So for the longest time
Pejo,
Zera, and myself have been working on teams that didn't require a tank and/or a white mage by using units that had a role in the team. For the last few months I've been working on a full damage mitigation team, and while it is viable strategy it requires a lot of work, various niche TMs, and a very specific team. One day I will try it but I'm months away from making it possible (plus Water Veritas' enhancements are needed).
But recently Apple and Gumi collaborated on a brand new unit: iNichol. I didn't really realise the potential of this unit until Zera posted
a video in the discord chat. It showed the power of giving a full evasion unit the ability to 100% cover the team. This is what I'm calling
step 1.
And while this is amazing, using 2 units to do the job of 1, albeit perfectly, was a step backwards from where the 3 of us are trying to go. Nichol has enough utility with his maxed out LB to warrant being part of the team, helping towards the no white mage dream, but
step 2 was to find a unit that already would be on the team and can reach 100% evasion. Enter Soleil. Already ridiculous and on most people's teams atm, she can easily reach 100% evasion, adding further to her utility. And thankfully Holy is the one counter that doesn't seem to disrupt her dance combos (I don't know why this is). So this has allowed us to replace the traditional physical tank, maintain our buffs and debuffs, and gain MP and HP regen. In essence our team value has increased with no real downside.
So now we have that, we're left with 2 slots free (if 2 are taken up with any generic chainer). This part is a discussion for another time, but I believe here you have the option of either using two units to attempt to cover magic damage, or, like we aim to do, increase our own damage. We can easily use 1 support here and 1 ender, in short increasing our damage while maintaining the same level of defence. For the point of this unnecessarily long essay I'm working on the latter option.
Step 3 - Enter Louis Vuitton
So after obtaining the perfect tank, and then giving that tank use outside of being a tank, I started to think about the next step. Being an evasion tank who covers the team you end up getting a high chance to prok your counters. So I was looking at units who could provide more value on the enemy phase than just Holy.
Tangent: Yesterday I defeated the event trial thanks to
CrazyIvan's strategy of nuking it with 3 2bs. When he was giving me advice he said his 6th unit was Marie but she didn't really do much, so I looked into who I could take that would add more value, and I stumbled onto Light Veritas. She could lower his light resist even further, and she could set up a 16x finisher. On top of that she already has innate undead killer. The plan worked better than I thought to the point I probably could have done it with 2 2b and no finisher.
Anyways back on topic. Because I was thinking about counters and I had just used LV the night before I remembered that like Year 2 Sakura she can prok her strongest imperil of 100% light debuff from a counter. And so finally we're at the point I've been trying to get to. If we can set up a relatively strong LV with full evasion, we can essentially have access to one of the strongest imperils in the game right now on a consistent basis, without having to waste a turn or a unit. Having a 16x single hitting move makes her a pretty good ender and as discussed above this is the team build we're going for this exercise in theorycrafting.
So the build. First the full TMR build:
Veritas of the Light 6 Star
FFBEDB Unit Calculator
Right Hand: Horizon Breaker +117ATK
Left Hand: Romandan Pistol +107ATK
Head: Rider's Helm +28ATK+60DEF+100%Disease/Petrify
Body: Assassin's Vest +40DEF+20SPR+100%Poison/Paralyze+10%Evasion
Accessory 1: Ring of the Lucii +3MAG/SPR+25%P.Evasion/P.Counter
Accessory 2: Ring of the Lucii +3MAG/SPR+25%P.Evasion/P.Counter
Ability 1: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Ability 2: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Ability 3: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Ability 4: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Pot Stats: HP: 450 MP: 75 ATK: 30 DEF: 30 MAG: 30 SPR: 30
Esper: Titan HP:6000 MP:2000 ATK:5300 DEF:4000 MAG:1800 SPR:3200
Total Stats: HP: 4852 MP: 326 ATK: 761 DEF: 290 MAG: 328 SPR: 240
Crit Rate: 10% P. Evasion: 100% M. Evasion: 0% P. Counter: 55% M. Counter: 0%
Because of the use of quick assault I've gone away from the typical mag build and made her a physical build. While 761 attack is not that high when you consider the 100% imperil and the 16x modifier it's not that bad. I looked into seeing if fixed dice would be better, but the average damage output was same. I think it's up to you what you choose. I'm unsure if the calculator takes into account dual wield moves hitting twice. If so fixed dice will be the better option.
Now obviously this build is quite difficult to pull off so he's the more discount build that I will be testing with:
Veritas of the Light 6 Star
FFBEDB Unit Calculator
Right Hand: Horizon Breaker +117ATK
Left Hand: Romandan Pistol +107ATK
Head: Imperial Helm +18ATK+15DEF+15%Fire
Body: Assassin's Vest +40DEF+20SPR+100%Poison/Paralyze+10%Evasion
Accessory 1: Twenty-Sided Die +20%CriticalRate/Evasion
Accessory 2: Ring of the Lucii +3MAG/SPR+25%P.Evasion/P.Counter
Ability 1: Spirit of Freedom +15%ATK+10%Evasion
Ability 2: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Ability 3: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Ability 4: Quick Assault +30%ATK +10%Evasion
Pot Stats: HP: 450 MP: 75 ATK: 30 DEF: 30 MAG: 30 SPR: 30
Esper: Titan HP:6000 MP:2000 ATK:5300 DEF:4000 MAG:1800 SPR:3200
Total Stats: HP: 4852 MP: 326 ATK: 725 DEF: 245 MAG: 325 SPR: 237
Crit Rate: 30% P. Evasion: 95% M. Evasion: 0% P. Counter: 40% M. Counter: 0%
Unfortunately at this point in time this will only give us a 95% evasion rate, but in the future we can upgrade Spirit of Freedom to 20% attack and 15% evasion, giving us the full 100%. What's also amazing is this setup has LV immune to everything that can affect her except confusion. If we need to resist this then Grand Helm is an option we can use. Furthermore, if in the Noctis buff they decide to enhance his TM this will only further boost her power.
I think this set works well with A2 and 2B as they both have very high chain counts that can easily allow LV to cap out the damage. They also both have high modifiers on their chaining moves to make up for the lack of native imperil (2b does have lightning debuff on a separate move though) which works in this team comp as we have LV providing the imperil. However this can be used with any chainer that can wield a light weapon.
And so that's it.
TLDR: LV has a chance to counter with 100% light imperil which could potentially make her a valuable evasion tank. 16x single hit move with multiple innate killers makes her a potentially good ender.
Sorry this was long. Ended up being more of a reddit style post lol.
