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From the Experts: First High Mercury Clear

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Article by Kiera Hoogendam
Table of Contents

Intro

Hello everyone! Today’s interview is a special one featuring the first team to defeat the Queen of the Blue Seas, High Mercury. Our guests today are Mia, Fyre, Techei, and Rillafane!

The clear was later verified by the JP Twitter and Mia received a note in-game commemorating the clear. Congratulations, everyone!

The clear took place on the 18th of April 2019, a mere two hours following the content release. 

The Team

Their icons for this interview are part of a full artwork of the team, viewable here! 

For tips on building your own team and clearing High Mercury, see the dedicated guide:

Team

Main

Main Team

Level: 80
Mana Circles:: 50

Techei as Lin You

50/50 MC

MUB 5t3 Weapon

MUB Jewels, MUB VC

MUB Zephyr

Max Dracolith + Max Dojos + Max Fafnir

Level: 80
Mana Circles:: 50

Rillafane as Musashi (originally Pia)

50/50 MC

0UB 5t3 Weapon

MUB King's Countenance, MUB Valiant Crown

MUB Zephyr

Max Dracolith + Max Dojos + Max Fafnir

Level: 80
Mana Circles:: 50

Fyre as Maribelle

50/50 MC

MUB 5t3 Weapon

MUB Heralds of Hinomoto, MUB HMC WP

MUB Zephyr

Max Dracolith + Max Dojos + Fafnir 25

Level: 80
Mana Circles:: 50

Mia as Lowen

50/50 MC

MUB 5t3 weapon

MUB HMC WP, MUB Destiny's Hand

MUB Zephyr

Max Dracolith + Max Dojos + Max Fafnir

Interview

So, let’s get this interview started: How did you all do it within a day? Nonstop practice?

We had allocated 5 hours to do High Mercury as soon as she was released, so we were all very motivated to learn and clear the fight as fast as possible! It was also important that as a team we were willing to try out different strategies, adapt to new things and move past mistakes quickly to get more attempts in. Thanks to the retry feature, we just kept running to optimize our rotations until everything came together and we got our first clear in under 2 hours. World first was the icing on the cake and the in-game message was definitely an unexpected bonus! And shoutout to Marikyuun for the ADORABLE team art, it got us all super hyped!

Looking at the team composition, everything seems to be maxed out! What even was NOT maxed out?

Even though we were pretty maxed out, our initial comp was still very conservative. Compared to other High Dragons, High Mercury’s HP requirement was a lot easier to meet and damage was mostly all avoidable. To meet the DPS check though, we swapped to a more aggressive team -- having Rilla use Musashi instead of Pia, Zephyr on Lowen, DPS prints instead of High Mercury prints, and King’s Countenance to have Dragon up for Break.

Honestly, it was such a relief to survive as Maribelle, considering how built Lily has to be to survive in High Brunhilda. I had maxed out everything for Maribelle in advance preparing for a huge HP check!

What kind of preparation took place before the release?

We all stocked up on Water Insignias to buy the print immediately on release (only for us to never use it again LOL).

As an added bonus to what Mia said, we have been messing around on High Midgardsormr with full wind teams before double wyrmprints were a thing, so that definitely helps out our team synergy.

Having to buy an energy drink just to stay awake for the reset at 2am.

Coffee coffee coffee! One day Techei will know the true glory that is coffee.

We see the “zombie glitch” in action at the end when Techei (Lin You) and Rillafane (Musashi) “die” but are still moving onscreen. How did this look on your respective ends?

The glitch is really from Max HP desync bug, where the game thinks we are dead as the game is not sure if we have enough HP to live or not. From my perspective, I was well and alive. You can become “alive” again to other party members if you can either heal yourself or get healed during dragon transformation.

This bug occurs often due to Lowen's S2 as well - it seems that when your health goes below the bonus HP provided by his S2, you'll appear as dead onscreen.

Yeah, this happened a lot when we practiced running our wind team in High Midgardsormr. Using Lowen’s S2 to survive the initial blast, I would often appear dead to others when my HP was <100HP, but I would appear fine from my point of view.

Mia psyched us out so many times during those runs lmao. Did Lowen survive the roulette? Or was he actually dead? Who knows!

Which mechanic of the fight took the longest to learn?

I think it took us a while to figure out how to handle the prison/homing bubble early on. It would seem easy now as rotations have been mapped out, but doing it blind was definitely challenging.

I agree, the prison/homing bubbles were super scary going in blind! I can't count the amount of times I screamed when a homing bubble straight up killed me LOL.

For me, it was memorising the mechanic order so I knew when to bait the water bubbles to avoid putting out the Fyre (ahem). It was also super fun to work out our strategies for our first clear and it’s very interesting to see how the strategies have improved since.

Mia. 🔥

The mechanic that probably took me the longest to learn were the “Water Donuts” after the first phase with the additional enemies. We would always wipe at those “Water Donuts” because I always thought it was safe to skill there, but it wasn’t. Also the waterfall section was kind of rough, we would always pop each other’s bubbles on accident.

At what point did the rotation all come together? How did you all coordinate?

Once we reached our first ‘Time Out’, we knew we had the fight rotation down and just needed to execute all the mechanics correctly while optimising DPS to secure the clear.

Rilla's callouts helped keep my head in the game! We also have established synergy from the different high dragon trials we've run before as well, so I feel like that helped us in terms of coordination.

What was the most difficult part of playing your respective characters?

Not doing a skill during one of the bursting bubbles where there is a chance of blue AoE spawning underneath us. That’s the most death count I think for myself.

Running away from homing bubble and remembering not to run back to a tail swipe. Also, trying to maintain my full auto combo as Lowen while at range to maximize damage.

I loved being able to iframe with Maribelle's long S1 and S2 animations, but skill-locking myself right as a whirlpool formed below me was... a bad time.

Being careful about the “Water Donuts”. Since axe characters automatically step towards who they are attacking, you need to be careful about how many attacks you can do. The “Water Donut” hitbox is much larger than the visual.

My bad... “Water Donuts.” For future reference, the very northern corner of the map is the safest spot to be to get away from them. Try to bait there when possible, melee friends!

Any other tips for players going into the fight?

Try to have fun with the fight itself and don’t feel daunted by the HP numbers. For those that bought the High Dragon Print, don’t think of it as a waste as it does help you learn mechanics faster as you can afford to make mistakes and not die. Dead DPS do zero DPS.

Try to stay positive and patient! This fight is honestly very accessible - the wyrmprint is mostly optional and so many different characters have cleared the fight already. It can naturally be very frustrating wiping due to mistakes or lack of synergy, but you've got this!

A lot of viable character options are available for High Mercury so if you’re ready, definitely give this fight a go! Focus on surviving through mechanics first then figuring out where you can add a little more damage. If you’re up for it, you could even try running four DPS or non-Bog resistance units -- just always try to have fun while you’re at it! Stay calm and never give up!

Pretty much all the wind characters are viable for this trial, so pick whoever you love playing as. Definitely bring the High Dragon print with you if you’re learning the fight; it enables you to see more of the fight if you do end up making mistakes.

And that wraps up the interview! Again, a big thanks and congratulations to our first clear team.

Thanks! All hail our fat cat overlord!

Thank you! Meow!

Thanks for having us! Fat cats FTW!

Meow, I mean thanks.

Team!
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About the Author(s)

Content editor and graphic designer for GamePress. Native to Austin, loves cacti and drawing.