer.

[Monkeyfinger]

Uryu over Heat. Gates survive inferno roar with about 10% HP I think, and even severely weakened they add a lot of extra punch.

[Dark Holy Elf]

So...   Aeris & Mojo.

No firm FF7 damage figures for Aeris, but assuming all front row (which she wants), it seems like Aeris's weapon is subtly worse than everyone else's, but the real problem is that Cloud & Red wreck the damage average with materia.  If we assume they do double average damage, that leaves everyone else with 9/11 * .4 = ~.32 PCHP damage, maybe .30 PCHP in Aeris's case due to a meh weapon (for all that Princess Guard is actually *great* in game).  Yes, Aeris, the existence of magic somehow makes you worse, Sephy runs the DL.  Mojo has above average HP and average defense, so this is a 7-8HKO in practice vs. that evade + losing some turns due to Healing Wind procs

For what it's worth L3 magic is kinda questionable at that point; I didn't have it on my last playthrough though you likely could if you religiously keep Fire/Ice/Bolt in double growth slots? Dunno. If you disallow them then L2's are slightly under a third as strong? That said 30% sounds like a pretty good place for Aeris damage to me anyway so I dunno.

EDIT: Looking things up in the thread, Aeris does 32% with the L3 spells tossed out, 25% if you include them. I definitely favour tossing them myself, now.

Also: For all that your comments about the match itself seem spot on... Surely Aeris is equipped with the Umbrella, not the Princess Guard? Unless you ban the Umbrella for being annoying to get (I wouldn't, to be clear), but in that case Aeris' Atk will be meagre indeed (she has bad strength in addition to weaker weapons). And for all 10 minutes you have the Princess Guard in-game, it certainly is not a "great" weapon, but that's partly because it's a magic-focused weapon right before a magic-immune boss. (It wouldn't be super-amazing even if this weren't the case, though it would be solid, analogous to say the Silver and Gold Megaphones as a "good magic weapon for the time".)

[SnowFire]

Yeah, I'd allow the Umbrella (for all that it's worthless in-game).  My recollection must be off but I recall the PG being pretty rockin' with its 8 slots and around for at least one dungeon, but oh well.

I didn't see the direct damage figures in the thread when I looked before, but .30 is between .32 & .25 anyway (maybe one of Cloud / Red got an L3), so glad to see my intuition is roughly correct.