I thought we would have had more time to rest and relax after the last ranking dungeon, but the North American GungHo staff may have been affected by the 3 minute stamina buff and are firing out content left right and centre. Regardless, the Noah Tournament Ranking Dungeon is the fourth in the ranking dungeon series and has the No Dupes restriction. No Dupes has become easier to manage as the restrictions only apply to your own team and not your friend’s leader. This means you can still bring matching leaders and has eased team building and theory crafting. However, with ranking dungeons, we are not simply concerned with finishing the dungeon, but with scoring as high as possible. I failed to achieve the top 1% from the Cauchemar Tournament, but averaged top 2% over the course all 3 ranking dungeons to date. As such I wish to share my thoughts and strategies to help my fellow Puzzle and Dragoners in achieving a new personal best. Continue reading Noah Tournament Ranking Dungeon Strategies
Awoken Archdemon Lucifer, UUevo Baal, and Amon Analysis
Cue the fan boy screams, Awoken Archdemon Lucifer 
is here. UUevo of both Baal 
and Amon 
were also released, but the majority of the attention will be on due to his amazing increase in power and viability.
Awoken Archdemon Lucifer is the only awoken evolution to be released of the 3. Being an awoken evolution, received a revamped active and leader skill along with new and powerful awakenings. Continue reading Awoken Archdemon Lucifer, UUevo Baal, and Amon Analysis
Rank 500 and beyond
Right before the release of coop dungeons, I hit the coveted rank 500 milestone. I meant to do this post then, but was swept up in the frenzy of coop and the Cauchemar ranking dungeon, I had to put it on hold.
PAD as a whole has been advancing quickly with the advent of 3 minute stamina, numerous best friend resets, experience of a lifetime, and now coop dungeons. All of these give players the opportunity to rank up at an increased rate. Regardless, it still takes a very long time to reach rank 500. This journey took me over 850 days to reach. For fun, 88 million experience translates into: Continue reading Rank 500 and beyond
Yamatsumi – Farmable Monster Analysis
We have not had a powerful or useful farmable monster since Zaerog Infinity 
. Some may argue that Volsung 
or Hel 
are powerful, but are not special enough to warrant heavy investment. suffers from being inaccessible due to the challenging descend and an active is not novel nor unique (regardless of how strong it may be). is capable of clearing high level content due to a unique 49x multiplier, but the playstyle may be too foreign for most players and has a more restrictive sub pool. Furthermore, her viability as a sub is almost non-existent except for over riding poison skyfalls (or funky heart orb generator).
However, the latest descend boss, Yamatsumi 
, has power and uses beyond simply selling for 10 Monster Points. The key aspect in making a useful farmable monster is a novel active that has a synergetic role in popular teams. Continue reading Yamatsumi – Farmable Monster Analysis
Nordis Descended – Mythical Plus: Mantastic & Fantastic Coop
First of all, I love playing with myself; in coop, PAD multiplayer mode. Now that I have that out of my system, I can properly explain my strategy for clearing Nordis Descended – Mythical Plus which is the found in the coop/multiplayer dungeon section. Mythical Plus differs from the regular Nordis Descended as the bosses have more health along with the nasty PreDRA 
spawn on floor 8. Thankfully, coop allows you to bring 8 subs to better combat the harder mechanics in Mythic Plus.
My 2 accounts (Mantastic and Fantastic) are able to do coop together by using their semi developed Continue reading Nordis Descended – Mythical Plus: Mantastic & Fantastic Coop
UUevo Archangel Lucifer and 8.6 Monster Buffs
Happy Lunar New Year to all those that celebrate! The latest update brought an unprecedented amount of new content and most of use were probably busy with the Cauchemar Ranking dungeon or the new coop feature. However, there were also countless monster buffs and a new evolution that got released, but were perhaps overshadowed. I just want to take this opportunity to analyse the new changes and highlight any major improvements you should look out for.
Seraph of Corruption, Lucifer is the only new evolution to be released this patch and perhaps marks the end of an era. Lucifer used to reign supreme in the early days of PAD when awakenings and grossly high multipliers did not exist as he could tank gigantic hits along with executing bosses with his active. Fast forward 2+ years and 
has undergone countless active skill reworks in hopes of resurrecting his viability. Currently, it is the strongest it has ever been with the ability to inflict 200x damage Continue reading UUevo Archangel Lucifer and 8.6 Monster Buffs
3 Minute Stamina and Coop Gameplay Initial Impressions and Tips
Coop/multiplayer dungeons were part of the newest update and allow players to team up with their friends to take on some new dungeons along with some of the most challenging descends. I spent a great deal of time playing with my best friend (donutdust) and Mom (MOMtastic) last night and it was the most fun I had in PAD in a long time. It helped that they both came to visit me and the room was filled with lots of laughter, cries of joy, and wonderful drops. Furthermore, with the advent of 3 minute stamina recharge and reduced stamina cost for entering dungeons in coop, we were able to play for a very long time. Continue reading 3 Minute Stamina and Coop Gameplay Initial Impressions and Tips
Challenge 9-No Awoken Clear
This had to be one of the most frustrating challenge 9‘s of late due to the no awoken skills restriction. I guess as compensation, we get to play on a 7×6 board, but without the lovely time extends, it is difficult to take full advantage. Thus I was left with a bit of a conundrum as how to safely approach and clear this dungeon. My usual Sakuya 
team may struggle to make sufficient combos along with not having access to my actives for many turns and the final 2 floors reducing light damage by 50%. As such, I decided to take a different approach and dusted off my Awoken Leilan 
.
can reach 12.25x damage when matching fire, wood, and light orbs. This may not seem like much; however, Continue reading Challenge 9-No Awoken Clear
Cauchemar Tournament Pre-Release Strategies
The third ranking dungeon, Cauchemar Tournament, will debut after the Wednesday maintenance and will provide players another chance to test their puzzling skills for various rewards. However, what is perhaps the most appealing the top 1% of players will receive a crown beside their names. I have varied from top 1.2-2.3% for Zeus and Izanami without investing many runs as I was satisfied with the top 10% rewards. However, I want to achieve top 1% and wish to share my tentative strategies and pre-release thoughts.
In addition, this dungeon will impose the no awoken skills restriction which will hopefully level the playing field as push button teams cannot be used. Continue reading Cauchemar Tournament Pre-Release Strategies
Saria & Awoken Thor Team Building and Discussion
Introduction
Saria 
paired with Awoken Thor 
forms the 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 able to deal lethal damage by stacking row enhance 
awakenings along with built in damage enhancement. 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.
In addition, I would like to thank everyone who contributed their insights as well as screenshots for this guide. Even if your image was not featured, I still took note of your team roster and dungeon clearing capacity. So once again thank you to all my fellow Puzzle and Dragoners.
Continue reading Saria & Awoken Thor Team Building and Discussion
Mantastic Puzzle and Dragons 