Status ailments - August 8, 2015

Daily posting, on the topic of status ailments.

In Gachduine, there are 3 big status effects: Stun, Debuff (which is a combination of poison and blind) and Illusion (confusion, but requires the condition of the target needing at least one of their own allies in combat). There is no immunity to any status ailments from either side, player character, Drone, Golem, enemy or boss, but fortunately for the player, the only status ailment that can affect them is Stun.

Stun is the most common and easily applied status ailment, namely as a number of characters can have attached to their standard attacks, and the Static Competency inflicts it on attackers who hit them, and is great for interrupting enemy rapid-fire. On the converse, enemies who have Stun themselves can interrupt your own characters' rapid-fire.

Debuff's poison ignores defense, and though the total poison damage may not be as powerful as most character's weapon specializations, it is helpful as your team takes advantage of the blind effect, which severely lowers enemy accuracy.

Illusion is useful for turning enemy attacks away from your team and onto each other, but has no effect if an enemy is alone. Zippy's midgame-to-endgame Astral Glow passively inflicts Illusion on all enemies within melee range, essentially making him immune to melee opponents so long as there is more than one foe present. One particularly mean thing to in rare instances: if a Manipulator is in sight range of their Phantom, cast Illusion on the Phantom. The Phantom will target its own Manipulator, and if the Manipulator dies, so does the Phantom!

Melt Armour is a Sulfur Ball ability that causes enemies to take double damage for its next three turns, and though it is not quite a status ailment, it counts as one as far as Advantage Blade is concerned. Advantage Blade is a Cult Blade ability that boosts the Instant Death threshold on Cult Blades, when Debuff, Illusion and/or Melt Armour is applied.

Instant death from Cult Blades can be applied to any foe, boss or otherwise (though Cult Blade wielding enemies can do the same to your team, and their threshold grows as they level up, making high-risk low-HP playstyles even riskier to play). To initiate instant death effectively, the character will need to specialize in the generally weak Cult Blades, and depending on the character, may need to focus on stealth, combo building or status ailments to effectively pull off instant death.

The character Lucia has great skill with status ailments, and her midgame-to-endgame Burn To The Soul doubles the damage of Debuff's poison, doubles Debuff's duration, doubles Illusion's duration, doubles Melt Armour's duration and causes enemies suffering from Melt Armour to suffer quadruple damage rather than double.

Lucia has access to more than one Advantage Blade Competency, as well as Debuff, Illusion and Melt Armour, making her extremely capable of instantly killing any foe if she can apply all status ailments to them. There is a rare Sulfur Ball called Venom, which not only boosts Debuff's poison damage, but has Sulfur Ball attacks inflict Debuff. With one attack, Lucia can apply Debuff and Melt Armour to an area. There is also a rare Cult Blade called Zweihander, which has Advantage Blade Competencies. This combination gives Lucia great access to a high instant death threshold, especially if Illusion can be thrown into the mix.