I think I'm going to do something of a microblog in this thread on my progress in bringing my newly rerolled account up to speed. I figure that while sure, a new players' outline exists, I haven't seen many outline their journey, which is something I first looked for when I began playing.
Day 1+2: Assembling the Mihawk Killer Team
My first day wasn't particularly productive and more of going through the motions of starting a new account. I threw together a team of Luffy, some cheap units, and fodder units like bandits and proceeded to blaze through the story up to the completion of Shells Town. Since I started during the Frieza event, I was immediately able to roll with Gear 2nd Luffy and some of the cheaper East Blue Strawhats like Nami and Usopp. New players will want to go Luffy + Rare Recruit + fodder. You'll also be able to more or less play nonstop until Arlong Park due to the low threshold for leveling up, which will fully restore your stamina which is the biggest limiter on progress in the game. As you level up, your team capacity will expand and you'll want to put stronger and stronger units on your team. This level limit will be the biggest handicap to clearing tougher stuff for you for a good while. As long as you're evolving your units, this strategy should easily carry you up to Arlong Park.
The only notable moment of the first day was getting extremely lucky, and getting Alvida to drop as I was going through the story. Some of you may recall that I dedicated entire days in the past to trying to farm a single Alvida on my original account so needless to say, so much schadenfreude.
While I was rather lazy about it, I also made sure to spend the early levels on Penguin Island to obtain a healthy stock of evolvers, using all of the gems I earned from story mode as box expansion bait. I had plans for the next day...
By the end of the first day, my team looked something like:
Gear Second x 2
Zoro - Alvida
Usopp - Rainbow Penguin
Notable Gains:
-Alvida from story mode
-~Lv 25
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Now, day 2? That was a crazy day full of progress.
The very first thing I did was begin to clear all of the dragon islands(minus rainbow). Double Gear 2nd was more than enough to clear all three with ease, and so a small stock of dragons was secured. Between my low player level and the high payout of experience via Frieza 20 stamina, I was able to acquire a small stock of dragons while leveling up.
Which brings us into the second topic. Grinding Frieza made for very easy, very fast level ups, especially since 20 Stamina Frieza is easily cleared and gives about 3.2k exp each run. As a result, I more than doubled my player level by the end of the day and acquired a steady stream of books, lobsters/crabs, and boosters.
The end result? I've evolved every single East Blue Strawhat into their third stage form, barring Usopp and Nami. Luffy began as Gear Third, but now Zoro is Ashura Zoro, Sanji is Diable Jambe Sanji, Usopp is Golden Pound Usopp, and Nami is Mirage Tempo Nami. Additionally, a spare Nami is due to be evolved into Thunderbolt Tempo Nami as soon as a INT crab drops. Additionally, all of my Strawhats are between Lv 45-50.
Next on the list is Alvida. She was evolved and is currently sitting at Lv. 45 over the course of the day thanks to a steady stream of fodder books and turtles/pigs. This was made possible thanks to set of princess turtles that came as a prize from the Frieza event, which helped boost the above units to their current states.
Thanks to all of the leveling, my box has a small stockpile of just about every evolver, lobsters included, barring INT crabs which are just a matter of time. I've also got about 2-3 books for each East Blue Strawhat plus Chopper and minus Usopp, so a fair amount of space in my box is dedicated to books atm. I additionally got 3 Mr.3 books and 6 Mr.5 skillbooks which I plan to sit on. A skillup event just can't come soon enough.
Whenever my remaining EXP to the next level allowed for it, I ran the Arlong Fortnight at 8 stamina(the second one) with the goal of getting him to drop. He finally dropped late in the day, and I switched over to Noland, who also dropped easily. Chalk up two more tallies for the good guys.
By the end of the day, this was my go-to team:
2x Gear 2nd Luffy
Ashura Zoro - Diable Jambe Sanji
GP Usopp - Smooth Smooth Alvida
I also began building a preliminary Powerhouse team, but cost limitations are keeping me in check at the moment. Expect this to be a problem for at least the next week or so. It's also not particularly strong atm due to having zero powerhouse friend captains:
Legend Lucci
Alvida - Arlong
Diable Jambe Sanji - Armored Crab
The short-term goal with this team is to replace the armored crab with GP Usopp and evolve Arlong. Longterm, useful subs are already there like Legend Marco and Vergo. Alvida and GP Usopp will both be situationally useful for a long, long time due to being staples. Other situational subs like Arm Point Chopper, Arlong, the above-mentioned Sanji, and Fukuro means that I'll likely be leaning heavily on this Powerhouse team for the midgame onwards.
Finally, a just-built team which I imagine will see some use very, very soon once I can find a QCK Friend Captain.
Legend Marco
Capone Bege - Diable Jambe Sanji
QCK Lobster - QCK Crab
This team is likely to be my strongest team in the short term, but is hampered by my currently narrow character pool and the high cost of most of my units. Straight beatdown will be the name of the game with this team for the forseeable future. Shorterm goals are to increase our team cost capacity to run more useful subs like GP Usopp that are low-cost. Longterm....? Hope that the Lucci, Croc, and Okama fortnights roll around again, I suppose. Candy Sanji would make Capone a whole lot better.
Notable gains:
-Evolved Ashura Zoro, Diable Jambe Sanji, Smooth Smooth Alvida, GP Usopp, Mirage Tempo Nami, and Candelabra Mr. 3
-Dropped Nolan and Arlong
-Leveled to Lv 57
-Stockpiled a full set of evolvers, small stockpile of Strawhat and Mr. 3/5 books
Goals for tomorrow:
-Hit Pirate Level 65+
-Evolve spare Nami to Thunderbolt Tempo Nami
-Obtain Calgura
-Evolve Arlong to Enraged Arlong
-Boost Bege, Arlong to Lv. 50