Awoken Iduann&Iduanna (I&I) paired with Returning-Claw Blue Dragonbound, Ryune
forms a powerful 2x HP / 14.06x ATK / 2.5x RCV tank team that is capable of clearing end game content. Mono-colour tank teams have made a resurgence in popularity because they are capable of absorbing massive attacks and thus not need to bring any form of damage mitigation, able to recover large amount of health due to the 2.5x recovery multiplier, and ability to deal lethal damage by stacking row enhance
awakenings along with built in damage enhancement from
. You will not see the spectacularly high numbers every turn that rainbow teams can produce, but instead are able to consciously control your damage as you are active reliant for damage output. Do note that just because your starting multiplier is only 14.06x, you can still burst like other high end leads because you are able to stack a single colour for damage along with specific actives and awakenings.
Lastly, I would like to thank Qrr for his screenshots and insight on their playstyle and mastery. Feel free to add his hypermaxed .
Pros:
- Ability to control your damage as this is becoming more relevant with specific absorption shields that require you to hit less damage or else they heal
provides a full board change and
brings a 2x damage enhancement
- Bolstered health and recovery allow for easier stalling and removes the need to bring damage mitigation
- Leaders have a combined 4
and 4 two prong attack
awakenings and can focus on either
provides 2 skill bind resist
- Offers a different playstyle to those tired of rainbow or higher multiplier mono colour/combo teams
- Team building is modestly flexible as you can change (mostly REM) subs to address specific dungeon mechanics
lacks an ultimate evolution and thus has room to grow in the future
has some of the best art in the game and doubles your fun and damage
Cons:
- Vulnerable to binds. This is becoming a more relevant issue with unbindable leaders becoming more common and dungeons having more pre-emptive binds. Furthermore, if your leaders are bound, you lose your health and recovery multiplier
- Ideal team building is quite REM heavy as you wish to focus on
awakenings
- Row based teams face a tougher time against bosses with higher combo shield requirements as rows take up more space on the board. Also the leaders only provide 1 time extend
awakening
- Reliant on actives to trigger the additional damage through the leader skill along with having enough water orbs to form rows. Thus weak against skill delay attacks
is a 6-star godfest exclusive and may be rarer to find
Many people have asked what is the ideal number of awakenings to have and it comes down to a bit of math:
- Each
awakening adds 10% damage
- Every matched combo adds 25% more damage
- Thus you need 3
to “break even” (instead of matching 2 unique sets of 3 water orbs)
However, for the sake of argument, lets say 4 is fair compensation as you may not be matching many combos when trying to position your horizontal rows. Thankfully,
/
already provide 4
awakenings. Therefore, any sub you bring can be seen as an added bonus, but more is better.
The broad categories of subs to bring and their respective actives are as follows:
Sub | |
---|---|
Single orb changers: |
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Double orb changers: |
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Orb/damage enhance: |
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Full board changers: |
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Bind clearing: | ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Damage mitigation: |
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Gravity: | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Delay: | ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Niche: | ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() ![]() |
Orb changer combos: |
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Skill lock Resist ![]() |
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Single orb changers: These subs have low cooldowns and can convert a single type of orb into water. One benefit to a fast orb changer is the ability to activate the bonus damage from your leader skill more often.
Reine combines style, grace, power, and my favourite colour into a pretty girl. She provides 2
and 2
awakenings along with the often overlooked enhanced heart orb
awakening.
significantly increases your healing potential along with retaining the enhanced status when converted to water orbs. Only drawbacks of using
is a lack of
and removing heart orbs with her active. Granted this synergizes well with most other actives, but you may need to heal and deal lethal damage in the same turn.
Amon is powerful for his impressive base stats, 3
and
awakenings, but falters when it comes to his active.
‘s active is poorly designed as it starts at 17 turns and can be painfully max skilled to 7. As of now, we currently do not have a feasible way to skill
up. However, we should be receiving the Ancient Fire & Lake Dragons dungeon at some point, when that is, I have no idea. This will at least give a 50% drop chance for his skill up that does not require evolving. If max skilled, he provides a red to blue orb change (that does not synergize with either Karin
, Ryune
, or Skuld
‘s full board change) along with providing a 3x counter attack damage. That counter attack can prove valuable in niche situations such as killing off a boss with perseverance provided you can survive their 1% ability. The new Machine Killer
awakening provides 3x damage against machine types for this monster only. Currently, we do not have too many machine type bosses with the exception of the extremely difficult Machine Hera descended in coop.
Nut has an interesting active that generates a full column of water orbs on only a 4 turn cooldown. This can be good and bad as your water orb generation can range from 1-5 orbs. However, you can overwrite poison and jammer orbs along with creating an easy to match
by simply moving 1 blue orb. Yet, if your main focus is
, it may be challenging to rearrange the orbs along with
not contributing any rows herself. In addition, a lack of
may make team building harder. As a side note, the 4 enhanced water orb
awakenings do contribute significant damage as you guarantee 80% of the orbs will come enhanced.
Alreshca is part of the new mechanical Star God series and offers 2
,
, and
awakenings. This eases team building as you only require 1 additional sub with
to achieve 100% immunity. The passive damage from the enhanced orbs and augmented healing can come in handy, but a lack of
or
lowers her damage contribution.
‘s active is quite powerful as it provides heart, poison, and jammer orb conversion to water and 1 turn haste on a 7-turn cooldown. Lastly,
has not received an ultimate evolution so there will be room for growth and may become more viable in the future.
Hatsume is another powerful 5-turn orb generator and converts dark orb into water. This has great synergy with
and
‘s board change as you can almost guarentee 2 water rows with some orbs to spare. Contributing a single
along with 2 (3 after JP buff) jammer resist awakenings offer more viability on many end game teams. Main draw backs are a lack of
and low base stats.
Sharon is an often overlooked orb changer who has great synergy with row based teams. She provides a
,
, and
awakenings, but it is her active that can propel your team forward.
converts the entire bottom row into water orbs and this automatically guarantees a row’s worth of damage. This can be used in conjunction with other actives or as a standalone and only takes 5 turns to recharge. Unfortunately, she has abysmally low stats with only 660 and the 3 (4 in JP) awakenings may dilute her value.
Sadalmelik is part of the Cyber Dragon series and is a superior version of
in that he changes the top row into water orbs and provides 1 turn of haste on an 8 turn cooldown. Changing the top row is better because many players will pool water orbs at the bottom of the board as they cannot control what cascades down after matching. This should ensure you have 2 rows worth of water orbs. Furthermore,
has 2
awakenings, bind immunity, and soon to be released
form Japan. It is a bit strange of an upgrade as
can be bound and has no heart generating ability, but something is better than nothing. Only downsides are lower base stats and no
awakening. Strangely,
has no evolution tree so they should receive one at some point?
Snow White is an often overlooked bind clearer who also has the recover bind
and single water row
awakenings. Her active also plays double duty as a heart generator and can be used in sync with a heart breaker for a pseudo double orb converter. This helps lessen the impact of bringing a bind clearing sub as it has some offensive capabilities. Unfortunately,
is plagued by low base stats (albeit high RCV) and no
awakenings.
Water Dragon Knight has perhaps one of the most unoriginal and uninspiring names and was clearly given up on. Thankfully he has a heart to water active that can be easily skilled up to 6 turns. In addition,
can remove 3 turns of binds while being bind immune himself. Sadly he has abysmally low stats, no
or
awakenings.
Blue Mystic Knight is a farmable solution to a 5-turn orb changer. He converts wood to water orbs and can synergize with Awoken Karin
to create a favourable board. Unfortunately, he is an outdated monster that lacks powerful awakenings and also hindered by low base stats.
Siegfried is the farmable alternative to
as they both share the same active and accessible skill up fodder.
has an impressive 4k base health along with a total of 700 weighted stats. This is quite impressive for an old farmable monster and can make an impromptu sub while you develop your team.
Double orb changers: These subs convert 2 different orbs to water and either heart or water orbs and allows for easier matching as you are dealing with only 4 elements. It is wise to bring at least 1 of these subs as they provide power through their awakenings, actives, and some utility.
Scheat, holy Scheat, 5
awakenings!
is one of the newest GFE and offers very high base stats, incredibly powerful active, and insane burst potential through two prong attacks. Her active converts light, hearts, jammer, and poison orbs to water orbs as well as increasing the skyfall chance of water orbs by 15% for 4 turns on a 10 turn cooldown. She essentially combines the actives of several monsters into 1 and greatly eases team building strain in terms of active management. By removing jammer and poison orbs, you can save a full board active and the enhnaced skyfall mechanic can overwrite other skyfall abilities created by certain bosses.
‘s base stats are powerful when matching two prong attacks, but her 653 attack falls flat when matching rows. Furthermore, a lack of
can impose restrictions in team building.
Andromeda is considered a somewhat staple sub due to amazing awakenings, strong base stats (especially with her soon to be released bankai evolution
), and synergetic active. She provides 2
awakenings and 2 (3 with Bankai)
awakenings. This eases team building constraints as well as providing a large damage boost. In addition, time extend
and recover bind
provide much needed utility.
is useful on
because her active generates heart orbs and the only draw back is not being bind immune. Overall an amazing card to own.
Gabriel is somewhat overshadowed by
even though they both provide the same net effect of water and heart orb generation (albeit
enhances the hearts). This could be perhaps due to him being a less masculine guy and
being a very pretty girl, but is most likely because
‘s awakenings provide less utility. The 4 auto heal
awakenings go somewhat to waste on a tank team as your augmented health pool and recovery potential do not require this type of healing. Regardless,
provides 3
awakenings, high base stats (including attack), and the powerful potential to combo with a heart breaker to generate additional enhanced water orbs.
Hermes is another powerful double orb changer, but instead converts both wood and heart orbs into water. This almost guarantees a massive number of water orbs and 2+ rows. Furthermore,
can combo with every ideal board changer as they all generate either hearts or wood orbs. This can ease team building decisions when trying to determine the best actives to use for your final boss burst. Lastly, the 3
and single
awakenings make
an amazing sub.
Awoken Hermes will be available in North America (at some point) and is worth considering while we wait. You are trading 700 health and a row for 2 orb enhance, +400 RCV, +100 ATK, and a significantly better active. The active changes in that you will cause water orbs to have a higher chance of skyfall for 2 turns. I would say he is a better sub on I&I/Ryune teams than his other forms due to the active buff.
Umisachi & Yamasachi are another viable double orb changer that generate both water and wood orbs while providing
, 2
, and 2
awakenings. The lack of any
does inhibit his overall contribution to the team, but his high base recovery can be appealing for many players.
Merlin Rider does qualify as a double orb changer, but his net effect is converting heart orbs to water.
provides 2
, 1
,
and
awakenings. This is quite valuable as it provides a nice mixture of offensive and utility, but
‘s active is lackluster for the cooldown and is challenging to skill up. Furthermore, the low weighted stats will be felt on high end teams and will most likely be sidelined if you have any of the other subs in this category.
Ilsix is a very challenging to acquire farmable monster who randomly spawns 5 water and heart orbs along with locking them into place. This can be invaluable as it will allow you to heal and deal row based damage in the same turn. However, skilling him up may be very difficult as his dungeon is very hard to clear consistently.
also provides a single
awakenings but lacks a
as well as having 0 base recovery.
Amberjack has a surprisingly synergetic double orb change with
as the giant fish changes dark to water and wood to heal. This creates a 2/3 board water and remaining hearts.Unfortunately, his long complcated evolution tree along with low base stats and negligible awakenings leave him better in the frying pan than a staple sub.
Damage enhancing: These subs provide an additional way to enhance your damage that does not conflict with as you will be enhancing orbs created via orb changers.
Blue Odin is a rare 6-star godfest exclusive and has an impressive array of awakenings. He provides 3
and 3
so he can deal lethal damage with either match. He used to have godly base stats, but with all the latest evolutions it is not as impressive, but the high recovery and health is welcomed.
‘s active can be max skilled to 10 turns and provides both a modest heal and enhancing all water and dark orbs. For the most part, the heal is trivial and mostly adds extra turns to the cooldown. Surprisingly,
is missing a
and can put pressure on team building to achieve 100% immunity.
Charite does not enhance water orbs, but deserves mentioning as she provides an another way to enhance your damage by changing the attribute of the boss. This can be done regardless of status void shields or any other current mechanic in effect now and is a guaranteed way to double your damage as the boss will now be the fire attribute. This is exceptionally helpful versus wood bosses or the Kali in Arena but otherwise is not as practical as she costs 250,000 Monster Points. Furthermore,
lacks a
and has low base stats although the
and 2
are valuable.
Permafrost Hera-Is is a farmable solution to orb enhancing and has an impressive 799.9 weighted stats. The 10% gravity is for the most part insignifcant and also adds turns to the cooldown, but can be max skilled to 8 turns. Her awakenings are a bit lackluster as she only provides 2 auto heal
and 2
and is missing
and
. Regardless, a powerful option for those who are unable to acquire
.
Paulina has arguably the best active of the featured water orb enhancers, but the worst stats and awakenings. This is because she is a farmable descend boss that lacks an ultimate evolution. Regardless,
‘s active enhances all water orbs and spawns 2 at random on a 5 turn cooldown. The random spawn can be wonderful as it can be used in conjunction with other orb changers to help achieve the ideal number of water orbs. As a sidenote, if you own her pretty Christmas form,
, the 5
becomes significant and the poor stats can be justified.
Wadatsumi is another farmable option with modest base stats (730) and an active that double dips in both orb enhancing and providing a single turn of delay. Unfortunately, his descend is quite challenging and requires many skill ups to reach 14 turn cooldown. However,
has surprisingly strong awakenings as he provides both a
and
.
Full board changers: These subs provide another safety net to unideal boards should your be on cooldown. Furthermore, they can be used in conjunction with another orb changer to create water heavy boards that can be broken up into multiple rows.
Blue Sonia has been catapulted back into the spot light with her latest evolution as she now features 2
,
, recover bind
, and the rarer time extend
awakenings.
is important on row based teams as it can require more dexterity to manipulate the orbs into multiple rows. The
awakening can be situationally useful, although
can be bound as well as her active not generating heart orbs diminishes the value. In addition,
features 899.8 weighted stats (albeit 0 recovery) and powerful full board change active. She converts the entire board into water and dark orbs and should consistently give you at least 12 water orbs required for 2 rows. Granted you cannot combo this board change with most orb changers (except those that spawn water orbs randomly), but 2 rows should be sufficient. Overall a powerful sub to own and use.
Ryune is an amazing sub on her own team as she provides 2
, 2
, and a single
. The main draw back of using
is a lack of
and may constrict sub choices to achieve 100% resistance. However, the full board change of water, dark, and heart orbs along with 1 turn haste is amazing because it spawns 2 useful orbs. Heart orbs can allow you to heal and simultaneously deal lethal damage to bosses along with the ability to combo with heartbreakers.
Awoken Karin will always have a soft spot in my heart as she combines my love for dragons, blue, and pretty girls. Fan boy moment aside,
has amazing awakenings, base stats, and active that transforms the board into water, dark, and wood. This has synergy with many orb changers and can easily combo to make a 2/3 board of water. 2
,
, and
provides damage and utility and she would be a dream sub if
(as a sub) did not exist. This is because the ability to spawn heart orbs (instead of water and 2 “dead” orbs) is superior as you have the option to heal and deal damage.
Mori Motonari is an often overlooked sub as he is part of the newer Samurai God pantheon. This pantheon lacks an ultimate evolution and still has lots of room for growth in terms of power and awakenings.
provides 2
and
along with transforming the entire board into water and fire orbs on a 14 turn cooldown along with 2 turns haste. Unfortunately, he is quite difficult to skill up as his skill up material seldom drops and rarely spawns. This combined with lower stats and fewer awakenings may make him less desired until and ultimate evolution is released.
Skuld is a rare 6 star godfest exclusive and has a recently released ultimate evolution
in Japan. This will boost her to 890 weighted stats along with a total of 2
, 2
,
, and
awakenings. This brings a nice mixture of utility and offensive capabilities. Only down side is a lack of
, but her active transforms the board into water, wood, and heal orbs. This proves invaluable when you need to heal and deal lethal damage at the same time.
Famiel is quite special with 3
awakenings and bind immunity, but falls somewhat flat without a
or
. Furthermore, their active transforms the board into water, wood, light, and dark orbs and this can prove cumbersome as not enough water may be generated along with no heart orbs. I would not use unless you really love
and have another active to combo with.
Volsung is probably scraping the bottom of the barrel, but should at least be mentioned as he is a farmable (albeit challenging to aquire) monster. His active changes the entire board into fire, water, wood, light, and dark orbs along with reducing the damage of all dragon and attack monsters by 50%. This damage reduction can be corrected by overriding with
, but may be wasteful as the board change must be combo-ed with another orb changer to have enough viability.
Bind clearing: One of the largest weaknesses for your /
team is having your leaders bound. When bound, you lose your health and recovery multiplier. This causes your team to lose their durability and become very fragile to most attacks. As such, bringing a bind clearing sub is almost mandatory for pre-emptive leader binds. However, if the floor will only bind at certain health thresholds or on their first turn, it is better to bring a burst active sub to try and one shot them instead. As a general rule, bind clearing subs bring little damage to your team as they lack offensive awakenings and their active for the most part is defensive in nature. Lastly, all the subs listed below are bind immune so you can use them to bait out specific colour binds safely.
Awoken Isis is the most synergetic bind clearing sub as she is on colour and provides
and 2
awakenings. Furthermore, her active can be max skilled down to 3 turns and this can be used to trigger your additional leader skill multiplier, bait out status void attacks, or provide a minor 15% damage reduction. Overall, your best bind clear sub choice in nearly every situation.
Snow White is an often overlooked bind clearer who also has the recover bind
and single water row
awakenings. Her active also plays double duty as a heart generator and can be used in sync with a heart breaker for a pseudo double orb converter. This helps lessen the impact of bringing a bind clearing sub as it has some offensive capabilities. Unfortunately,
is plagued by low base stats (albeit high RCV) and no
awakenings.
Water Dragon Knight has perhaps one of the most unoriginal and uninspiring names and was clearly given up on. Thankfully he has a heart to water active that can be easily skilled up to 6 turns. In addition,
can remove 3 turns of binds while being bind immune himself. Sadly he has abysmally low stats, no
or
awakenings. Is an inferior version of
.
Awoken Sakuya is another viable bind clear who also provides the additional role of 20% gravity. You are most likely only needing the bind removal once and providing a secondary function is ideal as you can push bosses into certain health percentages or bypass resolve/perseverance. Awakenings wise,
provides a lot of defensive utility including
and
.
Light Metatron provides rapid bind clearing and a modest heal on a 5 turn cooldown along with amazing base recovery. However, that is essentially all she will provide as her awakenings are outdated and she lacks a
. I would only bring
if you are truly desperate and cannot survive the binds otherwise.
Shielding / damage mitigation: In all honesty, you most likely do not need a shield as your health pool should be large enough to survive any reasonable attack.
Light Izanami has received a new ultimate evolution that grants her a total of 1,500 auto-healing along with minor stat increases pushing her to just under 800 weighted stats. However, her shield is not very good value as it only reduces damage by 35% for 1 turn on a 4-turn cooldown if max skilled. Unfortunately she is challenging to skill up as she is not a guaranteed drop even on mythical.
Gravity: Gravities are coming back into style as end game bosses are starting to have gigantic health pools or the resolve/perseverance ability. By using a gravity, you can easily push a boss into a certain health percentage to bypass various mechanics. Furthermore, as you are playing a “slower” paced team, you can take your time in charging up your actives if they not be skilled up.
Hera-Is is the poster girl of farmable gravities and is at least on colour for your mono blue team.
offers modest base stats, but poor awakenings as GungHo is encouraging you to ultimately evolve her into orb enhancing, 10% gravity form
. Regardless,
has a 30% gravity that can be easily (albeit time consumingly) max skilled to 15 turns. This can be used to easily bypass many boss mechanics as well as remove perseverance or resolve.
Hathor has received a powerful new ultimate evolution that grants her 4
awakenings along with a
and
. However, only her single
will contribute any feasible damage and the light main attribute will decrease overall damage of the team. In terms of gravity,
provides 25% on a 13 turn cooldown when max skilled.
Awoken Sakuya offers the most utility of any bind clearer/gravity user as she combines 2 actives in one.
‘s active provides 20% gravity along with 3 turns of bind removal. Furthermore, she is also bind immune and
awakening grants further utility although your team will suffer damage wise overall.
Delays / menace: Even with the advent of more bosses having status void shields, delays are still valuable as you can use them to safely bypass different floors while conserving other actives or restalling for skills. In addition, it can be a way to avoid perseverance mechanics as you can bring the boss down to 1 HP and kill on the subsequent turn without being punished by their special execution abilities.
Awoken Orochi can be max-skilled to 15 turns and provides an overwhelming 4 turns of delay. This is quite excessive as most things should die within 2 turns but I am sure someone will argue that 4 turns of delay is justifiable with the advent of stronger and scarier bosses. However, as a saving grace,
has an unbelievable 4
awakenings which results in amazingly high passive damage with every two prong activation. This is where you will need to weigh the pros and cons of using an somewhat lackluster active sub who has no
or
awakenings. He may constrict your sub pool choice, but does provide a substantial burst of damage output should you trigger a two prong match.
Sun Quan is another powerful sub as he has synergetic awakenings, favourable stats, and an active that can fulfil two roles. Usually when a monster tries to double dip with their active, it results in a higher base cooldown and a combination of two weak abilities. Thankfully,
‘s active is powerful for both the delay and healer type enhance (if you can benefit from it). The healer enhance can be used to conserve your
as a mini burst if you run multiple healer subs. Furthermore, his 2
awakenings combined with a single
contribute significant damage. Unfortunately,
does not have a
awakening so you will need to team build accordingly.
Christmas Siren is actually quite powerful as she shares the same active as Echidna
along with useful awakenings including a
and 2
. Furthremore, a 3 turn delay is valuable and it is worthwhile to pull at least once on the Christmas REM as all of the healer Christmas girls are a boon for newer accounts. For further reading as to why
is valuable, click HERE.
Niche / situational subs: These subs have harder to define roles, but may come in handy under the right situation.
Sumire is an interesting sub as he spawns 3 water and heart orbs at random and this can be used in conjuntion with other orb changers or as a means to heal and deal damage or generate just the right amount of water orbs for an additional row. This can also overwrite poison and jammers and may prove valuable in niche situations. However,
‘s haste component will mostly go unused as most of your subs will not have haste along with lacking both
and
awakenings.
Neptune Dragon is the horniest of all the MP Dragons and provides an astounding 4
and amazing base stats. His active provides the highest amount of poison in the game along with 2 turns haste. However, the situations in which you would need to poison are quite few and will otherwise be a stat stick dead weight.
Awoken Neptune is the less costly alternative to
but has significantly worse awakenings and perhaps even less useful active as there is no haste.
Sarasvati unfortunately got her leader skill buffed with her ultimate evolution and received no additional awakenings. This would be okay, but she lacks both
and
. Her active has situational uses, most notably overwriting skyfall debuffs put in place by various bosses as the water orbs will replace fire, wood, light and dark.
Lakshimi functions as an emergency heart generator, but at least has synergetic awakenings. Granted you will probably never need to use her (may be able to her as a lead with your various water subs) as the various orb changers at your disposal should take care of it; however, it can overwrite poison and jammer orbs so it may come in handy. However, heart orb generation combined with
can make a pseudo bind clear.
-
Kraken Rider is similar to
in that she randomly spawns heart orbs. However, she has inferior awakenings and base stats.
If you feel any sub was overlooked or not explained enough, feel free to leave a reply in the comments below.

Team Building:
Team building for /
generally revolves around maximizing your
awakenings along with orb changers, dungeon mechanics, and adjusting your skill lock resistance accordingly. Keeping this in mind, there is no “perfect” team that can clear all the current content and needs to be fluid and dynamic to adjust to new challenges. One of the key strengths to playing a 2x HP / 14.06x ATK / 2.5x RCV team is your inherit tankiness and ability to stall on what would normally be dangerous floors. This grants you flexibility with
subs as you may be able to grind it out instead. However, a large part of your damage multiplier is tied to using an active and it may be beneficial to try and bring a sub who has a 5 turn cooldown to more readily proc your full multiplier. When deciding if you need to bring a bind clearing sub, you need to determine the nature of the binds: is it a preemptive, are you capable of stalling it out, and is it possible to burst through the floor and thus bypass the bind? As a general rule, bind clearing subs lack damage output so it may be advisable to bring a burst oriented sub instead if the bind only occurs at certain health percentages. Furthermore, binds on your subs are usually not as important and it is only when your leaders are bound that danger arises due to losing your tankiness.

Dungeon Playstyle:
/
teams play differently than rainbow burst teams as your damage is strongly tied to active usage. As such, you are going to have to stall periodically throughout the dungeon in order to unleash your explosive damage. You should always enter endless corridors to test your damage output (with a 1, 2, or 3 rows matched) to give yourself a relative idea of how much damage you can deal when using an active and without. This is important because you may need to stall on a floor to acquire 6+ water orbs to trigger your
awakenings. Being
damage focused requires a different strategy for matching as it may seem “easy” at first glance. However it is quite challenging to safely manufacture multiple rows and ideally combos alongside. It will take practice in finding the best way to break up your rows because if they connect, you lose the additional bonus. This is where careful active usage and
comes into play as ways to ease your matching.
In addition, you should determine your base recovery (how much healed when matching 3 heart orbs) as each subsequent combo adds 25% healing. For example, 6,000 base recovery will heal 12,000 HP when matching those 3 hearts and 4 additional combos (5 in total). You will need to stall throughout the dungeon and this information helps you determine if an active is needed. Also, try to make a tentative plan and mental note of which floors you want to use actives. This provides some guideline to your usage and helps you plan out your team composition and awakenings accordingly. When determining how much skill lock resist you should try to achieve, you need to determine how dangerous having your skills locked is. Can you stall through the binding floor without actives? If the answer is yes, you may not have to alter your subs if it hinders your performance on other floors. The same can be applied to monster binds: if the bind does not target your leaders, feel free to just stall it out instead of gimping your team with a bind clearing sub. In addition, many teams will run who has
awakenings and heart generating active.

You also have to get into the mindset that you are not going to enter a descend guns blazing and sweep every floor. Stalling is key to success and is a challenge in itself. Thankfully, it is almost impossible to trigger a match along your damage being suppressed by the active usage clause. Therefore, just focus on healing and do not worry if water orbs are matched as they will do very little damage.

Best of luck in your I&I and Ryune adventures and Happy Puzzling!
Sadalmelik is about to receive an awoken buff in NA whenever. The series of CyberDragons have been buffed with a bind clear awakening, and they are all bind immune. This turns Sadalmelik into an incredibly attractive choice for many water teams so long as his typing is not critical (since he is Dragon/Machine). Not only is his active a free row, plus haste to cycle the actives of your other team members, he has a bind clearing awakening that will always be ready to use since he is bind immune *and* comes with double rows. Granted, Awoken Isis is definitely better, but compared to Snow White, Sadalmelik is no slouch offensively. Biggest weakness would be his lack of SBR.
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Yes thank you for the input and added in along with a nice little blurb about this funky robot dragon =D
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Ah, I see you added him and Awoken Hermes! AHermes is…interesting, to say the least. I have two, so I might make my dupe an Awoken Hermes if I find a place for him… It’s either that or Blue/Light, I am strongly considering making a Bsonia team since her LS allows for Dragons OR Physicals.
Also, Sadalmelik is bind immune :3 Which is why he can serve as an adequate bind clearer for those lacking Isis :3
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Yeah awoken Hermes is going to be quite powerful imo, its combining 2 powerful actives into 1. I hate the art but we cant win all the time XD
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Awoken Hermes! I’m pondering if I should awake him or leave him. Is Awoken a better sub?
He’s definitely no good as an alternate leader for most I&I teams.
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You are trading 700 health and a row for 2 orb enhance, +400 RCV, 100 ATK, and a significantly better active. I would say he is a better sub on I&I/Ryune teams than his other forms. Do note that Blonia teams need him to be Blue/Light for physical
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Kinda a follow up from the other thread but realize I might have better options for mono blue team than Lucifer. I have I&I, two Karins, Mori, Hermes, Sumire, Isis, Lakshimi, Sun Quan. Only thing I lack is the heart makers in Gabriel or Andromeda. Still a I&I with Hermes, Karin, Mori and one other would be strong. Plus SQ, Hermes and one Karin are max skilled already.
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Yeah your team is quite strong and you have the key player: Hermes. You can combo him with virtually any board changer to create a dual colour board with ~2/3 water and ensures you can form 2-3 rows.
Hermes, Karin, Mori, and another fast orb changer (or dupe Hermes/heart maker) would be ideal.
PS I am glad you can post without moderation XD
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Heh no problem. Found this site a couple weeks ago and enjoy the content. I’m just trying to put together some teams that can do higher tier stuff. Shiva is good but has limits. I’ll use Ra and Sakuya but don’t love the playstle as much. If I had a second board clear that wasn’t Chocobo that might be different. I regret not buying the D Kali that was in MP last year.
Sumire is likely who I’d use as last sub as his skill is short cool down plus haste and it makes hearts and gives some plus move which rest of team lacks. I’ll probably build this team up as well as my Saria team (Saria, Sun Wukong, Ilm, two Da Qiaos) before I decide where to invest my eggs next.
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Rainbow teams are not for everyone and can be frustrating without sufficient board refreshes.
Sumire is a nice candidate for your last spot as he does bring a lot of utility and the desperately needed time extend awakenings. I am glad you are patient and not tossing plus eggs out willynilly and may be best to wait for the next big godfest to see what holes are filled in your team
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Great guide! BTW I have Qrr as a best friend and he helped me early on in my Ryuneii journey, so props to him!
Here’s my end content team that is pretty much unstoppable when hypered (which it is hehe)
AKarin/AHermes/Andromeda/AIsis
– Karin over Blonia due to shorter CD.
– A Hermes is an absolute MUST. Dat skyfall.
– Isis is a permanent member for several reasons:
1) allows Andro and Hermes to be up on turn 1
2) dat OE (allows a full 5 on the team)
3) precious bind recovery
4) 3 turn skill activator
5) Great stats (HP!!)
– Andromeda needs no introduction
I consider this the ‘ideal’ end game team that is not Arena. For arena switch out Andro and Isis for Charite and Nepdra (hyper of course).
Hope this helps!
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Yeah those are great points and I can’t stress enough the value of Hermes. You can combo with Ryune or Karin for a 2/3 water board and unleash some truly spectacular damage. Especially if you get 18-20 water orbs and do the cascade row manipulations for 6 combos and 3 rows.
What kind of HP does your team achieve out of curiosity along with base RCV? I have been using Blonia a lot more extensively as a lead and am enjoying her playstyle which is only augmented further in coop due to the increased HP pool and insane RCV
I will also pass on the message to Qrr =)
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Base HP is 21610, which amounts to just over 53k.
Base recovery is 3572.
Blonia looks fun but I only have one so the team wouldn’t be ideal.
Kinda sad Ryunneii fell off Game8 tier list :/, she doesn’t feel any weaker!
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Those are some impressive stats! You must feel somewhat invincible now XD
In regards to Blonia team, you have many of the key subs as you already own Ryune and Andromeda. Blonia also benefits from dragon types so Karin and Neptune Dragon work. You should ideally have a B/L Hermes too, but you have more options than you think and you do not need dupe blonias to do so.
I have a video showcasing my team if you want to take a look:
https://mantasticpad.com/2016/05/04/video-blue-sonia-vs-challenge-level-9-with-ilsix-and-30-resolve/
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Yes this team has trivialized much of the content of the game for me! It’s a good feeling after all the work it takes.
Though i’m tempted to try out Blonia, I want to get out of Blue for a while lol. Already have a +297 tama and 4 shynpys for ADQXQ 😀
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I am also excited for Awoken DQXQ! I should have a +297 waiting for her on both accounts and have a reasonable team already assembled. I will probably use her for coop play as it will give me a break from Blonia (who I am not tired of yet, but change is always nice). I dont know if it can clear more content, but who knows =)
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Yeah I’m kind of worried about plussing a team that will not be able to do things my main team can’t, but it looks like it will be a fun team to play and more challenging because of squishyness :p
I was thinking of this lineup: A.Apollo/Wukong/Pollux/A.Ama
Indra/Raph can be put in depending on the dungeon. No Baal in my box sadly 😦
Your ADQXQ guide is great too btw, in fact this whole site is a great resource! Thanks for putting the time into making it.
Oh btw, I’ll be looking for Hyper ADQXQ friends if you have space
383,776,398
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Well eventually your main team will not have anyone left to plus so you would need to start working on something else.
You don’t need Baal or even dark coverage as many of your actives will be removing dark orbs.
Thank you for the kind words and encouragement =D I don’t have space and idk if I will commit to her just yet as I want to try it out before I plus away so maybe at a later time
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sumire is a guy??
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it may be, sometimes I am unsure. Probably all started when Noah became a blonde girl….
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well..i’ve played a game where hercules was a girl.
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I sometimes start referring to characters as it or other gender ambiguous terms XD
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oh and another good addition to the sub pool for these two is sun quan’s new evo. the active changes from 2 turn delay and 2x atk for healers to 2 turn delay and 2x atk for water. pretty great i think
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Well it’s not needed having another damage enhance that’s like I&i
The two turns delay is okay, but the 3 tpa largely go to waste. He would be more so a I&i replacement on blonia teams
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I pulled 2 Ryunes from the last PCGF. Was wondering if I were to obtain any other of the board changers, which would I replace her with?
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Ryune already has a fantastic orb changer due to the heart orb generation. You can heal or combo with a heart breaker to form a water heavy board.
The only time you would use a different board changer is if you cannot reach 100% SBR (Ryune has none) or you have a better board change combo to form a 2/3 dark board. However, in most cases Ryune is the best choice
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Thank you very much for your reply!
I am a new player and feel fortunate to have pulled some usable water subs this PCGF (although still very lacking)
Currently I have Ryune(or I&I)/Ryune(unevoed cause team cost)/Hatsume/Nut/Isis + an Orochi
Hope to get some more eventually
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That’s a nice starting team with a healthy mix of utility and offensive capabilities. Keep at it!
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So I just obtained Karin and Andromeda from this fest!
As of now I have Ryune/Karin/Andromeda/Hatsume. What would you suggest for the final slot? Options have not changed much since last time (another Ryune/Nut/Isis/Orochi)
Also clicking on Ryune’s icon under full board changers links to Saria’s page
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I would use either Orochi or isis as needed (can even inherit Orochi onto isis!). Not sure why it’s linking incorrectly, sometimes WordPress messes up my links for no reason zz
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Yeah I was planning to have Orochi inherited onto Isis for the future one day…
I was really hoping for a Hermes on day 1 as well but I’m very happy I was able to get Karin instead (thanks water gala)
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Well Karin is a Fantastic (and pretty) consolation prize =P
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So I have pretty strong collection of water types, and I think I&I/Ryune would probably the best team I could field atm (don’t have ideal teams for any of the MP heavy hitters). What I am not sure of is what my most useful subs are, and hence what I should focus on plusing. I have:
Andromeda
I&I (with 2 dupes)
B Sonia
U&Y (with 2 dupes), one is +250
Blodin (1 dupe)
Scheat
Orochi
Karin (1dupe)
Sun Quan
Lakshmi
Merlin
Summer Urd
Pretty much everyone who is not a dupe is max evo, level, and skill.
Any advice?
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Hello Entropy,
For an I&I/Ryune team, I would recommend Andromeda, Orochi, Summer Urd, and Blue Sonia. Blue Odin is largely unneeded as his stats and awakenings are nice, but his active is just meh overall (possible SI base if you have him max skilled and a Hatsume to combo with Ryune). Scheat can be used situationally over Orochi if you cannot benefit from his delay, just keep in mind that the TPA goes against the row playstyle (which does far more damage overall). Urd+Andro = 2/3 water board burst. I am wondering if you have a Hatsume or Hermes as they can be used for more comboing.
Hope this helps =)
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I do have Hatsume (just forgot to list her), but no Hermes. So perhaps my main subs should be Andromeda/Karin/Hatsume/Orochi.
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Yeah! That team has a nice solid mix of board changers/quick single orbs changers/and utility via delay. Hatsume can be used in conjunction with Karin or Ryune. Summer Urd is usually superior to Karin due to the heart orb generation. However, you cannot combo off of Hatsume, but can use Andro after Urd. Comes down to what you feel will work best =)
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Would you recommend any skill transfers to a ryune team? Currently I’m running ryune/andromeda/karin/hatsume/hermes.
The only thing I can think of is perhaps replacing karin or Hermes for amon and skill transferring either snow white or l.meta onto him?
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Hermes is your required combo burst with Karin or ryune. Hatsume is the only sub who could be replaced (to a lesser extent karin).
Unless amon is max skilled, he would be a poor choice. Better option would be using snow white as the base and inheriting an orb changer onto her. That way you are not stuck with a bind clear active at the end if you have fulfilled her original purpose.
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Hello,
I’ve been enjoying reading your articles, and I was a bit surprised to see that one of my oft used subs wasn’t mentioned here. I run an I&I team most of the time with Ryune friends, so I’m curious to hear what you think of ‘Gentle Fist Master, Toki’ (No.1863). I’m using him primarily as a bind clearer/panic button invincibility ^_^;
I’m haven’t had the good fortune to roll an Isis, though I do have an Awoken Sakuya and an L.Meta, but I went for Toki to have an all-blue team.
I don’t have that many sub options, but this is what I have setup at the mo:
I&I, B.Valk, Andromeda, B.Odin, Toki, and then a Ryune friend.
Other potential subs I have from the REM:
I&I dupe
Rinoa
Siegfried
Muse
Sightseeing Sorceress Ars Paulina
Blue Time Sorceress Ars Paulina
Milky Way Alrescha
Shinji & Eva Unit-01
Tidus
Other teams I’m running/building:
A.Sakuya, L.Kali, L.Kali, A.Venus, L.Valk (I have Elia, but need to get her skill level up…)
Tsukuyomi Dragon, Akechi, D.Meta, AA.Luci, Castor
A.Pandora, AA.Luci, Akechi, LuBu, T.Yomi Dragon
Ronia (Still! when I’m feeling lazy farming dailys)
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Well Toki is a very situational card and is not needed in most cases. I&I/Ryune teams should be durable enough to handle attacks on their own; however, if he works for you, feel free to use =)
As for your team, Blue Odin does not contribute too much and you would be better off with an orb changer such as Alrescha who provides a nice variety of awakenings (the enhanced orbs greatly improve your damage and healing). I know she competes with valk, but another fast orb changer helps. In addition, Sightseeing Paulina is quite powerful for her awakenings and those enhanced orbs add massive amounts of damage.
Your team (provided you do not need bind clearing) could be:
B Valk, Andro, Alrescha, flex (so either Blodin for stats, Paulina, or Toki)
For your Sakuya team, do you have another option for Venus, she does not bring much to the party imo
Your other teams look solid, just remember Yomi Dragon is not a devil so doesnt fully benefit from Pandora
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Interesting! I think my understanding of how damage is calculated is severely lacking at a fundamental level then -_-
I’ve been favouring more rows and TPA awakenings over Orb Enhancers. I guess at some point the extra rows and TPAs have diminishing returns in terms of damage output vs reliably enhanced orbs dropping into the board?
Alrescha’s stats don’t look all that impressive, but having the ability to change jammer/poison/heal orbs does sound mighty handy, so I’ll get to work on levelling her up.
When a bind clearer is needed, what’s a non-Isis owner to do? Would Rinoa would be better suited than Toki as a dedicated bind clearer?
Thanks for your input Mantastic, I really appreciate it as I’ve been middling along for quite a while now without a strong direction =)
Regarding my Sakuya team, I like Venus as her AS helps when my brain’s feeling slow =p Here’s my current light att alternatives:
– Yamatogoto Playing God, Sandalphon
– Elia (needs skill ups)
– Zhuge Liang
– L.Meta (meh bind clearer?)
Undeveloped:
– 3rd(!) L.Kali (only recently rolled)
– Yuna
– Cloud
– Rei Sirius
– Maeda Keiji
– Indra
– Van
– Ra
– Ganesha
I discounted A.DQ&XQ & Saria as their AS is anti LS.
As of tomorrow, I should be evolving my DQ&XQ into their awoken form, so I’m looking forward to trying them out too =)
Here’s my Padherder if it helps:
https://www.padherder.com/user/Mkm73/monsters/
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Well rows & TPA counteract each other whereas Orb enhances compliment either. Rows hit harder as a whole, but once you reach 10 on your team, you want to go for enhanced orbs (someone did that math and thats the result).Another handy feature about Alrescha is her enhanced hearts for augmented healing AND being converted into enhanced water orbs with her active
As for bind clearing, you need to make due with what you have regardless of how “odd” it may seem. With that being said, Sakuya is an option who has water along with a handy gravity.
If Venus helps, then feel free to use =) Your team is solid as is, but i would drop Venus for Dark Izanami (or Indra) if you need shielding.
And hurry up on getting aboard the DQXQ hype train!
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Hmm, with Alrescha and Sakuya on the team, total rows drops to 9. With Toki in place, it’s back to 10. I’m guessing the trade off in damage is probably worth it for Sakuya having nearly double Toki’s HP and all the other perks she brings?
Evolved my DQXQ into her lovely Awoken form this morning, so I’ll be hitting up your other article on them now =) I suspect I might not have the subs for her…anyhow
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Well the nice thing about dqxq is her flexibility and innately high damage through just her leader skill. 100x damage is still powerful (with rows) no matter how unideal your team is =P
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urd + UY
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That is definitely a viable combo =)
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