Nyarlathotep's Dungeon: Week 118

[Nephrite]

"Hm... I suppose I'll have to make things a bit more interesting sometime soon..."


Link to the Dungeon Wiki!

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**Full Heals reset limit and other types of gauges when teams pass through them.
**Characters that join after the start are locked into the relative stats they have at that time until they would officially join.

Team Piggyman | Ramza, Aika, Shadow (MT), Sharanda, Bowser
[Ramza: Ninja, Item, MP Switch, Attack UP, and Move-MP Up] (Time Mage, Oracle, Geomancer, Monk, Chemist)
Floor 6b: Overachievers
Team Piggyman vs. Ashera and Dheginsea
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Katrina and Charlton Blunt (XF)
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Neo Exdeath and Gilgamesh
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Profound Darkness and Dark Force 3
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Izanami and Kunino-Sagiri

Team Snowfire | Yuri2 (as Trode), Guv, Yangus, Jessica, Angelo (SSL)
Floor 2a: Adventuring (Earlygame)
Team Snowfire vs. Alex, Kyle and Luna
Team Snowfire vs. Jack, Cecilia and Rudy(all WA:ACF)
Team Snowfire vs. Colm, Jaffar and Matthew
Team Snowfire vs. Killey (S2) and Lorelai (S5)
Team Snowfire vs. Boss Zed and Boomerang 2 (ACF)

Team Djinn | Team Djinn | Mei-Ling, Whimsicott(MT), Nina1, Ryu1, Gilder
Floor 2a: Adventuring (Earlygame)
Team Djinn vs. Alex, Kyle and Luna
Team Djinn vs. Jack, Cecilia and Rudy(all WA:ACF)
Team Djinn vs. Colm, Jaffar and Matthew
Team Djinn vs. Killey (S2) and Lorelai (S5)
Team Djinn vs. Boss Zed and Boomerang 2 (ACF)

Team Andy | Ramza, Chemist, Ninja, Worker 8, Beowulf (Spillover JP allowed)
[Ramza: Time Mage, Item, Auto-Potion, EQUIP CHANGE, MOVE-FIND ITEM]
Floor 2b: Magical Mystery
Team Andy vs. FFT Wizard, Oracle, Priest, Summoner and Time Mage
Team Andy vs. Sarah (S3), Estella, Joker and Piccolo
Team Andy vs. Lemina, Ronfar and Borgan (EBC)
Team Andy vs. Lyon and Riev
Team Andy vs. Narshe Kefka

Team Random | Yuri2, Hilda, FFT Chemist, Raquel (Speed?), Raynie
Floor 3a: Unified Strength
**On this floor, party HP is pooled together. If someone is fatally statused, likewise if a character is hit with gravity, that health should be removed.
Team Random vs. Crono, Marle, Lucca, Frog and Robo
Team Random vs. Adramelk and Velius
Team Random vs. Seymour Omnis

Multitarget - One person on the team's actions all become Multitargetted. Moves that were originally MT are not affected by this. Movable.
Damage is reduced by 33%.
Healing is reduced by 33%. (Kindness Drops is 67% MT Healing)
Status hit rates are reduced by 33% (Deadly Fingertips has a 67% chance to ID multiple targets)
Buff and debuff -effects- are reduced by 33%. In the case of moves that reflect damage or effects, this Sealstone has no effect. In a case such as Vanish or Delta Shield, the damage is reduced by 67%.

Status Symbol Law - Team is fully status, debuff and ID immune, but has damage done to them increased by 1.1x and damage done by them decreased to .9x.

Speed? - The effective speed of one character is set to 120% (1.2x) average speed. This number may be further increased by Haste effects.

Spillover Sealstone - I have no idea how spillover JP works, you all get to figure that one out.

[Nephrite]

I'll probably cut down on the teams to 3 or 4 again whenever someone does lose, sorry if it's a bit overwhelming at the moment.

[SnowFire]

More analysis on Team Piggyman later, but FWIW, I at first thought the Radiant Dawn bosses might be tricky - MT physicals & MT magic on both of them makes choosing between Delta Shield & MT Vanish useless, they'll both suck.  However, Ramza has like the most YOLO setup possible right now, and Shadow's throws ignore defense, so ninja bros just smash themselves a Dragon.  Miranda can handle Ashera (doesn't even fear her Silence!).  The WAXF fight looks easy too.  FF5 could be tricky though, Ramza can kill NeoExdeath's back, but Shadow's MT throws don't KO all of the NeoExdeath parts, and Gilgamesh has that pile of extra HP in the Dungeon where waiting out 4 more turns is far more deadly.  (Ramza easily KOs his "runaway" HP).  So Gilgamesh might get off a lot of status nonsense.  Probably still doable, of course.

--
For my team, as per usual, Yuri wants to sink all his fusion energy into Light ASAP to get Raise Up.  This is doable enough in-game though you usually won't, but Dungeon Yuri always wants to do this.  I'm assuming you allow this, this floor gets rockier if Angelo is the only reviver.

Team Snowfire vs. Alex, Kyle and Luna
Just blitz.  Yuri2 slightly outraces Alex I think, which helps, although Alex's elemental halving means Jessica will want to TDL despite the rando-targetting.  Anyway, whoever gets hit by TDL can get finished off by Yuri & Angelo, and Luna surely won't survive to see a turn (but don't leave her for Guv, Alex can Blue Dragon Heal when he goes).  If everything goes wrong, Guv & Yangus can uh play healer.
Team Snowfire vs. Jack, Cecilia and Rudy(WA:ACF)
Kill Cecilia.  The other two don't have any MT as best I can tell, so they can at best try to rush down Yuri2.
Team Snowfire vs. Colm, Jaffar and Matthew
Jessica casting Accelerate & Angelo casting Kabuff goes a long way to making these guys suck, now they aren't doubling and are doing puny damage.  Most of the non-Yangus offense ignores counters anyway (Guv's boomerang, Angelo's Whack, Jessica's TDL when it hits different targets or just plain Bang if she wants to play it safe).
Team Snowfire vs. Killey (S2) and Lorelai (S5)
Frail mages.  TDL + Angelo & Yuri beatdown away.
Team Snowfire vs. Boss Zed and Boomerang 2 (ACF)
From the stat topic, Zed does .65 PCHP, Boomerang does exactly .50.  Yuri2 has 1.09 PCHP at endgame, but also good defense (unsure how much it helps).  Let's assume Yuri2 goes down to the initial assault.  I think I still win, unless you see these bosses as notably tanky?  Angelo casts Kabuff, reducing them to needing 3 actions to kill a target, and everyone beats down.  Guv doesn't lose much damage at this stage going for a boomerang, either, and him or Angelo can use ST healing if needed, as well.  Just takes too long for the bosses to get anyone else dodge - 2 more actions each at minimum - that giving up that much offense to my team should wipe 'em.  (and if Yuri2 lives, then lol of course.)

[Dark Holy Elf]

Although I don't think it tilts any fights, I feel obliged to point out that Kabuff sucks (in DQ8 anyway, yes Super I know Cristo's version is good). It raises Def by 25%, and each point of DQ8 def takes off only 0.25 damage. At endgame, Kabuff reduces damage by ~15. Even if you assume an average enemy multiplier of 2 (generous, but hey DQ8 bosses doubleact), this is a 20% reduction of damage. And that's... really probably an overestimate (said aforementioned bosses certainly do more than 75 per swing anywhere near lategame), so I'd eyeball it closer to a 1/6 reduction myself. Of course it could tilt some fights in the dungeon still (turning an XHKO into an (X+1)HKO can sometimes be all you need), but it doesn't make anyone's damage puny.

Buff, the ST version, is a bit better if you really need one specific person to live; it's twice as potent.

[Dhyerwolf]

Team Piggyman | Ramza, Aika, Shadow (MT), Sharanda, Bowser
[Ramza: Ninja, Item, MP Switch, Attack UP, and Move-MP Up] (Time Mage, Oracle, Geomancer, Monk, Chemist)
Floor 6b: Overachievers
Team Piggyman vs. Ashera and Dheginsea- Defensive tricks work well here, as well as decent MT offense. Should be okay.
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Katrina and Charlton Blunt (XF)
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Neo Exdeath and Gilgamesh- So Gilgy is pretty much mostly physical status right? Neo Exdeath...

OH blah NEO Exdeath.

OH blah NEO Exdeath.

So much for keeping dungeon simple.

Dunno.

(Please never use Neo Exdeath again? I have a feeling that I wouldn't be alone on that request)
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Profound Darkness and Dark Force 3- So Aika means they can just take DF 3 in full before PD. Granted, PS 4 doesn't really delineate whether Shadow Bind and DF 3's Sleep are magical or physical (Shadow Bind would just kind of really suck for the team overall).

Once they focus on PD 3, the worry is that PD has an OHKO ITE physical.
*Full Heal*
Team Piggyman vs. Izanami and Kunino-Sagiri- Kunino starts all magic, but Megidolaon should ignore Delta Shield (use "magic" spell that ignores the reflect so...) and Mind Charge + that is scary. Kind of worry here. Sharanda has no damage. Shadow's damage is split across the two, so not great at blitzing. Aika is DSing to keep one of them at bay. My gut here is that the team doesn't like this floor. A lot of people get around the defensive quirks, and beyond that, the team doesn't really hold up on a defensive front. Willing to hear arguments.

Team Andy | Ramza, Chemist, Ninja, Worker 8, Beowulf (Spillover JP allowed)- Can someone remind me the mechanics of spillover JP? Something should be hammened down here
[Ramza: Time Mage, Item, Auto-Potion, EQUIP CHANGE, MOVE-FIND ITEM]

Others later

[SnowFire]

Dhyer: Come on, NeoExdeath is not THAT hard.  (Or, to the extent he is hard to interpret, he's no worse than lots of others used.  Yes I'm biased due to writing the stat topic entry.)  The worst thing about him is the interp split between "force multipart bosses to have 1 part with moves of all 4" and actually giving him all 4 parts, but he's fairly simple in both, and he's far frailer than Castle Exdeath, so many teams will just smoke him before he gets going.  (.5 - .6 PCHP?  Characters like Zerase just MT OHKO him and render the point totally moot.  And if you reduce him to 1 part, he just sucks forever and you can vote a free win.)  It's just more awkward with Piggyman's team because Shadow's MT doesn't cut it here.  (Although if you reduce NeoExdeath to one part, then Ramza just smashes it, the end.)

I guess there's the usual AI arguments about "how spammable is Grand Cross, can he skip the charge time and use it turn 1," but that's no different than hordes of other bosses, and it's usually moot anyway for most teams due to the durability problems mentioned above.

[SnowFire]

Also, for spillover JP, really Andy should be telling us the secondaries that he's setting on Chemist / Beowulf / Ninja as well, but this early it just means that Chemist probably has Throw (better than BASIC SKILL) and Beowulf & Ninja have Item with far fewer options than Chemist (probably not Auto-Potion yet, probably just Potion & PDown).  I wouldn't let them get anything useful out of Time Magic this early.

Long-term it means that the entire non-W8 team will have Auto-Potion & Item is the big thing, and Chemist can either have Throw for okay damage or maybe get something off whatever Ramza is doing, especially if Ramza picks the same class twice.

[Nephrite]

I will replace Exdeath and Gilgamesh with something else for next time. =)

[DjinnAndTonic]

Voting a pass for my team on the assumption that enough of them are status bait and fall prey to MT initiative whimsicott status shenanigans that my damage dealers can finish off the threats.

The only one that looks troublesome are the wild arms bosses. I'm just gonna hype Mei ling damage and hope for the best. No time to look up stuff this week.

[Dhyerwolf]

Team Snowfire | Yuri2 (as Trode), Guv, Yangus, Jessica, Angelo (SSL)
Floor 2a: Adventuring (Earlygame)
SSL will not be kind overall to this team. They often need to rush a lot of people. So DQ 8 has like 200 skill points at endgame. After floor 2 of 7, this will be 56ish (skill points...were generally even I think). So
Yuri 2- Sole reviver
Guv- Slowish Whatever
Yangus- Slowish Whatever Mk 2?
Jessica- TDL, Accelerate, Bounce
Angelo- Bounce
Team Snowfire vs. Alex, Kyle and Luna- Hmm, I'll say that it appears that there are a lot of times that Yuri, who is basically near dead average speed is needing to go before people. Did Accelerate kick in the turn Jessica cast it?

I also should note that I don't think Angelo has revival now? First learns Zing at L19, right? So then Raise Up Yuri is the only reviver.
Team Snowfire vs. Jack, Cecilia and Rudy(all WA:ACF)- Turn order is probably
Jessica
Jack
Angelo
Yuri
Cecilia
Guv
Rudy
Yangus

Jessica has non focusing damage, but needs to hit Cecilia so probably uses something worse (unless Angelo and Yuri can kill her, which is questionable given SSL?). Jack hits someone. Guv heals someone Jack hit. Here's where the nastiness may start though. Rudy can Arc Nova, which is GT. This kills Jessica, and leaves anyone else hit by it in the danger zone where Jack can easily pick them off. Now...GT, so how many is will get is arguable. It's also about 80% hit rate, which helps. But killing Jessica+one other person puts Snowfire's team on a heavy defensive position. Now a lot of the rest of the floor depends on Jessica being alive, which means that Yuri needs to revive her (with a weak revival) while the others kill Rudy/Jack at the perfect time without incurring most casualties.
Team Snowfire vs. Colm, Jaffar and Matthew- Accelerate better be kicking in turn 1, or else Yuri is probably just dead.
Team Snowfire vs. Killey (S2) and Lorelai (S5)- Both should go before Yuri, but Bounce helps a lot in protecting a few. However, Lorelai will aim at someone who doesn't have Bounce and Killey can finish off at least one (if you told me that Jessica was OHKOed by Killey under SSL, I would not be surprised). So they have to bounce Jessica and Yuri. Goodbye to Guv.
Team Snowfire vs. Boss Zed and Boomerang 2 (ACF)- Who knows how many people even come into this match. They deal with it everyone alive, but tending to doubt that's the case.

Team Djinn | Team Djinn | Mei-Ling, Whimsicott(MT), Nina1, Ryu1, Gilder
Floor 2a: Adventuring (Earlygame)
Mei-Ling
Whimsicott- 50% MT Paralysis (which...wait, is not so hot is it), 33% MT Magic Up (which is...not remotely relevant)
Nina1-
Ryu1- MT damage
Gilder- Is Gilder, is not good

So...just as a synthesis, team isn't jelling too well. Mei-Ling has initiative decent ST damage. Does Whimsicott have anything decent right now? Nina 1 is a slow start (and her spell progression is slow. She learns spells on floor 8 of dungeon). Gilder is Gilder. Mei-Ling is the obvious target since she's the sole reviver.
Team Djinn vs. Alex, Kyle and Luna-
Team Djinn vs. Jack, Cecilia and Rudy(all WA:ACF)- So...Rudy OHKO Mei-Ling (piercing damage!). Fort might save her though.
Team Djinn vs. Colm, Jaffar and Matthew-
Team Djinn vs. Killey (S2) and Lorelai (S5)
Team Djinn vs. Boss Zed and Boomerang 2 (ACF)- Much like Snowfire's floor, this basically comes down to the enemies leveling everything at one PC. At least this team is better at getting threats out earlier I think (Boomerang+Mei-Ling), but unsure. Definitely a somewhat uphill battle, although it would help if Whim has something good.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Uphill battle at the end shouldn't be too bad. If Gilder gets enough turns, he actually gets to use one of his damage S-Moves which should be breaking the damage curve this early on.

More Leech Seed hype goes here because clearly it will keep my whole party alive. (that or Nina1)

[SnowFire]

Elf: I realize that Kabuff was not THAT amazing, but thanks for pointing that out.  I was more thinking "subtractive defense buff vs. low-base damage dealers in a game also with subtractive defense" so Kabuff is better than usual vs. Fire Emblem thieves, and more importantly, Jessica's Accelerate IS turning off their doubling, and that is really what's hosing their damage.

Dhyer: Skill point gains are not random in DQ8: 
http://www.rpgdl.com/wiki/index.php/Dragon_Quest_8_Stuff
I would also certainly see L19 as "Floor 2" ish.  Levels 1-10 come very fast in DQ8 (Angelo joins at what, L12?) so the levels-per-floor is not constant.  But yes, if you deny Angelo Zing, then the team absolutely has problems because all enemies just want to rush down Yuri, and the team has to fight super-defensively as a result.

As for SSL, uh, the DQ8 crew is kind of bait to status, so there are various fights on Floor 4 onward that are basically 100% guaranteed losses without SSL.  Sure, they might lose anyway due to the damage problems of course, but better to at least have a chance then get owned by any sort of MT status!  (Okay there's uh MAGIC BARRIER hype off Jessica but yeah no.)

Accelerate doesn't affect initiative the turn it is cast to my knowledge, that's already precalculated.  However I would certainly see it affecting the *stat* immediately which is what matters as far as Fire Emblem is concerned.  See Resolve for example, according to Elf if you knock a character into Resolve range, it instantly recalculates and might let the Resolve'd character get a double off.  I guess you can argue that Accelerate itself is a belated effect, but that would be *really weird* and not how the vast majority of such things work, and is probably not true anyway (I think there's some minor defensive boost from the extra agility, and I want to think it does kick in immediately?).

Bounce is self-only, I think, so Jessica won't be protecting others with it.  (Correct me if I'm wrong?)  However, Angelo is fast too, I definitely question Killey surviving to get an action off here.

[AndrewRogue]

I haven't been provided much in the way of specifics for how Spillover JP works, so it might come down to interp? I'd favor rushing Auto-Potion over wasting time on Item at the moment, but it all comes down to how it works.

[superaielman]

You want Phoenix Down (90 JP), auto potion (400).  The rest is skippable for now.

[ThePiggyman]

Uphill battle at the end shouldn't be too bad. If Gilder gets enough turns, he actually gets to use one of his damage S-Moves which should be breaking the damage curve this early on.

More Leech Seed hype goes here because clearly it will keep my whole party alive. (that or Nina1)

Out of curiosity, how would MT Leech Seed work? If you count it as a status, it's 60% accurate, so probably doesn't hit everyone. If you count it as a drain-type attack, then it drains 8.3% on everyone per turn. I haven't played much Pokemon, so I wouldn't know, but based on how the move works, if Whimsicott is the one using Leech Seed, wouldn't Whimsicott be the recipient of all the drainage-healing?

As for my floor, I'll be actually voting and analyzing in a little while. For the most part, I'm banking on the same tricks as before, although Ramza outspeeding an enemy with MP Switch/Move-MP Up could be life-saving, too (maybe), especially if I can just bull-rush one of the bosses, and have it be Ramza + whoever's still alive vs. the other boss. Status and double-acting make that trickier against some of the bosses, though.

[Dhyerwolf]

Okay, Zing helps kind of (50% chance is dicey), but Bounce being Self Only doesn't. Can Jessica/Angelo reliably take out both Lorelai and Killey (reliably, so TDL isn't great) with Lorelai cutting Fire/Lightning/Wind 40% at default and SSL giving a 10% damage penalty? Gut reaction is that it isn't a great shot.

Rudy is also still pretty dangerous overall I think.

Also noting that they may not take out Alex turn 1 by your own analysis. This is a bit horrific, because the team's MT healing is not great.

How is early DQ 8 MP holding up? Feels like Jessica is needing to throw out a lot of spells (even something like the FE fight, she's needing to constantly recast Accelerate in addition to using damage and hoping it hits). I'll look at it more later, but there are a lot of worries.

[DjinnAndTonic]

Leech seed's recipient can be any one on the team, though the MT seal stone might make it multitarget on my team's end as well?

[ThePiggyman]

Leech seed's recipient can be any one on the team, though the MT seal stone might make it multitarget on my team's end as well?

That's what I think needs clearing up: what exactly becomes MT? What happens if Leech Seed is used in-game in a Double Battle, just for reference? Can you use it on both opponents? I think whatever happens if you have one Pokemon use Leech Seed on both opposing Pokemon would be a good example of how it would translate in the Dungeon with the MT Sealstone.

[Dark Holy Elf]

Leech Seed heals the user, or whomever the user has switched to. I believe a single user can have multiple Leech Seeds active in double battles, though I can't actually recall doing this myself to check. Leech Seed can not heal allies unless you switch to said allies, which probably isn't a thing that happens here. edit: Personally, I'd see a MT Leech Seed being equivalent to hitting every enemy at once with Leech Seed (applying whichever of accuracy of damage penalty you find is easier to parse for dungeon voting, but ymmv).

[ThePiggyman]

I'm actually not so sure I pass anymore. I honestly don't think my team can handle Ashera. I'll start by throwing out that I give Ashera full credit for the Auras. Although Dheginsea's got a triple lightning weakness, Shadow's damage is hurt by the MT Sealstone, and Ramza is getting countered regardless whether I attack or throw a Lightning Ball (I'm not even sure which will do more damage: one hits into godlike defenses, the other does garbage damage prior to the weakness.) I'm not sure I can bum-rush Dheginsea, and even if I do, it means that no one will have Vanish, and half my team will have already been hurt pretty bad. Ramza's MP Switch trick isn't going to work because of the return damage, and his durability is bad if he reaches 0 MP.

Snowfire mentioned that Sharanda can handle Ashera, but I don't see it. I'm on Floor 6, so the item damage is pretty much below average now, and it's ramming into Ashera's resistance, which borders on immunity.

I'm going with a Fail for myself, but if you don't have the same respect for Ashera I do, you might see me passing.

For what it's worth, I think I'd have failed the other floor even harder, haha.

[SnowFire]

ThePiggyman: I thought that Miranda has MT item heals?  My theory was that Ramza + Shadow can just smash Dheginsea.  Dheginsea is all about the subtractive defense hype, but Ramza has very high damage (even if it's in 2 shots), and Shadow's Throw is ITD, so it's acutally perfect for breaking through.  Dheingsea's HP is actually not all that special, so if you're able to get damage in, I'm willing to hype it.  Ashera...  sure she has MT damage, but as noted, I thought Miranda could just heal it off.  I'm also not one for hyping Aura reflect-damage much vs. MT damage, so Shadow doesn't commit suicide when he attacks everyone to finish off Dheginsea to me.  (but even if he did, that might be okay.)

Okay, Zing helps kind of (50% chance is dicey), but Bounce being Self Only doesn't. Can Jessica/Angelo reliably take out both Lorelai and Killey (reliably, so TDL isn't great) with Lorelai cutting Fire/Lightning/Wind 40% at default and SSL giving a 10% damage penalty? Gut reaction is that it isn't a great shot.

Well, TDL damage is nuts the whole game, so my theory in a lot of fights is just to TDL anyway, and then finish off whoever it hit who should be deeply wounded.  I doubt I'll kill *both* them, sure, but I should be able to kill one, probably Lorelai.  I don't think the other one can inflict enough lasting damage.  I suppose if you see Lorelai as faster than Angelo then there are problems, though.

The emergency holy shit option is for Jessica & Angelo to both cast Bounce, then turtle & kill one and land Silence on the other, then heal everyone.  I suppose that might be a bit MP intensive, but it's there.  (The Fizzle option also helps for healing up if, say, TDL + Angelo kill Lorelai, then turtle & throw around all the ST healing while waiting for Fizzle to hit, then heal up.)

Rudy is also still pretty dangerous overall I think.

Also noting that they may not take out Alex turn 1 by your own analysis. This is a bit horrific, because the team's MT healing is not great.

Yeah, Alex living is bad, but those Dragon Lashes have to hit SOMEONE.  If the team eats a Red Dragon Anger, oh well; it probably means that Kyle & Luna are eating damage (although I suppose Luna is just a healer vs. SSL).

How is early DQ 8 MP holding up? Feels like Jessica is needing to throw out a lot of spells (even something like the FE fight, she's needing to constantly recast Accelerate in addition to using damage and hoping it hits). I'll look at it more later, but there are a lot of worries.

Accelerate costs like 3 MP, it's very spammable; TDL's cost is also piddles.  If Jessica is using Bang, that can eat her MP a lot faster (I want to say it cost around 15 MP?), but she only needs to use it rarely, like the Fire Emblem fight.  Also, Accelerate's duration is not THAT short?  If it's worn off, than something's gone terribly wrong in the Fire Emblem fight, Guv boomerangs should solve it eventually.  Also, worst comes to worst and Guv is dead or something, Angelo spams Thwack from behind defense buffing, status attacks don't trigger counters and target crappy Thief Resistance.  Not a great hit rate but it'll eventually hit, and post-Accelerate / Kabuff the FE team only really threatens Team DQ8's healing with a critical.

Anyway, don't get me wrong, the lack of MT healing early on in DQ8 is definitely a problem.  However, it's usually okay to let one big shot of MT damage resolve; it's only if the team hasn't put the fight away by round 2 that the lack of MT healing becomes killer, but even then just using a lot of ST healing and giving up most actions can sometimes work.

[ThePiggyman]

ThePiggyman: I thought that Miranda has MT item heals?  My theory was that Ramza + Shadow can just smash Dheginsea.  Dheginsea is all about the subtractive defense hype, but Ramza has very high damage (even if it's in 2 shots), and Shadow's Throw is ITD, so it's acutally perfect for breaking through.  Dheingsea's HP is actually not all that special, so if you're able to get damage in, I'm willing to hype it.  Ashera...  sure she has MT damage, but as noted, I thought Miranda could just heal it off.  I'm also not one for hyping Aura reflect-damage much vs. MT damage, so Shadow doesn't commit suicide when he attacks everyone to finish off Dheginsea to me.  (but even if he did, that might be okay.)

She does, with Healing Breezes. I wasn't aware that Throw damage was ITD, though. I guess that would put a pretty big dent into his HP. FWIW, I do consider Ashera's Auras returning MT damage, since the returned damage is not a counter in any way, by my definition of a counter, at least, although I would consider the damage returned to only be the equivalent of if one Aura was attacked, or otherwise, Ashera would just pretty much murder anyone who even thought about using MT damage, and that's kinda silly. Just my view on it, though.

Anyways, ITD might swing that fight, since that also pierces through the Auras. I guess the only question I'm wondering now is if Sharanda has to attack Dheginsea to finish him off. If Ramza + Shadow can pull it off, I might pass after all, but if not, Sharanda either has to eat a Dheggy counter (lolol) or let Dheginsea get a turn, and if Dheginsea and Ashera combine their MT, that will most probably kill off Sharanda, Shadow, and maybe even Ramza, if he gets caught with his MP at 0 from the Dheginsea counter.

Maybe I'm just being pessimistic here? I just feel like if I go for the Vanishing, I'll just be stuck in an MT heal-lock of sorts, but if I go for the bum-rush, I'm putting myself at risk to just get ripped apart.

[Dhyerwolf]

Thwack is floor 3, so that strategy is out.

Even if TDL is something like 80% at base, that means like it's often (post SSL) two hits of 36%, right? So take something like killing Lorelai, there's probably only a 25% chance of that happening before her turn. Or with Alex, there's a 55% chance one hit of TDL will kill him, but it may be that with only 1 hit of TDL, Angelo and Yuri can't even combine to kill him (especially if Angelo's best is Wind or Yuri's best is magic).

Actually that worries me. Don't think they have anything to reliably clearly to kill Alex minus 2 parts of TDL hitting him. They can recover of course, but needing at minimum 5 actions to get everyone back to full (assuming that one heal gets them back to full; My gut is that DQ 8 healing is like...50% right now, and I doubt Yuri's is either) is horrible. Alex is doing 75% MT after SSL penalty. Then Rudy rolls around next match and kind of ensures that everyone needs to be pretty close to back to full.

Right now I think those first two fights are too much. Fail on Team Snowfire. Bitten by the unpredictability of by far his best damage.

[Dhyerwolf]

Team Andy | Ramza, Chemist, Ninja, Worker 8, Beowulf (Spillover JP allowed)
[Ramza: Time Mage, Item, Auto-Potion, EQUIP CHANGE, MOVE-FIND ITEM]
Floor 2b: Magical Mystery
Team Andy vs. FFT Wizard, Oracle, Priest, Summoner and Time Mage- Ramza's CT is less than enemies as they are endgame and he isn't yet (Granted Time Mage is....not scary). And Beowulf doesn't have CT and should therefore go before them. Regardless, they can get enough of the way to get through it. Beowulf works well for statusing someone out and letting them reset and get back to full.
Team Andy vs. Sarah (S3), Estella, Joker and Piccolo-Two of them can wreak havoc, but not enough to threaten them overall with that level of revival.
Team Andy vs. Lemina, Ronfar and Borgan (EBC)- RONFAR IS THE MOST DANGEROUS PERSON ON THIS FLOOR TO HIM
Team Andy vs. Lyon and Riev
Team Andy vs. Narshe Kefka- Lol lol lol Worker 8 soloes this floor (not 100%, but kind of. Probably should through in a few half way passable physicals so that W8/Aika aren't just 100% auto-wins maybe)

Team Random | Yuri2, Hilda, FFT Chemist, Raquel (Speed?), Raynie
Floor 3a: Unified Strength
**On this floor, party HP is pooled together. If someone is fatally statused, likewise if a character is hit with gravity, that health should be removed.
Team Random vs. Crono, Marle, Lucca, Frog and Robo- Crono rips 40% of the joint HP bar. This is where I get a bit iffy here. So...does this team have any MT healing? Against the CT team, Hilda can ID one person, but...all of them hurt here except for Frog. Marle's Chaos is very effective and her buffs are nasty, Lucca has more MT damage, Robo also has MT damage (albeit not as dangerous). I'm trying to figure out how to best work this. There's 4 PC HP or so left to get through. Raquel hits Lucca for a lot, but Yuri/Raynie/Chemist obviously aren't going to make up another 2.7 PC HP of damage. Honestly feel that this team would have been very well equipped for the other floor 3 variant.
Team Random vs. Adramelk and Velius- If everyone is here, Raquel hits, Adramelk statuses Yuri, Velius statuses Raquel.
Team Random vs. Seymour Omnis- Seymour unscaled. Raquel's physical isn't ITD yet, right? A few of them can play around with his weaknesses

[dude789]

Random and Piggy fail, others pass.