Help me build my A- team

First things first, what is your max stamina? If it's not over 200 yet, then a good idea would be to tackle some Realm dungeons. Each realm dungeon gets you mythril, and that will enable you to do a lot of pulls to get at more soulbreaks. Plus they increase your stamina and get you other resources, heh, so they're definitely a good place to jump into.

In particular, until April 16th, we have the 'Luck of the Realms' banner (If you look in the Relic Draw section you'll see it!). If you haven't pulled on all of those, that is definitely a good spot to spend your mythril. You're new, you need /stuff/ haha. So that is definitely a great place to pull with the new mythril you'll be getting!

Beyond that, progression wise, it helps to go through the 'Books of Trials' (On the home screen there's a book icon near the mid-upper right). Those help direct you to things to do and bring you through the nightmare dungeons.

The one 'out of order' progression thing I'd highly recommend doing is doing at least one dream dungeon every day, as we have a mission for that that gets you bonus rewards. This does presume 'Cardia Dungeons' are open, but go into Cardia dungeons -> Dreams -> The easiest difficulty. Pick a dream where you have at least one well leveled character from the realm (multiples help but aren't as critical) and get the boss beaten up. This will help in the fairly near future!

The FFX realm dungeon [Chaotic Memories] goes away... uh today, actually haha. It will help to try to do as many of those dungeons as you can before they do! Just go through as far as you can until it gets too difficult to accomplish.

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Of your awakenings (That's a very competent Deuce, by the way!) I notice only one is an exact match to one of your chains - Vivi and Vincent. Having Vivi use his awakening while Vincent's chain is up will result in Vivi doing a lot of damage, and thus that may be a good place to focus on for the time being. Chains boost damage of a particular element or realm, and Vincent's is a powerful fire chain that also gives a big boost to magic, while Vivi's awakening gives free and doubled fire magic, and thus the two synchronize nicely.

I do notice your Vivi is a lot lower level than your two physical types, mind you, so there may be a lag in there - but that's definitely where a lot of your power will come from.

One big thing I would then add is that you /do/ have a good attack booster for your level in Quina! Quina's Culinary Curiosity is a 50% attack buff (essentially the highest), and it comes with hastega, protectga, and shellga to boot. Definitely cycle Quina in if you're using physical attackers.

While Cloud is awesome, and you do have his awakening, heavy skills may be hard for you to create and hone for him. If you /can/ do so then by all means do that, haha, but otherwise Squall with his Steely Blade burst may be stronger.

So in low end content, I actually think I'd go for either Cloud, Squall, Quina, Tyro, Deuce, or Cloud/Squall, Vivi, Quina, Vincent, Deuce at the moment. Vivi + Vincent is a very powerful combo for you and one to focus on, but I am assuming that your hones aren't super hot at the moment so it may be easier to go physical over magica. I would prioritize getting some 5* or 6* black magic fire spells for Vivi to use.

You'll also do well going with slightly unusual setups - Squall, Quina, Serah, Deuce, and a DPS unit is a good combination. Possibly Vivi again as awakenings are good things.

Hopefully these suggestions help! Definitely go do a little bit more realm dungeons, then try the FFX [Chaotic Memories] event while it's still around, and pull on the Luck of the Realms when you get five mythril to do so ^_^

Edit: Oh! your Meia and Barbariccia are also good and definitely can play in the same pool as your other top enders, haha. The main reason I didn't suggest them is that I again dunno how strong your magic hones are, and Vivi is the one who synchronizes so perfectly with one of your chains. But basically anyone with an awakening is great, and your Squall is level 99 and has a strong BSB (Burst) which will help while hones are lacking.

Edit2: When you do get to Nightmare abilities, the first one I suggest you make is Meltdown. There's a strong argument for ultima as well, but Meltdown is Fire/Earth/Wind and thus hits the elements of two of your awakening mages (Vivi and Barbariccia), and thus I feel the extra hit will go well with your vincent chain in powering especially-Vivi.

 

Don't hone flare.
Edit: Don't hone Comet either, and I wouldn't bother with Quake nor Bioga.

Honing Firaja is useful, but your current target goal is the 5* skill 'Chain Firaga' (You can just make this now, but it costs you 5* orbs you may not have). A little later, or well once you've beaten the Meltdown Nightmare, you will want to make the 6* skill "Meltdown' similarly. I'd push hard to try to get Chain Firaga, though!

For Cloud, Retaliate will work for now - it does its job! Your current target goal for your Cloud Kit should be the 4* skill [Heavy Charge], then the 5* skill [Evil Swing]. Later, you'll want to upgrade from using the 4* skill to using the 5* skill [Grand Charge]. Heavy skills work by 'building charges' and then 'using finishers', so you'll want to use two heavy charges and then one evil swing for big damage. It's a little clunky, haha, but right now that's what your Cloud does once his awakening is up, so hey. Try to activate Cloud's awakening after having done two heavy charges (So he can immediately finisher). Once his awakening is up, he can actually just spam the finisher (Evil Swing) or alternate one-for-one between the two.

Lifesiphon is then always useful on your physical attackers, and wrath is useful for Quina or Tyro. Both of these skills generate you soulbreak gauge. Wrath is much better at it than Lifesiphon, but wrath overwrites attack buffs and thus you don't want to use it on someone you plan on having do physical damage.

Squall, when not using his BSB (Burst), wants to be using the 5* skill [Freezing Quadstrike] right now. But I actually don't recommend investing too heavily in skills for Squall just yet as you don't have his awakening or better - just have him lifesiphon up to his burst and use burst commands. ^_^

 

All of them!

You can only pick a particular realm once, and thus you should definitely do all the realms there. Each pull gives you a guaranteed relic, and right now you need all the relics you can get! Be especially on the lookout for any chains, awakenings, syncs, or dyads that you obtain ^_^

Finding awakenings/syncs that match your chains is definitely the goal. In the long term (Or well, even in the mid term haha), most fights are focused elementally or realm-based, and elemental focuses tend to show up more first in the form of Magicite. Chains are thus the most valuable things, really, as they'll power a lot of what you're doing.

 

@Dżaf_Prod About your earlier question on upgrades,
priority always goes to weapons and armor which has boost <element> damage by small amount.

If u had managed to acquire Artifact tokens, these are usually the most ideal type of equip for DPS. However, note that there are realm artifacts (which are only better when there is realm synergy, like Cardia dungeons) and pure boost artifacts (which are better in magicite dungeons since synergy does not apply there). to upgrade artifacts, u will need rainbow crystals. to create more rainbow crystals, i suggest to convert them from weapons, armors and accessories which do not offer any bonus stat.

 

Have things been going okay in game?

At this point if you have several decent soulbreaks from the same realm, it may help to go get a historia crystal! Getting even one of those will help you a lot more than fiddling with a magicite deck up to and through 5* magicite, haha.