Introduction
The general gist of Question Time posts are for players to ask various PAD-related questions that do not have a simple/Google-able answer or related article on my website. I do play other games and have often found myself having specific/unique questions about it but have no where to go and can imagine this may hold true for some of my readers.
With that being said, there will be some restrictions on the types of questions I will be answering.
If planning on commenting on a regular basis, it is advantageous to create a WordPress account to both receive notifications as well as giving me a point of reference as to who I am responding to.
Do’s and Don’t
For the most part, almost any question will be answered, even some non-invasive Off-Topic ones; however, it is best to ask questions that require explanation/why/my personal opinion. The following examples are Fantastic types of questions to ask:
- Of these options, what is the best Yusuke team I can make for Arena 3?
- What direction do you think GungHo will take with the 4x HP leads?
- Can Heart Cross teams be revived and if so, how?
The following types of questions will not be answered by me either because it has a simple Google-able answer or shows a lack of effort on the reader’s part:
- Anything that Google/Padx can answer
- A link to your entire Monster Box and saying “make me a team”
Conclusion
I hope my readers use this opportunity to ask questions that will hopefully improve their overall game play and progression.
Happy Puzzling!
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Mantastic Puzzle and Dragons 
Do you feel like we’re being forced into very specific teams to beat end game content? It feels like in order to stand a chance lately we need to be running Norza, Remu, Yugi, or V.ideal. I’ve got many great looking teams that are relegated to AA3 or lower because the end game dungeons now seem tailor made for the chase REMs.
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That game has most certainty made a significant shift towards the team building side plus active skill management and less on orb matching/puzzling.
The main problem is that GH introduces new mechanics that have no true counter and then release several high rarity cards who can counter it which in turn gatekeeps players from progressing if they lack the ideal cards.
While puzzling/orb matching is still valuable, having the “right” team with the correct active skills is more important
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I am an above average player with a very deep box (been playing for years). However, I play almost entirely solo as I am just not much of a discord/social player. Despite having many great leads and lots of solid teams, I have been stuck on AA2 for a very long time. I have tried multiple runs with all of my current best teams Yugi/Nelle.. Fasca/Alice… SRAstaroth and Chakeol. This has almost become a mental block for me. I feel like every team winds up short on just one mechanic. Should I give in and seek help to just clear it in 2P, or do I keep trying and risk losing my passion for the game. I feel like i have teams that can beat AA3 and higher but cannot seem to get past AA2.
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I would not run the risk of losing your passion and there is nothing wrong with 2p coop. In fact, 2p coop makes life much easier, especially if you use Transforming cards as SA is not an issue already.
On a different note, why do you feel you are falling short in AA2? Which aspect is giving you problems? is it a team building issue, active skill management, or orb matching/puzzling?
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So, I think it is a combo of four things. The first is not having a perfect team for any of them. For example, I pulled heavy in Yugi and did really well, except I did not get a 2nd Bakura. I also do not have Orphen or Hiei so I wind up short on dark orbs. For SR Astaroth I think the team is short on Vdps so even though I have fujin and another fujin assist I dont always have them ready at the right time (see # 3). My Fasca team is my newewst and I feel like it should be more than enough, but I just can’t seem to beat it on my own with it. I recently got Dyer so was considering adding him as a sub (or do you think Fasca/Dyer would be better than Fasca/Alice).
2. I have not focused on all challanges so I do not have access to every team badge, I have a lot of them but not sure if I am always using the right one for any given team.
3. Skills management. Even though I use SD latents liberally, i still get caught off guard alot. So i either think i am going to have something up but get delayed, or i forget to use one and rollover into the assist.
4. This is probably the biggest one, I do not understand how to use Pad X as a dungeon guide. I can’t seem to translate what is coming up the way I see you and other players do. I never know what floors I can stall on, or how many turns i can stall? This problem with AA2 is a perfect example, even though I have tried it dozens of times, I still feel surprised every time I play it. My last two attempts, i tried with SRAstaroth. Both leaders got bound early on and I died. I switched to the “Team leaders become Bind immune” badge and tried again and Chakoel still got bound (I am not even sure how that happens)..
Not sure where to go from here. I even went back and re-read your Teambuilding for AA2 article and covered all the mechanics, and still failed to beat it.
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Do you have two fortress dragons? I did aa2 (and aa3 and a4 and a5) with yugi, 2x fortress dragons, dark magician and usually diochan. The Magical girls should be providing most of your dark orb generation, magician to help stall and yugi active only for absorbs if you can help it. You can get orb trolled for sure but that’s the nature of a 20+ floor dungeon.
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My normal Yugi Team is Yugi/Dark Magician/RLucifer(for damage) and two fortress dragons. all maxed and all have assists. I feel like I should be able to clear it but still have not. I am going to change the assist on Lucifer to ally spirit becuase I dont have a jammer fall overright, and keep trying. What badge do you use on that team ?
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My AA2 team ended up looking pretty similar. I only have one Fortress Dragon, but used one of {Hades, Loki} to do it (can’t remember, been a couple months). My biggest problem in AA2 was consecutive, hard-hitting preemptives. Better RCV and heal/dark orb gen (Pandora, even?) was what I needed to keep my hp high while avoiding unnecessary hits.
Certainly don’t get too discouraged! AA2 was a huge wall for me, enough that I let it sit there for a while as I worked on other things, namely A3 and A5 clears. Now through AA3, I still prefer to avoid AA2 for that early Goemon SMACK, among the dungeon’s other annoyances.
On the topic of dungeon guides, I agree PADX isn’t terribly accessible. DadGuide has been a good pickup on my iphone recently (there has been some recent ‘sync’ issues, regarding GH’s legal position on third party helper apps…this could impact the longevity of using something like this) as it has a better readout of which floors hit how hard and with which mechanics. Not sure about Mantastic’s AA2 collection, but his guides for AA3 were hugely helpful as they call out the main mechanics to build for. For example, you cannot get away with running A6 without rcv and atk (de)buffs…at least I can’t. Still, I can hop into AA2 and 3 without fearing much in that department (certainly on the atk buff side).
Lucky runs will find their way to you, as well. I am sure I could only beat AA2 about half the time, if that. Happy I don’t have to prove it anymore!
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Thank you so much for the advice. I dug in and made a few minor changes to my Yugi Team and threw on RDiochan instead of Luci and after some tweaking and a couple of attempts I beat it solo. So grateful for the guidance and maybe just the confidence of going in with a team I know other people have beaten it with. This community is the best.
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Congrats on your first solo clear! That is fantastic to hear and a big thank you to Tim as well
For myself, whenever i am planning on building a team for any dungeon, I try to write a checklist of things I need to bring in order to counter any notable mechanics. For AA2 I wrote this (older) article https://mantasticpad.com/2019/09/27/building-a-phenominal-team-for-aa2/
Basically I tried to build a team around mechanics section which in turn gives me an answer to any dangerous mechanic
The getting bound by Fuma on floor 4 is a notorious place to kill players as you really need an awoken bind and regular bind clear on a sub to overcome him
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Any tips for the current REMDra ranking event? Unlike previous ones, this time there are no active skills that let you clear “unwanted” orbs (black) to prolong the game. So it seems to be more a game of skyfall luck than anything. Thanks!
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Really not much you can do as we lack any true orb changers that take away Dark orbs
That is my walkthrough video
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hi mantastic, what are the ideal subs for vergil and Norza? (sb is not an issue here since i mainly play in coops) thanks
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What dungeon is this for? Are you pairing Vergil with a Norza (just want clarification)
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not really, im actually asking the subs for two different teams, vergil team pairing himself, and norza team pairing tsukuyomi, srry about the confusion
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The full team comp is still based around the dungeon at hand but for Norza/Yomi teams having a sub Norza is ideal as she provides a steady flow of orbs along with having full up time on RCV/TE buffs
But outside of that, the main goal is just to fully counter as many mechanics as possible as neither team should have an issue with damage
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Hey Mantastic!
Thanks as always for the great site. If you could pick one dream collab, what do you suppose it would be? I’ve always hoped for a Tekken event (we got KoF and SF, so who knows?)
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Hard to say as I do not have any exceptional fondness for any particular franchise growing up
I feel big things in my childhood were Warcraft 3 and the Dresden Files (book series) so if either of those appeared in PAD, hot diggity damn I would probably be rolling lots
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Yugi was probably my dream collab. My son was into Yugi when it first came out and it gave dear old dad a chance to act like a kid again. I bought “him” lots of packs!
Mantastic, are you still reading Dresden? The next book is 3 weeks out!!
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Glad to hear you bought your son lots of packs 😉
I have read up to Skin Game and Peace Talks came out this year but I already have a modest backlog of books to read (currently on the 4th Hyperion book) but when that new book does come out, I would probably pick up Peace Talks as well and reread Skin Game to refresh myself as it has been over 5 years lol
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What do you think of MA Fenrir viz and MA Ilm as a leader pairing? Ilm has the AS conditional 4x atk which is covered by Fenrir’s 1 turn CD as well as hp buff to devils. Compared to running dual Fenrir leads how does it compare? Thanks!
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Compared to double Fenrir Viz, this is a much better pairing as the unconditional HP from Ilm makes your life much safer and Viz does add additional damage from their LS compared to double Ilm
Main drawback is still going to be all the Jammers polluting your board and requiring 6 to fully trigger Viz
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Thoughts on aljae/ menoa / Anna teams?
Green is in a weird spot but if you could build a dream team around wood right now what would it look like.
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Well those leads are primarily Rainbow whereas something like Freya, Astaroth, or Chakeol as a lead is more mono Wood as they need to stack rows/VDP
The main crutch of mono wood at this time is a lack of any outstanding leader pairing that ideally combines bonus combos with auto FUA along with sizable bulk
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Oops. That was meant to be two separate questions. Seems like RCV is an issue on wood leads. We have big shields but not much of the traditional hp/rcv leads that other teams enjoy.
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Yeah I feel Wood went through a slump after Zela had her reign as she was significantly stronger compared to other subs at the time
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What would you like to see in a MA fujin and raijin evo? What additions/changes would most benefit them while staying true to their base functionality? What would make raijin more meta relevant
with the resurgence of rainbow teams?
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In order for Fujin to stay competative with other options, she either needs a Skill Charge, large cooldown reduction, or adding in colour absorb/some other helpful aspect as she is heavily outclassed by other options
For example, I use Polowne almost everywhere as an easy solution as she has 4 Effective SB and then an 8 turn cooldown
For Raijin, I am not truly sure how to help her as giving her unable to match orb effects basically makes her Dark Kali so she would have to have another extra effect. Perhaps awoken bind clear and also dropping the TPA awakenings
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What do you think about being able to determine attack order? While we do have that for subs, I think it would make teams more versatile if you could also move around leader and friend slot while retaining the same leader skill.
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Are you mostly trying to avoid colour absorbs? Rearranging damage is often not required but I am not sure what you have in mind
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For new players, what do you see as the progression path now?
Assuming mostly rolling in GFE fests, the base awoken and +297 is already taken care of so the prior grind for evo mats isn’t really there anymore.
Starting from there teams with any sort of synergy seem to be able to clear the machine technicals (Hera / Zeus / et al which were among the hardest content when I last played) outside of A1.
From the looks of it, it appears to be building teams that can:
– Do the new descendeds for the rare gems to continue the evo chain
– Get a team capable of clearing content where diamond fruit / mask drops, and I don’t mean the super rare invade chance in the mythical Thursday dungeon.
– At that point it’s super revos and equips to springboard into AA and looking towards Shura?
Does this sound correct or am I missing something fundamental in current progression?
Many thanks!
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You are right about many things not being part of the new player life as numerous farmable currencies are being given out so quickly.
With that being said, I feel that due to the sheer depth of PAD, there may still never be enough to go around along with having access to leaders that are far superior to what dungeons they can currently play through.
I feel the key with being a new player is not to over commit to a card/team and just using what you have in the interim as you steadily build up towards clearing the higher level arenas
The hardest aspect now I feel is trying to build up enough Box depth to tackle harder content as it has now become more of a Monster Box-check to see if you have enough counters available along with knowing which Pantheon cards are worth pursuing (eg. Amaterasu, Diaochan, Horus, Indra, etc.)
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Many thanks for the reply!
Agreed one shouldn’t go all in on a given team early as a single good pull could change things dynamically these days. Ergo I am not that far away from a functional Remu team but getting that last card or two to have things fall into place is awkward.
One benefit though to the new model is one can experiment: I did roll a few times in Persona on the alt and wound up with a pair of 5* blues which kitted out even unskilled on a blue Ney lead from the starter godfest, beat the challenge Scheherazade which admittedly was a near thing but it worked and I really just was taking a flier to trying to team build on the main. When I last played though that would have been absurdly cost prohibitive even when I was end-game at the time.
That being the case, where do you see the break point for investment in the current game? Diamond fruit / mask / rainbow tokens? Building specific reincarnations has been trivialized, super Revo though, that is a much bigger challenge though I suppose could exchange rainbow medals for gems to evo clutch cards (like the aforementioned Amaterasu if I pull her this time playing).
Figure I will be in wait and see mode anyway, Sin / Key heroes might change a lot to your point.
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I feel the rarer evo mats such as Diamond Dragon Fruits etc. are the biggest stopping point for newer players who want to evo all their cards. They are unable to reliably farm them and evolving most cards would constitute as an upgrade
As such, I feel the biggest “trap” is trying to SR evo everything they have which will greatly deplete their resources and possibly having those cards not being that good once finally evolved (some SR cards are less ideal etc.)
Furthermore, it is difficult to determine which card is truly needed right now for a newer player as there are possibly too many things going no
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I super reincarnated my anubis for funsies and was exploring making a team for him to lead. Do you think aubade bastet would be worth the 25 rainbow metals she costs to bolster that team or am I putting to much effort into a team that cant get me further than other combo based leaders? My current is furious rajang with a re-vajrayaksa helper for ease of use and lots of power.
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From a value point of view, spending 25 Rainbow Event Medals for Bastet is a bad idea.
I know nothing about your Monster Box but you probably have stronger options available
With that being said, if you feel it will bring you happiness and you truly love this team, go for it as this game is all about having fun but it may harm you long term if you don’t have many rainbow event medals overall
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If I only have one R Horus, should I evolve it for the A1 event or try to roll another in the special machine? It’s already Limit Broken for ranking dungeons if that helps.
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I also have every other Reincarnated Egyptian and enough of Ra to field a whole team so there’s no value in rolling beside Horus.
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I would not spend magic stones chasing another Horus considering how you have the others already
As for your ranking dungeon dilemma, how important is crown chasing? SR Horus’s main drawback is a different sub colour but provides the same style point awakenings
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