Hello everyone, and welcome to the GFL GamePress Theatre VI Ranking!
Much like last time, I invited all the members of the GFL team here at GamePress to participate in this ranking to see who, out of us, did the best overall and get their thoughts and feelings on Theatre VI as a whole. Those who agreed to participate, you can read all of their interviews. Many old faces from the Theatre V article return, with some new ones as well.
Including someone very important in the rankings! If nothing else, you should go read the interview for our number 1.
I hope you enjoy!
Well, interesting score you have there Sheele.
Yes. That's what you get for relying on EN to reach core 8.
Even then, what happened? Were you just waiting until Core 8 was reached to actually play?
Yes and no, I already said in the previous GP interview that I was getting more and more tired of the game, and the lack of new content this year didn't help to keep my interest for GFL. However, i still enjoy theater, but didn't find the motivation to login for most of it, and even with that, jashin collab hide the theater for me. So when i saw a tweet about Advanced 8, i decided "hey, if i come for core 6, what kind of score could i end up with?"
Unfortunately, IRL stuffs went through, so i couldn't log in for core 6 and 7 so i played 2 days and got 220k, 58%, which is the lowest ranking I EVER had on GFL (my worst being 13% in CT ranking).
Ah, I see. An interesting experiment nevertheless. Well I think we can skip over what my first question would be, to the next one. So across the 2 days of Core 8 you played, did you just do the same thing you did in T5 or did you use any different team comps, dolls, etc?
I didn't change much things, since all my teams were already settled for core 8. I did change some formations here and there, upgraded some skills, but outside of that, no, not much changed. Except maybe my skills in fights, which is surprising, unless i got lucky on enemy rolls.
Fair enough. If it works no need to fix it huh. I was pretty much the same in that regard. So final thing. Our next theatre is going to be a new rotation of enemies of course, are you planning to do much research or prep for this in advance or just go for it when it arrives?
I honestly have no idea, but i think i'll be in the second case, i like to adapt, especially when i have no motivation like now.
That's fine, not gonna lie I'll probably be doing much the same. I doubt I'd be unable to do it once it arrives. Well Sheele, hope things turn out better next theatre. Before we wrap this up, anything else you wanna say?
Sorry baguettes, I was sleeping. Omelette du fromage. That's all.
I'm sure the baguettes will accept your apology. Bread is forgiving like that.
they won't, us frenchies are stoopid ahah.
I see. I'm guessing French bread is unlike British bread then. Anyway Sheele, thank you for your time, it has been a pleasure.
same here.
Hey Beard, another theatre season done. How did you find this one?
Meh… Dunno this one was just kinda boring.
I feel you there honestly. Was kinda just there. How did you find it compared to Theatre 5 though?
Well, it was the same set of enemies, no? Not sure how the rate of progress compares to last time, but it felt a LOT slower.
I more meant how do you feel you did this time compared to last time
I mean how I felt last time's on record. This time it felt a lot slower and boring. Little more comparison to be made. ¯\_(ツ)_/¯
...How did you think you PERSONALLY PEFORMED compared to last time.
Oh.
Uh… Filtered by archers. Still not sure how the fuck damage doesn't carry over if you wipe.
Yeahh kinda stupid that is. Sorry to hear about the filtering though. If I may ask, what happened this time that was different to last time in regards to archers?
Well I usually already barely scraped by their waves last time. One bad kite and the run's dead.
Ah I see. Yeah those archers really are crafty buggers. I still don't have the micro down myself yet. Sometimes I can get through it with next to do damage, other times I just eat shit lol.
So in comparison to Theatre 5, did you do anything different this time around or just stuck to what you did in T5?
Spare for trying to get big on CE stacking (which ultimately bit me in the ass as noted), not really. Vote C, try not to die too bad.
That's fair, not much real need to change if it's working. I was much the same. So final question. With Theatre 6 done, the next theatre will be a new set of enemies and challenges. Are you doing much in the way of planning and preparation for it?
Nothing in particular, just my general desperately having to get my account in order. Looking forward to the new systems tho.
Sounds about the typical, I'll be the same again. Just the usual prep and development. Alright Beard, I think that's pretty much everything I had to ask. Before we wrap this up, anything left you wanna say?
The update's probably gonna be out by the time this article is, but mark my words, I'm going for Chief rank in Raverbury S1.
Hahaha, I'm looking forward to trying the chess out. Don't know much about it but it looks interesting. I've seen people compare it to 100% Orange Juice?
Yeah, I have 100% OJ, but never played it, so I have no clue. I like that people co-opted the name as 100% Collapse Fluid tho.
Heh it's a good name, well fitting. Ok, thank you very much for your time Beard. Until next time.
Cheers.
We meet again, my old double.
Indeed we do. For another theater season.
Theatre the sixth indeed. Right, so this theatre was basically the same as the fifth so I don't think we need to go into the same stuff as last time. Overall, did you think you were more or less successful than last theatre? Or maybe around the same?
Both. I scored higher CE scores on bosses and core 8 this time around, but still dropped a considerable amount since last season. I forgot to do a day of theater, and another day I forgot to do my 2nd run. Had I done every run this season, I'm pretty sure I could make it into Top 100 or at least Top 1%.
Hmm that's a shame. And that did lose you a considerable amount of points. With less participants, those boundaries are getting extremely slim. So besides the uhh missing days, was there anything you did particularly different this time in your runs? Like did you mix up team comps, use different dolls, etc?
Just going to mention on my total score, I actually had a decent amount of bets this time around, but that didn't save my missing runs. In terms of my comps, not much changed. I did find out that on uhlans, it's easier and faster for my Grape+NTWMOD+Taunt team to kill them than the 2SG team. That's the only specific example I can recall.
Oh yeah, the RFHG taunt works far better for Uhlans in my experience too. They can barely even hurt the taunt as long as the Strelets die fast enough. But I've been already doing that since Theatre 1 haha.
In my instance, I was the SG team for Uhlans+Pyxis nodes. Though it's way easier to just grape+ntw it.
Oh I still used SGs for the Pyxis, though I had them with MGs for the SWAP stack too.
Least my comp for it wasn't as interesting as last season. The forbidden anti-uhlan negev strategy. At night. Also it helps this theater I got a few more fairies to 5* since last season too. Specifically 5* artillery.
Ay nice. Though I'm quite interested to hear more about this usage of Negev lol. But, I think we can save that for another time. Final thing to ask. So next up we've got a new theatre rotation with T7. Have you been looking into it at all? Any plans?
I played through it on KR, and I can say it's certainly something. I won't spoil EN on the "fun," but there's a pretty strong filter hidden in there. BLT probably knows which one I'm talking about. Further, having battles where you don't lose health over the entire run are a saving grace.
Damn, sounds exciting, I can't wait to see the filtering.
I can already see the posts about it now.
I look forward to seeing them. Anyway Ferrari, thanks for your time. Anything you wanna add before we wrap up?
Nothing more to add from me theater-wise. I got HK21 on KR while doing this interview lol. Looking forward to S7 on EN.
Lol, enjoy your HK21! Until T7!
Hey Matt.
Get the notepad. Because I'm drunk and ready to meme.
Sounds fantastic lol.
Me when theater 7 comes after DR.
Anyway, questions. So, overall how did you find Theatre this time around?
Same as last theater. Having duel theaters gets obnoxious to be fair. The last one was at least a bit more challenging. I didn't get filtered. There was no quality content for brainroom to witness (me resetting because 
C chairing every day, the ultimate level of EN.
I am the C-hairman of EN. Rigging scouting since Theater 2
What a prestigious position, thank you for your contribution.
07. Vote C Theater 7.
I'll make sure to always C vote forevermore. So, I know because we are EN we only got 2 days of Core 8 lol. How did you find dealing with Core 8 over the past two theatres?
Last theater hurt a bit. Failed one day. This time, 0 death.
What made you fail last time?
DOGS. They nom nom. They attacc. They snacc.
Ah understandable, the damn doggo archers. Did you do anything differently for them (or core 8 in general) that made them easier this time around?
More HOC.
Ha understandable. HOCs are important like that. So I suppose the final thing would be Theatre 7. Do you have any plans to prep for it beforehand or just going for it once it arrives?
Just go in and meme.
A noble way to go about it, I support it wholeheartedly. Meme for the win.
My section is going to be really quick. For the most part it’d just be a rehash of what I said for Theatre V if I went in depth. So quickly I’ll just say I think this Theatre overall was a bit weaker for me than the last one. I did about the same in the runs but scouting was definitely weaker for me this time around. For the most part, I just stuck with everything I did last time.
I’m not worrying too much about Theatre VII right now either. I’m starting to hear interesting things about it though, so I’ll likely be at least looking into it a bit, contrary to what I may say in any of these interviews.
Well… that’s about it lol. Until the next theatre when I mid-rank again haha!
So Soul, seems we didn't have our cutthroat close call to each other this time around, though we're still next to one another in our leaderboard.
Doesn't look like it. I should have forgotten another day of voting, would have kept the pattern going.
Lol, maybe I should've just remembered to vote more, I think I missed a few days myself. Anyway, I don't think we need to recap everything again since T6 is just T5 again. Do you think you did better or worse this time around compared to last time, or maybe about the same?
Bit of a mixed bag. I didn't forget to vote as much, and I had better bonus % for the core 3-6 period. Of course I only had that bonus because I spam crafted for p38 repeatedly, having gotten her for bonus, immediately scrapped her, and repeated the process day after day. Gameplay wise, much worse I got progressively lazier as theater went. And only 2 scouting wins.
Only 2 scouting wins? Damn.
Mostly B votes. I think I went something like 14 neutrals.
Fair enough, I went B pretty much all the day, and then missed a few days outside of that. So in this theatre, compared to the last one, is there anything you did particularly in terms of team comps, dolls used, etc?
Not really. Mostly used the same combat teams as before, although I think my ARSMG swapped G11 in for AN. The Rd teams were all the same and did well enough. Although we had so little core 8 not many chances for things to really go wrong.
Ain't that the truth huh, just 2 days of it. Sounds fair though. I think I used G11 on my ARSMG team too, for both bonus and because she good on the dogs.
Yup. Freed up a slot on my final team for a bit better ce stacking.
So final thing I wanted to ask about is the next time, theatre 7. Are you doing any research and prep for it? Actually I assume you may have played it.
I haven't actually played theater 7, but I've seen some of the theory crafting and systems information about it. Not sure what I think yet, the optimization seems more streamlined, but also more punishing so well see. And given how I've been backing off being extremely tryhard on GFL I'll probably just wing it when T7 hits.
That's fair, I'll just be following you in that regard mostly haha. I'm sure we'll be able to do it once it gets here.
Shouldn't be too bad to lazy mode to a HOC for sure
For sure for sure. Anyway Soul I think we'll wrap things up. Before that though, any last things you wanna say?
Don't think so.
More people play next theater pls, I don't enjoy getting stabbed 2 whole percent.
Ain’t that just the truth huh lol.
Adam, we're back doing this!
Hon, I really hope you'll give me a splendid date after this interview.
Hey, I've got everything planned out dear, but that's staying a secret. For now, Theatre talk!
Uhhhhhhhhhhhhh sure. Kay, where do I get started?let's see, I got no damage Coues fights this time. I'm still calling them [REDACTED ] though. I also decided to B chair this whole theater. How did that go? According to sources this was one of the worst B chair performances in all Theaters EN had :kekw:
I also wasn't really competing with Crally or Varz this time, so I didn't feel particularly motivated to minmax and vote well this time. Just wanted my top 5% to turn SMAW data into iteration chips for when T7 arrives and I get SMAW to 5 star.
...Well I didn't even ask any questions yet but we already got some talking points haha.
The sooner we're done with this the sooner you can take me on a date hon. I'm impatient, I wan see you soon.
We'll be done sooner if you stop waffling and let me ask a question lol.
bulli
So this theatre overall, did you find yourself more or less successful than Theatre 5? Or did things mostly stay the same for you?
Well, I'm not sure, since we had one less day of Core 8. I did notice scores were much tighter this time around. Not sure if because we had less people overall playing Theater or if we had less veterans tryharding. I'd say I did better the other time. B chair had a lot of neutrals and losses this time around. Last time any of the chairs had roughly a third of the wins, B chair flopped this time more than C chair usually does. I did have a brief hope of having almost the same score as Soul when he said he was B chairing too. Unfortunately I forgot to factor each of ours lazy factor :heh:
Yeah scores were tighter it seems, mostly due to the one less day of Core 8 so scouting was more prevalent as you said. I was mostly B chairing too... either that or forgetting to vote at all lol. I wonder why B did poorer this time round... Actually that's pointless speculation, trying to figure out EN is impossible.
I think a lot of people B chaired this time. A chairing is risky, because A neutral doesn't beat construction and A loss hurts and C chair is comfy, and most people who C chair doesn't really care about scores. Though you could say B chair also shouldn't care much about scores, since, well, they're sticking to a single vote. I think it was due to people forgetting theater exists, and thus C had less people chairing it. We saw that on T3 I think, or T5. Event arrives, mica cba to leave two event buttons on main menu, so people forget theater exists.
Understandable. They really should make that event button scrollable I think.
Eh, I liked the edit someone made, where there was a second event button to the left of where the event button currently sits. Didn't feel out of place, or cumbersome, and it was easily accessible.
Interesting. Anyway, I just got one more question. So next theatre will of course be different. Have you looked into it at all, any plans on how you're gonna prep or what you wanna accomplish?
I have vague information on T7. Most from what I saw was from Mars' twitter thread, and it looked promising. Though from what BLT said, it seems CE stacking plays an even bigger factor on boss, and we all know oaths also help with CE stacking, so I'm wondering if this won't just make Theater favour even more old veterans and whales than T1 and T2 with MGSG stack did. I'm not looking forward to the reward though. Call me pessimist, but I see little room to use PP-93.
Assuming T7 will arrive before MS like Hokor said, we won't really have a reason to use it on MS (or so it seems to me) as its performance sits between M2 and 2B, and we'll only have 3-4 star PP-93 when MS arrives. Maybe it can replace QLZ? Then we have PR, which was Parafest with ringleaders and at most 2 HOCs, and that's what we know for now. We have no info on how many events Mica will make for GFL1, but given that Mars mentioned that, lorewise, the game is close to the 10 year gap to GFL 2, I don't expect to see many more story events after PR. We also still have nothing confirming we'll see ranking reruns in EN. So overall I think Mica missed the chance to introduce something else on Theater 7 instead of yet another HOC that we already have other options. I think we could maybe make an article highlighting Theater changes.
Maybe so, but that's a discussion for another day I suppose. I hadn't really looked into PP-93 much, I think it'll be hard to break the mold with HOCs now.
Yes, for now we have our date to worry about :heh:
I suppose we do. Yeah I got nothing more to ask, anything you want to add before we wrap this up?
Yes, are we going to a pub?
Oh, you'll see heh heh heh...
Our previous top place, now fallen from grace... Sorry that was terrible lol. How are you doing Hass?
I'm doing just fine Red, although my score is dead... Yeah let's not do that.
Honestly we just didn't have anyone who cared more or was more lucky participating last theater, which was why I got first. Now, not so much.
Fair enough I suppose. Less people in general but competition was definitely a lot stronger it seems.
Hm? less turnout this time?
Not for this article, but theatre overall.
Ahh.
Speaking of that, how do you think this theatre went for you overall compared to last time?
Did slightly worse due to failing voting, but I think it's the same reward pool. 1%, 2%, really the same thing. Bet C chairers had a field day with that last week though. Seems BLT got enough consecutive C's to beat second place by a mile.
Yeah those consecutive C wins really made a difference for some. Especially when we only got 2 damn days of Core 8 lol. Speaking of that, did you find yourself doing anything different for theatre this time around or mostly stick to the same guns as Theatre 5?
It was mostly the same old. Might have stacked a little harder this time, but that's about it. Too much going on with life and 2 events running in parallel to try to mix it up.
Makes sense, why fix what isn't broken after all. Would you have actually considered changing anything if you had the time though?
Hmm, maybe figuring out if there was a way to use LTLX, since she makes quite a few fights a cakewalk.
Did you find anything new to do in theater?
Myself, nah. I stuck to the same guns myself and just used the ssme teams for the most part.
Even numbered theaters can be such a slog right? You already know all the strats and teams and fights, and you probably don't even need as many rewards as you got last time. So for vets, it's really just Ctrl+c, Ctrl+v. I almost envy the people who can't clear core 8 the first time, then find the motivation in that failure to grind and prep for the next one. Almost.
Almost. I get ya though it is a lot less interesting the second run round. But I guess that at least makes it quick to deal with each day. At least Theatre 7 will be a new line-up. Speaking of that, are you doing much research or prep into T7?
Eh not really? I know there's some lists floating out there about advantaged dolls, dolls that give best CE, and whatnot. I'll give them a look at some point, but my main concerns are SF dragging and making a chapter 13 video. But I'm glad they fixed some parts of theater's quality of life for t7. Like worrying about damage taken.
Huh really, I haven't looked into T7 at all what was the damage taken change?
Ah so I've heard your teams refresh after every fight, so there's no point-loss after taking damage. Not sure of the exact details (whether they'll recover links, or if dead t-dolls revive) but it's certainly easier for people who can barely take 1 fight or CE stack to the heavens.
Oh so you might start battles at full health even if the team got minced in the fight before? Sounds like a good change but also one that might make Core 8 too easy if that's the case?
Well I'd imagine they'd ramp enemy difficulty to match the difficulty curve, but who knows? MICA? Balance? hahaha.
Hahaha what is even balance. Anyway, I think that's everything for now, anything else you wanna say before we wrap this up?
M14 is the cutest. That's about it.
Ain't that the truth. Well Hass, thank you for your time once again.
Thank you too.
Aru, good to see you again. Are you doing well?
I'm doing very well! :D and you?
Yeah I'm doing pretty good. Driving test is next week so a little nervous but yeah times are good.
Good luck!
Thank you!
(I failed, RIP)
Anyway, Theatre 6. So overall Aru, how do you think you did overall this theatre compared to the last?
I gotta say, it was pretty good, more than half of the Scoutings were wins and I had a comfy time overall, so comfy that I almost forgot theater is happening. So much better compared to last theater.
That's true, IIRC you were just getting back into GFL during the last theatre?
Yea, I was pretty casual back then.
Understandable. Good to hear things went a lot better this time around, and the effort does show on the rankings haha.
I was seriously surprised that I managed to stay up so high.
A nice surprise then I'm sure. So besides not being so casual as last time. Was there anything you did differently for this theatre compared to the last? Different dolls, team comps, etc?
Not really, I was so lazy that I used the same teams as last time, no CE stacking just playing the video game.
Hey, nothing wrong with that. I reckon that's mostly what others did too anyway.
Yea, I heard from some people that they also just reused what they had.
I mean if it ain't broke why fix it.
True, true
Ok final point of interest. So next up is Theatre 7 and Hass before told me there's some big changes. Have you or are you going to do any planning and prep for it? Or just gonna go for it when it arrives?
I saw it on KR and didn't really understand how things worked, so I'll just wait and see how things work when it arrives on EN. Maybe I'll ask someone who knows but that's only if I feel like I really need help. I just wanna keep taking newer things slowly. Don't wanna burn myself out again.
That's understandable. Stick to doing what you wanna do to avoid burnout.
Yep.
So Aru, I think that's everything. Before we close this, anything else you wanna say or mention?
While voting, don't trust anyone... not even yourself!
Aru be like
Well then, thank you for your time Aru! Been good.
Hey Destination, hope it's going well. How you been doing?
Hey Red. I'm still alive but I'm barely breathing. Send sanity, primogems, and $3.50.
I can spare maybe 10,000 Mora and a purple exp book.
That'll cover the interest. Retirement is expensive. I miss the good old days when all I had to worry about was restarting logistics mission 9-1 on time.
The good old days huh, those were the good old days. Anyway, Theatre. We didn't interview you last time so I'll begin with a simple question: How did this Theatre go for you overall in your opinion?
All things considered, not bad. I barely raised anyone new, CE stacking is a Sisphyean exercise (as usual), and dog-archers aren't going to stop haunting my nightmares anytime soon. The real surprise is probably scouting.
While the player count continues to remain stable (or at least, they were stable during T4 and T5), EN's scouting behaviour has changed considerably. My unprofessional analysis indicate that EN voting patterns no longer follow T1-T3 patterns for large differences in zones scouted; I've been deducing that the overall composition of Theatre players have changed. Now it's less new players against more veterans. The number of days where the votes across all three zones differed by less than 2% - margins tighter than hotly contested elections - was quite significant.
Yeah things were very close on the scouting side, it's quite impressive that there were days where there wasn't even like 1% of a gap between them. Seems you still did very well given your 1% placement, probably quite close to a top 100 I imagine. How did you find Core 8 in general? (Both this and last theatre).
I take no credit for the high placement - it has to go to Crally, who himself was juggling work and studies. Any comment I do have must mention 2.07 and how absolutely atrocious it is to play on Android. Had I done Theatre myself, I would be confined to use of emulators, modified game files, and a litany of other optimisations. Meanwhile, iOS players have felt and seen no difference. I envy them.
You... Didn't do theatre yourself?
Nope
Crally did theatre for you?
He's a pretty good pilot, if I may say so.
I see… Well I guess he should actually be the one I'm interviewing then haha.
Redarrix adds CrallyLystia to the call
Hey Crally, good to see you!
Hiya, me too. You doing good?
Yeah I'm good, thank you.
So, what are we doing right now?
Well, Destination here told me you did his runs for him. Since I was interviewing him about his experiences, in reality I should be interviewing you lol.
Oh this is Theater. I've been handling his account, yes. Since Polarized Light even.
And you're handling R93. Very closely
And she handled my luck, quite poorly.
Heh. Greetings, my GFL pilot of Asian descent.
Ain't you Asian yourself, mate?
Yeah but I'm not a pilot.
You have a point.
I'm a Master Doctor Commander Captain Admiral Lord of the Travellers
I'd like to add you forgot Tactician role
I may also be a retired Summoner, but no one calls it that anymore.
Soooooo anyway, after that tangent, I want to know how you think this theatre went for you, using Dest's account?
Actually, it tracked back to Theater 5. Where I didn't ran his account at all until the 15th or 16th day, with only Core 8 to run. I stabbed myself quite badly that I missed 30%, which in turn made me had to run to top 5 in this theater. Which I definitely failed LMAO. If we take that out though, I have to say it's a very satisfying theater.
Lol, so no 5 star SMAW for Dest just yet then. To be fair though, Top 5 was a monumental thing to ask of anyone. Getting 1% is a valiant attempt, though.
I'm even missing some important dolls for CE padding like CF05.
He did manage a monumental comeback during the second half of theater though. He got 3 out of 4 C wins.
Wait, I got three?!
One in first week I think, the rest is in the final week. Couldn't log into the screen to look due to ceasefire somehow.
Damn
I couldn't tell the score rn. Due to it being at... 1.008m something.
Damn nice indeed.
The painful part is Desti's account stabbed me by 300 points. Due to A win and I took a B neutral.
What did your own account score, out of curiosity?
1.008m. Desti's account is ahead of me by 300 points.
Ah I see. Anyway, next question. So I know we only had two runs at it this time but how was dealing with Core 8? Found it easy? Anything you had trouble with? Etc
The most painful is uh… Doggo Archer no doubt. For some reason I had trouble this time, despite clearing them without any trouble last time around. That said, I don't really have much issue otherwise, since I don't really mind losing HP as long as I keep full link. I think Desti knew I had to reset almost half an hour on dogs.
Damn, those doggos gave you that much trouble huh.
The dogs, the client, the HOC RNG, the client, the misclicks, the bloody fucking client...
So final question, and this is addressed to both of you. Theatre 7, are you guys going to be doing any sort of planning or preparation for it? Is Crally piloting both accounts again too?
Eyes
Uh, well, I'm sure I'll be handling the accounts, though I'm unsure how committed I will be.
I don't want to tease Crally, but nor do I wish to overwork him. Since I'm working from home so much more now, I could allocate more time to play GFL again. I enjoy the retirement life, but not at his expense, so...
Fair enough, so think you'll actually do Theatre 7 yourself?
...Yeah. If I still recognise the game at all.
Haha I see, fair enough. Well guys, thank you both for joining me in this interview. Before we wrap this up, anything else you guys want to say?
Hmmmmm, maybe I have to say despite not getting top 100. Being in there for three days were fun enough.
A nice fun adventure for you.
The good old days will never return, not unless Mica miraculously blesses us with ranking reruns. The next best thing left, which is really very generous considering that there's nothing else to do with GFL, has got to be Theatre. And at least, the fun still remains.
The fun remains indeed. Right guys, thank you so much for your time, been a pleasure.
Major congrats to you BLT. Not just number 1 in our rankings here, but number 1 in all of EN.
Thanks Red, looks like theater ranking is more of a test of scouting ability than anything else, though. I usually don’t score well in scouting, so I definitely didn’t see this coming, I even sent a message to the Top 3 (TCD) telling him it was probably too late for me to place in overall Top100 this time. That… aged poorly.
Ha scouting definitely played a very major role this time around. I guess that's what just 2 days of Core 8 does to a ranking.
It always does, the people in the high end of Top 100 are those who can accurately predict winning zones better than the rest, in addition to clearing the right zones with 24% advantage, of course.
As is natural. Anyway, I'm sure people are going to be very interested to hear from you. So overall, how did you find Theatre 5 and 6. Did you enjoy your time, satisfied with how T5 went, etc?
As someone who was around for every single theater, I’ll say I don’t hate it as much as most people do, but yeah, 6 theaters with minimal changes between new seasons (and getting four of them in the same year) is pretty boring. I don’t mind the combat aspect at least, and I do feel like running full CE stacked setups on boss stages and getting 0 damage clears (although this adds next to nothing for your score), makes for a decent challenge. Though I recognize that this isn’t exactly a good time for everyone, especially Core 8 where your 0 damage clear is determined by wave RNG instead of skill (and this has been the case since theater 3, my god) As for theater 5, I believe that one was alright thanks to the new waves to figure out, and I’m satisfied with how I played that one, but I still think it falls victim to the repetitiveness issue that comes with playing theater for this long.
I can understand, this many theatres in just one year, it has been quite tiring. I don't dislike theatre but it ain't exactly my favourite kind of event.
Yeah, that last sentence summarizes my thoughts on it pretty well.
I'm interested particularly in your CE stacking, because I've been watching you just try and squeeze out as much CE out of every run you can. Surely in some cases that's come to bite you in the ass or have you found it alright?
Surprisingly(?), it really hasn’t been the cause of too many problems. The combat team(s) you’re left with are always sufficient to handle whatever the stage can throw at you (even in the Judge stages and Core 8’s Dog/Archer and SWAP Stack comps), so it becomes more of a kiting challenge than anything else.
I see, interesting. What about Pyxis in Core 8? With RFHGs?
That’s the real killer. I don’t know why this enemy is in a stage where the recommended comps for max CE are RFHG. Now it wasn’t as bad in Theatre 3 and 4, where you could run an MGSG that could reach some insane CE for the stage, but in theater 5 and 6, where that little screw up with the boss’s stats is corrected so it becomes ideal to run 6 RFHGs? It’s awful. And when you only had six possible attempts to get a no Pyxis run of Core 8, competing for the top spot on the final battle rankings is a nightmare. You have to clear it with a team that looks like this, and even with the best possible kiting and throwing all three HOCs at it, you’re still looking at multiple HGs below the heavy damage threshold. God help you if a second Pyxis wave shows up, because if that happens you can say goodbye to that entire run.
Going back to scouting for a bit, I’d like to give a big thanks to MashedPotato (SilverPotato in game) for both his assistance with scouting on some of the trickier days, as well as his actually-pretty-helpful guide to various scouting strategies in theater (please don’t go annoying him into giving you that guide, he hates talking to a bunch of people at once).
Can't say I know the guy (though tbf I don't really interact with people for GFL anywhere but GP really) but sounds like a good person. Sounds like trying to get those perfect Core 8 clears was a nightmare though. Just praying you didn't get Pyxis huh. But given your number 1 spot I suppose it was worth it haha.
Pretty much. Every other wave in core 8 can be cleared without taking damage provided your dolls/fairies/HOCs/kiting abilities are up for it, but Pyxis have been the killer of excellent runs for four theaters straight. Although this removes a bit of the old challenge, I’m somewhat thankful for the changes in theater 7, where your dolls are restored to full HP after each wave in boss stages (though enemies are more powerful), due to all of those being classed as electronic warfare stages.
Ah, Hass also mentioned that (about the HP being refilled after every fight in T7). So does that mean we're gonna be up against some real tough shit next theatre?
Uhh… I’ll let you take a look for yourself and anyone reading:
https://pengupengupengu.github.io/gflmaps/index.html#campaign=6007&mission=748
What's this?
That is an enemy that was supposed to be introduced in the Mirror Stage event. It specifically targets things with a lower link count, has extremely high accuracy, and its attacks ignore armor.
Sounds quite annoying.
They are, especially when they show up alongside, well, anything else.
Understandable. So in a general sense, not strictly talking about CE stacking, what sort of stuff would you recommend the average player do in order to prepare for next theatre that they might not have already done for this theatre?
Funnily enough, CE actually makes a not-insignificant difference to your score this time around, with every point of CE being equal to +1 point from the boss fight, though explaining the changes made to CE is its own thing. For those who are interested in learning about the new theater mechanics, there is a nice wall of runes infodump by CosmicArcher that explains all of it. Unfortunately, we can't practice on the new waves in theater 7, but despite how painful some of the waves look, some of the new mechanics and extra effects make it more forgiving (and some make it less forgiving, have fun with those).
Oho I'm interested indeed. I'm guessing we'll probably have quite some time to prepare regardless, given it has Mirror Stage enemies. Though Mica is Mica I suppose, they threw Paradeus at us early after all.
According to our QnAs (trust at your own risk), we will see theater 7 before MS, though whether or not it will be before Dual Randomness is still uncertain. It also has Poincare Recurrence enemies, so even more weird mechanics to learn.
The filtering will most likely be caused by people not reading the stage objectives, which you need to meet for each wave to get the most points possible. Of course, the fights themselves can be a source of pain for some people.
Sounds intriguing for sure with these stage objectives. Are they asking you to do specific things or use specific types of dolls or something?
Some of them do, for example, some of the objectives include “use at least three HGs”, “total dolls left alive is no less than 4”, or “clear the wave in under 30 seconds”. Some of these make for some really, uh, “interesting” team comps used for a few stages.
Sounds like that could lead to some memes, but for the most part they sound easy to meet
They are, just make sure to read and you’ll be fine. :]
Sounds fair. I'm sure you're gonna be gunning for another top spot in Theatre 7?
No guarantees on a “top spot”, but I will be giving it some effort as usual.
Naturally, best of luck
You too, thank you very much.
Anyway, I think we can wrap things up. Before we go BLT, anything else you want to mention or say?
Congrats to those of you who gave theatre a shot, Good luck in theatre 7, and hope that the 2.08 update doesn’t break the game too much ;]
Hahaha that's a long shot hope with Mica. It's ok though, 2.08 client has already broken me in spirit to learn they're adding the pity system literal days after the VSK rate up.
I may not like any of the new dolls, but yeah, that sucks. Anyways, thank you for your time, Red.
Thank you too BLT, and hopefully they'll do VSK on a christmas costume rate up if I don't get her in this rate up.
(It’s ok, I got her!!)
Hopefully.
Recap
Well, the curtains close on yet another exciting theatre season. Next time will be interesting, with many changes (for better and for worse) made to the game mode. I hope you all achieved the score you wanted and enjoyed this journey into those at GamePress and our thoughts on Theatre.
Thank you all for reading!
