RPGDL 2012 Season 1, Week 4: Supervillain Showdown

[Cmdr_King]

Results!

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn)- iiiiiiiiii vs Mewtwo (Pokémon Series)- iii
Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)- iiiiiii vs Terra Branford (Final Fantasy VI)- iiiiii
Cidolfas Orlandu (Final Fantasy Tactics)- iiiiii vs Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII)- iiiiiii
Mei-ling (SaGa Frontier)- i vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia)- iiiiii

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia)- iiiiiiiiii vs Wakka (Final Fantasy X)- ii
Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)- iiiiiiiii vs Nel Zelpher (Star Ocean: Till the End of Time)- iiiii
Chie Satonaka (Persona 4)- iiiiii vs Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium)- iiiiiii
Cthulhu (Cthulhu Saves the World)- iiii vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)- iiii  (Hatbot)

Middle


Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals)- iiiiiiiiiiiiii vs Ashton Anchors (Star Ocean: The Second Story)- ii
Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)- iiiiiiii vs Nina (Breath of Fire: Dragon Quarter)- iiii
Yukiko Amagi (Persona 4)- iiiii vs Syphide (Valkyrie Profile: Silmeria)- iiiii (Hatbot)
Sara (Breath of Fire)- iiiiiiii vs Warlock (Suikoden IV)- iiii

Light

Sazh Katzroy (Final Fantasy XIII)- iiiii vs Kahn (Breath of Fire IV)- iiiiiiii
Piccolo (Suikoden III)- iiii vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)- iiiiiiiiiii
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI)- iiiiiiiiiiiii vs Nina Wyndia (Breath of Fire III)- i
Elena (Final Fantasy VII)- i vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)- iiiiiiiiii


Words!

Next week, we'll be having happy fun ranking times.  During them, to keep the ranking list as democratic and up to date as possible, we'll be putting a selection of games that either barely met or barely failed ranking criteria up for an up/down ranking vote.  These have been cordoned off into an easily readable segment in a new post in the appropriate topic Here.

Additionally, since the original data gathering was based on my own notes and playing habits, I want to make sure to get audience input as well.  As such, feel free to nominate one (1) game for ranking this week.  Please be sure to read the linked post and make sure a game you're suggesting is not listed.  As well, if you have not put data into this topic, I encourage you to do so this week so any lists are as up-to-date as possible when rankings take place.

New pool!

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia)

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)

[Random Consonant]

Godlike
what

Heavy
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series) - Hmmm, is Elincia's RES good enough to fend off the ID landing turn 1 here to me?  Not sure.  Edit: or MGC, *whatever*, stat topic says mdef.  Was leaning yes anyways, so.

Middle
more what

Light
Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete) - edit: unless I'm overrating the impact of the def buff, it should push Mia out of OHKO range, and Kahn's big damage shouldn't be coming out until turn *3*, not 2.  Anyways.

[superaielman]

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)- Kneejerk.
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)- EDIT: Depends entirely on if Hope can build up to an eventual 2HKO. If he does it's an easy win, if it's not he probably loses to a Dekar Blade critical hit. Abstain till I figure out Hope's exact damage.

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)- Locke's awful defense makes this kinda interesting, but no.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF): EDIT: Later.
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia): Close, but... well, Apocrypha has way more HP. Granted, once Cid is beaten up a bit he can buff and actually stall out Apocrypha's offence... until form 3. At that point Cid loses, even if he was able to apply Deprotect, I think, though it's kinda close. Just too much HP left to cut through, and Curasa's only good at stalling when he's nearly dead, so he can't really make headway there.

Heavy

Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series): Negatis/Diem don't check MDef, but Magic. However Elincia is quite far above average at that, too (Meeple's average is 15.5, Random has her at 24.2, so even with the adjusted averages she's probably at least +6 or so) so she probably wins, though it does depend how you scale that magic difference and how you take status in general.

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII): Haste/Faith Hope has the offence needed to punch through here.
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire): Hmm, Sara should OHKO with a crit (Sylphide is 0.88 HP, Sara does ~45%), but her crit rate is pretty terrible. On the other hand, so is Sylphide's damage. If she could avoid the 2HKO and hence not need to heal every turn I think she'd make it in time. Of course, the crit needs to be strong enough to OHKO, and due to random variance it might not be, which might push the rate low enough for Sylphide to win. Grah, not sure. Will vote for Sara but it's pretty much a tossup.

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete): The only match this week I'm completely sure of! Focus, OHKO on turn 2 easily enough. (By my numbers, he does this to average, so even with quite a few extra levels he should manage against Mia). Mia doesn't 2HKO much of anything with the Wind Cane.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Thoughts on this match only because I'm short on time and it's the only one I spent any time looking up:

Locke vs Tricia: So I haven't mathed this out, but I think Tricia's got a really good shot here. She's long-ranged, so unlike what Dhyer's numbers say, she should have no trouble getting her Limit attack by Turn 3 (and Turn 2 with the counters). I think it would play out like this:

Locke: Attack (Tricia counter)
Tricia: Move & High Ground (Atk/Crt up)
Locke: slightly-boosted Attack (boosted Tricia counter)
Tricia: Move (Tricia's STM is now low enough to use her Limit) & boosted Attack + Nova Storm.
I suspect this kills, but if not, then Locke is probably low enough health that his damage is enough to finish Tricia off? If not, then Tricia's counter + another boosted Attack+NovaStorm definitely does.

[Pyro]

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF): I don't think the MT triggers the Aura counters. So two applications of that and an Energy Drain should do it, since ITD owns FE bosses as a rule.
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia)

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss): Should be a better boss slugger.
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series): Rune's magic is even ITE? Why? By attacker's definition it would check her evade and magic score (no reason to assume his magic is ITE). By defender's definition it checks her awesome RES score. Even besides that, he is so negligibly above average that I think her above-average Range counts for more and she would go first anyway, shish-kabobing him.

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII): Buff and win.
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire): Little more love for VP2 light warriors than most.

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete): Two Ice Walls and that should be good.
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters): I'll agree with Dhyer, sure. He's mathed out SN pretty extensively and hypes them regularly, so when he says she loses to Locke, whose pdur he respects less than I do...

[Dhyerwolf]

Thoughts on this match only because I'm short on time and it's the only one I spent any time looking up:

Locke vs Tricia: So I haven't mathed this out, but I think Tricia's got a really good shot here. She's long-ranged, so unlike what Dhyer's numbers say, she should have no trouble getting her Limit attack by Turn 3 (and Turn 2 with the counters). I think it would play out like this:

Locke: Attack (Tricia counter)
Tricia: Move & High Ground (Atk/Crt up)
Locke: slightly-boosted Attack (boosted Tricia counter)
Tricia: Move (Tricia's STM is now low enough to use her Limit) & boosted Attack + Nova Storm.
I suspect this kills, but if not, then Locke is probably low enough health that his damage is enough to finish Tricia off? If not, then Tricia's counter + another boosted Attack+NovaStorm definitely does.

This has her losing 25 STM prior to attacking turn 2 (10 from Counters, 10 from Movement, 5 from Attacking turn 1. She needs to lose at least 26, and I don't think you could select the option without losing the 26 either (so could not just kick in in the middle of the attacking round).

[Nephrite]

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia) - I have a lot of respect for Cid's offense, but probably a lot more for Giant Stairs HP.

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss) - Don't really think he can punch past the limit. Nel got robbed.
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII) uhhhhhh
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)

[Dark Holy Elf]

I don't think the MT triggers the Aura counters

Now that I think about it, you're probably right. Hmm, rethinking.

Rune's magic is even ITE? Why?

The physical skills (not spells, or techs as PS4 calls them) are uniformly ITE, so I tend to assume the magical skills are too. They aren't shut off by silence if you need further wishy-washy evidence.

Defender's definition of status checks gives this to Elincia cleanly (since it either checks Evade or Res, neither is good news for Rune) but I tend towards attacker's definition if there's translatable mechanics on how that works (i.e. stat checks, not "well it checks status resistance only monsters in the home game have").

[Dhyerwolf]

Godlike

Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia)- People who give Cid far more respect find this close, so this should be easy.

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)- Isn't Legretta's defense a notable cut. Galcian is hitting the wrong stat. He may have better damage at the start (And honestly, with the defense, maybe not), but she has a big damage unlock on 75% HP and is probably getting at least two turns in that range with her defense.

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)- I mean...if Haste is just a 27% boost, then that kind of throws out part of the buff because that will never be good enough for a triple (Dekar is slow, but not 63.5% even at 25% SD). This would mean that Hope would need to get above 65% PC HP damage buffed. Now, I think Faith is a 40% damage boost and Hope's damage is very near average if given Commando, so that's only 56% PC HP damage. Dekar's HP is monsterous. Some other buff I'm missing or is Faith better? Vote changed.
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI)[/b] vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)- Move. Up. Hype.

[superaielman]

I was under the impression Faith was a much bigger boost in practice. He doesn't even have to 2HKO Dekar to start with, just be able to 2HKO and lock Dekar down before he lands a critical hit.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Yeah, if he does 112% (say) over his near-constant doubles, then he can heal-lock with much less to avoid triggering an IP. (Even easier for me since I don't give Dekar the IP from the attack he took last, but honestly I don't think that interp is necessary.) It's a good fight if you both bar Hope from Commando, but otherwise, not really buying it.

[Luther Lansfeld]

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia)

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)

[SnowFire]

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)
More Charlton getting OHKO'd.
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia)
Battle of the supertanks.

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)
Not particularly close to me.

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)
Well, Ravager Hope *almost* has average damage post-Faith.  And Dekar has mildly below average Magic Resist, so it probably is average damage.  Problem is that Dekar has 142% Avg. HP apparently, so Hope's stuck with a 4HKO.  I'd easily vote his direction if he had a 3HKO - with the doubles he gets, he'd force healing with a single attack chain.  But that isn't true with a 4HKO, and Dekar can also equip Tough Hide for IP-efficient healing, and slowly build up IP for Attack-buffing according to the stat topic.  So not sure 4HKO Hope going aggro is really a winning strategy.  That said, the stat topic doesn't say what Dekar's critical rate is.  If it's bad enough, I'd be willing to see a summon happening first.  (Not 100% on starting CP.  It still takes a loong time to activate a summon, but maybe not THAT long for 0 CP.)  super, do you have a rough guess?

EDIT: See Tal.

[Talaysen]

Ravager Hope can also cast an En-element buff  to increase his damage as well.

[superaielman]

Snowfire: Dekar's critical hit rate is weapon dependant. His only DL weapon that does is the Dekar blade, which has a 10% crit rate.

[SnowFire]

Ah, thanks Tal.  Critical question is moot since I should update that damage chart in the FF13 topic, I didn't know about the En-Water boosting Water damage and the like at the time.  But yeah, if Hope was managing .4 PCHP damage before post-MagResist, now he does .56 PCHP damage, which is a 3HKO.  Hope buffs up, attack (intentionally wait if double, saving double for next round) -> Force Tough Hide healing -> repeat.  If Dekar ever doesn't heal, then finish the 3HKO on the double and kill.  Hope doesn't donate much extra IP because he can chip nearly perfectly on his first attack such that his next 2 will kill, and eventually he summons after a heal-lock of some length of time.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Thoughts on this match only because I'm short on time and it's the only one I spent any time looking up:

Locke vs Tricia: So I haven't mathed this out, but I think Tricia's got a really good shot here. She's long-ranged, so unlike what Dhyer's numbers say, she should have no trouble getting her Limit attack by Turn 3 (and Turn 2 with the counters). I think it would play out like this:

Locke: Attack (Tricia counter)
Tricia: Move & High Ground (Atk/Crt up)
Locke: slightly-boosted Attack (boosted Tricia counter)
Tricia: Move (Tricia's STM is now low enough to use her Limit) & boosted Attack + Nova Storm.
I suspect this kills, but if not, then Locke is probably low enough health that his damage is enough to finish Tricia off? If not, then Tricia's counter + another boosted Attack+NovaStorm definitely does.

This has her losing 25 STM prior to attacking turn 2 (10 from Counters, 10 from Movement, 5 from Attacking turn 1. She needs to lose at least 26, and I don't think you could select the option without losing the 26 either (so could not just kick in in the middle of the attacking round).

Hey, you're right! Okay, so instead of using High Ground turn 1, she uses Long Range, giving her the one extra point she needs during her second movement phase.

[Jo'ou Ranbu]

Doesn't that make her damage worse, though?

[DjinnAndTonic]

Well, it's no longer boosted, but all of her real damage is coming from her limit Nova Storm. I think she's better off going for it. It wouldn't be such a close match if Tricia wasn't at a type disadvantage against thieves for her damage. Still, interesting match in Light counts for something~

[Dhyerwolf]

Well...yeah, that would actually do it. A use for Movement Up in the DL. This does about 310 damage overall considering typing (Not enough to normally get Tricia to a kill point, but she gets there against Locke Pdur). Vote changed.

Dekar/Hope changed too.

[Lance]

Godlike
Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)

Heavy
Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)

Middle
Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII)
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light
Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)

[Monkeyfinger]

Godlike

Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia): Kneejerk. I can't be bothered crunching numbers but I do know I take endgame RH levels at about 10 levels higher than the stat topic does, so I feel apocrypha really isn't all that strong.

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series)

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII): Skip for now.
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete)
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters)

[DjinnAndTonic]

Proper voting!

Godlike

Ashera (Fire Emblem: Radiant Dawn) vs Charlton Blunt (Wild ARMs XF)
Cid Raines (Final Fantasy XIII) vs Apocrypha (Radiant Historia) - I'm pretty generous to Cid's durability, which is probably enough.

Heavy

Galcian (Skies of Arcadia) vs Legretta (Tales of the Abyss)
Rune Walsh (Phantasy Star IV: End of the Millenium) vs Elincia (Fire Emblem Series) - Attacker's status rates is generally what I take. I can see the argument for the other way, though. Will think more on the subject later, but if I took Defender's definition of status resistance, then doesn't that imply that Rune's base rate is 100%? Headache. EDIT: Sure, what Pyro said.

Middle

Dekar (Lufia II: Rise of the Sinistrals) vs Hope Estheim (Final Fantasy XIII) - Does starting with 50% IP give this to Dekar? EDIT: Sure, what super said.
Syphide (Valkyrie Profile 2: Silmeria) vs Sara (Breath if Fire)

Light

Kahn (Breath of Fire IV) vs Mia Ausa (Lunar: Silver Star Story Complete) - yay Kahn~
Locke Cole (Final Fantasy VI) vs Tricia (Soul Nomad & The World Eaters) - Been discussed.

[superaielman]

Djinn: Nope, Dekar can't quite use two uses of Berserker from half IP (Which he would need to OHKO Hope with a normal physical).