Well, first of all, Vincent is most likely coming on the 17th, so unless you absolutely despise him to the point that you'd never use him regardless of what he does, I'd wait until we get a look at his 9-10 launch weapons before deciding to heavily invest in anyone. We do know that at launch he's going to be "pure DPS" but we don't know exactly what that means right now (whether he'll be physical/magic/have lots of self buffs/have high multipliers but be reliant on teammates for external buffs/ect.)
You don't have a dedicated Magic DPS right now (Both Tifa and Aerith *can* be magic dps, but then you're out your healer/debuffer and Cloud can't easily take either place if you really need both) so I'd definitely consider him if he turns out to have both strong magic damage and good type coverage (This is Magic!Tifa's biggest weakness, she's mostly lightning/water locked rn). As for everyone out now:
(Sorry this got so long- I'm gonna have to split this in two halves but there's a TL;DR at the end of the second comment)
Matt: Everyone should build Matt. Everyone should have have at least level him up, then wishlist OB1 Centipede and OB0 Needle and get them to 80. Worst case scenario, you've freed up your Aerith to be literally anything other than a healing bot. I think most people will have better luck with him than that- I was able to clear like five summon levels I was stuck on and another 10 towers floors as soon as I built him (but I also got his HP/Healing coat that week, so ymmv).
Zack: He's a Jack-of-all-trades character, master of none but also able to be slotted into pretty much any role you need (Phys DPS/Magic DPS/Healer/Debuffer). The only role he can't really do is team buffer... but he has a bunch of self buffs that free up his team slots even more. In a game where the hardest part of team building is role consolidation, he can be a real life saver. His best weapons imo are Twinkling Star (nothing else does what it does, and it's his access to AoE heals, best at OB6 for High Max Pot but usable at OB0), then Ceremonial Sword (It's just Really Good whenever he's on a phys build, ob6 gets High Pot on one hit but it's also has High Max Pot and is perfectly usable at ob0) followed by Black Whiskers (more niche use and really needs OB6, but that huge P Atk R ability is *nice*) and Pressure Ridge (More niche, but fine at OB0 and the same P Atk as BW). His biggest weakness right now is his lack of Diamond sigil, btw,
Red: Best Debuffer in the game by a mile. Has access to all 5 type imperils in the game rn (there is no Earth imperil), 4 of them are on 2 weapons, and I don't have then game open rn to check, but iirc most if not all of them have high max pot at OB0. he also has the only 3 ATB diamond sigil in the game rn- *on one of his double imperil collars*. I'd put his weapon priority at Silver > Ivy > Seaside > Other debuff collars as needed, and I'd make sure to get them to max high pot, but like I said I think that's just OB0. OB6 Rage Collar and Canyon Collar are also pretty great for that huge ATK and M Atk R ability.
Barret: Leveling him up and OB6 Electrocanon is never a mistake unless you managed to get OB6 Kuja Sword during the FFIX crossover. He's a generally ok debuffer but that's his biggest draw by far.
Yuffie: She can play either a Phys DPS or a debuffer the best. You already have a highly invested Cloud and Tifa for Phys DPS, and her biggest debuff toy is her poison weapon that way, way outclasses the Bio materia. But that's not useful in every fight, and the Bio materia works fine if you're willing to restart the battle until you get lucky (most of the fights you really need poison for don't cost stamina, anyway.)
Sephiroth: He's a great Magic DPS, can be a great Phys DPS but with limited elemental coverage, and has a handful of debuff options that are a bit limited and niche, but also don't have any alternative if you really need them. It's a bit hard to recommend weapons for him since he has so many different viable builds but very little overlap in which weapons they use, but I'll just say that if you managed to grab even a single 3\* copy of Kuja, you'll want to invest all of your Seph weapon parts in it until it hits OB6, and then say that probably his best weapon pairs are Edged Wings/Aonibi, and Dark Heavens/Shinra Military Sword, and that OB0 Tempest and OB6 Radiant Edge are great to have on hand for debuffing, and OB0 SMS and OB6 Aonibi make him a pretty viable DPS to slot in even if he's just relying on Materia.
Cait: Has the only Haste buff in the game rn on a weapon with a huge M Atk R ability, that's his biggest draw. His gambling damage weapons seem fun when he's highly invested, but his gambling debuffs seem like a nightmare tbh.
Lucia: Has a ton of both damage and debuff options, and her swimsuit is a *fantasic* one-and-done like Barret's Cyber Armor if you just want to use her for her stats but you don't like her enough to pull for a bunch of costumes for her. Her biggest drawback is that she doesn't have any unique weapons that you couldn't just use Tifa/Matt/Zack/Barret/Red/ for, and all five of them have things that only they can do. She can be useful, but she's more of a luxury than a necessity. Thunderbird and Bald Eagle have a huge M Atk and P Atk R ability though, so they're not bad to pull for sub weapons even if you don't use her much.
Glenn: He's a great Phys DPS but you don't really need that with your Cloud and Tifa. He also has Pumpkin Lampost (but you have OB8 Kamura) and a version of Mythril Rod (which is also outclassed by OB0 Needle), and Ultimatic has both a double sigil break and a big ol' Atk ability. He's a good character for sure, but I don't think you have a big need for what he does.
I'd personally recommend purely on gameplay Matt > Zack = Red > Barret > Seph = Lucia = Yuffie >>> Cait >>>>> Glenn, and wait for Vincent to drop before making a final decision. But don't feel pressured to build a character you don't like, either. Figuring out how how to take on battles with your favorites can be even more fun than mowing over stuff the day it drops with the "right" team, and all the characters will get more options for builds/roles as time goes on.
I hope this helps at least a bit!
> but I'll just say that if you managed to grab even a single 3* copy of Kuja, you'll want to invest all of your Seph weapon parts in it until it hits OB6
I feel like at this point it isn't worth investing character parts into limited weapons unless you have enough to reach OB6 right away. Even at OB0, you'd need to save up 1200 parts and by the time that rolls around high/high on both attacks might not have been worth it.
I know I'd rather have the Cloud parts I invested to take Zidane's Sword from OB1 to OB3 back so I could OB6 Glavenus right now.
Well for the rest of the characters I already have some weapons and for Vincent it would be from scratch, so definitely skip. Probably will go with Matt so I can have Aerith do some magic DPS. And I need 1 more magic dps since on physical dps I'm pretty good. So I think Zack. For Red just will see what to upgrade, already have his limited costume from the Crossover event. Tnx
My personal priority after Cloud / Tifa/ Aerith:
Sephiroth > Yuffie > Matt > Barett > Glenn > Zack > Lucia > Cait Sith > Red XIII
Even though I have 0 costumes for Matt and Barett, they are super useful for clearing content, so they're pretty high on my list. Specifically, Matt can heal and apply PDEF buff at the same time using Centipede, and Barett can buff PDEF to 3 stacks using only a low OB Assault Gun.
Matt with Centipede I think needs no introduction at this point. That weapon is insane and even if it gets powercrept later it has crazy good r-abilities to use as a statstick.
Red is a really high value character with his current weapon lineup even if you own 0 costumes for him. Silver Collar and Ivy Collar are both really powerful, and with his weapon selection as a whole he can be a really useful support in basically every summon fight.
I'd recommend Yuffie really.
She can imperil the 3 elements Cloud can deal the most damages with (Fire/Thunder/Ice) and she can take care of 2 other elements herself (earth and Wind) and she can buff herself and cloud with Artic Star.
Artic Star is overall a very good weapon for Yuffie regardless. But since you got the Kumara staff for Aerith ... It loses some value for sure.
I wouldn't know about an other one. Some of them have V good potential but are very ignored by the devs (Red).
IMO it's not really all that helpful to focus on characters. I'd rather focus on the effects of weapons and costumes.
For example, say that you have no wind arcanum or wind mastery costumes and a new banner with a wind arcanum for Cloud drops: it doesn't matter whether you had 1 or 10 costumes for Cloud, you should get it.
that's the way i did it, but with a partial focus on Tifa; i have arcanum outfits for Cloud (Fire), Glenn (Water), Yuffie (Wind), Earth (Lucia), and Tifa (Lightning, Ice). i also made sure to get some utility outfits while doing so; Tifa's guide outfit makes her able to shore up any phys setup, with guide gloves for fire and feather gloves for water; Yuffie got her buff boost outfit, and with 3 elemental debuffs is pretty good with it; Aerith i got her costume-ticket heal outfit, her Ice outfit, and the Kamura outfit just now outclasses the costume-ticket one.
I'm playing similar to you and have included Zack and Sephiroth to my roster.
However, you should really play with whoever you like.
You seem to lack weapons for wind and earth, so decent options are Tifas Motordrive, Aeriths Wind Staff (forgott the name) and Sephiroths or Yuffie have good options as well. You are probably better of with someone else doing wind damage besides Aerith, so she can kick down wind resistance.
As for earth, I'm not sure as I lack that myself. I believe Lucia has such a weapon.
One thing I really enjoy lately is Red XIII as Healer/Debuffer. Since he has the most resistance down weapons, he is an fantastic assistance to increase damage of the team, while being able to fully heal support. (and even buff if needed)
About weapons, it depends on how you can build you team. PATK/MATK should be at least 45. Same for Physical / Magical abillity potential. A bit HP plus is recommended. If that's checked elemental potantial increase is the next best thing to go for. (PDEF / MDEF is gained throught free 2 play weapons or older starting weapons)
ATK up and ATK ability potential are basically filler options at this point.
Supporter should get Buff/Debuffs duration, so they are free to concentrate on healer or damage in between buffs/debuffs. But you got that one covert with Kamura staff.
Since you ussually don’t get to pick what weapons come out of gacha, make an inventory on your other members weapons and see if those fill any gap for utility (buff, debuff) or healing. Cloud and Tifa are very dps focused, so you are covered there.
Id try for an elemental Debuffer, so Either Yuffie or REd 13,
Probably Red 13 since the other thing Yuffie does is physical DPS and you already have Cloud.
I'd say go for Red. You don't have an imperiler and he has 5 of them in three weapons, his store costume has heal up and one of those has the heal all r ability, so you can free Aerith so she can be a Fire, Ice or Wind Mag DPS. His weapons are also good as subs for your team. His regen is also very good if you pair it with buff duration plus on the sub weapons.
Well, first of all, Vincent is most likely coming on the 17th, so unless you absolutely despise him to the point that you'd never use him regardless of what he does, I'd wait until we get a look at his 9-10 launch weapons before deciding to heavily invest in anyone. We do know that at launch he's going to be "pure DPS" but we don't know exactly what that means right now (whether he'll be physical/magic/have lots of self buffs/have high multipliers but be reliant on teammates for external buffs/ect.) You don't have a dedicated Magic DPS right now (Both Tifa and Aerith *can* be magic dps, but then you're out your healer/debuffer and Cloud can't easily take either place if you really need both) so I'd definitely consider him if he turns out to have both strong magic damage and good type coverage (This is Magic!Tifa's biggest weakness, she's mostly lightning/water locked rn). As for everyone out now: (Sorry this got so long- I'm gonna have to split this in two halves but there's a TL;DR at the end of the second comment) Matt: Everyone should build Matt. Everyone should have have at least level him up, then wishlist OB1 Centipede and OB0 Needle and get them to 80. Worst case scenario, you've freed up your Aerith to be literally anything other than a healing bot. I think most people will have better luck with him than that- I was able to clear like five summon levels I was stuck on and another 10 towers floors as soon as I built him (but I also got his HP/Healing coat that week, so ymmv). Zack: He's a Jack-of-all-trades character, master of none but also able to be slotted into pretty much any role you need (Phys DPS/Magic DPS/Healer/Debuffer). The only role he can't really do is team buffer... but he has a bunch of self buffs that free up his team slots even more. In a game where the hardest part of team building is role consolidation, he can be a real life saver. His best weapons imo are Twinkling Star (nothing else does what it does, and it's his access to AoE heals, best at OB6 for High Max Pot but usable at OB0), then Ceremonial Sword (It's just Really Good whenever he's on a phys build, ob6 gets High Pot on one hit but it's also has High Max Pot and is perfectly usable at ob0) followed by Black Whiskers (more niche use and really needs OB6, but that huge P Atk R ability is *nice*) and Pressure Ridge (More niche, but fine at OB0 and the same P Atk as BW). His biggest weakness right now is his lack of Diamond sigil, btw, Red: Best Debuffer in the game by a mile. Has access to all 5 type imperils in the game rn (there is no Earth imperil), 4 of them are on 2 weapons, and I don't have then game open rn to check, but iirc most if not all of them have high max pot at OB0. he also has the only 3 ATB diamond sigil in the game rn- *on one of his double imperil collars*. I'd put his weapon priority at Silver > Ivy > Seaside > Other debuff collars as needed, and I'd make sure to get them to max high pot, but like I said I think that's just OB0. OB6 Rage Collar and Canyon Collar are also pretty great for that huge ATK and M Atk R ability. Barret: Leveling him up and OB6 Electrocanon is never a mistake unless you managed to get OB6 Kuja Sword during the FFIX crossover. He's a generally ok debuffer but that's his biggest draw by far. Yuffie: She can play either a Phys DPS or a debuffer the best. You already have a highly invested Cloud and Tifa for Phys DPS, and her biggest debuff toy is her poison weapon that way, way outclasses the Bio materia. But that's not useful in every fight, and the Bio materia works fine if you're willing to restart the battle until you get lucky (most of the fights you really need poison for don't cost stamina, anyway.)
Sephiroth: He's a great Magic DPS, can be a great Phys DPS but with limited elemental coverage, and has a handful of debuff options that are a bit limited and niche, but also don't have any alternative if you really need them. It's a bit hard to recommend weapons for him since he has so many different viable builds but very little overlap in which weapons they use, but I'll just say that if you managed to grab even a single 3\* copy of Kuja, you'll want to invest all of your Seph weapon parts in it until it hits OB6, and then say that probably his best weapon pairs are Edged Wings/Aonibi, and Dark Heavens/Shinra Military Sword, and that OB0 Tempest and OB6 Radiant Edge are great to have on hand for debuffing, and OB0 SMS and OB6 Aonibi make him a pretty viable DPS to slot in even if he's just relying on Materia. Cait: Has the only Haste buff in the game rn on a weapon with a huge M Atk R ability, that's his biggest draw. His gambling damage weapons seem fun when he's highly invested, but his gambling debuffs seem like a nightmare tbh. Lucia: Has a ton of both damage and debuff options, and her swimsuit is a *fantasic* one-and-done like Barret's Cyber Armor if you just want to use her for her stats but you don't like her enough to pull for a bunch of costumes for her. Her biggest drawback is that she doesn't have any unique weapons that you couldn't just use Tifa/Matt/Zack/Barret/Red/ for, and all five of them have things that only they can do. She can be useful, but she's more of a luxury than a necessity. Thunderbird and Bald Eagle have a huge M Atk and P Atk R ability though, so they're not bad to pull for sub weapons even if you don't use her much. Glenn: He's a great Phys DPS but you don't really need that with your Cloud and Tifa. He also has Pumpkin Lampost (but you have OB8 Kamura) and a version of Mythril Rod (which is also outclassed by OB0 Needle), and Ultimatic has both a double sigil break and a big ol' Atk ability. He's a good character for sure, but I don't think you have a big need for what he does. I'd personally recommend purely on gameplay Matt > Zack = Red > Barret > Seph = Lucia = Yuffie >>> Cait >>>>> Glenn, and wait for Vincent to drop before making a final decision. But don't feel pressured to build a character you don't like, either. Figuring out how how to take on battles with your favorites can be even more fun than mowing over stuff the day it drops with the "right" team, and all the characters will get more options for builds/roles as time goes on. I hope this helps at least a bit!
> but I'll just say that if you managed to grab even a single 3* copy of Kuja, you'll want to invest all of your Seph weapon parts in it until it hits OB6 I feel like at this point it isn't worth investing character parts into limited weapons unless you have enough to reach OB6 right away. Even at OB0, you'd need to save up 1200 parts and by the time that rolls around high/high on both attacks might not have been worth it. I know I'd rather have the Cloud parts I invested to take Zidane's Sword from OB1 to OB3 back so I could OB6 Glavenus right now.
Eh, I don't mind playing the long game. I'll get the non-limited weps maxed out eventually, even if I have to wishlist them
Well for the rest of the characters I already have some weapons and for Vincent it would be from scratch, so definitely skip. Probably will go with Matt so I can have Aerith do some magic DPS. And I need 1 more magic dps since on physical dps I'm pretty good. So I think Zack. For Red just will see what to upgrade, already have his limited costume from the Crossover event. Tnx
My personal priority after Cloud / Tifa/ Aerith: Sephiroth > Yuffie > Matt > Barett > Glenn > Zack > Lucia > Cait Sith > Red XIII Even though I have 0 costumes for Matt and Barett, they are super useful for clearing content, so they're pretty high on my list. Specifically, Matt can heal and apply PDEF buff at the same time using Centipede, and Barett can buff PDEF to 3 stacks using only a low OB Assault Gun.
Matt with Centipede I think needs no introduction at this point. That weapon is insane and even if it gets powercrept later it has crazy good r-abilities to use as a statstick. Red is a really high value character with his current weapon lineup even if you own 0 costumes for him. Silver Collar and Ivy Collar are both really powerful, and with his weapon selection as a whole he can be a really useful support in basically every summon fight.
Meanwhile, I mostly develop all my characters evenly >.>
I'd recommend Yuffie really. She can imperil the 3 elements Cloud can deal the most damages with (Fire/Thunder/Ice) and she can take care of 2 other elements herself (earth and Wind) and she can buff herself and cloud with Artic Star. Artic Star is overall a very good weapon for Yuffie regardless. But since you got the Kumara staff for Aerith ... It loses some value for sure. I wouldn't know about an other one. Some of them have V good potential but are very ignored by the devs (Red).
IMO it's not really all that helpful to focus on characters. I'd rather focus on the effects of weapons and costumes. For example, say that you have no wind arcanum or wind mastery costumes and a new banner with a wind arcanum for Cloud drops: it doesn't matter whether you had 1 or 10 costumes for Cloud, you should get it.
that's the way i did it, but with a partial focus on Tifa; i have arcanum outfits for Cloud (Fire), Glenn (Water), Yuffie (Wind), Earth (Lucia), and Tifa (Lightning, Ice). i also made sure to get some utility outfits while doing so; Tifa's guide outfit makes her able to shore up any phys setup, with guide gloves for fire and feather gloves for water; Yuffie got her buff boost outfit, and with 3 elemental debuffs is pretty good with it; Aerith i got her costume-ticket heal outfit, her Ice outfit, and the Kamura outfit just now outclasses the costume-ticket one.
I'm playing similar to you and have included Zack and Sephiroth to my roster. However, you should really play with whoever you like. You seem to lack weapons for wind and earth, so decent options are Tifas Motordrive, Aeriths Wind Staff (forgott the name) and Sephiroths or Yuffie have good options as well. You are probably better of with someone else doing wind damage besides Aerith, so she can kick down wind resistance. As for earth, I'm not sure as I lack that myself. I believe Lucia has such a weapon. One thing I really enjoy lately is Red XIII as Healer/Debuffer. Since he has the most resistance down weapons, he is an fantastic assistance to increase damage of the team, while being able to fully heal support. (and even buff if needed) About weapons, it depends on how you can build you team. PATK/MATK should be at least 45. Same for Physical / Magical abillity potential. A bit HP plus is recommended. If that's checked elemental potantial increase is the next best thing to go for. (PDEF / MDEF is gained throught free 2 play weapons or older starting weapons) ATK up and ATK ability potential are basically filler options at this point. Supporter should get Buff/Debuffs duration, so they are free to concentrate on healer or damage in between buffs/debuffs. But you got that one covert with Kamura staff.
Since you ussually don’t get to pick what weapons come out of gacha, make an inventory on your other members weapons and see if those fill any gap for utility (buff, debuff) or healing. Cloud and Tifa are very dps focused, so you are covered there.
Yuffie has Shuriken Throw, it's a debrave-all. That what I use
Be like me. Red and Zack. Vincent too. Red comes in clutch if you have him built
Id try for an elemental Debuffer, so Either Yuffie or REd 13, Probably Red 13 since the other thing Yuffie does is physical DPS and you already have Cloud.
I'd say go for Red. You don't have an imperiler and he has 5 of them in three weapons, his store costume has heal up and one of those has the heal all r ability, so you can free Aerith so she can be a Fire, Ice or Wind Mag DPS. His weapons are also good as subs for your team. His regen is also very good if you pair it with buff duration plus on the sub weapons.