Labyrinth of Touhou 6F

[Parallaxal]

Would you believe I had a harder time with Cirno V2 than any of the others as far as I can remember? I usually take them out immediately after beating the final boss (since I personally don't think they're that hard), but Cirno always catches me off guard for some bizarre reason. Not sure why.

[Ghaleon]

Would you believe I had a harder time with Cirno V2 than any of the others as far as I can remember? I usually take them out immediately after beating the final boss (since I personally don't think they're that hard), but Cirno always catches me off guard for some bizarre reason. Not sure why.

Well Cirno V3 was one of the hardest IIRC, I really don't remember her Ver2 version very well.

[Kanoe]

Yeah it was alot easier.  Seems the stages hp were not uped for Rinnosuke and Yukari.  Honestly I think I had the hardest time with Meiling since she was fast, does alot of damage with arrow storm, and kept resisting debuffs and paralyze. 

Also is it better to just grind on F20 or are the F21 mobs worth the trouble? 

[Ghaleon]

21F mobs are most certainly not worth the trouble. 20f trash is easier, gives more exp, heaps more skp, and has the chance of dropping great equipment.

[Kanoe]

Ok thats what I thought.  Thanks!  I've just be running away and picking up what treasure there is XD

[NEETori]

Cootiesuke Ver2 is definitely not one of the harder version 2 bosses (and version 3 coincidentally is pretty much the second easiest of all v3 bosses, the easiest being suwako). I don't really remember which the harder ones are but IIRC Yukari is one of them.

Yukari definitely is one of the hardest.  Somehow, it's essentially the same battle (you blitz her with Suwako and other strong attackers), but she actually puts up big numbers this time around.

[Kanoe]

Ok, got five stars.  Is there a recommended level for Maribel V.2?  I heard there were some things different about this one compared to the first one like having to wait till Rankain to kill the top one or something. 

[RegalStar]

Yukari gave me slightly more trouble with most other ver2s as well, but it's not really notable because I beat the ver2s after everything I can do in floor 1-20 except item star and hibachi twins. From the other ver2s, Flandre was the one that scared me the most (though I don't remember whether I had a hard beating her or not, so it must've ended up pretty easy), Alice actually got me game over'd because I got careless (lol)

[NEETori]

Mokou, Cirno, and Chen were most dangerous for me.  Flan was just a matter of getting Kanako first and getting her up to snuff with the rest of your team

[CP3]

I think

Spoiler:

Kaguya

did well enough for me in Flan ver. 2. I definitely remember having some problems with Cirno though, because her AoE spam towards the end of the fight is very quick and does a lot of damage. I had to stack cold res for that one and she still hit like a truck.

You know who was one of, or maybe even the toughest for me? Meiling ver.2. She hit very hard and fast. Rasetsu fist, huge tremor strike and arrow rain are not pretty...

Mokou was rather hard, but I actually found Chen to be one of the easiest, probably thanks to Reimu and

Spoiler:

Yukari

barriers. We'll see how I do against them this time around. This is the team I'm using, mostly composed of characters I didn't use much last time around with a few recommendations from a friend:

Meiling
Sakuya (defensive)

Spoiler:

Keine
Sanae

Rumia

Spoiler:

Iku

Cirno

Spoiler:

Renko
Maribel
Reisen
Nitori
ATK Komachi

I have yet to fight 16F boss. So far I haven't had any problems, although a couple of random battles in 16F were annoying, and I'm rather dreading 18F. I'd say the most worrysome thing is a lack of MND buffs.

[NEETori]

18F isn't bad, 16F V2 isn't too bad.  You can use Renko + Nitori + Suwako to awesome affect.  Reisen is still godly. 

[CP3]

I'm still at v1 for that team, mind. Haven't beaten the game yet. And I don't have Suwako. 

Yeah, I beat 16F on my first try, wasn't too bad. Skipped 17F as usual because it's 17F and now heading to 18F's random battles and eventually boss. Shub Nigguraths and Etherlites have me rather worried with that team, but

Spoiler:

Maribel

's wind nuke should be fun against Guardians and Peta Grains.

As for 18F boss, the only thing I'm worried about is Sanae not dying easily. Should I be able to accomplish that, I'll be fine.

[NEETori]

Restricted team game?  Yikes. 
18F is going to probably be a toughy. 

Nitori's like the only nuke you've got that's able to consistently deal huge damage for that battle. 

All I can say is uh, use Renko like a damage sponge to protect your squishier characters.

EDIT:
I lost my file where I beat Okuu!  Noo!
Gonna farm 20F mobs for ribbons, Flower Blade Kikiryuseis and hopefully a Scourge/Armads or two. 

Just beat Boss Rush v.2
Biggest threats overall were Yuugi, Yuyu and Yukari 
Yuugi must be defeated before KOi3S, Yuyu's Flawless Nirvana is instant kill (I used two characters to take the hit before I finished her), and Yukari's Djinn Storm messes you up before 18F.  Thank god no 20F v.2 at the end. 

18F is piss easy as long as your characters have the TP and SP regeneration to make it to the end (I literally had two characters in at a time - Meiling + attacker)

[Parallaxal]

Against 18F, Iku should be able to handle staying in the 2nd slot full-time to pass out buffs. I used her for both my last two runs of the game, and with a bit of effort she was surviving all of 18F's first form attacks at level 85. Past the first form, almost nothing should seriously threaten Iku if you've focused on raising her MND.  If you're worried about how to use your characters, check out some of my videos; I've used pretty much every character you've got on your team for this fight.

ATK Komachi is actually quite beastly for the battle. At just level 81, she was swinging for 50-60k+ per hit after a single Thundercloud Stickleback, and well over 100k+ on the MYS form, which is awesome given the attack's delay. Give her some affinity gear, and she can survive anything the boss has with no problem. Reisen is also not a terrible damage dealer by any means. Just because 18F is immune to debuffs doesn't mean she's useless; on the contrary, after self-buffing she should be doing 60-80k per hit on the elemental forms she can exploit, and she does so quickly thanks to her massive speed buffs and decent delays. Nitori of course just murders everything with Thundercloud Stickleback for backup.

Keeping Sanae alive is really quite challenging, though. I really can't bother to even try to get her to the point where she can survive Start of Heavenly Demise, so I used her solely to switch in, heal, and switch out immediately, just like how I'd use any other fragile high-delay nuker like Nitori.

[CP3]

Yeah, thanks for the advice. I just watched your video and noticed indeed Iku was doing great in slot 2, which I wasn't sure of for this fight because of the physical element, but she took them alright. I'll make sure Meiling is faster than her for the battle then.

I do expect Reisen to do some very good damage against his CLD and SPI forms. Komachi taking out his MYS form quickly will also be cool because IMO it's his most annoying one.

As for keeping Sanae alive...yeah, it'll be a hard task - maybe even impossible since I don't really want to overlevel (the plan is to not go higher than Meiling 95 if possible). I'm just spoiled by Minoriko tanking magic like mad I guess. She was my healer of choice on my first run, hence why I'm using Sanae now. She has a couple of cool perks, but I definitely miss Minoriko's survivability.

[NEETori]

Really, his only non-dangerous form is fire  :V
Maribel can also help Komachi if she really needs it.

[Ghaleon]

I don't understand. I feel his only dangerous form is his first >=P. Done that boss like 4 times with completely new parties each time. Even my glass cannon party didn't have too much difficulty.

[NEETori]

I find his first and last forms most dangerous, and his elemental forms of varying danger - mystic being the most dangerous overall, while fire is almost harmless.

[Parallaxal]

Oh most definitely, 18F's only truly dangerous form is the first. I don't think I've ever lost to him so long as my team survives his first form. Not even his final form is as bad, IMHO, since it has such low HP and sticks to composite attacks that are easier to defend against.

[CP3]

I came close to beating him with Meiling 94, I saw World-shaking military rule but ultimately lost because my team was almost entirely dead by then.

The toughest form is definitely the first, it can be trivial or horrible depending on the RNG you get.

I did have some problems with his elemental forms though. He hits pretty hard in some of them, NTR and WND come to mind. NTR I can somewhat zerg with Maribel and Iku, WND is a bit of a problem. I think the main thing hurting me here is the lack of MND buffs. Maybe I can afford to use Charge? I should try during his FIR or CLD forms which seem to be the most harmless.

You're entirely right about Sanae, btw. I did give her enough SKP love and gear to survive Demise, but she still doesn't work for me in slot 4, regardless. Her heals (and her buff, at least defensively) are too slow and inefficient for her to function like Minoriko.

EDIT: Just beat it, still Meiling 94. RNG was nicer to me in form 1 and I managed to beat up all his forms quickly. On we go to

Spoiler:

Maribel

and then plus disk.

[Kanoe]

I hated the F18 boss fight.  Felt a little too reliant on the RNG.  It only made me angry to watch Para's video of him winning both times with him only using Demise like once or twice while my fights he spams it no matter what form he was in.  He even opened with it and followed it with another on two separate occsions.  And since he was so fast, it was difficult to get some damager dealers out cast and call them back into the reserves before he gets an attack. 

Also some of his forms look way too similar so I find that I have no idea what element he was on.  I could never tell the difference between cold and spirit.  When I was on the final stretch of one fight, i was rushing to finish him off to find out that it was not his final form but his Mystic form X.X

And I agree, Sanae is just too slow to be very effective.  I dropped her soon after the last boss and replaced her with Minoriko.  Works much better. 

[Ghaleon]

Heavenly demise is only dangerous if he opens with it. Afterwards you should have enough def/mne buffs to make it rather gimp. It has very poor def-piercing abilities and you will see it hit for 0 while many of his other attacks may 2shot.

[NEETori]

Really, the only dangerous attack of those two forms is Scarlet Gold Sword to not Meiling/Tenshi.  But damn is it dangerous  :V

[Ghaleon]

ratsetsu fist isn't dangerous? Iai slash is also very dangerous if you don't have 2 tanky people up front. The formula on it might be compareable to the big nukes of each elemental phase. But it targets def instead of mnd, which tends to be much lower overall for the entire party excluding tanks, plus is non-elemental, so you wont be reducing that damage by your affinities, which should be well over 100 on average by that point in the game.

[CP3]

Heavenly demise is only dangerous if he opens with it. Afterwards you should have enough def/mne buffs to make it rather gimp. It has very poor def-piercing abilities and you will see it hit for 0 while many of his other attacks may 2shot.

This is why I was deathly afraid of Demise. I had Keine to buff DEF (and I used it when I had the chance, which helped loads), but my only MND buffs are Sanae's fruits and Renko's Charge. I didn't try the latter, but the former isn't very fast, big, or efficient, plus the majority of the time Sanae had things to heal. In retrospect, now looking at the formula in the database, I probably gave SoHD more credit than it deserves.

Rasetsu fist is powerful, as is SGS. Those pretty much spell death if he decides to throw them at slot 3 or 4, and they can nuke a tank low-ish on health.

Iai Slash is pretty strong indeed, but what I did like is that since it has fairly big delay, it gave me room to maneuver. I kept my tanks static on the front 2 positions anyway.

[Parallaxal]

I had more trouble with Iai Slash than anything else, mostly because I used Iku as a tank in the 2nd slot. I typically had less difficulty with 18F opening with Start of Heavenly Demise than Iai Slash, since Iku takes much less damage from the former than the latter. After the first form, though, nothing can really threaten Iku much at all. It also helps that in my past several runs, I have been forcing myself to use less nuke-tacular characters, which actually helped me a bit in that those tend to have better defenses and can actually expect to survive SoHD. Even ATK-based Sakuya had no problem taking it like a champ.

But at this point, I'm such a Iku fanboy for this game that my opinions are pretty much skewed...

I know that 18F does have some high-power nukes like Wild Dance of Freezing Mist in his elemental forms, but doesn't he only cast those on specific turns (I think the 4th turn after changing forms)? If you can safely predict the power nukes and switch in high MND characters to tank them, they should be more managable.

[NEETori]

ratsetsu fist isn't dangerous? Iai slash is also very dangerous if you don't have 2 tanky people up front. The formula on it might be compareable to the big nukes of each elemental phase. But it targets def instead of mnd, which tends to be much lower overall for the entire party excluding tanks, plus is non-elemental, so you wont be reducing that damage by your affinities, which should be well over 100 on average by that point in the game.

I tried to forget about Raesetsu fist, thanks... D:
My lineup consisted of primarily Tenshi, Meiling, attacker A, attackerB/supporter B
I nuked his ass down, and had Iku only come in occasionally to stickleback a character as opposed to having her sit in full time.  My experience that run through was that for some strange reason, he threw Raesetsu Fist at my second slot character more. 

[CP3]

20F boss down at Meiling 125. Bit higher than I'd have liked but not too bad regardless.

Now moving onto the ver. 2 bosses. I beat

Spoiler:

Reisen

and Chen already, but everyone else (well tbh,

Spoiler:

Reisen

as well, I just got a bit lucky) seems to hit terribly hard.
I don't even remember what level I beat these guys at last time, it's been a while. But since stuff like Cat's Walk is hitting Meiling for 5k-6k before buffs (let alone my offtanks who get hit for between 7k-9.5k), I figure it's meant to be done at a bit higher level than 128ish.

[Parallaxal]

Now moving onto the ver. 2 bosses. I beat

Spoiler:

Reisen

and Chen already, but everyone else (well tbh,

Spoiler:

Reisen

as well, I just got a bit lucky) seems to hit terribly hard.
I don't even remember what level I beat these guys at last time, it's been a while. But since stuff like Cat's Walk is hitting Meiling for 5k-6k before buffs (let alone my offtanks who get hit for between 7k-9.5k), I figure it's meant to be done at a bit higher level than 128ish.

If you find those too hard, then just go farm the 20F unique drops if you don't have them yet (Scourge, Divine Spirit Barrier, Armads, and Flower Blade something-or-other). You're going to have to do that eventually anyway, and 20F is still better than 21F for grinding.

[Dr.Strafe]

If you find those too hard, then just go farm the 20F unique drops if you don't have them yet (Scourge, Divine Spirit Barrier, Armads, and Flower Blade something-or-other). You're going to have to do that eventually anyway, and 20F is still better than 21F for grinding.

I second this course of action. It took me a very long time to get a Scourge, and the levels obtained in the meantime allowed me to sail through boss rush, the version 2's and the bloody seals.

As for my progress.... I've been playing for quite a while (with a few extended breaks to focus on other games) and have finally arrived on 30F. I go *splat* against any of the version 3's, so it's all about the grinding now. The wiki recommends that you grind on 29F while gearing up for the V3's but I prefer 27F. Roughly the same amount of exp per fight, and the fights are MUCH easier. (the real reason I stay there is for the Lilliths and their 92k skill points, though)

Question: Do we still need to keep the characters' names secret for the sake of spoilers? I mean, the game's over a year old. Most of the people here have either acquired the characters, used the forum's new game+ file, or used the wiki to figure out who and how to obtain them.  I believe the biggest surprise recruit is 18F, but it seems that most everyone knows who it is by now.