=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= DRAGON QUEST MONSTERS: JOKER WI-FI GUIDE (v1.20) -------- By GorothObarskyr =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= I've seen several requests on the GameFAQs board for a comprehensive guide on wi-fi battles, so I decided I'd help out. At the moment this is a rough guide, since I'm sure I will forget to put in many things that need to be in here. That being said, feel free to comment or make suggestions about what I should add, what you think should be changed, etc. To make suggestions, you can either make a post on the GameFAQs board, or send me an e-mail at [email protected]. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Table of Contents =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Version History I: Wi-fi Basics II: Monster Stats III: Team Roles IV: Offense V: Defense VI: Typical Battles VII: The AI VIII: Rankings IX: Prizes! Contributors Copyright and Contact Information =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Version History =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= 4/27/2008 v1.21 - Modified Acceptable Websites Section 4/18/2008 v1.20 - Added Section IX; Updated Contributors List 3/27/2008 v1.12 - Modified Sections VI and VII; Updated Contributors List 3/18/2008 v1.11 - Modified Sections VII and VIII; Updated Contributors List 3/17/2008 v1.10 - Added Table of Contents, Version History, Contributors Section, Copyright and Contact Information; Modified Sections V, VI, and VII 3/16/2008 v1.00 - First draft; released in GameFAQs forum =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= I: Wi-fi Basics =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= These are the most basic, fundamental rules of wi-fi battling. These are designed to get you into the mode of thinking that you'll need to set up a successful team. 1. Everything I have written in this guide I learned from my own personal experiences. Frankly, if you are new to wi-fi, you can read this guide and think of countless great strategies and team setups based on what I have said, but until you actually start experiencing and getting the feel for wi- fi you will not be able to fully understand or be able to predict how a wi-fi battle will work. So don't be shy; jump into the fray, get some experience under your belt and use this guide only as a helpful resource. 2. If you think up a strategy you think will work really well, don't immediately dismiss it if it hasn't been mentioned by this guide or someone on the board. Who knows, your strategy may be incredibly effective, and people might actually start copying off you! So if you have an idea, by all means try it out! 3. There is no one "best" monster. You will never be able to carry a team with any one monster. You have to design your monsters to support each other, cover each other's weaknesses, and fit in with your overall strategy. Therefore, when you're planning for wi-fi, don't plan out monsters one by one - plan out a team with an overall strategy, and then pick and choose your three monsters based on that strategy. 4. There is no one "best" skill set for any monster. This ties in with the above rule: you must plan your individual monsters based on your overall strategy, so your skill set will also have to be planned based on what role you want your monster to fill in your team. 5. There is no one "best" team. It is impossible to make a team that dominates all other teams. Every team will have its strengths and weaknesses, and you will find that sometimes you will need to substitute in a monster or even an entirely different team in order to overcome a challenge you are faced with. 6. There are always trade-offs in planning your team. Since your monsters only have a limited amount of skill slots, improving your team in one area will mean weakening it in another. For example, having Uber Healer on two of your monsters makes for much more reliable healing, but it means taking a skill slot away from a damage-augmenting, status inflicting, or support skill set. Finding that perfect balance in your team is something you will have to learn yourself, from experience. Whew! Now that I've covered the fundamentals, let's get into the really meaty stuff! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= II: Monster Stats =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= I know people will ask this, so before you start spamming the board with questions about the stat caps of such-and-such monster, check out Zelos71's monster list in the FAQs and Guides section of GameFAQs. It gives synth options, traits, stat caps, and resistances of every monster in the game. Basic explanation of how each stat affects your team's performance: - MONSTER RANK (X, S, A, etc.) - This only affects the growth rate of stats for the monster. A monster of higher rank will have faster stat growth overall. The rank of the monster does not inherently make it stronger than a lower rank monster, and in fact there are many A or lower ranks that are considered superior to some X ranks. Monster rank also has no effect on the monster's resistance to attack or status spells. - +VALUE - This determines the level cap of the monster. A monster with +0-4 will have a level cap of 50, a monster with +5-9 will have a cap of 75, and a monster with +10 or higher will have a level cap of 99. +Value has no other effect on the monster's performance. - HEALTH - Pretty self-explanatory. Health determines how much beating your team can take from the other team before dying. The more health your monsters have, the more resilient your team will be. However, getting more health on your monsters often means sacrificing overlapping of roles or damage-dealing potential. - MANA - Determines how many spells and abilities your monsters can use before they have to stop. In wi-fi, mana is one of the least important stats because of the fact that wi-fi battles last a maximum of 10 rounds, and most times they end before hitting that maximum. Therefore it is only really necessary for a healer to have 360 mp, so that they could theoretically use Omniheal (the most mp-expensive healing spell at 36 mp per cast) every one of the 10 rounds. Attack spell casters will need 550 mp minimum so that they could cast Kaboomle (55 mp) for every round if they needed to. Having mp higher than those two requirements will not make a difference at all in a wi-fi battle. - ATTACK - Determines how much damage you deal with physical attacks, and the damage done by slash abilities (not including Gigaslash and Gigagash, which are actually zap spells). As a rule of thumb, your monsters will deal little or no damage to a monster with a defense stat that is 450 or more points above your attack power. After you have passed that threshold, the damage you deal will increase linearly with an increase in attack power. Critical hits ignore the enemy's defense rating and traits, and do approximately your attack power plus or minus 50. - DEFENSE - Decreases damage taken from the enemy's physical and slash attacks. An approximate equation that seems to work pretty well is Damage = Attack/2 - Defense/4. - AGILITY - This stat influences two things: the order your monsters will go in the battle, and the chance that your monsters will dodge an incoming physical or slash attack. The higher your monster's agility, the earlier your monsters will go in the battle, and the higher chance they will have to dodge an incoming attack. - WISDOM - This stat modifies the damage your monster will do with attack spells. This stat does not affect healing spells like Fullheal and Omniheal because they heal the target to full in any case. Therefore it is only important for mages to have high wisdom, not healers or physical attackers. Wisdom does not decrease damage taken from incoming spells, nor does it affect the chance that a status spell will land on a target. The damage done by legendary abilities like Gigagash and Lightning Storm is modified by the caster's level, not his wisdom. It is important to realize that stats alone do not determine how effective a monster will be. Traits and resistances play as much a role in how much potential a monster has as do its stat caps. Also, the total sum of all a monster's stat caps is a pointless calculation that should be ignored. You will want your monster to have high stat caps in the areas that will help it to best fill its role in your team. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= III: Team Roles =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= - HEALER - This is an essential role in wi-fi, because if you don't have a healer on your team, you will be wiped out in two rounds maximum; many teams can take you out in just one round. Therefore it is required that you have at least one monster on your team with some skill set that includes Omniheal (Uber Healer, Cure-all, Cleric). It is often good to have more than one monster with one of these skillsets, so you will have a backup healer you can switch to if your main healer is taken out. You will want your main healer to be one of the most resilient monsters on your team, since he needs to stay alive in order to keep your team topped off. Traits like Metal Body, Attack Magicproof, and immunity to one of the main attack spells (Bang, Whoosh, Crack) are all very good traits for a healer to have. You will also want your healer to have 999 hp, or as close as you can get to it (if you're using a Darkonium or Gem Slime, you will need 294 hp), and high defense rating (850+ is good). - PHYSICAL ATTACKER - This is a monster that deals damage using physical attacks and slashes. A physical attacker will want high health, high attack (950+ is best), and as high agility as possible to avoid painful dodges by the enemy monsters. You will also want a physical attacker to have some skill set that will augment his damage potential, such as Naturalist, Assassin, Uber Knight, etc. Physical attackers have a disadvantage to mages because they deal less damage and have a chance to be dodged, whereas spells always land and can only be mitigated by resistances. However, physical attackers have their own advantages over mages in that they can damage all monsters, including Metal Body and Attack Magicproof monsters which are immune to mages, and they have a chance to score critical hits. - MAGE - This is a monster that deals damage using single- or multi-target attack spells. A mage should have as much health as possible, decent defense, and high wisdom (900+). Mages do the most overall damage by far of all damage- dealing monsters, and can damage all targets at once. This makes mages a very popular choice for damage-dealing in wi-fi. However, mages can be incredibly ineffective if the enemy team has one or more Metal Body or Attack Magicproof monsters, because they often suffer of low attack power. - STATUS-ER - This is a secondary, optional role that one of your monsters can play to help increase the chances of your victory. A status-er will attempt to inflict status effects such as sleep, paralysis, or confusion on the enemy team in order to inhibit their healing or damage potential. Being able to cast status effects is a nice bonus; however, it means sacrificing a skill slot for Hypnotist, Hive Mind, or similar status-inflicting skill sets. - OVERLAPPING ROLES - As mentioned above in the healer section, having roles overlap onto two or three of your monsters can make for a more stable team overall. You can have two healers on your team to make sure your team is always at full, or to buffer against the chance that your main healer receives a critical hit and dies. Having two status-ers on your team doubles the chance that the enemy monsters will be asleep, paralyzed, or confused at the end of the round. However, like for all good things, there is a trade-off. Overlapping roles makes for a more stable team, but it means using a skill slot that could be used elsewhere for boosting stats or increasing the damage-dealing potential of your team. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= IV: Offense =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Congratulations! You have made it to the phase of the fight where your monsters get to explode, freeze, slash, or otherwise pound the enemy team into oblivion. Excited? ;-) On that note... --- PLAY BY DA RULES --- There are really only two necessities for having a successful offense. I have (very originally) dubbed these two requirements Rule #1 and Rule #2. Rule #1: Your team must be able to deal a minimum of 950 points of damage to at least one of the enemy monsters per round. 1000+ damage is a good thing to shoot for if you want the most effective offense possible. Rule #2: Your team must be able to deal the bulk of its damage in one string of attacks, between the enemy team's heals. --- FULFILLING RULE #1 --- - Options! - Ah, yes! Don't you love when you have options? Specifically you have the option of making a team of mages, a team of physical attackers, or a mixture of the two. Having a team of three mages, or having one or more Double Trouble monsters on your team, are easy ways to get over 1000 damage points per round. As long as you team is able to deal over 1000 damage points per round, you can use any combination of mages, physical attackers, and double troublers that you desire, and your team will be good to go (at least from an offensive standpoint, but more on that later). - Mercurial Thrust - One of the most useful abilities in wi-fi, Mercurial Thrust is an attack that will be used automatically by the AI if there is an enemy monster that is low in health (i.e. able to be killed by the Mercurial Thrust) at the beginning of a wi-fi round. Assuming no monster on the other team is also using Mercurial Thrust, the ability will negate the speed bonus granted by all of the enemy's stats and traits (including Early Bird), and therefore a monster using Mercurial Thrust will always move first in the round. Mercurial Thrust gives you that extra little bit of damage you sometimes need to finish off an enemy monster. Therefore, it makes achieving 1000+ points of damage per turn much easier than it had been before. Mercurial Thrust is modified by attack power, of course, so if you're going to use it, make sure to put it on a monster that has a high attack stat. /--------------------------------------------------------------------------\ Note: Mercurial Thrust does only 75% of your monster's normal physical damage, so a monster with 950+ attack power will do about 200 points of damage with Mercurial Thrust (~60 to metal slimes). Mercurial Thrust also cancels a Double Trouble monster's second attack. \--------------------------------------------------------------------------/ --- FULFILLING RULE #2 --- - Agility Stacking - This idea is fairly simple to understand. If you just throw together a hodgepodge of three random attackers without any regard to their agilities, then you'll have maybe two of you monsters attacking at the beginning of the round and one at the end, or have them all spread out during the round. This may not seem like too big a deal, until you realize that the enemy's healer will have a good chance of landing a heal right in the middle of your assault, basically cutting its effectiveness in half. At best, you would be sitting around for a few rounds waiting for a lucky turn order to pop up, giving the enemy more time to take you out. In the worst case scenario, the enemy team would have more than one healer, and you wouldn't be able to take out any of the enemy monsters no matter how hard you tried. The name of the game in agility stacking is burst damage. You want to be able to deal your 1000 damage points in one clump, between the enemy team's heals. Agility stacking is just what it sounds like. You choose monsters for your wi-fi team which have very similar agility caps, so that they will have a higher chance of having their turns taken next to each other. If you want a fast team, your damage dealers should all have 999 agility or close to it, and if you want a slower team, your damage dealing monsters should all have 400-500 agility. Since your healer will be healing almost every round anyway, he doesn't necessarily have to fit in with this pattern. - Mercurial Thrust - Deja vu anyone? If you have made a slow team that focuses its damage mostly at the end of the round, you will find this ability even more useful than before. Since MT always moves first, it will add to the burst damage you built up at the end of the previous round. - Status-inflicting Abilities - Having a status effect like sleep, paralysis, or confusion on the enemy healer makes it much easier to fulfill Rule #2, since chances are the enemy healer will miss one or two opportunities to heal, doubling or tripling the time window you have to deal all your damage. Using status-inflicting abilities is a strategy that can be used in place of Agility stacking and Mercurial Thrust; however, remember it is not guaranteed that status spells will land... =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= V: Defense =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Hmm...perhaps it would have been better if I had held off on the congratulations at the beginning of the last section. Because if your team can't survive the enemy's assault, there's a good chance you won't be able to get to the fun blow-them-up phase of the battle. Therefore you cannot simply design your team to have a super-powerful offense, because there is a good chance you will have sacrificed very necessary survivability in order to get such a high damage potential. You have to find the balance between a good offense and a good defense. There are two main things associated with a good defense: healing and survivability. -- HEALING -- As important to a good healer as his traits or his stats is the timing of his heals. A good healer is able to control the turn order so that he can heal when the team most needs him. For example, if a healer casts Omniheal after only one of the enemy monsters has taken its turn, then there will be two other enemies attacking later in the round. This means your team will start off the next round with less health than it did the previous round, which leaves the healer's teammates open to being killed with an unlucky turn order. The healer would have been more effective if he had cast his heal after all three of the enemies had taken their turns, so that the team would be healed to full at the end of the assault, and would start the next round with all their health. There are a couple of ways to time your heals in a wi-fi battle. One way is to have a healer with very low agility (500 or under), so that he has a high chance of going last and healing your team to full for the enemy's next assault. The second way is to have a healer with a trait like Early Bird or Last Word, so that they will be guaranteed to go either first or last in the battle. Early Bird is not as effective a trait for healing as Last Word because the Mercurial Thrust ability overrides the Early Bird trait and always attacks first, giving the enemy a chance to finish off a low monster before your Early Bird can heal. A healer with Last Word will never give the enemy a chance to use Mercurial Thrust. /--------------------------------------------------------------------------\ NOTE: It's important to realize that having a healer with 999 agility will not control turn order in many cases. There are countless fast mage teams in wi-fi that are made up of monsters with 999 agility and 999 wisdom. This means it is totally random where your healer will land among the three enemy attackers, and there will inevitably be a string of 4 or 5 enemy spells in a row between your heals, which will destroy your team. \--------------------------------------------------------------------------/ -- SURVIVABILITY -- Yes, that means health! It doesn't matter if your healer has great timing if your monsters die when the enemy so much as sneezes at them. 900 hp is about the bare minimum for survivability in a wi-fi match, with 950 hp and higher being a much more comfortable range. A monster with anything less than 900 hp will have a very hard time staying alive in wi-fi because of all the mage teams out there that do around 950 damage points in a row. 990-999 hp is the premium in survivability because it essentially places your monster above the damage potential of conventional 3-mage teams. Kaboomle rarely hits for more than 330 points of damage, and the other two multi-target spells (Kacrackle, Kaswooshle) do less damage. This means a monster with 999 hp will be able to survive three mage spells 95% of the time. There are occasionally odd spells that hit for around 345 on one of your monsters; however these are rare enough that overall you shouldn't have to worry about them, and besides 999 hp is still often enough to absorb a spell or two like that. However, even 999 hp is not enough to absorb the assault of three double trouble monsters, so in this case you will have to either use status effects to incapacitate the enemy, or bring another healer into your party. Traits also have a lot to do with how resilient your monsters are. Metal Body, Attack Magicproof, and immunity to any of the main mage spells all greatly increase the survivability of a monster in a wi-fi battle. However, realize that these traits are often accompanied by low health and/or low defense caps, stats that will need to be buffed with one or two skill sets. (Thanks to Halectic for the following) The Steady Recovery Trait can also increase a monster's survivability to a certain degree. Steady Recovery will heal a monster of 10% of its health after it has taken its turn in a round. This trait is especially useful when your monster might be taking its turn in the middle of the enemy assault. In this case, Steady Recovery could increase a monster's survivability by up to 10% for that round (80-100 hp), because the heal will effectively subtract damage from the enemy's assault. However, if your monster does not land among the enemy monsters in terms of turn order, Steady Recovery will do nothing to increase survivability. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= VI: Typical Battles =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= This is a list of typical teams that you will most likely face in wi-fi battles, and strategies on how to defeat them. -- LEGITIMATE TEAMS -- The Three Mages: By far the most common team on wi-fi, this team is made up of monsters with Uber Mage, 999 wisdom, and 999 agility. This team will usually attack first, and pummel your team with three top-tier spells (Kaboomle, Kacrackle, Kaswooshle) in the hope of wiping you out in the first round. It is very important to have monsters with high health or high magic resistances to combat this team. Having one or more Metal Body or Attack Magicproof monsters on your team also greatly increases your chance of success. It is very important to have a healer that is able to control turn order in a battle against three mages, so that they don't end up getting 4 or 5 spells in a row and wiping out your team. There is often an Uber Healer or two thrown into these teams also, so don't slack off on your offense. Survive the initial assault, and then hit hard and fast to defeat this team. (Thanks to Halectic for suggesting the following strategy) Another way to avoid getting hit by too many spells in a row is to trick the enemy into healing instead of casting magic at you. An easy way to do this is have a fast mage in your team, that will land somewhere among the enemies in turn order. Set your mage to Show No Mercy, and have a slower healer in your team set to Focus on Healing. There is a very good chance that your mage will go before your team is wiped out, cast a multi-target spell, and do 300+ damage to the enemy team. This could trigger one of the enemy mages to cast Omniheal instead of an attack spell (often the mages on these teams have both Uber Mage and Uber Healer), and your team will survive to attack or heal as needed for the rest of the round. With this strategy, you won't necessarily need high-hp monsters to survive mage teams. Halectic also mentioned setting an Uber Healer monster to Mix It Up on the first round, so it will use Magic Barrier and reduce the damage done by the enemy team to a manageable size. The Attack-First Team: This team is made up of the three early bird monsters in the game: Fencing Fox, Great Sabrecat, and Riptide. This team is designed to kill one of your monsters before you even have a chance to move. Usually one of the monsters will cast a multi-target spell, one will cast a single-target spell, and the last will use a slash. This setup is enough to kill any monster other than those immune to magic, even if the monster has 999 hp. There are a couple of strategies for defeating this team. If you have a double trouble monster with Mercurial Thrust, this first strategy is for you. Sadly, you will have to sacrifice one of your monsters. Put your healer and your DTer on either end of your party, and put the monster you want to be sacrificed between them. Your sacrifice should have less health than your healer or DTer, so that the enemy will go for him on the first round. Round 1: put all your monsters to "Show No Mercy," including your healer. The enemy will take their turns and kill your sacrifice. Your healer will attack once, and you DTer will attack twice for a total of 3 attacks. Round 2: put your healer on "Focus on Healing" and your DTer on "Show No Mercy." Your DTer will use Mercurial Thrust and hopefully finish off one of the enemies before it moves. With only two monsters left, the enemy team will have trouble killing either your healer or your DTer, so your healer will be able to heal both back up to full after the assault. After this point, just keep beating on them with your DTer until they die. Alternatively, you can use your own Early Bird monster with 999 agility to try to put status effects on the enemy team before they can move, giving your healer the ability to heal through the assault. Teams with Metals: These are teams that include one or two metal slimes (usually Gem and/or Darkonium Slime). They usually take the form of three-mage teams, since both GS and DS have 999 wisdom and agility. Therefore everything I've said about surviving three-mage teams applies here also. As for killing them, it would be best to have one or two Double Trouble monsters with high attack to combat these types of teams, so that you will have 3 or 4 attacks per turn while still being able to heal. It is important to use only physical attacks for the first part of the battle - until the metal slime(s) are dead - because using spells will only waste a turn. After the metal slimes are dead, proceed to take out the one or two monsters left with your normal offensive lineup of abilities. The Double-Trouble Team: This is a team made up of three Double Trouble monsters. While pretty rare, this is an extremely difficult team to defeat. There is the benefit that the best Double Trouble monsters are all pretty slow (400-500 agility), so you will usually have the first attack. However, if all three of them are left alive and without status effects on them at the end of your assault, there is a very good chance that one or two of your monsters will be dead by the end of the round, due to the overwhelming offensive power of three Double Trouble monsters. For that reason, it's important to either use status-inflicting abilities on them, or be sure of your ability to take one of them out before they can have their turn. The Annoying Team: This is a team made up of three monsters, one or more of which likes to use status effects on your team. To be honest, battles like this are all luck, especially if there is more than one annoyer on the enemy team. To increase your chances, make sure your monsters don't have any vulnerability to sleep, confusion, or paralysis, and have monsters with high health. Metal Slimes also perform admirably in these battles, since they are immune to status effects. Or... you can bring in your own Early Bird annoyer to incapacitate the enemy team before they're able to put status effects on you. (Thanks to chrishootu for suggesting the following strategy) Since most status-er monsters use breath effects (instead of Kasnooze or Kafuddle, which are rarer), putting a skill set that includes Brake Wind, Gobstopper, or any other anti-breath ability on one of your monsters could be a good counter to the annoying team. Such abilities will only be used against enemies that actually have breath attacks in their arsenal. The Hodgepodge: This is a not very well set up team. You can recognize these teams by the fact that they don't seem to have an overall strategy, they don't hit very hard, and they don't heal efficiently, if at all. If you have followed the advice I have given so far on setting up a good team, then you should have no problem defeating these teams. -- HACKED TEAMS -- The Three Incarni Team: As the name states, this is a team of three incarnus monsters, which is impossible to obtain without hacking. These teams generally fall into the hodgepodge category, or are a bad imitation of a three-mage team. Either way, they are not usually all that difficult to defeat, especially if one of your monsters has Uncarnate. The Infamous Metal Slime Team: This is a team made up of three metal slimes (usually Gem Slime, Darkonium Slime, and Metal King), each of which has been hacked to have 999 hp. This is another three-mage team, so get out those 999 hp monsters of yours. You will also have to sub in an Early Bird with 999 attack and Anti-metal, to make use of Hatchet Man. This monster will alternate using Metal Slash and Hatchet Man on the slimes. It's basically luck whether your Hatchet Man will land a critical on one of the slimes, so cross your fingers. An alternative strategy to beating these teams is to have 999 hp monsters, and a slow healer which heals at the end of a round. Just wait out 10 rounds, healing through the enemy's spells, and then your healer will heal your monsters to full at the end of the last round and give you the win by default. The Unusually Fast Team: This is a team made up of monsters that are usually slow, but that have been hacked to 999 agility to allow them to attack at the beginning of the round. These teams are not usually dangerous, unless they are made up of powerful Double Trouble monsters like Nimzo, Estark, and Belial. To beat hacked DT teams, you will most likely need an attack-first team that can put status effects on the enemy, and then take them out one by one. -- DEALING WITH A MIXTURE OF TEAMS -- (Thanks to preschoolcobra for bringing this up) So I've set out a lot of individual strategies for how to deal with each type of team. However, you have to fight 5 different teams every day, and you have to use the same team for all 5 battles. Therefore the question is: how do you deal with a variety of different team setups? My answer: it all depends on the day. You will have to decide on one team, be it your normal team, or your team with a monster subbed in, that you believe will do the best against all the teams you know you will have to face that day. You will often have to make sacrifices and trade-offs, but wasn't that Basic Rule #6? And once again, experience will be the best guide for you here. But since I can't leave you fumbling with such a lousy answer, I can give you a general idea of what type of team will do well against a wide variety of teams. In this case, the more stable your team, the better. Make surviving a higher priority than attacking, because remember - you don't actually have to kill the enemy team, you just have to last ten rounds. A stable team generally means high health, and a certain amount of overlapping of roles. For example, I have a fast healer (Gem Slime) and a slow healer (Belial) on my team, and I can set whichever one to heal that would do the best job against the team I'm up against. If I'm against a slow team, I use Gem Slime to heal, and if I'm against a fast team, I use my Belial to heal. Building a certain amount of flexibility like this into your team will help you with beating a greater variety of opponents. -- DETERMINING WHO WINS -- Wi-fi decides the winner of a battle in different ways based on which of four different circumstances the battle ends in. 1. If one of the teams has no monsters left before the 10-round limit has been reached, then the team with monsters still remaining is the winner. 2. If the 10-round limit has been reached, then the team with more monsters remaining in its party at the end of the 10th round is the winner. 3. If the 10-round limit has been reached, and both teams have the same number of monsters remaining, then the team with a higher % of its total health remaining at the end of the 10th round is the winner. 4. If the 10-round limit has been reached, both teams have the same number of monsters remaining, and both teams have the same % of total health remaining, then you are given the win by default. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= VII: The AI =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= So you've poured hours into making the perfect team, with an unbeatable strategy. You decide to unleash this team on wi-fi, and you start your first battle, only to find... OH NOES! No matter what you do, your monsters will not cast the spells or use the abilities that you want them to. As you watch in helpless dismay, your entire strategy crumbles before your eyes. You will find that the artificial intelligence your monsters use in wi-fi is pretty poor, and often does things you would think were illogical. Unfortunately, you cannot change the AI, and if you try to force it to do things it doesn't want to do, you will fail miserably. You have to play by the AI's rules to be successful, and that means finding ways to work around its eccentricities. Knowing all the tricks is something that will take experience, but just as a heads-up, I've included a list of all the oddities in the AI that I can recall at the moment. Metal Slimes: The AI always directs physical attacks toward metal slimes first. This is most likely due to the fact that they have about 1/3 the health of other monsters used in wi-fi battles, so the AI sees them as an easier target to take out. You can take advantage of this quirk by including a Gem Slime or Darkonium Slime in your wi-fi party, as protection against mage double- troubles. The DTer will cast a spell on the first turn, and then attack the metal slime on the second, completely splitting the damage of its two attacks and making it much easier for you to heal through. This quirk can also be frustrating if you are fighting a team with a metal slime in it, because you will always have to take out the metal slime before the enemy's other two monsters, which often entails setting your monsters to Don't Use Magic. Mercurial Thrust: The AI will always use Mercurial Thrust (as it should) against monsters with low enough health to be finished off by the attack. However, the AI also always uses Mercurial Thrust against Early Bird monsters, whether or not they are at low or full health. For this reason, you will most likely have to set your Mercurial Thrust monster to Don't Use Magic until the Early Bird is dead, or it will gimp its own damage potential by attacking for 75% damage every turn. Metal Slime with Uber Healer: When setting a metal slime healer to Mix It Up, hopefully in order to use Magic Barrier, the slime will often use Mist Me on itself instead. This goes for any monster with Uber Healer, but it is particularly annoying with metal slimes because the next enemy attack is often an attack spell. This cancels the mist, but since the slime would not have been damaged by the spell anyway, the slime has essentially wasted a turn. Be careful using Mix It Up on a monster with Uber Healer. Cleric on Focus on Healing: The Cleric skill set includes Omniheal, which is why it is commonly used in wi-fi. However, a healer with Cleric will sometimes not use Omniheal when it should. For example, if the healer and another monster on your team are at 100% health, and your third party member is at 5% health, your healer will not use Omniheal, but attack instead. I suppose the AI doesn't think that only one of your monsters being at 5% merits the use of an Omniheal, and often that monster dies soon after, while you are still banging your head on the wall. This is one reason I prefer Uber Healer over Cleric. Cleric on Mix It Up: A monster with Cleric set on Mix It Up will often use Reheal on monsters that are damaged. Firstly, Reheal is a useless ability on wi-fi because it doesn't heal nearly enough to help against the kind of beating you'll be taking. On top of that, your Cleric monster will use Reheal even if you have a status skill set like Hypnotist, and you had set it on Mix It Up in order to use its status effects on the enemy, causing much frustration. For this reason, don't put a status-inflicting skill set and a healing skill set on the same monster, so you avoid this conflict. Psycho: This trait is incredibly effective in the single player game. However, there is no way to get a psycho monster to psyche up reliably in a wi-fi battle just by using tactics, so having a monster with psycho in wi-fi is essentially pointless. Uber Helpful: There are lots of great support spells in this skill set. However, when a monster with this skill set is put on Mix It Up, it will spend most of its time casting Decelerate. Such a shame... Fortifier: Another support skill set. A monster with this skill set that is set on Mix It Up will only use Accelerate (Acceleratle sometimes) and Buff. Not bad if you want your monsters to be faster. No so good, though, when Accelerate turns your slow healer into a fast one. Uber Healer on Focus on Healing: (Thanks to NecroZerumurk for reminding me of this) Occasionally, the AI will use Full Heal when it should be using Omniheal. For example, if one of your monsters is at 50%, another one is at 90%, and the last one is at 100%, your healer will use Full Heal on the monster at 50%, leaving your second monster at only 90% health. This could potentially leave your second monster vulnerable to being killed in the next round. However, the only time I've seen situations like the one described above, it was in battles against teams that really didn't hit too hard. Therefore, I don't think it will be a serious issue. Resistances: (Credits to zenithian66 and NecroZerumurk for bringing this up) When a monster is set to Show No Mercy, the AI's choice of what ability to use does not take into account the enemy's spell resistances when casting multi-target spells. So for example, a monster with Uber Mage might still cast Kaboomle, even if one of the enemy monsters has a weakness to Crack or Whoosh. The AI will, however, take into account resistances for single- target spells and slashes. For example, a monster with dragon slash will always use dragon slash against dragons, and will always attack dragons before other monsters that it does not have a strong attack against. Following from the above, here's a rough priority of what the AI likes to use when set to Show No Mercy. Which ability it will ultimately use will be based on what abilities your monster has available. Therefore, if you want a monster to use Uncarnate or some other slash ability, do not give it a skill set with a multi-target spell in it, or it will just spam the spell. Multi-target spells and slashes (Kaboomle, Gigagash, Multislash, etc.) Then Single-target spells and slashes which the target has a weakness to Then Single-target spells which the target has no weakness to Then Single-target slashes which the target has no weakness to Or Normal physical attack Multislash: This is not so much an issue with AI, as an issue with the mechanics of wi-fi battles. Multislash does damage in a decreasing pattern, i.e. 100% damage to the first target, 75% to the second, and 50% to the third. In the single- player game, when the first monster of an enemy group is dead, Multislash will recalculate damage done to do 100% and 75% respectively to the two monsters still alive. However, for some reason the computer does not do this in wi-fi battles. If the first enemy monster dies, the Multislash damage is not recalculated, and you'll still be doing 75% and 50% of normal damage to the monsters left alive. Any Monster on Don't Use Magic: (Thanks to chrishootu) If a monster is low on health (~150 hp or lower) while set on Don't Use Magic, it will defend on its turn, reducing all damage taken by spells and attacks by 50% and lowering the chance it will succumb to status effects. /-----------------------------------------------------------------------\ NOTE: This part of the guide is the one most in need of comments and additions by you guys, so it would be great if you could post/e-mail any oddities/frustrations you have noticed in the AI that have not yet been listed here. \-----------------------------------------------------------------------/ =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= VIII: Rankings =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Probably one of the most asked questions is how wi-fi rankings are determined. Unfortunately the answer to this question evades most of us, except of course to those people who are at the top of the rankings and who don't want to let the rest of us know. I am working on experimenting to find out the criteria for a high-ranking team, but for now here are my best guesses in at least a few areas: - FREQUENCY OF PLAY - One theory on rankings is that playing often raises your rankings, and playing only every so often leads to your dropping in the rankings. I tested this by not registering for a whole week, and while my ranking did drop on a few days, there were other days where it rose, so there was no noticeable net drop in my rankings. Therefore it is my belief that frequency of registration in the Wildcard World Cup has nothing to do with a team's position in the rankings. - MONSTER RANK - There were several instances in my wi-fi experience where I was faced by a team of all rank F monsters (presumably a team made for Regional SP) that was in the top ten for the normal regional competition. From this, I have inferred that the rank of the monsters in your wi-fi team has no affect on its ranking. - SKILL SETS - There is a possibility that having all Uber, Incarnus III, or Dr. Snapped skill sets on your team leads to a higher ranking than you would have with normal skill sets. I tested this out by replacing my Estark, which has no Uber skill sets, with my Orgodemir, which has all Uber skillsets, for one day. Over that one day I saw a rise in ranking from 1500 (where it had been hovering for a few days) to 1100, and then a further rise to 900 in the subsequent day. Of course, I will need to do more experimenting, but at least this shows that there is a possible correlation between having Uber skill sets and having a higher ranking. Update (v1.11): Since the original draft of this guide, I have confirmed that the use of Uber Skill Sets over normal skill sets does, in fact, raise the ranking of your wi-fi team. This confirmation stems from consistent results from my own experiments, and help from rosemj, who has performed experiments with similar results to mine. Incarnus III and Dr. Snapped skill sets remain unconfirmed at this time. - COMING SOON - Experiments on monster level, +value, and total stats to see if/how those affect rankings. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= IX: Prizes! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= (Thanks to nWoWhammy for suggesting this section) So why go through all this trouble of planning and making a team that can win on wi-fi? Well, for the prizes of course! Here's a list of all the prizes you can get. The prizes for the regional competition rotate every day on a weeklong period, so you will get the same prizes on Monday's, Tuesday's, etc. of every week. Prizes for the global competition have been the same each day since it was opened. It remains to be seen whether Square Enix will change the global prize rotation in the future (hopefully they will). Format: - DAY - C: Consolation Prize 1: Team 1 2: Team 2 3: Team 3 4: Team 4 F: Final Prize -- REGIONALS -- (list from fluxcapacitor) - MONDAY - C: Special Medicine 1: Warrior's Scroll 2: Seed of Life 3: Anchorman 4: Chain Whip F: Miracle Mallet - TUESDAY - C: Komodo 1: Mage's Scroll 2: Seed of Magic 3: Wild Boarfish 4: Satyr F: Snapdragon - WEDNESDAY - C: Multi Medicine 1: Priest's Scroll 2: Seed of Wisdom 3: Jumping Jackal 4: Slime Knight F: Dragon Slayer - THURSDAY - C: Drake Slime 1: Thief's Scroll 2: Seed of Agility 3: Cureslime 4: Jum F: Drakularge - FRIDAY - C: Think Negative 1: Martial Artist's Scroll 2: Seed of Defense 3: Octavian Sentry 4: Diemon F: Executioner's Axe - SATURDAY - C: Dancing Flame 1: Sage's Scroll 2: Seed of Strength 3: Angel Slime 4: Dragonsblight F: Lost Katana - SUNDAY - C: Positive Puller 1: Neutral Ground 2: Seed of Skill 3: Liquid Metal Slime 4: Seed of Skill F: Leopold -- GLOBALS -- - EVERY DAY - 1: Riptide 2: King Bubble Slime 3: Sledgehammer 4: Grandpa Slime F: Trode =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= THE END! =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= I hope you have found this to be a useful guide. Again, since this is still a pretty rough guide, comments/suggestions/additions are much needed and appreciated! Of course, contributions to this guide will be credited to those that give them. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= CONTRIBUTORS =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Many thanks to all the people that have commented and help me add to my guide. Here's a list of the contributors so far: Chrishootu fluxcapacitor Halectic NecroZerumurk nWoWhammy Preschoolcobra Rosemj Zenithian66 Zelos71 for his excellent Monster List GameFAQs of course! Your Name Here! Even the teeniest, tiniest addition will get your name in this section, and in a parenthetical note next to what you helped me out with. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= COPYRIGHT AND CONTACT INFO =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-= Again, you can e-mail me with comments and suggestions at [email protected]. Just include something like "wi-fi guide" or whatever in the subject that indicates that you're e-mailing me about the guide. Copyright 2008 GorothObarskyr This may not be reproduced under any circumstances except for personal, private use. If you want to host this guide on your website, all you have to do is write me an e-mail, and I will most likely accept. Websites with permission to use this guide: www.gamefaqs.com www.supercheats.com www.gamesradar.com www.cheatplanet.com www.neoseeker.com Dragon Quest and Dragon Quest Monsters Joker are the property of Square-Enix.
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