[I Scream, You Scream] Building your Scream Team, Pt. 6a: Cloudy Wolf

Table of Contents

Party Composition

Abilities & DPS

Orb Chart

Character & SSB evaluation: Mages & Supports

Character & SSB evaluation: Celerity & Spellblade

Character & SSB evaluation: Job Classes

SSB Rankings

Banner Evaluation: Intro & Cloudy Wolf

Banner Evaluation

#Banner Evaluation: Intro So from what I've already covered, we can see that we basically only need five soul breaks, since we only ever have five characters in our party at any time. Granted, they’re highly specific ones and having more gives you more options when team-building, but knowing this helps us to not waste mythril, so we can maximize our chances of pulling them.

If you're aiming to run a Scream Team, and I highly recommend it, since it will be the most universally powerful option, then the five soul breaks you're looking for, in order of importance, are:

• Scream and/or Wall

• a Medica

• two to three SSBs (single-target physical Lifesiphonable, with some exceptions for BSBs or outstanding SBs).

What else does this mean?

• Hastega: For Hastega, Ramza’s got you covered, either natively or via RW, which makes all other Hastegas redundant. Yes, unfortunately, this obsoletes quite a few chase relics from the past or even the near future.

• ATK Boostgas: The only other +50% ATK buff is Aeris's Planet Protector, which we won't be using if we're running Scream. So while non-Scream Hastegas are redundant, non-Scream Boostgas are much, much worse, since they're actively detrimental by conflicting with and potentially overwriting Scream's +50% ATK buff. (Hand of the Emperor and its clones are exceptions since they stack with Scream.)

Realm Synergy:

The other thing we should be looking for are physical synergy weapons, although this is not as important as having that solid core of five soul breaks. Element-boosting armors are also nice. On weapons, not as much, since they may still lose out to RS weapons.

Do note, there is a hierarchy for weapon types. At the top would be Swords (high ATK, and the most common), and then Daggers (universal, but lower ATK--some are pretty low even w/ synergy, so character daggers are preferred).

The other melee weapons to consider are Fists, Spears, and Katanas. (Axes and Hammers are not as common. Ranged weapon types I'm excluding for now, and also aren't as common.)

We want to look at which Sword-users can also use these three melee types.

• Katanas have 10: Gilgamesh, Bartz, Basch, Vaan, Wol from Mobius, and Ramza, Zidane, Zack, Cloud, Auron.

• Spears have 12 commonly-used ones: again, Gilgamesh, Bartz, Basch, Vaan, Wol from Mobius, and also, Balthier, Lightning, Fang, Edgar, Kain, Leon, and Faris. (I'm leaving out Firion, Gordon, Garland, and Ricard.)

• Fists have only 6: Gilgamesh, Basch, Zack, Jecht, and Thancred & Yda. (And the two from XIV are unlikely candidates, since Thancred doesn't have Cmb at all and Yda's SSB is terrible with Scream.)

If we narrow down these users to only ones who have a single-target physical SSB or BSB, then:

• Katanas have 5: Auron, Bartz, Cloud, and Ramza (who has Scream). Let's not forget Shadow as well.

• Spears have 5 or 6: Bartz, Balthier, Lightning, Edgar, Kain, and Faris (who can't Lifesiphon).

• Fists have only one: Jecht.

Thus, I consider Fists to be the worst of the three types. The other two are better depending on which of the characters who can equip them you pull SSBs for.

Cid's Missions:

One final note about the Cid's Mission full-synergy team quests. I don't think it makes sense to let this influence your banner pulling decisions too much, especially not until they arrive ~5 months from now. It's pretty farfetched to think you'll be able to pull a character medica for each realm for instance. And I would say that the most important things for these quests are having good hones (esp. for Full Charge and to a lesser extent Saint Cross) and also having some shared SB items (a shared medica like the Candle Rod in particular).

It doesn't hurt to consider it, but we'll be trying to pull for synergy weapons down the road anyway, which is an overlapping concern. At the end of these banner evaluations, I will also recap what I consider to be the top banners for physical synergy for each realm (IV-XIII at least).

(The Cid's Missions are also a pretty transparent tactic by DeNA to expand your list of wants so that you spend even more mythril/gems.)

OK, with all that out of the way, let's look at Cloudy Wolf's Banner 1.

#Cloudy Wolf Banner 1

• Fusion Sword @ 1%: This is the best item on the banner. That being said, the BSB is not bad, but if you've read my SSB Rankings where I discuss BSBs in more depth, you should know that BSBs aren't that much better than SSBs and aren't actually the top physical damage soul breaks.

• Magic Comb @ 1%: I know there's quite a few Red XIII fans out there, but this is a pretty terrible consolation SSB, since Red is not that great. He's a non-Ramza support which means he has mediocre stats and no access to Lifesiphon, he can't equip swords so RS will likely be an issue, his armor selection is also limited, and you can't even equip the comb itself on anyone else besides Tyro. You're also unlikely to put Mako Might on Red to pop it at the beginning for the Shellga. Once you get better SSBs for better characters, this will just sit there collecting dust. I should know, I have it myself in JP.

• Zack's Glove @ 2%: The 100% AoE stun is situationally nice. But for most Ultimate fights, the low 4.11x multiplier is not going to justify bringing Zack. It's also a fist.

• Pole Axe @ 2%: Just a 5.12x regular SB multiplier, on a character who can only equip Spears and Daggers. Also gives Cid a personal HotE buff, which I suppose helps since RS will be an issue for him. He does get Machinist though, for the times you want to bring one. The best thing is that it's a Spear for physical VII synergy if you need it.

• Platinum Fist @ 2%: A fist. And an ATK boostga. Terrible for Scream Teams.

• Basilisk Claw @ 2%: Not that great either, since even with synergy it has lowish ATK.

• Precious Watch @ 2%: Has a shared heal, if you're worried about Cid's Missions I guess.

So, after our analysis, we can really only say there's a 3% chance to get a good weapon for VII Synergy (Fusion Sword and Pole Axe) and a 1% chance to get a soul break that you'll actually end up using.

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So should you pull?

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My answer would be an adamantine no.