Best Farmable Monsters to Obtain – January 2017

Introduction

With 2017 in full swing, you should make it your New Years Resolution to acquire all the beneficial farmable monsters in Puzzle and Dragons. What will be most helpful will vary from box to box, but you should at least pursue most/all of the listed cards because they are always available and have varying degrees of value.If you feel I have missed anything out, please let me know in the comments below.

Video commentary

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Overview

These are who I consider to be the most vital farmable monsters moving forward into 2017 for Puzzle and Dragons in no particular order:

Gainut Scarlet Icon Volsung Linthia Nordis Z8 Miru Awoken Zeus 3074 2526

Cross Valk Flame Armour Ogre 312 Echidna Zera 2809 2121 2398 2894 1206

1090 Blast Aurora Dragon Generate Earch Dragon Tornado Holy Dragon Cyclone Devil Dragon 2739 2740 2741 2742 CDK R

1466 604 2639 3045 2055 1064 Ult Zeus Dios Tengu Griffin hera beorc

3237 1206 Lilith Goemon Swallow Tail Diza Hera-Is Elia Grisar 440

3159 3365 283 784 Kaguya-hime 1230

Rogue descends bosses

Rogue Descends are the purple/pink dungeons that have a leveling up mechanic. This means your monsters start at level 1 and gain experience as you progress through the dungeon based on their team cost. These tend to be challenging dungeons with the bosses having difficult evolution paths and a lengthy skill up process; however, they have varying degrees of usage and have become easier to acquire due to stronger teams/leaders.

 

Gainut Gainaut
Gainut has the beneficial coop boost Multiplayer Bonus along with a full board changer that creates fire, water, wood, light, dark, hearts, and Jammer orbs. This has many applications on rainbow teams, but has the most value on Ronove Ronove teams. Gainut covers two awkward colours along with an active that creates a wood heavy and heart crossable board when used in conjunction Ronove’s short cooldown active.
Scarlet Icon Scarlet
Scarlet once made powerful system team due to her fire generating active and haste component. Presently, she is able to act as a stand-in sub on virtually any mono-fire team as she provides beneficial awakenings along with the same helpful active that can help correct a poor board changer or cycle through other abilities.

Volsung Volsung
Volsung has a less ideal board changer than Gainut or Linthia as he does not produce heart orbs. Thus, he cannot be used on many rainbow teams, but his low base cooldown provides a desirable option to act as a base due to his helpful awakenings. Unfortunately, the best team he could be used on is the situational Awoken U&Y 2982, but can arguably be replaced by Colouring Book Kali 3246.
Linthia Linthia
Like Gainut, Linthia also possesses the powerful coop boost awakening and is able to produce all 6 elements and poison orbs through her active. This allows her to become a viable Ragnarok Dragon Ragnarok replacement on Ronove teams as she also covers dark.
Nordis Nordis
Nordis provides a 30% gravity on a 15 turn cooldown. He has stronger stats and awakenings than D/B Hera-Is Hera-Is, but falls short compared to Machine Hera 2526. However, he is much easier to obtain and still provides the same amount of gravity. Gravities may be less popular today with large multiplier leaders, but still has value when trying to avoid resolve mechanics.
Z8 Zaerog Infinity
Zaerog Infinity was once the strongest farmable card in the game, but has been largely replaced by Eschamali Eschamali as his active is relatively low impact as it only promotes dark skyfalls. However, he can still be used on mono dark teams along with being able to remove skyfall debuffs. His base stats and awakenings also make him a potential base for Skill Inheritance and has found some relevance on Aizen 3359 teams.
Miru Myr
Myr is one of the best leaders in the game and farming her is a goal for nearly every player. What helps set her apart from the other top-tier leaders is the ease she has when team building as she is not as heavily reliant on 6* Godfest Exclusives. You can read more about team building Myr HERE.

Button teams

Button teams are used to quickly and efficiently clear easy content when playing in coop. Their main goal is to save you time to better take advantage the hourly time limit imposed by Guerrilla dungeons. They can largely be broken down into three broad categories: true damage, poison, and non-true damage. Each has their own merits and what you choose to use will be based on what dungeon you are playing.

These are by no means mandatory, but having these components ready to go will greatly increase your chances of finding coop partners.

True damage

True damage is damage that is dealt which is not resisted by defense or attribute. It will always deal the same amount of damage and is best used to bypass high defense monsters as the damage dealt is relatively low. These types of cards are helpful as they will not induce a pass turn animation and the same player can continuously button through the entire dungeon.

The following list showcases the more common true damage monsters that hit all enemies. Also be on the lookout for the skill up material rotation as some GFE have a true damage component.

  • Ra Tamadra 1466
  • Mechadon 604
  • Bane Bane
Anji

Anji 3045 is a unique card as he reduces all enemy’s defence to 0 and then deals a small amount of damage. This allows you to kill a high defense encounter and the defense void carries onto the next floor and is only lost due to a preemptive or status void shield. Not as reliable as true damage, but worth mentioning.

Poison

Poison is similar to true damage as it deals a set amount of damage to an enemy that does not have a status void buff. This damage takes place after you match orbs and can actually kill resolve bosses. However, poison is slower than true damage for a button team as it will switch to the other player after killing the floor.

  • Lilith Lilith Lilith
  • Jormungandr 2639 (high stats and two skill boosts)
  • Swallowtail Swallow Tail (has a skill boost)
  • Rodin Tamadra 1230
  • Gin Ichimaru 3365
Non-true damage

These types of cards are able to deal large amounts of damage, but is affected by enemy’s defense and attribute. As such, you will be unable to kill high defense monsters, but will be able to kill encounters with a couple hundred-thousand health and is mostly used for farming Star Den.

  • Devil Fish 1064
  • Arthur 2121 (also resets HP to 1)
  • Goemon Goemon
  • Zeromus 2055
100% farmable Mechdragon plus egg team

A slight extension to the non-true damage cards is the Ogres Flame Armour Ogre 312 who are able to deal 70,000 damage to wood enemies. This can allow a full team of Ogres and Goemon to push button the wood difficulty as shown in the following video:

Button leaders

This mostly applies to scenarios where you need to deal modestly large amounts of damage to a final floor (Star Den) as you require an easy to use leader skill. Otherwise, feel free to use any card that has the most skill boosts possible or a damage nuke.

Goemon Goemon
Goemon is a popular choice as he is able to deal 200,000 fire damage to all enemies while simultaneously resetting your HP to 1. This allows for instant activation of your leader skill (25x) and helps condense the number of actives requires as his fulfills two roles. Often used in conjunction with Betelgeuse 283 to kill a water ogre and have a full enhanced board.
Ult Zeus Dios Zeus Dios
Zeus Dios is usually a staple sub on Awoken Liu Bei A Liu Bei teams; however, he can make a 49x ATK leader when you are below 99% HP. Thus, you can use a card like Arthur 2121 to drop your HP to 1 and proceed through the dungeon.

 

Viable subs

This section will cover commonly used subs on a variety of teams. They can act as REM alternatives or provide specific actives required for success. These are in no particular order as value varies from person-to person.

Diza Dark Izanami
Despite the lower dependency on damage reduction, Dark Izanami still possesses one of the best shields in the game. Her naturally large health pool combined with a 35% damage reduction for 3 turns on a 6-turn cooldown is quite amazing.
Elia Elia
Elia is still a powerful mono-light option as she possesses dual TPA TPA awakenings along with a dark to light orb changer coupled with a turn of haste on a 7-turn cooldown.
Grisar Grisar
Grisar is the dark and devil alternative to Elia. He possesses two dark rows Dark row along with a light to dark orb changer and has great value on numerous dark teams. He can help cycle your actives with his haste along with producing more of your primary orbs while boasting naturally high base attack.
Echidna Echidna
Despite the fact I fused away my +297 Echidna over a year ago, it is still worth having at least one ready to go in your box. Not everyone has access to the REM delay cards and having three additional turns can be vital to success when dealing with a powerful boss or resolve mechanic.
Hera-Is Hera-Is
D/B Hera-Is is the superior evolution as she offers a 30% gravity on a 15-turn cooldown. This can be vital when facing tanky bosses or those that possess resolve and cannot be delayed. Despite having max skilled her over 2 years ago, I still find myself occasionally using her in niche situations.
Zera Zeus Hera
Zeus Hera possesses the largest gravity in the game as they can deal 45% of a boss’s current health at the push of a button. This has relevant applications when dealing with resolve bosses as your room for error is significantly larger along with being the single best option for dealing with Ilsix. Ilsix has a 30% resolve and will resurrect himself to 50% HP if killed. When this occurs, you can simply use Zeus Hera to instantly bring him below the resolve threshold and easily kill. In addition, they also have strong base stats and respectable awakenings.
Cross Valk Ana-Valkyrie
Valkyrie has always been the strongest heart breaker and with her PAD Cross evolution, she gains even more power and potential. She is able to convert hearts into enhanced light orbs while providing wonderful base stats and awakenings. Her only downside is the relevancy of the heart cross meta and finding an ideal home to use her on.
2739 2740 2741 2742 CDK R Reincarnated Mystic Knights
The Reincarnated Mystic Knights may require massive amount of monster experience, but they are reasonably strong cards for their respective teams. They may provide board changer synergy or occupying the final slot until you find something stronger. Their dual TPA and triple orb enhance awakenings also provide a fair amount of passive damage.
1090 Blast Aurora Dragon Generate Earch Dragon Tornado Holy Dragon Cyclone Devil Dragon Ripper Dragons
The Ripper Dragons are more budget friendly alternatives to the Mystic Knights as they require less experience to max level while providing a different orb changer. However, they have inferior stats, awakenings, and active skill.
2809 Aamir
Aamir is a powerful option for bind clearing as they can remove 4 turns of binds on an 8-turn cooldown. Furthermore, he retains his devil typing and bind immunity and can be used on a wide variety of teams.
3159 Khepri
Khepri is capable of forming a powerful 225x ATK team that can only match 5+ connected orbs. This is awkward to say the least, but her active skill has potential to help you bypass combo shields as it will passively provide +2 combos at the end of your turn. This has great applications when farming Machine Zeus.
440 Gunma
Gunma is an interesting and unique card as it has a 1-turn cooldown active. This enables teams that have the active skill clause to achieve their full multiplier every single turn. Furthermore, Gunma has respectable stats and it is common practice to inherit a powerful active to use on turn 1 to gain a bit more value. Gunma is essential for farming Machine Zeus with Reincarnated Ra 3273.
Ult Zeus Dios Zeus Dios
Zeus Dios is the reason for the name Puzzle and Buttons as he is a dream card for easy farming. He provides two skill boosts Skill Boost and coop boost Multiplayer Bonus along with a full board of wood orbs. This has trivialized most dungeons as Awoken Liu Bei A Liu Bei teams can simply Dios their way through content. Viable alternative to using dual Liu Beis are to have one player bring Green Odin Green Odin, Australis Australis, Perseus Bankai Perseus. or a Zeus Dios as a leader if you can bring your health below 99%.
2398 Surtr
Surtr is the fire alternative to Zeus Dios but has inferior awakenings as he lacks a second skill boost and has no coop boost. Otherwise, he can be easily used to produce a full board of fire orbs on Awoken Cao Cao A Cao Cao teams.
2894 Cauchemar
Cauchemar is able to produce a board of fire, wood, and dark orbs along with a 30% damage reduction shield on a 11 turn cooldown. This nearly puts his active on par with the non-awoken Chinese Celestials. Cauchemar helps newer wood boxes as he provides a helpful board changer along with a small amount of damage mitigation.
2639 Jormungandr
Jormungandr is a powerful sub as he boasts high base stats and two skill boosts. His active will be mostly used for the poison effect and will often be found on Awoken Liu Bei teams.
784 Nazca
Nazca is normally a poor monster; however, with the introduction of Ganesha 3071 boosting rank experience, Nazca has new found value. Nazca is able to swap positions with your leader and this is crucial for Monday Dungeon farming as you can enter with Ganesha, then swap with Nazca to unlock 3x ATK when HP is full. With a partner doing the same thing, you can have 9x ATK along with 2.25x rank experience.
Tengu Tengu
Tengu is the king of skill boosts Skill Boost as he possesses four of them. Furthermore, he is on a short 4-turn cooldown that allows you to easily inherit something over top of him. Tengu is used on a wide variety of teams and every player should have at least one. For those who wish to save Tamadras, you can acquire his evolved form from Yamato Rush and simply feed it to himself for free awakenings.
Griffin Griffin
Griffin is an easy to acquire wood enhancer. His stats may not be that high, but his low team cost and 3-turn active provides significant level gains in rogue descends and the opportunity to inherit something over top. Griffin will be mostly found on Awoken Liu Bei teams as you can enhance an entire board of wood orbs after using Zeus Dios.
1206 Canopus
Canopus is one of the Mechdragons and is a surprisingly powerful monster. He boasts 813 weighted stats and a wood orb enhancing active on a 5-turn cooldown. He requires more investment than Griffin, but the payouts are larger.
283 Betelgeuse
The fire Mech Dragon is mostly used on Goemon button teams for Star Den as he deals 30,000 damage and enhances all fire orbs. This will you to kill the Water Ogres as Goemon does insufficient damage with his active.
hera beorc Hera-Beorc
Hera-Beorc is yet another wood orb enhancing option and possesses the best awakenings of the three options. However, her base cooldown is also the longest and most challenging to skill up while also having the most difficult evolution requirements.
3237 Ishtar
Ishtar has a somewhat new evolution that provides the highly sought after Dragon Killer Dragon Killer awakening. She may be eclipsed by Machine Athena 3074 from a weighted stats/awakenings point of view; however, Ishtar is the superior choice in leveling up dungeons. Ishtar has significantly lower team cost along with a normal experience curve. This means she will be much closer to max level while Machine Athena will be struggling with her late-bloomer distribution and massive team cost.

In addition, Ishtar possesses the powerful full defense void to all enemies and small nuke to a single target. This can allow you to instantly kill a single high defense monster or bypass the PreDRAs Fire PreDRA defense.

Kaguya-hime Kaguya-Hime
 

Kaguya-Hime is another powerful wood monster as she boasts well distributed stats and a short 4-turn cooldown. This allows you to inherit various other actives over top of her while providing useful awakenings. Also, bunny ears and stockings.

3246 Art/Colouring Book Kali
Art Kali is only available from the PEM during special events as a very rare pull (my rates were about 1% on 800+ rolls). Despite that, she is technically “farmable” and is worth keeping if you are fortunate enough to pull her. Just be aware you cannot inherit her active skill.

Machine bosses

The three Machine bosses are all immensely powerful; however, they are challenging to acquire, skill up, and evolve and may prove challenging for the average player. All of the following cards lack a sub element and have around 1,000 weighted stats. In order to unlock their full leader skill, you must be playing in coop.

Awoken Zeus Machine Zeus
Machine Zeus is able to form a 76.56x ATK / 6.25x RCV team if you are full health. The full health clause can be problematic in most scenarios, but with careful planning, you can build your team around dungeon mechanics for fast farming. Furthermore, there is no type or colour restriction and you can use any sub you want.

Machine Zeus also possesses a 35% gravity, bind immunity, two light rows, a single TPA, and Devil Killer Devil killerAll of this allows him to be used as a viable sub on a variety of teams.

2526 Machine Hera
Machine Hera is similar to Machine Zeus, exception she provide 56.25x ATK / 6.25x RCV when above 80% HP. The loss of damage for a more lenient leader skill can be advantageous in many situations. However, you still have to carefully plan out any dungeon or bring a healing-based active skill if a boss is on a 1-turn timer.

Machine Hera also has a similar awakenings set up as Machine Zeus, but instead trades the Devil Killer for God Killer God Killer and has a 30% Gravity.

3074 Machine Athena
Machine Athena differs from her other mechanical cousins as she forms a 1.82x HP / 56.25x ATK team for only machine types. This typing restriction can be frustrating; however, there is no longer an HP threshold requirement for activation. Thus, you can deal maximum damage at any amount of health. Unfortunately, you may struggle in replenishing your health as most machine cards have poor RCV. Machine Athena is also capable of forming one of the fastest Arena 1 teams.

Machine Athena is also bind immune, but her shining aspect is her Dragon Killer Dragon Killer and dual TPA TPA awakenings when combined with the largest base attack in the game. This allows her to achieve spectacular numbers and will easily tear through dragon bosses.

Conclusion

There are many powerful farmable monsters to be acquired in Puzzle and Dragons. They may not always have the same flair as various REM cards, but help provide diversity to your monster box along with helping fulfill niche roles.

What farmable cards have you found to be the most helpful?

Happy Puzzling!

38 thoughts on “Best Farmable Monsters to Obtain – January 2017”

  1. Nice reference write-up, thanks! Off the top of my head the current Bleach Collab has the farmable Byakuya who does a true damage attack to all enemies (as well as providing a one turn shield), and Mayuri who poisons all enemies. ROdin Tamadra is another farmable poison + damage all enemies option (not true damage though).

    Betelgeuse is also used in conjunction with Goemon to button farm STTD. The added button damage kills water enemies that Goemon’s button damage alone could not – and he enhances the fire orbs for the final floor swipe (allowing a single swipe through water enemies). Betelgeuse needs to be level 60, Goemon needs to be maxed with +99 attack. The rest of the team can be buttons like Arthur or Devil Fish.

    Liked by 1 person

    1. Thanks for the feedback! I added in Betelgeuse and Rodin Tamadra. As for Byakuya, he starts at 22 turns and you are better off with a Ra Tamadra as they come with a much lower cooldown.

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      1. Yeah, if you’re not going to skill him up, the cooldown is often prohibitive. He’s like Zeromus that way – except when max skilled he’s only 12 turns.

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        1. Well it’s still a small amount of true damage and I wouldn’t go out of your way for him as ra tamadra is ready to go. Zeromus does have a uniquely powerful active as the damage is quite large but rarely needed

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  2. Lilith seems like a great option for beginners/mid-level. (even more than you mentioned!)
    Between her, grisar, izanami, and the dark mystic knight, you have the makings of a truly strong and diverse dark sub pool. Her Moonbeam Fang version boasts a row, a rare SBR, and a super rare finger.. in addition to her poison active.. which is ALSO in addition to that same active’s 1.5x attack boost for devils.
    Like.. wow. Her utility is undeniable even when compared to REM cards.

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  3. When and how often do the Machine Descendeds come? I can never find them and don’t know how to get the dungeon.

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  4. Love the list and your content has been extremely helpful to me as a player. I thought Arthur could only be gotten by the GungHo Collab Pal Machine. If monsters from that machine are included, I think Coloring Book, Kali deserves a place on this list.

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  5. I think Hera Sowlio has a place too. She gives you three rows and covers the dark element if need be. I can only really think of Baal doing better for a light row team.

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  6. Kaguya-Hime should be on the list too. She has good awakenings and is a very strong base for skill inheritance, as she’s only on a 4 turn cooldown!

    Cauchemar is also a strong leader pairing with Astaroth and can even clear Arena1!

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  7. I use Bane for the Levelling up dungeons to beat the preDRAs, but I’m trying to max a Mion up to poison them instead. Pretty painful to max and evolve, but 11 turn poison

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  8. Nice. I didn’t know about Ishtar’s buff (I knew about the contest in JP and how she was one of the candidates but I never followed up to find out who won the contest) and you reminded me that I need to get back to working on Kaguya and Scarlet.

    Mark my words, my dream of an Awoken Cao Cao with 4 max skilled Scarlets will happen!

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  9. Just one quick thought. Jormungandr gets the devil type, which means he is an incredibly potent farmable sub for reincarnated ra teams. He fulfills the tricky blue requirement, gets a full board change and poison to boot.

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    1. That is a good point! He also has a healthy amount of time extends, but I feel Colouring Book Kali does eclipse him overall as the poison is usually not needed when you have Ra true damage

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  10. What about Wind Twin Star Fafnir? (there’s a gift dungeon for it once or twice a year, so Idk, I think technically that makes him farmable….or at least as farmable as Art Kali.)
    He’s got >>4 (four)<< wood rows and has a heart cross LS. His active isn't half bad too- fixed damage + 1,5x burst for 2 turns. That makes him a staple in any wood row team imo, or are those falling out of favour?

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    1. Maybe I guess. Not quite sure where the line is drawn for farmable for fruit dragons and late bloomers. I don’t recall the last time we actually got a late bloomer as they are great for skill delay protection so I think GH stopped it

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  11. What about Yamatsumi? Good HP and Atk, SBR (which is still a rare thing on farmebles), SB, and a never ending rain when paired with another Yamatsumi.
    Never used him and I am not sure if it is 10% for each color or 10% for both together. But He looks at least like a poor mans Kaede sub (and I miss something for Kaede last spot [Kaede, Perseus, Verdandi, TaXin, xXx]).

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    1. He was pretty good upon release, but quickly fell out of favour as it’s just not impactful enough when compared to other farmable wood cards (who happens to have the most)

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