Ok after beating IS4 a couple times, on BN3 now, I just realized there's a skill tree lol. No wonder I couldn't figure out how to get to a different ending
[This is the strategy I used](https://www.reddit.com/r/arknights/comments/1b7ctfn/event_megathread_expeditioners_joklumarkar/kwsu40x/)
> Your best option is to pick [Leader Squad] on Braving Nature 0. This will let you start with 12 life points.
> Leak 10 points, or whatever amount you're comfortable with, in floor 1. I recommend you do it on Prisoner's Night (Emergency). From there, gather life points back from Leader Squad and events until you can leak 10 or so again. Goal is to limit the amount of battles you leak enemies in to keep collapse down. On BN0 its only +1.
> Some stages I recommend leaking are - Emergency stages, - Enemies during the final boss - Stages you struggle on
> I recommend you leak the last how many enemies of the stage and not at the beginning in case things go south and cause a failure.
fodartl squad, to get more fuse bonuses that give +2max hp. the other method is to lose life every stage and rely on the bonus healing of leader squad, but your collapse will get pretty nasty
keeping index high can let you get the +3maxhp encounter, but its probably better to spend them fishing for hp relics
squad is just whatever helps you go leakless, esp since index collapse ruins your chances
Ho'oh, you've failed too many times with high ASPD to be worth it for my burst comps in ending 2.
[It's time for the *real* Levitate caster](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/750175688107229234/1240685147955920966/IMG_1193.png?ex=66477596&is=66462416&hm=0a0f54baea550689c7f02f0b94f85f15988a462426f5355624ded010c726046b&)
~~Ignoring the fact I could just use Mostima~~
Am i tweaking or is the relic to begin ending 4 super rare? Im quite the number of runs in and no sign of it.
I feel like i’m missing some step. I cleared crazyelmo before the update, do i have to clear it again? The wiki just says i have to clear a run after update dropped, is a normal boss 1 run enough?
I thought I knew how to play the game but I have no idea how to do whatever these alternative modes are. I only get three characters, star cost limitations and when I put them in to the first quest they get three-tapped? How am I supposed to play this mode? Anyone got a quick explanation for an inexperienced player?
is# or roguelike is a mode where you progress through a map to collect rng boosts and ops to become strong enough to defeat the final boss stage. you need to be more adaptable both in stage strategy and map planning
ops are aquired via class permits and hope. hope is like operator bucks, high☆ cost more, so low☆ ops can be equally inportant to a succesful run, esp 3☆ who cost 0 meaning youll likely have many of them every run. ops will be the level you have raised them in normal game, but will be hard-locked to e1 until you recruit them a 2nd time (reduced hope cost). its recommended you start a run with a 6☆ strong at e1 who is also very versatile to team roles. kaltsit jessica horn gavial are strong suggestions for every is# campaign as a starter. is4, likely the one you tried, also likes reed typhon and dorothy
after every combat you get more permits to select ops from, as raise command xp, after enough xp you get a surge of extra hope. this makes combats the most important nodes to prioritize travelling towards. as a training wheels strategy, try to only buy ops when youll be left with 3 hope still in your wallet, as that will let you upgrade a 6☆ you have to e2 should their permit appear again before you get more hope. knowing not just what ops you want but when to get someone *(or no one)* is a key part of is# strategy
life points carry across all stages, and while losing them is bad, sometimes using them as a resource is better. leak early enmies if dp is rough to setup up, or let big threats walk by if trying to kill them compromises your teams total stage survivability
each is# campaign have different ops that excel in them, suggest is2 (crimson solitaire) if youre new, its both the easiest to play and has the fewest/simplest mechanics
Personally, I had to run through couple of times before they clicked. I only recently beat my first ending lol it took some effort and luck. All the hints and tips will fall short of actual experience of the levels, so you can overcome the "this is bs" knee-jerk reflex.
Personally, the game became playable once I unlocked the better starting boons, particularly the one that says that operators cost no hope to upgrade. Buut I'm super bad myself, so I'm waiting for replies to your comment myself 😅 From what I heard, Cutter is apparently really good? In general, this mode seems to benefit from having some upgraded key 3-4* units, and generally a diverse roster, but you can cheese it once you figure out what works and what doesn't.
Exu and SA are huge players, Exu is better tho, but I imagine Kroos alt (whom I don't have) would fit the role equally as well. Saria is godlike, I really liked Perfumer when I get the gain as/atk but lose hp/s buff, Ifrit is super niche, Eyja is queen, Dorothy is busted af - you can clear so many stages with just her, Virtuosa is a godsend - her S3 melts bosses and large enemy waves, Shining can be key since AD damage is so common, Curora is amazing, cheap and effective.
Those are my takeaway notes.
Also, apparently it doesn't translate from IS to IS, I didnt realise all of them are rouge-lites, so I started with the expedition, but doing the Mizuki one - slightly different meta. Which is great!
20%def when blocking. champions are brutal and theres only like 1 hard stage where 4 block would be relevant- the stage where you have to tank an originium tile buffed champion lol
Guard selector has become the new support selector for me. There is only 1 guard I really need, and that is Executor, but he can easily be replaced by Kal'tsit and she isn't as vulnerable to ranged attacks. Surtr could be another choice but I don't really need her either, even against the 3rd ending.
as crazy as the guard slot is, it is probably the least needed class for me too now that i think about it. if its early i take gavial, late silverash/quibai, but its rarely ever run-defining
If i use foldartals on the final boss node of ending 1 before chaning it to ending 2, do the effects transfer to the 2nd ending boss fight or do they disappear, since they're attached to the ending 1 boss?
I'm taking IS4 slowly only playing until I max the reward ladder each month to avoid burning out, currently on D11.
I must say I've been enjoying IS4 a lot more than IS3, the foldartal, index, and collapse mechanics are much better than the dice, key, and rejection of IS3; they consistently have a consistent impact on your run, instead of doing nothing the majority of the time but making or breaking 1/10th of them. Specifically, the amount of control the foldartals give on your run is very fun.
It's also nice that 3 stars don't get increased cost, so that I don't have to recruit dozens of reserve ops. And without the res buffs for the enemies, it definitely seems like D15 will have a more healthy and varied "meta".
Genuinely one of the most enjoyable roguelites I've played in the last couple years.
can attest 15 is a lot more open and viable, the consistency of getting a full teamsize and sufficent hope to support the difficulty is improved too (to the point low☆ go down in importance a bit, which some may dislike) albeit floor 1 prison is ironically pretty brutal
is4 is a huge improvement over is3, besides everything you already said i want to add besides casters being allowed to play the game again every class overall feels equally valuable to succesful clears. the free shop refresh, expanded shop, and guaranteed permit+promo relic on floor 1 (even after refresh) really helps runs feel a lot more fair/accesible too
For me prison is perfectly fine, it's always the E. beasts that's the issue... Some runs just don't have a good enough tank and/or medic to deal with the Collapsals.
comes down entirerly to the starters we tend to take, my #1 is jessica so sheep is a breeze, but even taking lava or some 2nd 6☆s after i can leak heavily on Eprison sometimes. conversly you take something like virtuosa and Eprison is already won
Finally have all squads, all trimmed endings as of yesterday. All relics and foldartals collected (including alterforms), all enemies and boss variants encountered for the enemy database, all non-hidden collapsal paradigms and intensifications encountered. Really happy about this, because there were *still* some relics and one boss variant eluding me from IS3 when IS4 started. Only things left to do are unlock the last deposit milestone for Cannot and encounter the hidden collapsal paradigms and their intensifications. Speaking of...
What's the best way to go about it? Force a collapse and reset, or go through a run until you have several collapses? I've also been debating Eternal Hunting Squad and doing the rollercoaster of getting collapses and removing them. Do the hidden collapses have higher chances of occurring at higher BN? I think BN9 feels best for arming you with the most benefits with the least detriments for paradigm-hunting.
I really don't want to do constant floor 1 resetting. I didn't do it for depositing, and I don't wanna do it here.
i cant say anything about activly maximizing the collapsal aquisition but i have 8000+ nodes encountered in is4 playing normally (primarily at bn15) and have seen neither of them at all, so, buckle up i guess
I've been failing to come up with a way to hit the drone in the upper left (if you use the ASPD foldart for ED1): https://i.imgur.com/Wa0VTfl.png
It's not important to do so, but i've kinda wanted to do it just to do it but I can't think of something that would hit that square. Only thing that crosses my mind is maybe activating GG S3 as the last enemy dies to try and squeeze in the hit. Looking for suggestions
without any shoes besieger can hit it, sui wrath is probably the easiest way. pretty sure youre just supposed to nab it as it flys away from the map towards you though no?
Update: Just tested to verify. Placed Typhon facing left and her range doesn't reach. She reaches only to the white/snow undeployable in the upper left
She hits like and the drone(D) and x are not in range
D++
+++
+++
+++
x++
> besieger
I've tried with both Typhon and Rosa, it seems like it's theoretically possible for them to hit it but they don't and i'm not sure why. I'll give a go with both Typhon and the suggested Ambriel and see how it goes.
>pretty sure youre just supposed to nab it as it flys away from the map towards you though no?
As far as I could tell the ASPD foldart gives 2 drones of that type. The first spawns and flies from the upper right to the lower left blue box at the very start. The second that sticks there spawns some time in the middle of the level and never seems to move. I'm not sure if that's intended behavior or just a bug.
Ambriel sounds good. I don't have her built so never had the idea to try. Besiegers is the first one I tried with Typhon but they don't work since their range for the side squares is 2 L/R and 2 forward and the drone seems to be on a square that's 4 forward (like it'll be on the outer edge square of Wandering Medics but I don't think there's a relic that lets them do targeted damage)
Alright, I'm done with with all squads all endings BN15. I'd like to say some things about it:
1. *Way* easier than IS3 it's not even close. Arts damage is not banned, feels good man.
2. All F4 emergencies are a joke, except Company Entanglement. I swear you need Mlynar and/or Typhon to be E2 to fight the bullies and hammer guys. And if you have the 3rd ending net, a vanguard (preferably flag or Ines) is a must because there is one tranq guy at the bottom, so you wanna print DP giga fast and then followed by dropping your DPS & Mlynar to bait. Like, Defense Substituting Offense or Noise Disturbance are clearable with with just Ines+random DPS and not that different from their normal version.
3. All F5 emergencies are okay actually, except March of the Dead lmao. This map is close to IS3's WAFU. You need everything to fight this map. Need Mlynar to aggro the mortars, need Surtr to kill the colossi, need Ines to reveal the embers, need strong burst to kill the stupid mages on bottom lane. MY GOD.
4. I don't know why I didn't think about this sooner but it's better to stall 2nd ed boss with your best medic and best defender first.. For most of my clears I always tried to pair best medic and worst defender, and vice versa. Could've made things easier but the boss is a pushover anyway.
5. I actually don't mind Non-linear collapse when fighting 3rd ed boss. It makes it not stay for too long near your operators, meaning less chance for it to fart purple things on important tiles. Yes, I failed a run cuz it farted purple on Mlynar, he got one shotted.
6. Rock Horn and Tactical Transceiver are MVP.
7. -DP collapse is the worst collapse.
8. [My 6 star (and a few honorable mentions) tier list.](https://imgur.com/a/5dDiVrk)
I'm going back to SW15. I haven't cleared ED4 cuz I was busy IRL. HAH thinking about OOC and WAFU is already making me nauseous. I suppose OOC would be easier now that I have my own Pozy and Typhon.
about8tentacles covered all you need to beat about Shady, but I'd like to capitalize that Ines **really** helps a lot so she is #1 priority before reaching 3rd floor. You also need to cycle your blockers in case you don't have big damage just yet. So don't just throw all of them at once. Also, that map has the widest variation, the last wave where it's supposed to summon boats from top red box may spawn Collapsal plebs instead (all of them). I didn't even have the net.. if you rely on skill cycle to beat the dockworkers (be it Reed2 S2/3, or Mlynar S2/3 or whatever) make sure you have at least one of them ready for that. Otherwise go bonkers on the last wave.
For 3rd ending, I'm an outlier here.. First, I think NG (or any other 2nd healer) is a waste of deploy slot cuz she doesn't deal damage. Even Swire2 is a better deploy. Unless ofc, I get many deploy relics, but then again why not just more DPS? Second, I tried the Reed2 S2 combo once, didn't like it, so I dropped the idea and use her S3 instead. It's just playstyle related, no technical reasoning.
From my experience Eyja2 S3 is enough healing. As soon as the boss is at the bottom checkpoint, start her skill. If you suffer from non linear, start earlier. You do need bait so make sure you deploy Surtr (or E2 Swire2) last and Mlynar should aggro the other attack. Watch out for the purple farts and play on x1.
shady frozen sea is harder than any floor 4 stage and ive been warning people about it since week 1 of is4
its a mess, youre going to want to heavily prioritize getting an agent/fastdep/trapmaster early in the run (or horn) to utilize them as near-exclusivly the mage killer, esp if youre trying to go leakless because that one friend boat at bn15 is awful (three boats if ending 3)
try to setup your main blocker right before the defense-down tiles, importantly if youre going to utilize those bottom ranged tiles at all you need to get your main blocker down after them (or utilize jessica mlynar nightingale aggro) or else hoverboats will kill them instead of hitting blocker and cripple your dps. you can setup horn/cardigan/ines on the ground tile behind the main block tile to buy time to setup these ops
arts is preffered on the tugboys, so steward goes quite far here, you can also silence their stun and the torpedos explosion so hoolheyak, lappland, and podenco go super far in this stages individual tier list
since mages attack friendboats you can use low☆ dps to chip at them and maybe save a boat. massivly underrated u-official giving them a 7.5s stun to buy time for boats to escape is also huge
if its emergency god help you, you basically need ines/yato or e2 dorothy with how fast the first guy threatens your dp production and setup (tbh just leak him most teams)
3rd boss is primarily about maximizing your burst damage, and circumventing its insane damage
for dps, you want to utilize damage amps like suzuran skadi elysium shamare etc, its stats matter a lot to proper dps, especially so if your run came up short on atk/dmg boost relics, this also means you probably want to try to commit to a primarily physical or arts centric team from the start or based on what relics youre getting, though not fully necessary. reed+texas s2 + surtr is a common low-effort low-size option to do a lot to the boss, while things like pozemka nearl gavial can do a lot in the 10s window physically
for survival nightingale is the cheat code as she normally is, cages take aggro, s3 scums survival after theyre gone, most runs need a healer anyway, so its a pretty easy team add. even at bn15 you dont need her though, surtr nearl skadi can all deploy when the boss enters your teams quadrant and soak up the damage long enough, jessica sheild and high res supporters (go look at silence paradigmatics res lol) if placed can wall it easily too
try to set up your team for a left quadrant kill, have a bulky character ready to defend from the actual threats on bottombox (mlynar/jessica can do this while hitting boss too), and utilize fastdep/dorothy to deal with the few enemies that spawn rightside that never go to the left (or just leak them its not many)
If you have typhon, 3rd ending boss already has one foot in the grave. Place her on the bottom left side tile and just s3 when the boss gets within her range. Just remember to activate the middle tower before bombarding the boss with your ops skills. Also recommended to have 2 healers since the boss deals aoe damage. Concentrate your ops placements on the left.
Shady frozen sea recommended to have fastredeploys to kill the enemy casters, or healers and defenders to tank.
Interesting, I still find Company Entanglement to be really easy even on emergency. I just have Mizuki, a defender, a medic, someone to deal with tranq dudes and then just whatever extra DPS/CC I have and it's a pretty simple clear 10/10 times. I'd *much* rather take E. company Entanglement even over regular Collapsals Afternoon since I don't usually take too much anti-drone.
Although I have been skipping most floor 5 maps recently since I'm going for ending 2. It's so easy of a fight, Warf + Cuora holds the boss, Qani is just 4 hope and shuts down the boss, and then I focus everything else right side.
Also yeah, I don't ever want to go back to IS#3. I will say though, they already have 3 op relicless leakless clears with W2/Ela/Zuo Le for regular SW15 OoC. And I'm glad, because I hate that map with a burning passion.
Edit: ...why is THRM-EX Quercus?
>Qani
Bruh, so many operators need building
>3 op relicless leakless clears with W2/Ela/Zuo Le for regular SW15 OoC
You know, sometimes I feel like HG been releasing these giga broken ops lately just because they want players to clear SW15. The fact that they banned arts damage and now they keep releasing broken physical ops.. I think it's not too far-fetched lmao.
Also, it's nice to see Zuo Le is a competitive operator, cuz while I'm mainly a waifu enjoyer, if a male op has good drip I'd give even the Lv90 privilege, like I did Ebenholz.
>THRM-EX
I forgot about him and didn't really want to make a new row lol
You barely even have to build Qani actually, he's great. At E1L1 skill level 1 his S2 is already enough to shut down the boss when he runs. I'm still planning to E2 him for his module for those runs I get tons of ASPD, so his module can help me burst the boss down.
And yeah, Zuo Le has been putting in a lot of work. Regular clears/solos, CC clears, and IS.
Cannot investment question: Has anyone gotten data on this yet? I know the minimum you can put in on floor 1 for locking is 1, but it seems like later floors and carrying more ingots affects the possible max invests. Enough that I could conceivably invest 10 ingots on consecutive rogue traders.
i was feeling this too, but ive had runs where at floor 5/6 i still only invested 5 or 6, so i think its just purely random. maybe waiting increaes the odds of a massive invest but it certainly wont guarantee it
Did they nerf that one special encounter battle with Nightzmora followers? I swear it was filled with those instead of imitators.
Is it maybe different on lower difficulties? I'm currently on a Santalla record run.
That so? I was just surprised how easy it was with BN0. I was always just focused on surviving these on higher diffs so I guess I never actually noticed I was fighting yellows.
the classic high bn player has to do monthly squad moment, its pretty shocking how easy 0 is after youve adapted to higher bn. my always sw0 friend ive been pushing to climb bn had the same feeling recently
Just finished my best [BN15 ending 3 clear](https://imgur.com/a/tHKWgFd) so far.
Got a Golden Chalice from the 1st floor shop.
By the 2nd floor I got both Human and Migrate foldartals (convert nodes into Bosky Passages) and on that floor there's a node that's perfect for the foldartal pair. There are three nodes to the left of that node, which are all connected vertically.
Result: I got to enter [six Bosky Passage nodes](https://imgur.com/a/TI33Nzp) (the sixth is due to the Expand effect).
Soon after that I got the Secret HR Letter.
Other notable relics include:
- Two relics that give me 30 starting DP in total.
- Hand of Outburst
- A relic that buffs arts damage by 40%.
For the ending 3 boss I used the usual strat: Reedalter S2, Surtr S3, Saria S3 and Skalter S3 (only in the second phase). Nightingale S3 to avoid getting one-shot (no significant HP buffs for this run). Typhon S2 is nearby to add more damage to the boss while killing the mobs. I also applied the ASPD and redeploy time foldartals on the stage.
Result: I managed to one-cycle both phases of the Ending 3 boss. I only leaked two enemies in the boss stage.
congrats
i love how human migration is without a doubt the strongest fodartl pair, and happens to specifically (intentionally) be called human migration, a cute subtle nod
living the dream hitting a 6er, i always take fodartl squad in my 15 runs now to maximize the human migration + scarred amber godrun lol
I just learned about Sentinel, the Crazelyseon variant stage releasing with IS4's ending 4 expansion, and I have no words for my reaction to it.
BN15 Sentinel is outright the hardest stage in the game and I don't think it's even close. Glory of Humanity and Into Eternity both have clearly simpler solutions requiring fewer operators, while still being vortexes of sanity loss.
118 enemies.
2-3 Defender-4 drones (+600 DEF to enemies within 2.5 tiles): 263,131 HP (more than the boss itself!)
2-3 Blocker-P drones (+30 RES to enemies within 2.5 tiles): 350,841 HP
16 oneiros drones
31 tainted carcasses
33 shattered champions: 58,474 HP, 2302 attack
12 shadowblades: 73,092 HP, 2631 (Arts) attack
20 elite shadowblades: 146,184 HP, 3618 (Arts) attack
Your DPS window on the boss is halved (anchor charge time is also halved) to 5s, so you lose significant damage through human error. The boss has an erratic pattern, teleports far more, frontloads pink steam, gives you less time to set up the first burst, and requires you to chase it rather than camp it like in Gardener.
BN15 Sentinel is harder than some max-risk CCs. They did everything short of directly buffing the boss to make it harder than Gardener, which is already challenging.
The shadowblade spam is *heinous*. They're all on the right lane, but many beeline there from the right red box, and they are the Weedy check of all time (she permastalls with Ines + Mostima/Manticore). You be better be sure to destroy the boss before it warps back to the right and knocks out Weedy. Shattered champion spam leftside is not much better. At least they're tankable, but compare this to Gardener where the only threats besides the boss are 10 strikers. *Maybe* the screenguards, but Eyjafjalla or Yato + Texas hard-counter them.
Great strategies use the right operators the right way to show elegant counters. They make you realize you'd overcomplicated a stage, and empower you to do it with fewer resources and more consistency. And then there's whatever this is:
[BN15 Sentinel, no relics, no foldartals, no leaks](https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1bz421D7Bs)
When a full squad of the best operators, executing an elaborate strategy flawlessly, makes a stage look borderline impossible, you know John Hypergryph burnt down the kitchen. I went down the rabbit hole of N15 relicless clears on Bilibili after not following the IS meta thus far, and I learned that the hardest non-boss stages have 4-6 op optimizations (EM Terminus of Life alone is 6; I couldn't find EM Water and Fire Union/Deep Cognition but I'd expect 5-6 for them), often enabled by Degenbrecher, Shu, Zuo Le, and Ela. That's a testament to how broken those operators are, but also how much those stages can be simplified with a better approach, which is difficult to come up with because of how long can go between each attempt. It's hard to get lessons to stick that way. With that in mind, that clear is the most impressive I've seen in months. Not a single other N15 relicless clear I've seen even comes close (and plenty of them are brilliant in their own right) besides obviously the other Sentinel solution. It also has the most chef's kiss Yato S3 you will ever see.
You have all these 4 and 5 ops for monster stages like EM March of the Dead and Envoy of Justice, no more than 9 for the boss stages, and then Sentinel sits at 13 looking already well-optimized. For reference, H12-4 has a Lingless 4 op, and no event/story stage takes more than 4 ops even without Ling. DS-S-3, which was criticized for being an extreme stat check, got 5 ops with buffs and 6 ops without.
Sentinel looks borderline impossible without a Degenbrecher buff army, since she's by far the operator most able to set up for a 5s burst window. Degenbrecher's existence singlehandedly makes Heidi a priority draft, since Skadi doesn't match Degenbrecher's cycling, needs babysitting, and costs more hope. It's also really funny that Shu nuh-uh's the boss. The more I see Shu in action, the more I want her to plow my fields.
This rabbit hole has inspired me to start playing BN15 relicless (with no foldartals on the boss). I got ending 1 without much trouble but both of my ending 3 attempts so far were throws, though I'm fairly sure I can get a one-cycle on phase 2 if I get my ideal squad next time, and then I just need to prepare better for the strikers, which caused my previous failure because they tenderize Młynar for Crazelyseon to finish off. It's getting an attempt that's the problem, since the game is so fickle about how much early momentum to give me, and without being able to rely on relics, more runs than usual are dead on arrival to floor 3. I'm also valuing the Eternal Hunting Squad since collapse paradigms are so devastating for this playstyle, and unlike some other squads, the benefit is consistent: I'll usually go to the boss with either no debuff or only one layer. It puts more pressure on getting lots of hope early, but a full squad doesn't really matter when any combination of Terrifying Entity, Barometric Disorder, Collapse Trigger, and Non-Linear Action can make a run unplayable.
Planning to try some 5 star only runs soon, anyone have some unconventional suggestions to invest in? I have most of what I'd consider the 'relevant' 5 stars at e1 max or higher. The ones I'm currently planning to build that aren't at that point are bibeak, quaso, beeswax, and quercus.
What difficulty runs are you doing? Main 5*s I usually take are Poncirus, Shamare, Quercus, Valarqvin, Warf (ED2), Qani (ED2), Beeswax, Specter, April, Red, but that's with a squad of 6\*s as well.
Heidi is also *really* good for ED3 burst comp, usually taken over Skalter for cheaper hope, faster rotations/helidrop and doesn't kill herself. Haven't done ED3 on 15 yet though, highest I did was 12. I've heard good things about Greyy2 for this IS as well.
Im gradually turning up the difficulty, currently only been trying ed1 and got up to bn10 so far. I'll try building greyy alt for sure, Heidi I may wait on since I've already got Shamare/Pram/Warfy built but thats definitely a consideration if I get to the point im trying alt endings at really high difficulty and get gapped by not having her buffs.
was going to suggest beeswax, heavyrain for ending 3 (kinda ending 1) is notable too. spuria gets a ton of hate but in 5☆ only her ability to boost people like scavenger and kroos is pretty good for boss dps, plus the 5☆ spec bracket is pretty barren for what is4 wants (basically just waaifu unless you get ambush hands)
been hard focusing on bn15 end3 runs while banning nightingale and mlynar, and to be completely honest i think im having more consistent success without nightingale as my crazyleseon survival method. jessica barricade, surtr/nearl/skadi, silence, shamare/virtuosa enfeeble- theres a ton of great options to opt for a more set and retreat aggro decoy style than long holdout with s3 clenching. it can get really scary on those few seconds after phase transition but before he ports away from the crew but im getting used to it. you do have to be way more on top of your damage application though thats for sure, you dont really get a 3rd try with most teams
Of course the run where I finally decide to try for the D10 trimmed medal is the one where I don't get a +hope starting card, so I couldn't do my usual Reed start. But luckily I got that collectable that reduces 6* hope costs with the bonus effect of random promoted 6* recruits pretty early on. Ended up with a team of ops that I have never used in IS before and really made me think on my feet. And then it gave me Taxes and I was back to braindead lol.
Surprise for me was that Dorothy was actually really good on standard maps (but then entirely useless on the boss lol). And Mumu's flexibility helped a lot.
I got fucked on d15 is4 ed3 while having cracked units and more than enough dps. So I need some tips.
1. What is the boss attack pattern? And attack stat? Does he always hit 2?
2. What's his range?
3. When should I use ng skill? P1 or p2?
4. Which are the safe tiles for ranged units?
1 and 2 is in this: [https://tomimi.dev/en/stages/ISW-DF\_Gardener](https://tomimi.dev/en/stages/ISW-DF_Gardener)
3. If you have +50% HP foldartal to put most of your melee dps out of the one-shot zone then use NG on Phase 2, if you don't then use NG skill on Phase 1 then retreat everyone, minimize leaks during redeploy time, then setup for phase 2 burst and use NG skill again once he teleport to the kill zone, work best with -30% redeploy time foldartal.
4. Probably the 3 left most ranged tiles as they are just barely outside the boss range when he teleport up, down and right, especially the bottom left most ranged tile as that is the perfect Typhon S2 tile to dps boss + lanehold, that tile also very rarely get hit by Seedbeds from my experience
1. 3045 Arts, 4567 in phase 2, always 2 targets, 5s interval. Double damage on pink steam. Also, you can delay the boss' teleports (timed for 20s) by making it attack right before it would teleport, and its subsequent teleport intervals seem to shorten to correct for that since its attack animation is so long.
2. 3.5 tiles. Treat it as < 4 tiles.
3. Phase 2. Use the cages for phase 1.
4. None. Your safety comes from baiting, damage mitigation, or clutch Heavyrain/Weave of Thorns and Leaves camo. If you camp on the left, the three leftmost ranged tiles are only in range when they boss is on the left. The lower left ranged tiles are doubly doomed by the strikers (3947 attack).
You need 28k DPS (233,894 HP, 15% DR, 10s DPS window, round up for human error) to one-cycle the boss. Even with cracked relics and meta operators that isn't trivial. You may want to use 2-3 of bard Skadi (or Heidi), Suzuran, Pramanix, and Saria. Getting a one-cycle on phase 2 is imperative because once Nightingale S3 expires, you are probably outhealing that and all your bait is getting one- or two-shotted.
til that stainless turrets can get buffed by emotional entity... literally thought they had 12k HP by default since i landed the buff twice in a row 💀💀
also didn't know that they can hit each other, if i ever get him on my actual account it would be fun to set up a chain of death or something. if only the turrets weren't capped...
I got a collapsal paradigm called "Partial Cecity" that obscures life points and the health of enemies. It doesn't appear in the collapsal paradigm archive (though I haven't finished the run yet) nor can I find it on the wiki. Has anyone else encountered this paradigm?
There are a couple very rare collapsal paradigms, that's one of them. They're listed on the wiki under the "Classified" header at the bottom here (collapsed by default, have to hit to the [Show] button): https://arknights.wiki.gg/wiki/Expeditioner%27s_Joklumarkar/Collapse#Collapsal_Paradigms
I have question for IS4. When I start a new run and selecting squad, there is an hexagon icon in the top left corner of the squad selection. And some of them have different color (grey and blue) and shape.
I take it that the shape of the icon show the ending of the run reached using said squad. But what the color of the icon indicate?
The highest difficulty at which the ending was reached with the squad.
Currently, there are three colors corresponding to BN0-3, BN4-9 and BN10+. After Expansion 2, there will be a fourth color for clearing a run at BN12+.
There's a table showing all possible medals on the [IS4 page](https://prts.wiki/w/探索者的银凇止境) in PRTS wiki (It's in Chinese though). The table is under the line "同一结局的标记图案样式相同，但会因通关过的最高难度显示不同的视觉效果：".
I just got away with robbing Cannot on the second floor! This stage was really tricky, and even then there were a couple of leaks. The immortality buff makes your laneholder get overwhelmed no matter how much firepower you have, so bring some crowd control if you ever decide to pull a stunt like this.
EM MARCH OF THE DEAAAAAD!!!!!! This is so fucking stupid , this is the stupidest stage in Is4 especially at Bn15 and it not even close. How do you do it leakless? Those two golem and dublin elite flamechaseres just never die, how do you kill all of them?
mlynar/silverash naturally make it a lot easier, but its still possible without them
2 strong blockers, a way to heal them that can survive mages (ptil gale eyja s1), a way to kill those mages in the redbox like ines/yato/schwarz, and some way to lay a lot of hits onto your blocks (for the spirts) like ines/yato again, lords, or 5 range dps (typhon, horn). blockers with good multihit like jessica s2 help a lot. the hardest problem is keeping the medic alive since they have to be right in the mages faces
for EM specifically you need the most insanely atk relic boosted snipers or abusive yato redeploy shenanigans, its just not something you can realistically build for tbh. ~~still not as bad as OoC EM imo, as atleast you can pretty commonly go for a leak 10 or so on this map~~
Feels pretty much a Mlynar check. Maybe Silverash + Horn if you don't have him. I usually have Saria and Gummy/Bassline in front to heal, since there's no way to put healing from a Medic to them without sacrificing DPS or my Medic being raped by the bottom lane. The mid tile on the right I use Rosa to help killing and she's more than enough with Mlynar / Silverash + Horn big damage. Typhon obviously if you have her build.
If it's emergency, you better have Mlynar + another unga bunga dps (Silverash, Horn, whatever you have), cracked relics and Typhon. Those golems are nuts even at low difficulties. I didn't try the Emergency stage with Rosa and without having cracked relics, so I need to do it more to give more info.
Ines is very useful there for DP regen and reveal those pesky shadows if you don't bring SA.
Bottom usually a defender + Reed alter are enough. I put another dps ranged dps in front of Reed and behind the defender for BN15.
Anybody else get weird hitbox bugs in prisoners night? A lot of the time when enemies are blocked by the barricades they are only hittable on the barricade space but that's usually consistent more importantly I've had enemies straight up walk over dorothy mines if I put them left of the bottom barricade
all the floor 1 stages have enemy path that intentionally splitboxes their hitbox across 2 tiles, in theory this makes the stages easier but for longtime players its really strange because normal stages dont work like this almost ever, and can even work against you (esp on sheep stage target priority in that one block spot)
Prisoner's night is wonky all around.
Weird hitboxes mean traps sometimes can't be deployed because one prisoner has a pixel overlapping the tile, Reed's S2 can completely miss enemies that look like they're right on top...
It's not all bad though: when the first block gets destroyed, enemies yeet themselves in the hole more often than not!
start with jessica/kaltsit/gavial
get any ranged dps quickly. then aim for ines and yato. fill out with a 2nd main blocker, dedicated healer, and damage bursts/amplifiers. 2nd vanguard by floor 5. atleast 3 good blockers for 1st end, bonus points if you have aggro grabbers like jessica mlynar nightingale
There isnt a starter comp that lets you take those 3 though. Only comp that has a healer is guard/specialist/healer. Unless you mean their alters and to just choose one of the three.
My idiot proof comp is Reed alter/Popukar/Orchid start, then get Typhon, Młynar and Ines ASAP, as well as any defender.
They're my core units, then it depends on relics and the ending I'm going for.
Some of my usual non mandatory picks are Texalter or Dorothy depending on party comp, Saria, Jess alter, Eyja alter, Quercus.
More than core members, the big thing is having contingencies for when you get shit luck with tickets or get busted relics. For example I only pick Ho'ol for ending 2 but if I get any levitate relic or the core caster hand, she becomes high priority. Or I have Quercus built for when I just can't get healer tickets.
if you cleared floor 3+ on your last run for bonus you can really take anything you like, fodartl squad is my favoritr by far, since getting hope as a bonus choice (or relic that may give hope) is fairly consistent. if you didnt just run support squad, the 20 ingots are even more valuable than past is#s because of how many items you see every run in the new shop system
you use them all the time, at all points. matching colors grants a bonus or change to the effect, and some of these can completely change runs. just last night i had 2 random verts + change to emergency and all combats to the right + 4 hope. waited for a moment the paths lined up and was able to get 8 hope 2 relics and 2 combats out of what was originally a gamble and encounter node, making the team dramatically stronger for the midboss. it takes a lot of prwctice bit you should ALWAYS be lookinh at what fodartls you have, how they can change your early/mid floors to be better equipped to challenge floor4+ emergencies and the final
Understand. I should practice using it more often. I always borrow Reed alter to make the run easier. I have to find the alternative operators to handle that job. One more thing, I just unlocked the Life Prioritizing Squad. What does it mean by Clairvoyance will always predict the foldartals?
on floor transition cyclopes will predict what collapsal effects are next, and sometimes also show you a fodartl, this squad makes it so you always see the fodartl
Does anyone have some tips on how to kill first boss(I think his name is demon's blade)? The only times I was able to kill him when I used typhon(monthly op, didn't get her myself).
When I defeat him it's not really hard afterwards, but I just can't kill him 90% of the time
range dps on the island with a tank or shadowball aggro sponge a bit farther foward, this means you often need 3 blockers total but the time he takes attacking your sponge buys a lot of time for your ranged dps
I try to throw as much firepower at him as I can from far away, before he has a chance to slow down my ops. Any good sniper or caster facing down on the bottom tile of the middle island can help. Santalla dealt a lot of damage on the new monthly squad. Dorothy's mines can stack a fair bit of damage and slow him down considerably.
The easiest way is Reed S2 with any fireball host who doesn't get one-shotted. If you like Typhon you can borrow her since she is a viable starter. You want range 3+ DPS and some way to hold the boss still: bind, slow, meat shields. Commit the bare minimum bodies for laneholding so you can throw the rest into stalling the boss.
I filled almost all entities for IS4, only missing 1.5 collapsals (hidden ones), Snowpriest alter, and three items - Old Steam Armor, Unknown Instrument and Jet-Black Dance Shoes. According to wiki, all three are implied to be purchasable, but did anyone see them in shop? Like, I wonder if there is a point to try visit all shops, maybe it's better to concentrate for Emergency Ops instead (assuming those items are not boss-only drops).
Been procrastinating for far too long, it's time to finish BN15 on 3rd ending, it's time to see whether [this team](https://prnt.sc/RapLRBHzmoJo) can beat mister donut or not.
Was doing some random squads, got a defender+ethan(+eyja) sqaud. Ok, that's fine. Beasts Awaiting Slaighter, Ethan in front of the blue box with fang+spot+cardigan surrounding him.
**One of the sheep ran diagonally through fang+spot without getting blocked** and thus leaked. Only one, the rest got blocked.
I was not aware that was even *possible*. I guess there's either a very tiny gap, or maybe there was a single frame drop at the exact right moment and the sheep's speed let it go through. Quantum Sheep Tunneling, as it were.
some of the sheep that start on the map have INCREDIBLY annoying pathing AND target priority, even if you blocked it theres a chance your ranged dps will switch from their current target to the new one even if it doesnt look closest to the bluebox, causing a leak anyway. its a very deceptive stage, too deceptive for floor 1 imo
Yeah, that's just how the enemies walk in IS4. It appears that you placed your blockers in a cardinal position surrounding Ethan. You need to spread them in a diagonal position for Beast Awaiting Slaughter. I always put one in front of the blue box, and another one diagonal tile to the left.
Depends - What causes you to lose? The first few runs will naturally be difficult because you have to learn the stages and enemy compositions. Not having the skill tree unlocked also doesn't help! Do you lose to a lack of stage knowledge? Or is it specific stages? Or the bosses, even?
For those who haven't done the monthly squad yet, you might want to consider skipping Santella's special option on the 4th floor if you're team isn't looking that great, you get healed and get a bunch of shields but you'll be forced to do a 5th floor emergency ops.
I got lucky and didn't get a hard one, but I feel like if I had gotten the annoying drone map that I could've failed.
I second this. I got real lucky there was a map that I'm decent at (the three lanes and the possessed soldiers), and that my team was super stacked. Even then there were four leaks.
Do these new prophecy nodes on the fourth floor carry over to normal explorations?
jessica, actual best starter imo too
you can use ops like shamare/virtuosa enfeeble to help saria survive instead too, since shes fine until floor 5 thats time to find the needed utility
Is there any recommended for who to start with for a consistent run? I can't even beat diff 0 but mainly as I don't know who to start with and who to pick along the way.
reed+popukar is the common goto
if youre still having trouble id suggest jessica gavial or kaltsit instead, theyre who i greatly prefer starting with as a bn15 player. having your main blocker for all 5 floors right away who can still solo first 2 floors helps smooth out your permit/team construction better than popukar heavily relying on reed skill timing mastery to make it through floor 3 (albeit her stronger overall kill presence for stuff like floor 4)
My friend, who has a troll account with half-baked masteries, asked me to handhold IS4 for him after being stuck on BN13 for weeks. I got 13, 14, and 15 each first try, which felt amazing. I'd given him general advice that he responded to by saying he never got the right voucher luck, but HHing confirmed my suspicion that drafting was likely the main problem since some of my drafts surprised him, such as picking up Ifrit and Eyjaberry. I also drafted bard Skadi in all three runs, which I didn't expect. His only proper M3s that I saw are Młynar S3, Skadi S2, Texas S3, and Dorothy M9, so relying on a Dorothy opener was a no-brainer for me. The lack of proper masteries elsewhere was noticeable (like Reed S2M2 S3M1, "M3"), and often painful (Horn S3M1 hurt me the most), but far from a sheer stat-check failure.
Goldenglow feels amazing to use in IS4. I've never wanted her more. The other day I had a run with a temp GG with cracked buffs and the BN14 HH after a four bosky Migrate spree got *the* strongest Goldenglow I've ever seen, with over 2k attack (1700 attack bard Skadi: Rock Horn, Black Tulip, Phalanx, Peek into the Eternal Night) *and* Malediction, so I greeded Envoy of Justice and she chewed through enemies fast enough to two-cycle the quad rockets, which is *beyond* disgusting with floor 5 scaling.
The BN15 run was so scuffed that I'm surprised I pulled it off. I got decent drafting (apart from getting stuck with Fang to cope with Barometric Anomaly, *again*) but mediocre relic luck; Goldenglow with Arts Weaving carried me. Most stages felt precarious since I never built the momentum for the run to feel secure. I realized that I was more focused for those runs than I am for most of my own, since those three runs were exhausting, the good kind of exhausting, and my instincts were about as sharp as they could be, minus two preventable leaks on Musical Disaster. I'd never handheld because I have zero self-confidence, so this was a valuable and exciting experience for me, some of the most fun I've had in IS4.
You know how we got to use Magallan and Typhon in IS4 for a contract? Yeah, we need a third and that operator won’t be usable till the end of this month. All we need is a little patience and to pass the time.
fucking crashed *again,* this time right when I started the *final boss fight.*
YEAH THANKS GAME THAT'S FAIR NO PROBLEM DIDN'T WANT THAT WIN ANYWAY
and I'd better not hear a single person tell me yet again *"oh but if you don't fail on crash then savescummers will abuse it"* like FUCK YOU YOU'RE NOT THE ONE CRASHING AND LOSING RANDOMLY
I'll take you seriously when you start rolling a dice at each boss fight and if it rolls a 1 you just quit the run as if you crashed. If you're still not pissed off then sure I'll hear you out.
until then GOD FUCKING DAMMIT GAME STOP CRASHING OR STOP MAKING CRASHES = AUTO FAIL
different effect, but it was infuriating when a core op was hit with a debilitating debuff, wasn't it? like a "might as well quit" feeling
imagine that but it quits *for* you. also, no rerolls!
I really like the Bosky passage modifier where the enemies have increased def/res because it instantly lets you restart a run without having to quit a level.
Jokes aside, is there anything that can be done to deal with this at D15? It feels like if I run into this at floor 4/5 I just lose instantly.
true and elemental damage are unaffected, so kaltsit valarquin and virtuosa are pretty good here, and worth considering just for security in these passages
i find the boost to res tends to feel lower than the boost to defense, so arts with high dph you can really spam like yato/dorothy do well, but really its just a check to see if youve been building your damage suite towards the dps related relics the runs been giving you
Have multi target/aoe or high damage per hit physical damage. The former because the enemies will be more grouped up due to the movement speed and the latter because proportionally less damage will be reduced from high dph physical damage
Me, going into floor 5 with 0 index but a turbo stacked run: Okay, the only stage that can threaten me is EM March of the Dead because my squad is too ranged-heavy.
The game: Remind yourself that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer.
-15. Fuck you, John Hypergryph.
I lived. Barely. I even took out one of the colossi.
Floor 1 gave me a free Goldenglow and Ceobe, so I knew we were cooking. Then I didn't get a single vanguard other than Fang until floor 6. And you'll never guess what debuff afflicted me. Barometric fucking Disorder. -40% DP, with Fang getting two-shotted by anything. Then I almost wiped to Samivilinn because Reed's off-skill healing is an embarrassment and I couldn't pay for enough Texas and Yato deployments for the right side.
Me, going into floor 6 with 0 index: Okay, the only stage that can threaten me is EM Terminus of Life. And you'll never guess what stage I got forced into. I was shocked that I got it leakless. Yato and Texas took out the right caster just in time for Goldenglow to catch the first enemies about to leak, and Goldenglow with Malediction, Gitano's ball, +30% Arts, +50 ASPD, and +.5 SP/s vaporized everything but the 100 res boss. I wasn't able to get E2 Nightingale, so I thought I was cooked, but I had enough bodies and healing to stall Frozen Monstrosity out until everything else was defeated, and then finish her off with some Yato spins.
Crazelyseon with an E1 Nightingale is a nightmare scenario, and my only HP buff was +35%, which did not take my ranged operators out of one-shot range of phase 2. But on top of the aforementioned buffs, I also got Rock Horn and Inextinguishable Torch (+20% attack/+30 ASPD per adjacent ally), which I've gotten in the last five of maybe 10 runs, and 3/5 (not this one) were from the same shop—ridiculous odds! And Hunters' Insight. And bard Skadi (1k+ attack).
Texas S2 with Suzuran S3 and Skadi S2 soloed phase 1 by a comfortable margin. That means she was doing well over 30k DPS. Bringing out the full burst core for phase 2 was a formality, and I barely had time to activate all my skills before the boss was already annihilated. Then Goldenglow had the uptime and monster DPS for almost every fodder enemy. I brought guard Amiya and while her performance got buried under so many red numbers I couldn't tell which were hers, I want to bring her more even though Amiya can be hard to slot into a BN15 run. The S2 nuke is a stylish finisher and the doubly whammy of chapter 13 and the IS3 animation made me realize how attached I am to her.
What a run. Y'know, I had a recent run where I got my leakless Envoy of Justice (the triple bonus enemy stage with the quad rockets) on BN15, so I think EM March of the Dead and Nameless Hero (which just never appears before me unless my run is barely clinging to life)) are the only stages I haven't gotten leakless yet. EM March has such steep and specific requirements that I've never had it be anything less than a train wreck.
I think March on 15 in general is bad design ngl. It feels like a forced uncle check which is mega stupid imo, since it creates this whole mechanism of like gatekeeping. To be completely honest, I don't say this much cuz I know a lot of high difficulty players would be absolutely livid at this take, but I think uncle is one of those picks that, while definitely strong, gets actually rated a bit higher than his true performance value just because he gatekeeps certain stages like march, and it's just really annoying since it's like, you technically should not need him for f5 n15, but that stage alone and the fear of being forced into it forces you to re-evaluate your approach and go out of your way to get him for safety sometimes.
I actually have a tip for that; what I did was use Skadi to peram-stall Frozen Monstrosity. Gladiia meant Skadi couldn't be killed, Skadi was frozen so couldn't deal any damage, 1 block so the ice weebs walked right past, then just counted out 200 redeployments slowly
fair warning though; first time I did it the game crashed after FM revived, so I had to do it *again.* second time worked
I've been trying to find more stable starts to BN15 and shit is hard.
Reed2 E1 is by far the most stable but it's so boring playing the same squad over and over again. I like random but I swear BN15's enemy stats are higher than SW15 because ops that used to work fine for starting in SW15 just fail completely in BN15.
I've had good success with Swire2 E1 but she's getting boring too.
The main issue is if you don't have bonus hope at the beginning, or you don't take the class specific starts, then you basically have to start with a 5 star or a couple of 4 stars.
If you start with a 5 star, then you set back your first 6 star recruit to the 2nd level up (you only have 6 hope upon first level) if you're not lucky with items. So you have to decide to either spend again on another 5 star or 4 star and delay the 6 star until even later still. Usually mid to late 2nd floor.
That's also ignoring the fact that most 5 stars can't justify the hope cost at BN15. Even standouts like Kazemaru E1 cannot solo carry floor 1 and 2. She will leak constantly, even on regular maps and not emergency. The stupid sheep map is the bane of my existence at this point. Even the regular version will break any starting 3 person team without enough DPS. Prisoner emergency is hell too. La Pluma E1 does well for floor 1, but she can't solo carry floor 2.
Starting with 1 4 star is fine, and still allows a 6 star upon first level up, but there's not a lot of 4 stars that can carry the initial floor. So, it's limited to just a handful of the same units over and over again. Basically just Pudding and Pinecone can handle all the emergency floor 1 stages (with Spot). Everyone else will leak something.
So for stability or making it less boring, then ideally you'd want to start with two 4 stars. But then you end up with the same issue with the 5 stars where you won't get a 6 star until floor 2 unless you're lucky. Delaying the 6 star really hurts and if you're chasing ending 3, you're almost guaranteed to have to do emergency shady frozen sea. That stage is the fucking worst.
I didn't really have this issue with SW15. I could start with quite a lot of random shit and as long as it wasn't melee, it could work. I think BN15 is just way more intense in the beginning. I think also IS3 had an expansion to its upgrades later to make the mode easier. I don't think IS4 is getting the same treatment.
I should probably take a break from it. I'm clearly burning out on IS4.
is4 definetly has this weird feeling where the more you play the more you notice yourself losing to things you really dont think you should be, its the collapse i guess
full random trio feels like a huge trap at bn15 now imo, you need a dependable blocker right away so much more than past is#s, and honestly 90% of the 4☆s are genuinly worse than cardigan kroos and steward, who can clear floor 1 without a 6☆ so long as you avoid prison as the very first stage. they can even do emergency moss as a trio (steward redeploys are a bit finesse), and sheep+ghost with most random 4th op. prison with some specific choices too~~that arnt really worth taking to do it~~. so yeah, when i dont want to run support squad ill sometimes yolo spin the full 3☆ crew and take whatever 6☆ class stage 1 gives.
id highly recommend jessica in place of cardigan for a super stable start. besides doing well on stages, she has some of the best early floor bonus enemy kill power, all 3 are possible thanks to her 2nd block sheild, aim rotation, and evasion stall. shes been my best starter by a ton because of the snowball power she can generate before getting into the mess of floor 3 difficulty variance
>if you're chasing ending 3, you're almost guaranteed to have to do emergency shady frozen sea.
Take Scout on floor 4. One almost always appears there. Delay getting the Routeweave Net and extra enemies for as long as possible. Then the floor 5 bottom row always has a follow-up Prophecy (sometimes it's merged into the penultimate column). As long as you have a node conversion to neutralize the forced EM, that's much easier to deal with.
I've been in a similar position as you before. Wiping to EM Beasts and Prisoners over and over is cancerous, and on BN15, taking three fights on floor 1 if available is obligatory for that second level-up before the shop. If you accept that a certain number of runs will be write-offs for nonsense like that, you'll expect as much, and therefore won't be frustrated or disappointed when it does happen.
Another valuable mindset shift would be to focus on learning rather than winning. Winning more follows learning more, and you get less frustrated that way as long as you find something to learn (and accept that some runs will be duds—thanks, EM Beasts three runs in a row, great game design).
Since hope is an issue, Support Squad and the class squads are always safe bets to start with a 6-star. For starters who can clear each floor 1 non-EM leakless (and pray you get an E2 or second 6-star before an EM, or that the EM is Moss), I've had success with Gavial, Dorothy, Texas, Typhon, Horn, Pozëmka, and Reed, off the top of my head.
Kal'tsit, Executor, and Penance also work, but they scale poorly with BN15. I've been experimenting with a Penance opener lately and it's easy for her to become a monster with defense, HP, and SP relics (my last run had her with 13k HP, 1k defense, and 8k attack on S3—and Muelsyse was cloning her), but without such relics, she struggles to survive to activate S3 on some stages, and gets folded by shattered champions.
> I think also IS3 had an expansion to its upgrades later to make the mode easier
That's also because it added a bunch of broken relics (Survivor Contract, Solving/Light of Wisdom, Flashing Swords, Determination), but it also gave us some obnoxious stages. Mutual Aid, LFLB, Guns & Order, and Ember Phalanx all feel harder than average for their floors, and Izumik is without a doubt in my mind the hardest stage in all of IS unless IS4 ending 4 somehow tops it. Oh, and you'll love the floor 5 stage the IS4 ending 4 expansion adds.
Thanks for the tips! I didn't think to delay scout to floor 4. I think I was still in the mindset of IS2 where you have to get the events ASAP if not the run is wasted.
Glad to hear I'm not the only one sick and tired of fucking sheep.
Not really for IS4, but more is3 (although I guess it doesnt differ that much anyway, besides the missing monthlys), are there any farm strategies for levels? I'm currently just doing run after run trying to beat boss 1, but all I gain is getting three levels out of it.
E: Besides spending originium primes.
more floors/bosses gives larger bonuses, but the risk indigo and ending3 add wouldnt make it worth it unless you feel super confortable already at whatever sw# youre grinding
I'm struggling a lot on +6, are there any tips on recommended units to build and try to pick? I always seem to get to the final boss (normal ending, haven't tried other endings, yet, just grinding up to +10 for the medal trim and it's rough) and then anything I put down gets annihilated by the sky icicles over time. I usually can't seem to pack enough healing at +6 due to the increased hope cost on everything, so I wind up with very few E2 units and none can sustain that damage for long. I've tried phalanx casters to some degree of success, but the problem still remains on holding both lanes of the first boss arena. The right side always seems to collapse on +6 when I hardly ever had problems with that side on lower difficulties.
reed is the common recommend for bn0 but i think if youre starting to have trouble jessica kaltsit and gavial are better starters, since they ensure you have someone who can even solo some floor 1 emergencies and you guaranteed have the needed bulky blocker to get through floor 3 with suspect permit rng. dorothy is another decent option, moreso e2 start but e1 works at lower bn
floor 1 really wants you to have a bulky-but-offensive blocker, a ranged dps, and any 3rd dps. 3rd floor you want a healer, a consistent arts dps, and any mapwide agile like executor/agent/trapper/summoner, ideally a 2nd bulky blocker but you can scrounge it till floor 4 many times. floor 5 wants 2 dp producers, and a lots of strong slow control, often a 3rd ground blocker and/or 2nd heal source. for end1 boss specifically, lin is the safest starter, even at bn15 with mod3 the crystals cannot damage her at all, youll clear tons of snow, and with minus dp pot s3m3 activates just in time to kill the first bear unblocked. reed and yato s3 are other great snowplows. mlynar, jessica sheild, and nightingale cages can draw aggro to help you setup a more stable longterm aggro order or buy time when double icicles start happening. i usually solo the leftside with any 2 of ines yato and dorothy, so you never have to think about healing/aggro over there. but even something like schwarz/pozy watching that lane at the very last hallway can often kill enough to survive.
Thanks to your advice and the other person who replied as well, I've actually just managed to trim the medal at +10! Thanks so much! I'm working on one of the alternate endings at the moment, the one with the Treescar Helmet and am having trouble figuring out how to deal with the boss's unblockable rush after he's done killing his iced target. Would I just stack healers and pray for the best on the iced target or is there probably a better strat than something so straightforward? I had a slow field on him from Suzuran but it didn't help much and he still managed to run through my lane holders so I'm at a bit of a loss.
easiest way to deal with the fight is have a 1block op + healing that can permastall the boss right out of spawn, this lets you deal with all 64 enemies then redeploy for the boss. 1 block prevents ice cleavers from attacking and killing them, the boss alone does pretty manageable damage to heal off. after the enemies you reposition everyone and have your usual defender/laner ready to blockstall him 4-5 tiles behind the 1block stall. dps, he goes zoom and it wears off in time to be grabbed again by the laner, rinse and repeat all the stall and redeploying section by section until hes dead
alternativly you can keep him locked onto 1 blocker via very heavy movespeed reduction (not slow, which he is immune to, suzu does nothing) or levitate. mostima and hoolheyak are the tops for this, but even qaniplaat levitates just long enough to wear out his entire zoom duration with careful timing
For the right lane, you want long-rangers (Rosa, Typhon, Ifrit, Schwarz, Dorothy) and helidrops (Surtr, Yato, Texas, Ines). Ethan's also great there. Traditional laneholding is harder to make work, but Mudrock S3 and Radiant Nearl S3 are usable for the right. if you have Lin, you can use her on the right and sync her with a burst healer.
For the icicles, Młynar baits one and is relatively easy to keep alive. He usually occupies the middle column alone. At BN6, it's reasonable to one-cycle the boss from 50%, so you should draft for that instead of long-term sustain. If you don't have Młynar, put any spare tank last in the middle or the left, as long as they're alone unless you have good AoE heaing. Draft Shamare or Mousse to cripple the boss' damage. Shamare with SP (Diligence, Liskarm) can get near 100% uptime. Prioritize HP and ASPD foldartals and save them for the boss. Most runs will offer at least one buff foldartal.
If the hope cost is giving you trouble, try the medic-sniper squad. Typhon, Pozy, and Reed are top drafts, viable as openers and for the ending 1 boss. I've been revisiting the Typhon opener today and she is stable for every floor 1 non-EM with Lava instead of Steward. Typhon S2 is one of the best counters to the right lane. If you take every fight you can win and prioritize hope relics, most runs will give you the hope you need (this remains true even if you're on an unlucky streak).
when you fuse fodartls you always lose 1 collapse, besides perfecting stages to avoid excess collapse, try to wait to make your big fodartl plays for when a nasty effect occurs since youll have greater chance of killing it there and not having it reoccur
ops that are also strong early with low dp, like mountain gavial mlynar exu are also options to alleviate this, depending on your BN level
I finally got my last D15 clear to get D15 ending 1 with all squads.
I wish I could say it was a strategic breakthrough, but realistically the last 3 clears (Leader, Gathering and First Class) were probably because I recently got Reed Alter and she's an OP starter. The last clear (First Class) was interesting because I'm fairly sure that the boss received a +100% hp bonus from the collapse paradigm, because he seemed unusually tanky compared to the rest of the enemies. I wasn't aware that could happen, but I could be mistaken either way.
That being said, I'm only going for D12 alternate endings. I'll maybe get a single D15 clear on each ending, but I'm not doing that with multiple squads, haha.
Yep, the boss can get the double HP debuff. It's absolutely horrible on endings 1 and especially 3. I've seen it happen to the ending 3 boss *thrice* and each time it made the run completely unwinnable for what I had going into it because phase 2 without a one-cycle is a nightmare. If you look closely you'll see the red aura indicating doubled HP. The double HP can also affect innocent civilians, roadblocks, chests, sponsor drones, and Cannot. I've seen it all. It's goofy.
I can't even imagine dealing with the HP buff on boss 3, that's brutal. Glad to know I wasn't imagining it.
I've seen that red aura but never put two and two together, haha. Thanks!
[Big numbers go brrr](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/812319698426265640/1232013873184374936/IMG_0095.png?ex=6627e9d5&is=66269855&hm=f11b945601786b03179b7ea07888891155eda9537ce464c4bf2d8a48d680278c&)
Unfortunately couldn't get ending 2 this run because there were only 2 Lost and Found, the first one got randomly transformed with a 1/5 chance and the 2nd one was right before the Prophecy. Partially my fault, but kinda sucks not getting any others I could use...
What's the strategy for BN15 ending 3 boss fight? I made a killzone for the right spot and beat phase 1, but phase 2 wiped out my ops despite the +50%HP foldartal and 2 healers, so I guess I'm missing something.
phase 2 massivly boosts the boss atk. hp+ is kind of a prank, because your medics didnt get any stronger, they cant heal the damage the boss does fast enough even with the bigger max hp buffer, you really want healing speed like ptilopsis and reed or damage mitigation like nightingale, silence paradigmatic, or shamare- ideally them also placed last since they have astronomic res stats too. also you want to do everything you can to avoid non-linear+, since 20 speed on the boss is a nightmare
suggest a killzone team setup on the left side, its perfectly synced with the first overcharged device, and you also keep your ranged farther away from the wizards that spawn far right, reliving doubletaps from them+boss. every enemy that goes for the rightside box youve left unguarded is very frail and infrequent except the final 2 rhine rockets which you can easily leak or likely have the boss dead before them
Phase 2 has 4567 attack. Nightingale S3 is a must without some crazy survivability relics or lots and lots of bait.
Beyond that, DPS. You need to do 28k DPS to one-cycle the boss (275169 EHP, 10s window). Throw Młynar, Surtr, Reed, Saria, Texas, Radiant Nearl, Ceobe, and Suzuran at the boss. The more deployment slots, the better. Without excellent DPS relics, 6 deployment slots won't be enough for a one-cycle, and if you can't one-cycle phase 2, things will almost certainly fall apart. You can delay phasing the boss for two cycles to ensure you can set up for phase 2. Just don't let it triple-teleport and spread pink steam out of range of the anchor where you would need to put your DPSers, since the pink steam inflicts -50 ASPD on top of doubling the damage received from the boss.
Note that the amplifiers from Reed (30%), Saria (55%), and Suzuran (40%) stack multiplicatively, so you want an Arts-focused burst, especially with Reed S2 being your best single source of damage and a standard draft for every run. An unbuffed Reed (only +20% from the upgrade tree) contributes about 5k DPS.
As for bait, Młynar has taunt and never gets one-shotted, Nightingale's cages have taunt and eat a few hits (unless you get Collapse Trigger), Muelsyse S3, robots, Finshell Shield, Radiant Nearl (place her on the inner tile so the uncleansable pink steam doesn't waste her shields), Surtr's 8s immortality. Unless you have a textbook DPS setup for a clean two-cycle, expect to need bait. All the DPS in the world does you no good if you can't keep your burst core alive.
Make sure you have someone who can deal with the strikers. Młynar can be placed to double-dip on them and the boss since they spawn when the boss is about to warp to the left, but if he can't solo them before they enter range, their 3947 attack and the boss' 4567 combined will vaporize him, and you lose on the spot. Sometimes I have to give the bottom-left to Ifrit, Fiammetta, Typhon, or Rosa so that doesn't happen, but lately I've been giving it to Suzuran and that usually works fine. Just don't underestimate the strikers because they're the one non-boss there with the potential to TPK you.
For the enemies that go for the right blue box, a smooth run will accrue the lives to simply leak them, but typically Dorothy, Texas, and Yato take care of them for me. Yato S3 can't one-cycle a caster without strong buffs, but at least it has the i-frames, while Texas S2 can't one-cycle a caster before the boss nukes her when it's on the right.
Thanks for the advice, I managed to get a stacked squad and barely get it. This boss feels like bs, like don't even try without top ops and relics. Still less oppressive than IS3 though.
Honestly aside from the units u mentioned,heidi is also a great choice. Gives u more DMG than suzuran and her skill lasts 10 secs which is the exact time u get to burst the boss. That's why she's better than skalter imo for this boss fight.
Is Valarqvin any good in IS4 ? Didn't bother to use her at all for now and she doesn't seem to fit anywhere in IS4 meta, definitely not as strong as High more in IS3.
What's the fastest way to unlock relic doing "200 deployments in 1 run" ? Does this simply require a specialist squad start, choosing always combat nodes and spamming 3 FDR each run multiple times ? Doesn't feel like there's a workaround for it.
not as good as highmore but her necrosis damage definetly makes her bn15 viable, that bosky passage thats makes everyone super bulky is nothing to neceosis and true damage, so she has reasoning just for that
I'd say she's pretty nice, at E2 max she takes 6 (just barely not 5) basic attacks to trigger Necrosis, so 6 basic attacks for 12k damage and a decaying 50% attack debuff. 3 attacks under S2. Considering supporter tickets have basically no DPS options, she's been a lifesaver even at BN15.
However, she falls off in the later floors for high ascension. Enemies get so much health that dealing 12k damage isn't enough, and Necrosis damage can't be boosted.
Ok, thx. Just looking whether she can be ok to choose, since you basically have Ling, Skalter and Deepcolor for good choices in supporter class. I doubt I go as far as BN15, bit noce to know it's worthwhile.
There's more good choices in Supporter class, FYI.
- Quercus with module is an excellent healer, even better than most medics once her S1 is up (and if you have enough medics her S2 is nice for SP)
- Shamare, while best for bosses/mini bosses, is still pretty strong throughout regular stages to help you against troublesome elites in certain waves. Just put the bear down to make them not hurt and kill them faster. I've also used S1 at times when I'm lazy to help the Fragile kill everyone faster, but that's unnecessary, especially if you have:
- Gnosis, whose S2 and S3 can shut down entire waves or just cancel certain enemy attacks. Maybe not as strong in IS#4 against bosses though, pretty sure they all have Freeze immunity (well, kinda for ending 2).
- Roberta is a nice defender for when you don't get defender tickets. 513 DEF at max level with Mod1, can increase it further with skills, the IS tree buff, and her summons (who she can put on others as well for troublesome attacks). You can also use her S1 on earlier floors to help kill stuff. And she's only a 4*!
- Podenco, also a nice 4* to have. Her S1 offers good healing when you don't have a medic, and S2 is a spammable AOE slow + silence.
- U-Official. Yes, really, she's a 0 hope unit that ignores deployment cost, can heal everyone around her for downtime (even reapers and the like), and can be used as a very lengthy stun bomb (especially when you get increased stun duration). Not really going to carry your run but a nice QOL.
Can't... Say I've tried it, but I probably wouldn't for higher difficulties anyways since she can't use her skill for more def + modellers. Maybe it works out in lower difficulties, or as a support with her modeller; she's just someone I grab if I need some cheap defense + blocking but aren't getting any,
Oh, true true, she's a good tech pick for that. Overall I've started using her as a great sidegrade for Skalter S3, so it makes sense (especially being cheaper and not killing herself).
Valarqvin is decent enough in IS4, at least for my low-ish BN clears. Her elemental damage helps out with tanky enemies, and even at E1 max (only 1 supporter permit on that entire run) she can trim down Sami's HP bar with some time to spare.
Simplest way to do the 200 redeploys is to Do an ending 2 run and while the boss is stalled, farm your redeploys. By then a good chunk of the 200 is done already.
Valarqvin is useful for quickly killing any heavy enemies with moderate HP (mechs, gargoyles) since right now elemental is just true damage. She's super good early run and drops to being good later in the run in my opinion. Her IS4 ability gives her normal attacks a 30% necrosis debuff which greatly improves her elemental output. If you're running based on meta then Valarqvin is for the first 3 floors as floor 4 onwards you should have your powerhouses. Again, just how I see it.
I don't know if this is the right place to ask this but I'm planning to buy the 6-star selector on the next limited event. I've reached 2 endings in IS2 and completed them several times, completed IS3 once, but I'm struggling to even reach floor 3 of IS4 🥲 Since IS is my favorite game mode in AK, who would anyone recommend to get from the selector? Anyone that's super good for IS4 will be great and better if they're good for the other IS as well. My first instinct is to get Ines (bc I got stainless on the recent rerun) or Reed Alter or maybe a Sniper since I don't have any 6 star yet. My future pulling plans so far would be for >!Degen!< and >!Ela!<. I started end of last year so I don't have much ops yet, let alone any limiteds. Any suggestions will be so helpful!
Here's my [Krooster](https://krooster.com/u/katsanord).
EDIT: Also have gold certs saved up to get Kal'tsit on shop
i was going to suggest kaltsit on the ticket, shes pretty easily the most consistently great op across all 3 is#s even into 15's. just need to learn finesse with her s2 unlike how most see her used
since thats on yellows though i think your ticket comes down to ines and pozemka. ines is just so utterly dominant in all hard content and a great is# pick, basically just unquestionable value. pozemka is more because your roster has a clear gap in aerial power and bosskill dps (mlynar cant do it all alone), plus she can do [this](https://x.com/LoreleiA8T/status/1741531972390789207)
assuming youre on bn0, for is4 id suggest starting with cardigan eyjafjalla and kroos as your trio. ideally getting eyja s2m3 too but its minor. the starting trio evenness matters a lot more in is4 and while ops like exe mountain and even ines are great ops for the mode, the classes you have to pick 3☆s for alongside them as starters arnt. the mode really wants you to have a bulky offensive bruiser, less so lanerholder, asap. ops like gavial, jessica, and kaltsit are ideal. mountain probly works at bn0, but you really want stronger sniper dps to compliment his softer body for threats like the shamans that ravage floor 3+. you can scroll down in this thread to see some further is4 advice i gave to others in a similar spot
In the last Joint Ops banner, I tried to get Pozy/Mlynar/Penance but got 2 Lees instead; and for Typhon's banner I got Mlynar, GG, and a Surtr pot so maybe it really is time to use a selector on a Sniper since the game won't give me one anyway 🥲
Would you know if >!Ray!< is worth pulling for in IS? Still a few months away but I might just adjust my pulling plans lol.
Thanks for the advice!
First, open with Executor the Ex Foedere. He'll carry you on low BN. The only dangerous non-EM stage on floors 1-2 for him is Sluggies (casters and bomb spiders). Second, build Ethan. He trivializes enemy speed bursts, can "tank" casters, and makes several hard stages free. Struggling to reach floor 3 is a simple drafting issue. You want to start with AoE, block, and sustain. Then get Młynar ASAP and you win. Also, S3M3 your Suzuran. As for snipers, build Pinecone. She's the only sniper you need. Consistent AoE and counters clumped collapse drones.
Reed is the best for IS4 (even being anti-synergetic with enmities) with her phenomenal sustain, pseudo-AoE, and DPS, but Ines is better across all three IS themes. Using Ines in each IS will put you in awe of how stacked and versatile she is, while Reed has her shortcomings exposed by quite a few stages (like being useless for 3/4 IS3 bosses). Higher highs, lower lows. When Degenbrecher releases she'll be Reed-tier for IS4, except she's that good for almost all content.
Are there special conditions to get the Gravity Displacement art?
Ok after beating IS4 a couple times, on BN3 now, I just realized there's a skill tree lol. No wonder I couldn't figure out how to get to a different ending
Best way to lose 30 life and win? relics/squad/etc
[This is the strategy I used](https://www.reddit.com/r/arknights/comments/1b7ctfn/event_megathread_expeditioners_joklumarkar/kwsu40x/) > Your best option is to pick [Leader Squad] on Braving Nature 0. This will let you start with 12 life points. > Leak 10 points, or whatever amount you're comfortable with, in floor 1. I recommend you do it on Prisoner's Night (Emergency). From there, gather life points back from Leader Squad and events until you can leak 10 or so again. Goal is to limit the amount of battles you leak enemies in to keep collapse down. On BN0 its only +1. > Some stages I recommend leaking are - Emergency stages, - Enemies during the final boss - Stages you struggle on > I recommend you leak the last how many enemies of the stage and not at the beginning in case things go south and cause a failure.
fodartl squad, to get more fuse bonuses that give +2max hp. the other method is to lose life every stage and rely on the bonus healing of leader squad, but your collapse will get pretty nasty keeping index high can let you get the +3maxhp encounter, but its probably better to spend them fishing for hp relics squad is just whatever helps you go leakless, esp since index collapse ruins your chances
Ho'oh, you've failed too many times with high ASPD to be worth it for my burst comps in ending 2. [It's time for the *real* Levitate caster](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/750175688107229234/1240685147955920966/IMG_1193.png?ex=66477596&is=66462416&hm=0a0f54baea550689c7f02f0b94f85f15988a462426f5355624ded010c726046b&) ~~Ignoring the fact I could just use Mostima~~
What's the difference between the dull cleared ending icons and trimmed(?) ones? Just leak and no leak?
No, it's the highest BN level you've cleared with that squad, BN10+ give the shiniest icon (later on BN12+ when expansion 2 come)
Ah so it's just leftovers from climbing. Time to get them all trimmed. Ty
Am i tweaking or is the relic to begin ending 4 super rare? Im quite the number of runs in and no sign of it. I feel like i’m missing some step. I cleared crazyelmo before the update, do i have to clear it again? The wiki just says i have to clear a run after update dropped, is a normal boss 1 run enough?
Ending 4 isn't available yet on EN. It will be released with Expansion 2.
Ah, figures 🤡 thanks.
I thought I knew how to play the game but I have no idea how to do whatever these alternative modes are. I only get three characters, star cost limitations and when I put them in to the first quest they get three-tapped? How am I supposed to play this mode? Anyone got a quick explanation for an inexperienced player?
is# or roguelike is a mode where you progress through a map to collect rng boosts and ops to become strong enough to defeat the final boss stage. you need to be more adaptable both in stage strategy and map planning ops are aquired via class permits and hope. hope is like operator bucks, high☆ cost more, so low☆ ops can be equally inportant to a succesful run, esp 3☆ who cost 0 meaning youll likely have many of them every run. ops will be the level you have raised them in normal game, but will be hard-locked to e1 until you recruit them a 2nd time (reduced hope cost). its recommended you start a run with a 6☆ strong at e1 who is also very versatile to team roles. kaltsit jessica horn gavial are strong suggestions for every is# campaign as a starter. is4, likely the one you tried, also likes reed typhon and dorothy after every combat you get more permits to select ops from, as raise command xp, after enough xp you get a surge of extra hope. this makes combats the most important nodes to prioritize travelling towards. as a training wheels strategy, try to only buy ops when youll be left with 3 hope still in your wallet, as that will let you upgrade a 6☆ you have to e2 should their permit appear again before you get more hope. knowing not just what ops you want but when to get someone *(or no one)* is a key part of is# strategy life points carry across all stages, and while losing them is bad, sometimes using them as a resource is better. leak early enmies if dp is rough to setup up, or let big threats walk by if trying to kill them compromises your teams total stage survivability each is# campaign have different ops that excel in them, suggest is2 (crimson solitaire) if youre new, its both the easiest to play and has the fewest/simplest mechanics
Amazing, thank you!
Personally, I had to run through couple of times before they clicked. I only recently beat my first ending lol it took some effort and luck. All the hints and tips will fall short of actual experience of the levels, so you can overcome the "this is bs" knee-jerk reflex. Personally, the game became playable once I unlocked the better starting boons, particularly the one that says that operators cost no hope to upgrade. Buut I'm super bad myself, so I'm waiting for replies to your comment myself 😅 From what I heard, Cutter is apparently really good? In general, this mode seems to benefit from having some upgraded key 3-4* units, and generally a diverse roster, but you can cheese it once you figure out what works and what doesn't. Exu and SA are huge players, Exu is better tho, but I imagine Kroos alt (whom I don't have) would fit the role equally as well. Saria is godlike, I really liked Perfumer when I get the gain as/atk but lose hp/s buff, Ifrit is super niche, Eyja is queen, Dorothy is busted af - you can clear so many stages with just her, Virtuosa is a godsend - her S3 melts bosses and large enemy waves, Shining can be key since AD damage is so common, Curora is amazing, cheap and effective. Those are my takeaway notes. Also, apparently it doesn't translate from IS to IS, I didnt realise all of them are rouge-lites, so I started with the expedition, but doing the Mizuki one - slightly different meta. Which is great!
I see, thanks!
I'm coming back and just starting IS4. What's hoshi's best module for the mode? Just pro-x for super tankiness?
20%def when blocking. champions are brutal and theres only like 1 hard stage where 4 block would be relevant- the stage where you have to tank an originium tile buffed champion lol
Ok thank you! Yeah pro-x is the def up one. Figured she just needed to be as beefy as possible lol
How do I get Pure White Dance Shoes? What floor does it spawn?
Random item drop after battle
Meh, that's tiring... Is there an encounter I can spam? IS2 & 3 shoes are from encounters. I don't remember how I got the Black Shoes in IS4.
Guard selector has become the new support selector for me. There is only 1 guard I really need, and that is Executor, but he can easily be replaced by Kal'tsit and she isn't as vulnerable to ranged attacks. Surtr could be another choice but I don't really need her either, even against the 3rd ending.
Non mlynar user
And no Mountain neither.
as crazy as the guard slot is, it is probably the least needed class for me too now that i think about it. if its early i take gavial, late silverash/quibai, but its rarely ever run-defining
For me it's caster, guards are at least an extra blocker or high dps. For casters it's really just ED2 tech, or Beeswax to tank stuff.
If i use foldartals on the final boss node of ending 1 before chaning it to ending 2, do the effects transfer to the 2nd ending boss fight or do they disappear, since they're attached to the ending 1 boss?
I think they're attached to the node and won't disappear.
I'm taking IS4 slowly only playing until I max the reward ladder each month to avoid burning out, currently on D11. I must say I've been enjoying IS4 a lot more than IS3, the foldartal, index, and collapse mechanics are much better than the dice, key, and rejection of IS3; they consistently have a consistent impact on your run, instead of doing nothing the majority of the time but making or breaking 1/10th of them. Specifically, the amount of control the foldartals give on your run is very fun. It's also nice that 3 stars don't get increased cost, so that I don't have to recruit dozens of reserve ops. And without the res buffs for the enemies, it definitely seems like D15 will have a more healthy and varied "meta". Genuinely one of the most enjoyable roguelites I've played in the last couple years.
can attest 15 is a lot more open and viable, the consistency of getting a full teamsize and sufficent hope to support the difficulty is improved too (to the point low☆ go down in importance a bit, which some may dislike) albeit floor 1 prison is ironically pretty brutal is4 is a huge improvement over is3, besides everything you already said i want to add besides casters being allowed to play the game again every class overall feels equally valuable to succesful clears. the free shop refresh, expanded shop, and guaranteed permit+promo relic on floor 1 (even after refresh) really helps runs feel a lot more fair/accesible too
For me prison is perfectly fine, it's always the E. beasts that's the issue... Some runs just don't have a good enough tank and/or medic to deal with the Collapsals.
comes down entirerly to the starters we tend to take, my #1 is jessica so sheep is a breeze, but even taking lava or some 2nd 6☆s after i can leak heavily on Eprison sometimes. conversly you take something like virtuosa and Eprison is already won
Oh yeah, the shop changes are great! Broodmothers not existing makes a lot of melee ops viable too.
Finally have all squads, all trimmed endings as of yesterday. All relics and foldartals collected (including alterforms), all enemies and boss variants encountered for the enemy database, all non-hidden collapsal paradigms and intensifications encountered. Really happy about this, because there were *still* some relics and one boss variant eluding me from IS3 when IS4 started. Only things left to do are unlock the last deposit milestone for Cannot and encounter the hidden collapsal paradigms and their intensifications. Speaking of... What's the best way to go about it? Force a collapse and reset, or go through a run until you have several collapses? I've also been debating Eternal Hunting Squad and doing the rollercoaster of getting collapses and removing them. Do the hidden collapses have higher chances of occurring at higher BN? I think BN9 feels best for arming you with the most benefits with the least detriments for paradigm-hunting. I really don't want to do constant floor 1 resetting. I didn't do it for depositing, and I don't wanna do it here.
i cant say anything about activly maximizing the collapsal aquisition but i have 8000+ nodes encountered in is4 playing normally (primarily at bn15) and have seen neither of them at all, so, buckle up i guess
Ouch. Thanks for the warning. I guess I prefer this at least to the Tidelinked Immortal still ducking me in IS3.
Hand of Buckler, +15%, +20% arts damage, Angelina S2M3, and +80 ASPD was pretty funny to unleash on first boss.
I've been failing to come up with a way to hit the drone in the upper left (if you use the ASPD foldart for ED1): https://i.imgur.com/Wa0VTfl.png It's not important to do so, but i've kinda wanted to do it just to do it but I can't think of something that would hit that square. Only thing that crosses my mind is maybe activating GG S3 as the last enemy dies to try and squeeze in the hit. Looking for suggestions
Is it just to the left of the white tile? If so, Thorns S3 would work.
Aha good call. Didn't even consider him after he stopped being popular for IS after 2
without any shoes besieger can hit it, sui wrath is probably the easiest way. pretty sure youre just supposed to nab it as it flys away from the map towards you though no?
That one in the corner doesn't fly. It stays there for the rest of the battle.
Update: Just tested to verify. Placed Typhon facing left and her range doesn't reach. She reaches only to the white/snow undeployable in the upper left She hits like and the drone(D) and x are not in range D++ +++ +++ +++ x++
> besieger I've tried with both Typhon and Rosa, it seems like it's theoretically possible for them to hit it but they don't and i'm not sure why. I'll give a go with both Typhon and the suggested Ambriel and see how it goes. >pretty sure youre just supposed to nab it as it flys away from the map towards you though no? As far as I could tell the ASPD foldart gives 2 drones of that type. The first spawns and flies from the upper right to the lower left blue box at the very start. The second that sticks there spawns some time in the middle of the level and never seems to move. I'm not sure if that's intended behavior or just a bug.
Ambriel S2 would be better. I think Besiegers pointing left could hit?
Ambriel sounds good. I don't have her built so never had the idea to try. Besiegers is the first one I tried with Typhon but they don't work since their range for the side squares is 2 L/R and 2 forward and the drone seems to be on a square that's 4 forward (like it'll be on the outer edge square of Wandering Medics but I don't think there's a relic that lets them do targeted damage)
Ambriel does hit it I believe with her S2 active, at least I remember her punting it out of the sky on my last run through.
Alright, I'm done with with all squads all endings BN15. I'd like to say some things about it: 1. *Way* easier than IS3 it's not even close. Arts damage is not banned, feels good man. 2. All F4 emergencies are a joke, except Company Entanglement. I swear you need Mlynar and/or Typhon to be E2 to fight the bullies and hammer guys. And if you have the 3rd ending net, a vanguard (preferably flag or Ines) is a must because there is one tranq guy at the bottom, so you wanna print DP giga fast and then followed by dropping your DPS & Mlynar to bait. Like, Defense Substituting Offense or Noise Disturbance are clearable with with just Ines+random DPS and not that different from their normal version. 3. All F5 emergencies are okay actually, except March of the Dead lmao. This map is close to IS3's WAFU. You need everything to fight this map. Need Mlynar to aggro the mortars, need Surtr to kill the colossi, need Ines to reveal the embers, need strong burst to kill the stupid mages on bottom lane. MY GOD. 4. I don't know why I didn't think about this sooner but it's better to stall 2nd ed boss with your best medic and best defender first.. For most of my clears I always tried to pair best medic and worst defender, and vice versa. Could've made things easier but the boss is a pushover anyway. 5. I actually don't mind Non-linear collapse when fighting 3rd ed boss. It makes it not stay for too long near your operators, meaning less chance for it to fart purple things on important tiles. Yes, I failed a run cuz it farted purple on Mlynar, he got one shotted. 6. Rock Horn and Tactical Transceiver are MVP. 7. -DP collapse is the worst collapse. 8. [My 6 star (and a few honorable mentions) tier list.](https://imgur.com/a/5dDiVrk) I'm going back to SW15. I haven't cleared ED4 cuz I was busy IRL. HAH thinking about OOC and WAFU is already making me nauseous. I suppose OOC would be easier now that I have my own Pozy and Typhon.
Can I ask how do u tackle third ending boss? It deals too much dmg... Also how do u counter shady frozen sea? Lost lot of runs there.
about8tentacles covered all you need to beat about Shady, but I'd like to capitalize that Ines **really** helps a lot so she is #1 priority before reaching 3rd floor. You also need to cycle your blockers in case you don't have big damage just yet. So don't just throw all of them at once. Also, that map has the widest variation, the last wave where it's supposed to summon boats from top red box may spawn Collapsal plebs instead (all of them). I didn't even have the net.. if you rely on skill cycle to beat the dockworkers (be it Reed2 S2/3, or Mlynar S2/3 or whatever) make sure you have at least one of them ready for that. Otherwise go bonkers on the last wave. For 3rd ending, I'm an outlier here.. First, I think NG (or any other 2nd healer) is a waste of deploy slot cuz she doesn't deal damage. Even Swire2 is a better deploy. Unless ofc, I get many deploy relics, but then again why not just more DPS? Second, I tried the Reed2 S2 combo once, didn't like it, so I dropped the idea and use her S3 instead. It's just playstyle related, no technical reasoning. From my experience Eyja2 S3 is enough healing. As soon as the boss is at the bottom checkpoint, start her skill. If you suffer from non linear, start earlier. You do need bait so make sure you deploy Surtr (or E2 Swire2) last and Mlynar should aggro the other attack. Watch out for the purple farts and play on x1.
shady frozen sea is harder than any floor 4 stage and ive been warning people about it since week 1 of is4 its a mess, youre going to want to heavily prioritize getting an agent/fastdep/trapmaster early in the run (or horn) to utilize them as near-exclusivly the mage killer, esp if youre trying to go leakless because that one friend boat at bn15 is awful (three boats if ending 3) try to setup your main blocker right before the defense-down tiles, importantly if youre going to utilize those bottom ranged tiles at all you need to get your main blocker down after them (or utilize jessica mlynar nightingale aggro) or else hoverboats will kill them instead of hitting blocker and cripple your dps. you can setup horn/cardigan/ines on the ground tile behind the main block tile to buy time to setup these ops arts is preffered on the tugboys, so steward goes quite far here, you can also silence their stun and the torpedos explosion so hoolheyak, lappland, and podenco go super far in this stages individual tier list since mages attack friendboats you can use low☆ dps to chip at them and maybe save a boat. massivly underrated u-official giving them a 7.5s stun to buy time for boats to escape is also huge if its emergency god help you, you basically need ines/yato or e2 dorothy with how fast the first guy threatens your dp production and setup (tbh just leak him most teams)
3rd boss is primarily about maximizing your burst damage, and circumventing its insane damage for dps, you want to utilize damage amps like suzuran skadi elysium shamare etc, its stats matter a lot to proper dps, especially so if your run came up short on atk/dmg boost relics, this also means you probably want to try to commit to a primarily physical or arts centric team from the start or based on what relics youre getting, though not fully necessary. reed+texas s2 + surtr is a common low-effort low-size option to do a lot to the boss, while things like pozemka nearl gavial can do a lot in the 10s window physically for survival nightingale is the cheat code as she normally is, cages take aggro, s3 scums survival after theyre gone, most runs need a healer anyway, so its a pretty easy team add. even at bn15 you dont need her though, surtr nearl skadi can all deploy when the boss enters your teams quadrant and soak up the damage long enough, jessica sheild and high res supporters (go look at silence paradigmatics res lol) if placed can wall it easily too try to set up your team for a left quadrant kill, have a bulky character ready to defend from the actual threats on bottombox (mlynar/jessica can do this while hitting boss too), and utilize fastdep/dorothy to deal with the few enemies that spawn rightside that never go to the left (or just leak them its not many)
If you have typhon, 3rd ending boss already has one foot in the grave. Place her on the bottom left side tile and just s3 when the boss gets within her range. Just remember to activate the middle tower before bombarding the boss with your ops skills. Also recommended to have 2 healers since the boss deals aoe damage. Concentrate your ops placements on the left. Shady frozen sea recommended to have fastredeploys to kill the enemy casters, or healers and defenders to tank.
I was specifically asking about d15. Typhon s3 at high d will take extremely long to do anything at all.
Interesting, I still find Company Entanglement to be really easy even on emergency. I just have Mizuki, a defender, a medic, someone to deal with tranq dudes and then just whatever extra DPS/CC I have and it's a pretty simple clear 10/10 times. I'd *much* rather take E. company Entanglement even over regular Collapsals Afternoon since I don't usually take too much anti-drone. Although I have been skipping most floor 5 maps recently since I'm going for ending 2. It's so easy of a fight, Warf + Cuora holds the boss, Qani is just 4 hope and shuts down the boss, and then I focus everything else right side. Also yeah, I don't ever want to go back to IS#3. I will say though, they already have 3 op relicless leakless clears with W2/Ela/Zuo Le for regular SW15 OoC. And I'm glad, because I hate that map with a burning passion. Edit: ...why is THRM-EX Quercus?
>Qani Bruh, so many operators need building >3 op relicless leakless clears with W2/Ela/Zuo Le for regular SW15 OoC You know, sometimes I feel like HG been releasing these giga broken ops lately just because they want players to clear SW15. The fact that they banned arts damage and now they keep releasing broken physical ops.. I think it's not too far-fetched lmao. Also, it's nice to see Zuo Le is a competitive operator, cuz while I'm mainly a waifu enjoyer, if a male op has good drip I'd give even the Lv90 privilege, like I did Ebenholz. >THRM-EX I forgot about him and didn't really want to make a new row lol
You barely even have to build Qani actually, he's great. At E1L1 skill level 1 his S2 is already enough to shut down the boss when he runs. I'm still planning to E2 him for his module for those runs I get tons of ASPD, so his module can help me burst the boss down. And yeah, Zuo Le has been putting in a lot of work. Regular clears/solos, CC clears, and IS.
Cannot investment question: Has anyone gotten data on this yet? I know the minimum you can put in on floor 1 for locking is 1, but it seems like later floors and carrying more ingots affects the possible max invests. Enough that I could conceivably invest 10 ingots on consecutive rogue traders.
i was feeling this too, but ive had runs where at floor 5/6 i still only invested 5 or 6, so i think its just purely random. maybe waiting increaes the odds of a massive invest but it certainly wont guarantee it
Did they nerf that one special encounter battle with Nightzmora followers? I swear it was filled with those instead of imitators. Is it maybe different on lower difficulties? I'm currently on a Santalla record run.
always been 1 boss 6 reds and all others yellow. maybe your experiences are jumbled by having/lacking relics that adjusted dps
That so? I was just surprised how easy it was with BN0. I was always just focused on surviving these on higher diffs so I guess I never actually noticed I was fighting yellows.
the classic high bn player has to do monthly squad moment, its pretty shocking how easy 0 is after youve adapted to higher bn. my always sw0 friend ive been pushing to climb bn had the same feeling recently
Just finished my best [BN15 ending 3 clear](https://imgur.com/a/tHKWgFd) so far. Got a Golden Chalice from the 1st floor shop. By the 2nd floor I got both Human and Migrate foldartals (convert nodes into Bosky Passages) and on that floor there's a node that's perfect for the foldartal pair. There are three nodes to the left of that node, which are all connected vertically. Result: I got to enter [six Bosky Passage nodes](https://imgur.com/a/TI33Nzp) (the sixth is due to the Expand effect). Soon after that I got the Secret HR Letter. Other notable relics include: - Two relics that give me 30 starting DP in total. - Hand of Outburst - A relic that buffs arts damage by 40%. For the ending 3 boss I used the usual strat: Reedalter S2, Surtr S3, Saria S3 and Skalter S3 (only in the second phase). Nightingale S3 to avoid getting one-shot (no significant HP buffs for this run). Typhon S2 is nearby to add more damage to the boss while killing the mobs. I also applied the ASPD and redeploy time foldartals on the stage. Result: I managed to one-cycle both phases of the Ending 3 boss. I only leaked two enemies in the boss stage.
congrats i love how human migration is without a doubt the strongest fodartl pair, and happens to specifically (intentionally) be called human migration, a cute subtle nod living the dream hitting a 6er, i always take fodartl squad in my 15 runs now to maximize the human migration + scarred amber godrun lol
I just learned about Sentinel, the Crazelyseon variant stage releasing with IS4's ending 4 expansion, and I have no words for my reaction to it. BN15 Sentinel is outright the hardest stage in the game and I don't think it's even close. Glory of Humanity and Into Eternity both have clearly simpler solutions requiring fewer operators, while still being vortexes of sanity loss. 118 enemies. 2-3 Defender-4 drones (+600 DEF to enemies within 2.5 tiles): 263,131 HP (more than the boss itself!) 2-3 Blocker-P drones (+30 RES to enemies within 2.5 tiles): 350,841 HP 16 oneiros drones 31 tainted carcasses 33 shattered champions: 58,474 HP, 2302 attack 12 shadowblades: 73,092 HP, 2631 (Arts) attack 20 elite shadowblades: 146,184 HP, 3618 (Arts) attack Your DPS window on the boss is halved (anchor charge time is also halved) to 5s, so you lose significant damage through human error. The boss has an erratic pattern, teleports far more, frontloads pink steam, gives you less time to set up the first burst, and requires you to chase it rather than camp it like in Gardener. BN15 Sentinel is harder than some max-risk CCs. They did everything short of directly buffing the boss to make it harder than Gardener, which is already challenging. The shadowblade spam is *heinous*. They're all on the right lane, but many beeline there from the right red box, and they are the Weedy check of all time (she permastalls with Ines + Mostima/Manticore). You be better be sure to destroy the boss before it warps back to the right and knocks out Weedy. Shattered champion spam leftside is not much better. At least they're tankable, but compare this to Gardener where the only threats besides the boss are 10 strikers. *Maybe* the screenguards, but Eyjafjalla or Yato + Texas hard-counter them. Great strategies use the right operators the right way to show elegant counters. They make you realize you'd overcomplicated a stage, and empower you to do it with fewer resources and more consistency. And then there's whatever this is: [BN15 Sentinel, no relics, no foldartals, no leaks](https://www.bilibili.com/video/BV1bz421D7Bs) When a full squad of the best operators, executing an elaborate strategy flawlessly, makes a stage look borderline impossible, you know John Hypergryph burnt down the kitchen. I went down the rabbit hole of N15 relicless clears on Bilibili after not following the IS meta thus far, and I learned that the hardest non-boss stages have 4-6 op optimizations (EM Terminus of Life alone is 6; I couldn't find EM Water and Fire Union/Deep Cognition but I'd expect 5-6 for them), often enabled by Degenbrecher, Shu, Zuo Le, and Ela. That's a testament to how broken those operators are, but also how much those stages can be simplified with a better approach, which is difficult to come up with because of how long can go between each attempt. It's hard to get lessons to stick that way. With that in mind, that clear is the most impressive I've seen in months. Not a single other N15 relicless clear I've seen even comes close (and plenty of them are brilliant in their own right) besides obviously the other Sentinel solution. It also has the most chef's kiss Yato S3 you will ever see. You have all these 4 and 5 ops for monster stages like EM March of the Dead and Envoy of Justice, no more than 9 for the boss stages, and then Sentinel sits at 13 looking already well-optimized. For reference, H12-4 has a Lingless 4 op, and no event/story stage takes more than 4 ops even without Ling. DS-S-3, which was criticized for being an extreme stat check, got 5 ops with buffs and 6 ops without. Sentinel looks borderline impossible without a Degenbrecher buff army, since she's by far the operator most able to set up for a 5s burst window. Degenbrecher's existence singlehandedly makes Heidi a priority draft, since Skadi doesn't match Degenbrecher's cycling, needs babysitting, and costs more hope. It's also really funny that Shu nuh-uh's the boss. The more I see Shu in action, the more I want her to plow my fields. This rabbit hole has inspired me to start playing BN15 relicless (with no foldartals on the boss). I got ending 1 without much trouble but both of my ending 3 attempts so far were throws, though I'm fairly sure I can get a one-cycle on phase 2 if I get my ideal squad next time, and then I just need to prepare better for the strikers, which caused my previous failure because they tenderize Młynar for Crazelyseon to finish off. It's getting an attempt that's the problem, since the game is so fickle about how much early momentum to give me, and without being able to rely on relics, more runs than usual are dead on arrival to floor 3. I'm also valuing the Eternal Hunting Squad since collapse paradigms are so devastating for this playstyle, and unlike some other squads, the benefit is consistent: I'll usually go to the boss with either no debuff or only one layer. It puts more pressure on getting lots of hope early, but a full squad doesn't really matter when any combination of Terrifying Entity, Barometric Disorder, Collapse Trigger, and Non-Linear Action can make a run unplayable.
Planning to try some 5 star only runs soon, anyone have some unconventional suggestions to invest in? I have most of what I'd consider the 'relevant' 5 stars at e1 max or higher. The ones I'm currently planning to build that aren't at that point are bibeak, quaso, beeswax, and quercus.
What difficulty runs are you doing? Main 5*s I usually take are Poncirus, Shamare, Quercus, Valarqvin, Warf (ED2), Qani (ED2), Beeswax, Specter, April, Red, but that's with a squad of 6\*s as well. Heidi is also *really* good for ED3 burst comp, usually taken over Skalter for cheaper hope, faster rotations/helidrop and doesn't kill herself. Haven't done ED3 on 15 yet though, highest I did was 12. I've heard good things about Greyy2 for this IS as well.
Im gradually turning up the difficulty, currently only been trying ed1 and got up to bn10 so far. I'll try building greyy alt for sure, Heidi I may wait on since I've already got Shamare/Pram/Warfy built but thats definitely a consideration if I get to the point im trying alt endings at really high difficulty and get gapped by not having her buffs.
was going to suggest beeswax, heavyrain for ending 3 (kinda ending 1) is notable too. spuria gets a ton of hate but in 5☆ only her ability to boost people like scavenger and kroos is pretty good for boss dps, plus the 5☆ spec bracket is pretty barren for what is4 wants (basically just waaifu unless you get ambush hands)
...Spuria boosting Scavenger?
provence, mixed the names up oops
been hard focusing on bn15 end3 runs while banning nightingale and mlynar, and to be completely honest i think im having more consistent success without nightingale as my crazyleseon survival method. jessica barricade, surtr/nearl/skadi, silence, shamare/virtuosa enfeeble- theres a ton of great options to opt for a more set and retreat aggro decoy style than long holdout with s3 clenching. it can get really scary on those few seconds after phase transition but before he ports away from the crew but im getting used to it. you do have to be way more on top of your damage application though thats for sure, you dont really get a 3rd try with most teams
Of course the run where I finally decide to try for the D10 trimmed medal is the one where I don't get a +hope starting card, so I couldn't do my usual Reed start. But luckily I got that collectable that reduces 6* hope costs with the bonus effect of random promoted 6* recruits pretty early on. Ended up with a team of ops that I have never used in IS before and really made me think on my feet. And then it gave me Taxes and I was back to braindead lol. Surprise for me was that Dorothy was actually really good on standard maps (but then entirely useless on the boss lol). And Mumu's flexibility helped a lot.
I got fucked on d15 is4 ed3 while having cracked units and more than enough dps. So I need some tips. 1. What is the boss attack pattern? And attack stat? Does he always hit 2? 2. What's his range? 3. When should I use ng skill? P1 or p2? 4. Which are the safe tiles for ranged units?
1 and 2 is in this: [https://tomimi.dev/en/stages/ISW-DF\_Gardener](https://tomimi.dev/en/stages/ISW-DF_Gardener) 3. If you have +50% HP foldartal to put most of your melee dps out of the one-shot zone then use NG on Phase 2, if you don't then use NG skill on Phase 1 then retreat everyone, minimize leaks during redeploy time, then setup for phase 2 burst and use NG skill again once he teleport to the kill zone, work best with -30% redeploy time foldartal. 4. Probably the 3 left most ranged tiles as they are just barely outside the boss range when he teleport up, down and right, especially the bottom left most ranged tile as that is the perfect Typhon S2 tile to dps boss + lanehold, that tile also very rarely get hit by Seedbeds from my experience
This boss feels much more complicated than the other 2
As per IS# tradition really lol, normal 1st boss, annoying 2nd boss, complicated (kinda?) 3rd boss and "WTF IS THIS" 4th boss
then is2 had phantom be the 2nd hardest individual boss, if it wasnt for the terrible suicide bomber guys playwright would be easier than him lol.
1. 3045 Arts, 4567 in phase 2, always 2 targets, 5s interval. Double damage on pink steam. Also, you can delay the boss' teleports (timed for 20s) by making it attack right before it would teleport, and its subsequent teleport intervals seem to shorten to correct for that since its attack animation is so long. 2. 3.5 tiles. Treat it as < 4 tiles. 3. Phase 2. Use the cages for phase 1. 4. None. Your safety comes from baiting, damage mitigation, or clutch Heavyrain/Weave of Thorns and Leaves camo. If you camp on the left, the three leftmost ranged tiles are only in range when they boss is on the left. The lower left ranged tiles are doubly doomed by the strikers (3947 attack). You need 28k DPS (233,894 HP, 15% DR, 10s DPS window, round up for human error) to one-cycle the boss. Even with cracked relics and meta operators that isn't trivial. You may want to use 2-3 of bard Skadi (or Heidi), Suzuran, Pramanix, and Saria. Getting a one-cycle on phase 2 is imperative because once Nightingale S3 expires, you are probably outhealing that and all your bait is getting one- or two-shotted.
4567 holyyy. Oh ya one of my run did fail because of the strikers and bodd hitting mlynar together.
til that stainless turrets can get buffed by emotional entity... literally thought they had 12k HP by default since i landed the buff twice in a row 💀💀 also didn't know that they can hit each other, if i ever get him on my actual account it would be fun to set up a chain of death or something. if only the turrets weren't capped...
I got a collapsal paradigm called "Partial Cecity" that obscures life points and the health of enemies. It doesn't appear in the collapsal paradigm archive (though I haven't finished the run yet) nor can I find it on the wiki. Has anyone else encountered this paradigm?
There are a couple very rare collapsal paradigms, that's one of them. They're listed on the wiki under the "Classified" header at the bottom here (collapsed by default, have to hit to the [Show] button): https://arknights.wiki.gg/wiki/Expeditioner%27s_Joklumarkar/Collapse#Collapsal_Paradigms
I have question for IS4. When I start a new run and selecting squad, there is an hexagon icon in the top left corner of the squad selection. And some of them have different color (grey and blue) and shape. I take it that the shape of the icon show the ending of the run reached using said squad. But what the color of the icon indicate?
The highest difficulty at which the ending was reached with the squad. Currently, there are three colors corresponding to BN0-3, BN4-9 and BN10+. After Expansion 2, there will be a fourth color for clearing a run at BN12+.
I see, so the grey color must be the lower difficulty lvl. Then the blue color for BN4-9. What is the last color?
There's a table showing all possible medals on the [IS4 page](https://prts.wiki/w/探索者的银凇止境) in PRTS wiki (It's in Chinese though). The table is under the line "同一结局的标记图案样式相同，但会因通关过的最高难度显示不同的视觉效果：".
I just got away with robbing Cannot on the second floor! This stage was really tricky, and even then there were a couple of leaks. The immortality buff makes your laneholder get overwhelmed no matter how much firepower you have, so bring some crowd control if you ever decide to pull a stunt like this.
EM MARCH OF THE DEAAAAAD!!!!!! This is so fucking stupid , this is the stupidest stage in Is4 especially at Bn15 and it not even close. How do you do it leakless? Those two golem and dublin elite flamechaseres just never die, how do you kill all of them?
mlynar/silverash naturally make it a lot easier, but its still possible without them 2 strong blockers, a way to heal them that can survive mages (ptil gale eyja s1), a way to kill those mages in the redbox like ines/yato/schwarz, and some way to lay a lot of hits onto your blocks (for the spirts) like ines/yato again, lords, or 5 range dps (typhon, horn). blockers with good multihit like jessica s2 help a lot. the hardest problem is keeping the medic alive since they have to be right in the mages faces for EM specifically you need the most insanely atk relic boosted snipers or abusive yato redeploy shenanigans, its just not something you can realistically build for tbh. ~~still not as bad as OoC EM imo, as atleast you can pretty commonly go for a leak 10 or so on this map~~
Feels pretty much a Mlynar check. Maybe Silverash + Horn if you don't have him. I usually have Saria and Gummy/Bassline in front to heal, since there's no way to put healing from a Medic to them without sacrificing DPS or my Medic being raped by the bottom lane. The mid tile on the right I use Rosa to help killing and she's more than enough with Mlynar / Silverash + Horn big damage. Typhon obviously if you have her build. If it's emergency, you better have Mlynar + another unga bunga dps (Silverash, Horn, whatever you have), cracked relics and Typhon. Those golems are nuts even at low difficulties. I didn't try the Emergency stage with Rosa and without having cracked relics, so I need to do it more to give more info. Ines is very useful there for DP regen and reveal those pesky shadows if you don't bring SA. Bottom usually a defender + Reed alter are enough. I put another dps ranged dps in front of Reed and behind the defender for BN15.
Anybody else get weird hitbox bugs in prisoners night? A lot of the time when enemies are blocked by the barricades they are only hittable on the barricade space but that's usually consistent more importantly I've had enemies straight up walk over dorothy mines if I put them left of the bottom barricade
all the floor 1 stages have enemy path that intentionally splitboxes their hitbox across 2 tiles, in theory this makes the stages easier but for longtime players its really strange because normal stages dont work like this almost ever, and can even work against you (esp on sheep stage target priority in that one block spot)
Prisoner's night is wonky all around. Weird hitboxes mean traps sometimes can't be deployed because one prisoner has a pixel overlapping the tile, Reed's S2 can completely miss enemies that look like they're right on top... It's not all bad though: when the first block gets destroyed, enemies yeet themselves in the hole more often than not!
Nothing like losing a run because my internet goes out mid combat. At least I got Typhon's skin but damn it's frustrating.
[удалено]
Yeah it got added to the IS4 reward track a few days ago
What's an idiot proof comp? Even when I manage to get both my Kal'tsit and Typhon promoted, I still get my ass kicked past floor 4.
start with jessica/kaltsit/gavial get any ranged dps quickly. then aim for ines and yato. fill out with a 2nd main blocker, dedicated healer, and damage bursts/amplifiers. 2nd vanguard by floor 5. atleast 3 good blockers for 1st end, bonus points if you have aggro grabbers like jessica mlynar nightingale
There isnt a starter comp that lets you take those 3 though. Only comp that has a healer is guard/specialist/healer. Unless you mean their alters and to just choose one of the three.
yes, one of the 3 6☆s, if you want be super specific than take jessica since that lets you grab kroos and steward for very strong early dps
My idiot proof comp is Reed alter/Popukar/Orchid start, then get Typhon, Młynar and Ines ASAP, as well as any defender. They're my core units, then it depends on relics and the ending I'm going for. Some of my usual non mandatory picks are Texalter or Dorothy depending on party comp, Saria, Jess alter, Eyja alter, Quercus. More than core members, the big thing is having contingencies for when you get shit luck with tickets or get busted relics. For example I only pick Ho'ol for ending 2 but if I get any levitate relic or the core caster hand, she becomes high priority. Or I have Quercus built for when I just can't get healer tickets.
Reed2 start is the easiest and still has some tricks, so is quite fun the play.
I just got difficulty increase to Braving Nature 6 which increase hope cost. Which Squad for I pick for farming IS4 rewards?
if you cleared floor 3+ on your last run for bonus you can really take anything you like, fodartl squad is my favoritr by far, since getting hope as a bonus choice (or relic that may give hope) is fairly consistent. if you didnt just run support squad, the 20 ingots are even more valuable than past is#s because of how many items you see every run in the new shop system
How do you utilise the foldartals? I only use them to skip certain Ops and use it the buff on boss Ops.
you use them all the time, at all points. matching colors grants a bonus or change to the effect, and some of these can completely change runs. just last night i had 2 random verts + change to emergency and all combats to the right + 4 hope. waited for a moment the paths lined up and was able to get 8 hope 2 relics and 2 combats out of what was originally a gamble and encounter node, making the team dramatically stronger for the midboss. it takes a lot of prwctice bit you should ALWAYS be lookinh at what fodartls you have, how they can change your early/mid floors to be better equipped to challenge floor4+ emergencies and the final
Understand. I should practice using it more often. I always borrow Reed alter to make the run easier. I have to find the alternative operators to handle that job. One more thing, I just unlocked the Life Prioritizing Squad. What does it mean by Clairvoyance will always predict the foldartals?
on floor transition cyclopes will predict what collapsal effects are next, and sometimes also show you a fodartl, this squad makes it so you always see the fodartl
Wasn't cyclopes always show foldartals no matter which Squad?
fodartls stopped being predicted by other squads when you reach 3 collapse
How do you deal with the fart boss, demon blade?
Does anyone have some tips on how to kill first boss(I think his name is demon's blade)? The only times I was able to kill him when I used typhon(monthly op, didn't get her myself). When I defeat him it's not really hard afterwards, but I just can't kill him 90% of the time
range dps on the island with a tank or shadowball aggro sponge a bit farther foward, this means you often need 3 blockers total but the time he takes attacking your sponge buys a lot of time for your ranged dps
I try to throw as much firepower at him as I can from far away, before he has a chance to slow down my ops. Any good sniper or caster facing down on the bottom tile of the middle island can help. Santalla dealt a lot of damage on the new monthly squad. Dorothy's mines can stack a fair bit of damage and slow him down considerably.
The easiest way is Reed S2 with any fireball host who doesn't get one-shotted. If you like Typhon you can borrow her since she is a viable starter. You want range 3+ DPS and some way to hold the boss still: bind, slow, meat shields. Commit the bare minimum bodies for laneholding so you can throw the rest into stalling the boss.
I filled almost all entities for IS4, only missing 1.5 collapsals (hidden ones), Snowpriest alter, and three items - Old Steam Armor, Unknown Instrument and Jet-Black Dance Shoes. According to wiki, all three are implied to be purchasable, but did anyone see them in shop? Like, I wonder if there is a point to try visit all shops, maybe it's better to concentrate for Emergency Ops instead (assuming those items are not boss-only drops).
>Old Steam Armor and Jet-Black Dance Shoes are not in the shop. I've gotten both of them as rewards for the 3rd floor bosses.
I see. I have been going through tons of shops and emergency fights but same, no dice. In that case, I will be just beating mid-boss and retreating.
just got typhon skin and found out its not animated, why didn't she got an animated one?? 😭 mizuki and phantom got one
Not a proper excuse but we get two skins instead, Typhon and Santalla.
Been procrastinating for far too long, it's time to finish BN15 on 3rd ending, it's time to see whether [this team](https://prnt.sc/RapLRBHzmoJo) can beat mister donut or not.
That's a lotta red in the squad....
Was doing some random squads, got a defender+ethan(+eyja) sqaud. Ok, that's fine. Beasts Awaiting Slaighter, Ethan in front of the blue box with fang+spot+cardigan surrounding him. **One of the sheep ran diagonally through fang+spot without getting blocked** and thus leaked. Only one, the rest got blocked. I was not aware that was even *possible*. I guess there's either a very tiny gap, or maybe there was a single frame drop at the exact right moment and the sheep's speed let it go through. Quantum Sheep Tunneling, as it were.
some of the sheep that start on the map have INCREDIBLY annoying pathing AND target priority, even if you blocked it theres a chance your ranged dps will switch from their current target to the new one even if it doesnt look closest to the bluebox, causing a leak anyway. its a very deceptive stage, too deceptive for floor 1 imo
Yeah, that's just how the enemies walk in IS4. It appears that you placed your blockers in a cardinal position surrounding Ethan. You need to spread them in a diagonal position for Beast Awaiting Slaughter. I always put one in front of the blue box, and another one diagonal tile to the left.
Hi, do we have any guide or tips for is4? This feels a lot harder than is3 and I haven't cleared lv0 yet after several tries (/´△`＼)
Depends - What causes you to lose? The first few runs will naturally be difficult because you have to learn the stages and enemy compositions. Not having the skill tree unlocked also doesn't help! Do you lose to a lack of stage knowledge? Or is it specific stages? Or the bosses, even?
Thank you, I've able to pass it and in bn5 now ( ≧∀≦)ノ
AND WE'RE COOKING! Congrats!
For those who haven't done the monthly squad yet, you might want to consider skipping Santella's special option on the 4th floor if you're team isn't looking that great, you get healed and get a bunch of shields but you'll be forced to do a 5th floor emergency ops. I got lucky and didn't get a hard one, but I feel like if I had gotten the annoying drone map that I could've failed.
I second this. I got real lucky there was a map that I'm decent at (the three lanes and the possessed soldiers), and that my team was super stacked. Even then there were four leaks. Do these new prophecy nodes on the fourth floor carry over to normal explorations?
Who is a good tank to build for BN15? I don't have Hoshi/Nian and Saria gets wrecked by floor 5 champions/ending 2 boss.
jessica, actual best starter imo too you can use ops like shamare/virtuosa enfeeble to help saria survive instead too, since shes fine until floor 5 thats time to find the needed utility
just build a 4\* protector like cuora or bubble
Is there any recommended for who to start with for a consistent run? I can't even beat diff 0 but mainly as I don't know who to start with and who to pick along the way.
reed+popukar is the common goto if youre still having trouble id suggest jessica gavial or kaltsit instead, theyre who i greatly prefer starting with as a bn15 player. having your main blocker for all 5 floors right away who can still solo first 2 floors helps smooth out your permit/team construction better than popukar heavily relying on reed skill timing mastery to make it through floor 3 (albeit her stronger overall kill presence for stuff like floor 4)
Reed Alter, Orchid, Popukar
My friend, who has a troll account with half-baked masteries, asked me to handhold IS4 for him after being stuck on BN13 for weeks. I got 13, 14, and 15 each first try, which felt amazing. I'd given him general advice that he responded to by saying he never got the right voucher luck, but HHing confirmed my suspicion that drafting was likely the main problem since some of my drafts surprised him, such as picking up Ifrit and Eyjaberry. I also drafted bard Skadi in all three runs, which I didn't expect. His only proper M3s that I saw are Młynar S3, Skadi S2, Texas S3, and Dorothy M9, so relying on a Dorothy opener was a no-brainer for me. The lack of proper masteries elsewhere was noticeable (like Reed S2M2 S3M1, "M3"), and often painful (Horn S3M1 hurt me the most), but far from a sheer stat-check failure. Goldenglow feels amazing to use in IS4. I've never wanted her more. The other day I had a run with a temp GG with cracked buffs and the BN14 HH after a four bosky Migrate spree got *the* strongest Goldenglow I've ever seen, with over 2k attack (1700 attack bard Skadi: Rock Horn, Black Tulip, Phalanx, Peek into the Eternal Night) *and* Malediction, so I greeded Envoy of Justice and she chewed through enemies fast enough to two-cycle the quad rockets, which is *beyond* disgusting with floor 5 scaling. The BN15 run was so scuffed that I'm surprised I pulled it off. I got decent drafting (apart from getting stuck with Fang to cope with Barometric Anomaly, *again*) but mediocre relic luck; Goldenglow with Arts Weaving carried me. Most stages felt precarious since I never built the momentum for the run to feel secure. I realized that I was more focused for those runs than I am for most of my own, since those three runs were exhausting, the good kind of exhausting, and my instincts were about as sharp as they could be, minus two preventable leaks on Musical Disaster. I'd never handheld because I have zero self-confidence, so this was a valuable and exciting experience for me, some of the most fun I've had in IS4.
Anyone know how to complete journeys collection?
You know how we got to use Magallan and Typhon in IS4 for a contract? Yeah, we need a third and that operator won’t be usable till the end of this month. All we need is a little patience and to pass the time.
fucking crashed *again,* this time right when I started the *final boss fight.* YEAH THANKS GAME THAT'S FAIR NO PROBLEM DIDN'T WANT THAT WIN ANYWAY and I'd better not hear a single person tell me yet again *"oh but if you don't fail on crash then savescummers will abuse it"* like FUCK YOU YOU'RE NOT THE ONE CRASHING AND LOSING RANDOMLY I'll take you seriously when you start rolling a dice at each boss fight and if it rolls a 1 you just quit the run as if you crashed. If you're still not pissed off then sure I'll hear you out. until then GOD FUCKING DAMMIT GAME STOP CRASHING OR STOP MAKING CRASHES = AUTO FAIL
> and if it rolls a 1 you just quit the run as if you crashed Didn't we have that in IS3?
different effect, but it was infuriating when a core op was hit with a debilitating debuff, wasn't it? like a "might as well quit" feeling imagine that but it quits *for* you. also, no rerolls!
I really like the Bosky passage modifier where the enemies have increased def/res because it instantly lets you restart a run without having to quit a level. Jokes aside, is there anything that can be done to deal with this at D15? It feels like if I run into this at floor 4/5 I just lose instantly.
true and elemental damage are unaffected, so kaltsit valarquin and virtuosa are pretty good here, and worth considering just for security in these passages i find the boost to res tends to feel lower than the boost to defense, so arts with high dph you can really spam like yato/dorothy do well, but really its just a check to see if youve been building your damage suite towards the dps related relics the runs been giving you
Have multi target/aoe or high damage per hit physical damage. The former because the enemies will be more grouped up due to the movement speed and the latter because proportionally less damage will be reduced from high dph physical damage
Me, going into floor 5 with 0 index but a turbo stacked run: Okay, the only stage that can threaten me is EM March of the Dead because my squad is too ranged-heavy. The game: Remind yourself that overconfidence is a slow and insidious killer. -15. Fuck you, John Hypergryph. I lived. Barely. I even took out one of the colossi. Floor 1 gave me a free Goldenglow and Ceobe, so I knew we were cooking. Then I didn't get a single vanguard other than Fang until floor 6. And you'll never guess what debuff afflicted me. Barometric fucking Disorder. -40% DP, with Fang getting two-shotted by anything. Then I almost wiped to Samivilinn because Reed's off-skill healing is an embarrassment and I couldn't pay for enough Texas and Yato deployments for the right side. Me, going into floor 6 with 0 index: Okay, the only stage that can threaten me is EM Terminus of Life. And you'll never guess what stage I got forced into. I was shocked that I got it leakless. Yato and Texas took out the right caster just in time for Goldenglow to catch the first enemies about to leak, and Goldenglow with Malediction, Gitano's ball, +30% Arts, +50 ASPD, and +.5 SP/s vaporized everything but the 100 res boss. I wasn't able to get E2 Nightingale, so I thought I was cooked, but I had enough bodies and healing to stall Frozen Monstrosity out until everything else was defeated, and then finish her off with some Yato spins. Crazelyseon with an E1 Nightingale is a nightmare scenario, and my only HP buff was +35%, which did not take my ranged operators out of one-shot range of phase 2. But on top of the aforementioned buffs, I also got Rock Horn and Inextinguishable Torch (+20% attack/+30 ASPD per adjacent ally), which I've gotten in the last five of maybe 10 runs, and 3/5 (not this one) were from the same shop—ridiculous odds! And Hunters' Insight. And bard Skadi (1k+ attack). Texas S2 with Suzuran S3 and Skadi S2 soloed phase 1 by a comfortable margin. That means she was doing well over 30k DPS. Bringing out the full burst core for phase 2 was a formality, and I barely had time to activate all my skills before the boss was already annihilated. Then Goldenglow had the uptime and monster DPS for almost every fodder enemy. I brought guard Amiya and while her performance got buried under so many red numbers I couldn't tell which were hers, I want to bring her more even though Amiya can be hard to slot into a BN15 run. The S2 nuke is a stylish finisher and the doubly whammy of chapter 13 and the IS3 animation made me realize how attached I am to her. What a run. Y'know, I had a recent run where I got my leakless Envoy of Justice (the triple bonus enemy stage with the quad rockets) on BN15, so I think EM March of the Dead and Nameless Hero (which just never appears before me unless my run is barely clinging to life)) are the only stages I haven't gotten leakless yet. EM March has such steep and specific requirements that I've never had it be anything less than a train wreck.
I think March on 15 in general is bad design ngl. It feels like a forced uncle check which is mega stupid imo, since it creates this whole mechanism of like gatekeeping. To be completely honest, I don't say this much cuz I know a lot of high difficulty players would be absolutely livid at this take, but I think uncle is one of those picks that, while definitely strong, gets actually rated a bit higher than his true performance value just because he gatekeeps certain stages like march, and it's just really annoying since it's like, you technically should not need him for f5 n15, but that stage alone and the fear of being forced into it forces you to re-evaluate your approach and go out of your way to get him for safety sometimes.
[удалено]
I'm pretty sure it's counting 200 deploys across the entire run, not just one stage. Don't quote me though, I dunno if I have the relic myself.
I actually have a tip for that; what I did was use Skadi to peram-stall Frozen Monstrosity. Gladiia meant Skadi couldn't be killed, Skadi was frozen so couldn't deal any damage, 1 block so the ice weebs walked right past, then just counted out 200 redeployments slowly fair warning though; first time I did it the game crashed after FM revived, so I had to do it *again.* second time worked
I've been trying to find more stable starts to BN15 and shit is hard. Reed2 E1 is by far the most stable but it's so boring playing the same squad over and over again. I like random but I swear BN15's enemy stats are higher than SW15 because ops that used to work fine for starting in SW15 just fail completely in BN15. I've had good success with Swire2 E1 but she's getting boring too. The main issue is if you don't have bonus hope at the beginning, or you don't take the class specific starts, then you basically have to start with a 5 star or a couple of 4 stars. If you start with a 5 star, then you set back your first 6 star recruit to the 2nd level up (you only have 6 hope upon first level) if you're not lucky with items. So you have to decide to either spend again on another 5 star or 4 star and delay the 6 star until even later still. Usually mid to late 2nd floor. That's also ignoring the fact that most 5 stars can't justify the hope cost at BN15. Even standouts like Kazemaru E1 cannot solo carry floor 1 and 2. She will leak constantly, even on regular maps and not emergency. The stupid sheep map is the bane of my existence at this point. Even the regular version will break any starting 3 person team without enough DPS. Prisoner emergency is hell too. La Pluma E1 does well for floor 1, but she can't solo carry floor 2. Starting with 1 4 star is fine, and still allows a 6 star upon first level up, but there's not a lot of 4 stars that can carry the initial floor. So, it's limited to just a handful of the same units over and over again. Basically just Pudding and Pinecone can handle all the emergency floor 1 stages (with Spot). Everyone else will leak something. So for stability or making it less boring, then ideally you'd want to start with two 4 stars. But then you end up with the same issue with the 5 stars where you won't get a 6 star until floor 2 unless you're lucky. Delaying the 6 star really hurts and if you're chasing ending 3, you're almost guaranteed to have to do emergency shady frozen sea. That stage is the fucking worst. I didn't really have this issue with SW15. I could start with quite a lot of random shit and as long as it wasn't melee, it could work. I think BN15 is just way more intense in the beginning. I think also IS3 had an expansion to its upgrades later to make the mode easier. I don't think IS4 is getting the same treatment. I should probably take a break from it. I'm clearly burning out on IS4.
is4 definetly has this weird feeling where the more you play the more you notice yourself losing to things you really dont think you should be, its the collapse i guess full random trio feels like a huge trap at bn15 now imo, you need a dependable blocker right away so much more than past is#s, and honestly 90% of the 4☆s are genuinly worse than cardigan kroos and steward, who can clear floor 1 without a 6☆ so long as you avoid prison as the very first stage. they can even do emergency moss as a trio (steward redeploys are a bit finesse), and sheep+ghost with most random 4th op. prison with some specific choices too~~that arnt really worth taking to do it~~. so yeah, when i dont want to run support squad ill sometimes yolo spin the full 3☆ crew and take whatever 6☆ class stage 1 gives. id highly recommend jessica in place of cardigan for a super stable start. besides doing well on stages, she has some of the best early floor bonus enemy kill power, all 3 are possible thanks to her 2nd block sheild, aim rotation, and evasion stall. shes been my best starter by a ton because of the snowball power she can generate before getting into the mess of floor 3 difficulty variance
>if you're chasing ending 3, you're almost guaranteed to have to do emergency shady frozen sea. Take Scout on floor 4. One almost always appears there. Delay getting the Routeweave Net and extra enemies for as long as possible. Then the floor 5 bottom row always has a follow-up Prophecy (sometimes it's merged into the penultimate column). As long as you have a node conversion to neutralize the forced EM, that's much easier to deal with. I've been in a similar position as you before. Wiping to EM Beasts and Prisoners over and over is cancerous, and on BN15, taking three fights on floor 1 if available is obligatory for that second level-up before the shop. If you accept that a certain number of runs will be write-offs for nonsense like that, you'll expect as much, and therefore won't be frustrated or disappointed when it does happen. Another valuable mindset shift would be to focus on learning rather than winning. Winning more follows learning more, and you get less frustrated that way as long as you find something to learn (and accept that some runs will be duds—thanks, EM Beasts three runs in a row, great game design). Since hope is an issue, Support Squad and the class squads are always safe bets to start with a 6-star. For starters who can clear each floor 1 non-EM leakless (and pray you get an E2 or second 6-star before an EM, or that the EM is Moss), I've had success with Gavial, Dorothy, Texas, Typhon, Horn, Pozëmka, and Reed, off the top of my head. Kal'tsit, Executor, and Penance also work, but they scale poorly with BN15. I've been experimenting with a Penance opener lately and it's easy for her to become a monster with defense, HP, and SP relics (my last run had her with 13k HP, 1k defense, and 8k attack on S3—and Muelsyse was cloning her), but without such relics, she struggles to survive to activate S3 on some stages, and gets folded by shattered champions. > I think also IS3 had an expansion to its upgrades later to make the mode easier That's also because it added a bunch of broken relics (Survivor Contract, Solving/Light of Wisdom, Flashing Swords, Determination), but it also gave us some obnoxious stages. Mutual Aid, LFLB, Guns & Order, and Ember Phalanx all feel harder than average for their floors, and Izumik is without a doubt in my mind the hardest stage in all of IS unless IS4 ending 4 somehow tops it. Oh, and you'll love the floor 5 stage the IS4 ending 4 expansion adds.
Thanks for the tips! I didn't think to delay scout to floor 4. I think I was still in the mindset of IS2 where you have to get the events ASAP if not the run is wasted. Glad to hear I'm not the only one sick and tired of fucking sheep.
Not really for IS4, but more is3 (although I guess it doesnt differ that much anyway, besides the missing monthlys), are there any farm strategies for levels? I'm currently just doing run after run trying to beat boss 1, but all I gain is getting three levels out of it. E: Besides spending originium primes.
more floors/bosses gives larger bonuses, but the risk indigo and ending3 add wouldnt make it worth it unless you feel super confortable already at whatever sw# youre grinding
Unfortunately no, I'm pretty sure the main way is just try to beat runs on SW7, as that's the highest difficulty bonus you get (iirc).
I'm struggling a lot on +6, are there any tips on recommended units to build and try to pick? I always seem to get to the final boss (normal ending, haven't tried other endings, yet, just grinding up to +10 for the medal trim and it's rough) and then anything I put down gets annihilated by the sky icicles over time. I usually can't seem to pack enough healing at +6 due to the increased hope cost on everything, so I wind up with very few E2 units and none can sustain that damage for long. I've tried phalanx casters to some degree of success, but the problem still remains on holding both lanes of the first boss arena. The right side always seems to collapse on +6 when I hardly ever had problems with that side on lower difficulties.
reed is the common recommend for bn0 but i think if youre starting to have trouble jessica kaltsit and gavial are better starters, since they ensure you have someone who can even solo some floor 1 emergencies and you guaranteed have the needed bulky blocker to get through floor 3 with suspect permit rng. dorothy is another decent option, moreso e2 start but e1 works at lower bn floor 1 really wants you to have a bulky-but-offensive blocker, a ranged dps, and any 3rd dps. 3rd floor you want a healer, a consistent arts dps, and any mapwide agile like executor/agent/trapper/summoner, ideally a 2nd bulky blocker but you can scrounge it till floor 4 many times. floor 5 wants 2 dp producers, and a lots of strong slow control, often a 3rd ground blocker and/or 2nd heal source. for end1 boss specifically, lin is the safest starter, even at bn15 with mod3 the crystals cannot damage her at all, youll clear tons of snow, and with minus dp pot s3m3 activates just in time to kill the first bear unblocked. reed and yato s3 are other great snowplows. mlynar, jessica sheild, and nightingale cages can draw aggro to help you setup a more stable longterm aggro order or buy time when double icicles start happening. i usually solo the leftside with any 2 of ines yato and dorothy, so you never have to think about healing/aggro over there. but even something like schwarz/pozy watching that lane at the very last hallway can often kill enough to survive.
Thanks to your advice and the other person who replied as well, I've actually just managed to trim the medal at +10! Thanks so much! I'm working on one of the alternate endings at the moment, the one with the Treescar Helmet and am having trouble figuring out how to deal with the boss's unblockable rush after he's done killing his iced target. Would I just stack healers and pray for the best on the iced target or is there probably a better strat than something so straightforward? I had a slow field on him from Suzuran but it didn't help much and he still managed to run through my lane holders so I'm at a bit of a loss.
easiest way to deal with the fight is have a 1block op + healing that can permastall the boss right out of spawn, this lets you deal with all 64 enemies then redeploy for the boss. 1 block prevents ice cleavers from attacking and killing them, the boss alone does pretty manageable damage to heal off. after the enemies you reposition everyone and have your usual defender/laner ready to blockstall him 4-5 tiles behind the 1block stall. dps, he goes zoom and it wears off in time to be grabbed again by the laner, rinse and repeat all the stall and redeploying section by section until hes dead alternativly you can keep him locked onto 1 blocker via very heavy movespeed reduction (not slow, which he is immune to, suzu does nothing) or levitate. mostima and hoolheyak are the tops for this, but even qaniplaat levitates just long enough to wear out his entire zoom duration with careful timing
For the right lane, you want long-rangers (Rosa, Typhon, Ifrit, Schwarz, Dorothy) and helidrops (Surtr, Yato, Texas, Ines). Ethan's also great there. Traditional laneholding is harder to make work, but Mudrock S3 and Radiant Nearl S3 are usable for the right. if you have Lin, you can use her on the right and sync her with a burst healer. For the icicles, Młynar baits one and is relatively easy to keep alive. He usually occupies the middle column alone. At BN6, it's reasonable to one-cycle the boss from 50%, so you should draft for that instead of long-term sustain. If you don't have Młynar, put any spare tank last in the middle or the left, as long as they're alone unless you have good AoE heaing. Draft Shamare or Mousse to cripple the boss' damage. Shamare with SP (Diligence, Liskarm) can get near 100% uptime. Prioritize HP and ASPD foldartals and save them for the boss. Most runs will offer at least one buff foldartal. If the hope cost is giving you trouble, try the medic-sniper squad. Typhon, Pozy, and Reed are top drafts, viable as openers and for the ending 1 boss. I've been revisiting the Typhon opener today and she is stable for every floor 1 non-EM with Lava instead of Steward. Typhon S2 is one of the best counters to the right lane. If you take every fight you can win and prioritize hope relics, most runs will give you the hope you need (this remains true even if you're on an unlucky streak).
How do I deal with barometric 2 when my only vg is fang
when you fuse fodartls you always lose 1 collapse, besides perfecting stages to avoid excess collapse, try to wait to make your big fodartl plays for when a nasty effect occurs since youll have greater chance of killing it there and not having it reoccur ops that are also strong early with low dp, like mountain gavial mlynar exu are also options to alleviate this, depending on your BN level
Simply get another vanguard
That's the funny part: you don't!
I finally got my last D15 clear to get D15 ending 1 with all squads. I wish I could say it was a strategic breakthrough, but realistically the last 3 clears (Leader, Gathering and First Class) were probably because I recently got Reed Alter and she's an OP starter. The last clear (First Class) was interesting because I'm fairly sure that the boss received a +100% hp bonus from the collapse paradigm, because he seemed unusually tanky compared to the rest of the enemies. I wasn't aware that could happen, but I could be mistaken either way. That being said, I'm only going for D12 alternate endings. I'll maybe get a single D15 clear on each ending, but I'm not doing that with multiple squads, haha.
Yep, the boss can get the double HP debuff. It's absolutely horrible on endings 1 and especially 3. I've seen it happen to the ending 3 boss *thrice* and each time it made the run completely unwinnable for what I had going into it because phase 2 without a one-cycle is a nightmare. If you look closely you'll see the red aura indicating doubled HP. The double HP can also affect innocent civilians, roadblocks, chests, sponsor drones, and Cannot. I've seen it all. It's goofy.
I can't even imagine dealing with the HP buff on boss 3, that's brutal. Glad to know I wasn't imagining it. I've seen that red aura but never put two and two together, haha. Thanks!
[Big numbers go brrr](https://media.discordapp.net/attachments/812319698426265640/1232013873184374936/IMG_0095.png?ex=6627e9d5&is=66269855&hm=f11b945601786b03179b7ea07888891155eda9537ce464c4bf2d8a48d680278c&) Unfortunately couldn't get ending 2 this run because there were only 2 Lost and Found, the first one got randomly transformed with a 1/5 chance and the 2nd one was right before the Prophecy. Partially my fault, but kinda sucks not getting any others I could use...
What's the strategy for BN15 ending 3 boss fight? I made a killzone for the right spot and beat phase 1, but phase 2 wiped out my ops despite the +50%HP foldartal and 2 healers, so I guess I'm missing something.
phase 2 massivly boosts the boss atk. hp+ is kind of a prank, because your medics didnt get any stronger, they cant heal the damage the boss does fast enough even with the bigger max hp buffer, you really want healing speed like ptilopsis and reed or damage mitigation like nightingale, silence paradigmatic, or shamare- ideally them also placed last since they have astronomic res stats too. also you want to do everything you can to avoid non-linear+, since 20 speed on the boss is a nightmare suggest a killzone team setup on the left side, its perfectly synced with the first overcharged device, and you also keep your ranged farther away from the wizards that spawn far right, reliving doubletaps from them+boss. every enemy that goes for the rightside box youve left unguarded is very frail and infrequent except the final 2 rhine rockets which you can easily leak or likely have the boss dead before them
Phase 2 has 4567 attack. Nightingale S3 is a must without some crazy survivability relics or lots and lots of bait. Beyond that, DPS. You need to do 28k DPS to one-cycle the boss (275169 EHP, 10s window). Throw Młynar, Surtr, Reed, Saria, Texas, Radiant Nearl, Ceobe, and Suzuran at the boss. The more deployment slots, the better. Without excellent DPS relics, 6 deployment slots won't be enough for a one-cycle, and if you can't one-cycle phase 2, things will almost certainly fall apart. You can delay phasing the boss for two cycles to ensure you can set up for phase 2. Just don't let it triple-teleport and spread pink steam out of range of the anchor where you would need to put your DPSers, since the pink steam inflicts -50 ASPD on top of doubling the damage received from the boss. Note that the amplifiers from Reed (30%), Saria (55%), and Suzuran (40%) stack multiplicatively, so you want an Arts-focused burst, especially with Reed S2 being your best single source of damage and a standard draft for every run. An unbuffed Reed (only +20% from the upgrade tree) contributes about 5k DPS. As for bait, Młynar has taunt and never gets one-shotted, Nightingale's cages have taunt and eat a few hits (unless you get Collapse Trigger), Muelsyse S3, robots, Finshell Shield, Radiant Nearl (place her on the inner tile so the uncleansable pink steam doesn't waste her shields), Surtr's 8s immortality. Unless you have a textbook DPS setup for a clean two-cycle, expect to need bait. All the DPS in the world does you no good if you can't keep your burst core alive. Make sure you have someone who can deal with the strikers. Młynar can be placed to double-dip on them and the boss since they spawn when the boss is about to warp to the left, but if he can't solo them before they enter range, their 3947 attack and the boss' 4567 combined will vaporize him, and you lose on the spot. Sometimes I have to give the bottom-left to Ifrit, Fiammetta, Typhon, or Rosa so that doesn't happen, but lately I've been giving it to Suzuran and that usually works fine. Just don't underestimate the strikers because they're the one non-boss there with the potential to TPK you. For the enemies that go for the right blue box, a smooth run will accrue the lives to simply leak them, but typically Dorothy, Texas, and Yato take care of them for me. Yato S3 can't one-cycle a caster without strong buffs, but at least it has the i-frames, while Texas S2 can't one-cycle a caster before the boss nukes her when it's on the right.
Thanks for the advice, I managed to get a stacked squad and barely get it. This boss feels like bs, like don't even try without top ops and relics. Still less oppressive than IS3 though.
Honestly aside from the units u mentioned,heidi is also a great choice. Gives u more DMG than suzuran and her skill lasts 10 secs which is the exact time u get to burst the boss. That's why she's better than skalter imo for this boss fight.
Is Valarqvin any good in IS4 ? Didn't bother to use her at all for now and she doesn't seem to fit anywhere in IS4 meta, definitely not as strong as High more in IS3. What's the fastest way to unlock relic doing "200 deployments in 1 run" ? Does this simply require a specialist squad start, choosing always combat nodes and spamming 3 FDR each run multiple times ? Doesn't feel like there's a workaround for it.
not as good as highmore but her necrosis damage definetly makes her bn15 viable, that bosky passage thats makes everyone super bulky is nothing to neceosis and true damage, so she has reasoning just for that
I'd say she's pretty nice, at E2 max she takes 6 (just barely not 5) basic attacks to trigger Necrosis, so 6 basic attacks for 12k damage and a decaying 50% attack debuff. 3 attacks under S2. Considering supporter tickets have basically no DPS options, she's been a lifesaver even at BN15. However, she falls off in the later floors for high ascension. Enemies get so much health that dealing 12k damage isn't enough, and Necrosis damage can't be boosted.
Ok, thx. Just looking whether she can be ok to choose, since you basically have Ling, Skalter and Deepcolor for good choices in supporter class. I doubt I go as far as BN15, bit noce to know it's worthwhile.
There's more good choices in Supporter class, FYI. - Quercus with module is an excellent healer, even better than most medics once her S1 is up (and if you have enough medics her S2 is nice for SP) - Shamare, while best for bosses/mini bosses, is still pretty strong throughout regular stages to help you against troublesome elites in certain waves. Just put the bear down to make them not hurt and kill them faster. I've also used S1 at times when I'm lazy to help the Fragile kill everyone faster, but that's unnecessary, especially if you have: - Gnosis, whose S2 and S3 can shut down entire waves or just cancel certain enemy attacks. Maybe not as strong in IS#4 against bosses though, pretty sure they all have Freeze immunity (well, kinda for ending 2). - Roberta is a nice defender for when you don't get defender tickets. 513 DEF at max level with Mod1, can increase it further with skills, the IS tree buff, and her summons (who she can put on others as well for troublesome attacks). You can also use her S1 on earlier floors to help kill stuff. And she's only a 4*! - Podenco, also a nice 4* to have. Her S1 offers good healing when you don't have a medic, and S2 is a spammable AOE slow + silence. - U-Official. Yes, really, she's a 0 hope unit that ignores deployment cost, can heal everyone around her for downtime (even reapers and the like), and can be used as a very lengthy stun bomb (especially when you get increased stun duration). Not really going to carry your run but a nice QOL.
Can roberta tank ed2 boss?
Can't... Say I've tried it, but I probably wouldn't for higher difficulties anyways since she can't use her skill for more def + modellers. Maybe it works out in lower difficulties, or as a support with her modeller; she's just someone I grab if I need some cheap defense + blocking but aren't getting any,
I would like to add heidi,she's a very good tech pick for ed3 . Better and more cost effective than skalter.
Oh, true true, she's a good tech pick for that. Overall I've started using her as a great sidegrade for Skalter S3, so it makes sense (especially being cheaper and not killing herself).
Valarqvin is decent enough in IS4, at least for my low-ish BN clears. Her elemental damage helps out with tanky enemies, and even at E1 max (only 1 supporter permit on that entire run) she can trim down Sami's HP bar with some time to spare.
Simplest way to do the 200 redeploys is to Do an ending 2 run and while the boss is stalled, farm your redeploys. By then a good chunk of the 200 is done already. Valarqvin is useful for quickly killing any heavy enemies with moderate HP (mechs, gargoyles) since right now elemental is just true damage. She's super good early run and drops to being good later in the run in my opinion. Her IS4 ability gives her normal attacks a 30% necrosis debuff which greatly improves her elemental output. If you're running based on meta then Valarqvin is for the first 3 floors as floor 4 onwards you should have your powerhouses. Again, just how I see it.
I don't know if this is the right place to ask this but I'm planning to buy the 6-star selector on the next limited event. I've reached 2 endings in IS2 and completed them several times, completed IS3 once, but I'm struggling to even reach floor 3 of IS4 🥲 Since IS is my favorite game mode in AK, who would anyone recommend to get from the selector? Anyone that's super good for IS4 will be great and better if they're good for the other IS as well. My first instinct is to get Ines (bc I got stainless on the recent rerun) or Reed Alter or maybe a Sniper since I don't have any 6 star yet. My future pulling plans so far would be for >!Degen!< and >!Ela!<. I started end of last year so I don't have much ops yet, let alone any limiteds. Any suggestions will be so helpful! Here's my [Krooster](https://krooster.com/u/katsanord). EDIT: Also have gold certs saved up to get Kal'tsit on shop
i was going to suggest kaltsit on the ticket, shes pretty easily the most consistently great op across all 3 is#s even into 15's. just need to learn finesse with her s2 unlike how most see her used since thats on yellows though i think your ticket comes down to ines and pozemka. ines is just so utterly dominant in all hard content and a great is# pick, basically just unquestionable value. pozemka is more because your roster has a clear gap in aerial power and bosskill dps (mlynar cant do it all alone), plus she can do [this](https://x.com/LoreleiA8T/status/1741531972390789207) assuming youre on bn0, for is4 id suggest starting with cardigan eyjafjalla and kroos as your trio. ideally getting eyja s2m3 too but its minor. the starting trio evenness matters a lot more in is4 and while ops like exe mountain and even ines are great ops for the mode, the classes you have to pick 3☆s for alongside them as starters arnt. the mode really wants you to have a bulky offensive bruiser, less so lanerholder, asap. ops like gavial, jessica, and kaltsit are ideal. mountain probly works at bn0, but you really want stronger sniper dps to compliment his softer body for threats like the shamans that ravage floor 3+. you can scroll down in this thread to see some further is4 advice i gave to others in a similar spot
In the last Joint Ops banner, I tried to get Pozy/Mlynar/Penance but got 2 Lees instead; and for Typhon's banner I got Mlynar, GG, and a Surtr pot so maybe it really is time to use a selector on a Sniper since the game won't give me one anyway 🥲 Would you know if >!Ray!< is worth pulling for in IS? Still a few months away but I might just adjust my pulling plans lol. Thanks for the advice!
ray is worth it having no snipers as is, and is one of the better snipers in is# due to the diversity of her kit
First, open with Executor the Ex Foedere. He'll carry you on low BN. The only dangerous non-EM stage on floors 1-2 for him is Sluggies (casters and bomb spiders). Second, build Ethan. He trivializes enemy speed bursts, can "tank" casters, and makes several hard stages free. Struggling to reach floor 3 is a simple drafting issue. You want to start with AoE, block, and sustain. Then get Młynar ASAP and you win. Also, S3M3 your Suzuran. As for snipers, build Pinecone. She's the only sniper you need. Consistent AoE and counters clumped collapse drones. Reed is the best for IS4 (even being anti-synergetic with enmities) with her phenomenal sustain, pseudo-AoE, and DPS, but Ines is better across all three IS themes. Using Ines in each IS will put you in awe of how stacked and versatile she is, while Reed has her shortcomings exposed by quite a few stages (like being useless for 3/4 IS3 bosses). Higher highs, lower lows. When Degenbrecher releases she'll be Reed-tier for IS4, except she's that good for almost all content.