DFFOO [JP][Irvine IW Lufenia+][Series] FFVIII: AoE Range Team vs FFVIII Iguion Boss

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Knightningale90

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Published on August 18, 2021 11:13:55 AM ● Video Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b4dBSpIVr1M

Game:

Final Fantasy VIII (1999)

Duration: 9:16

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9

On many accounts, I really like this IW and there is definitely care and attention put into this one. There are many FFVIII trivia and references and an actual FFVIII boss. They even put in a little tease with the relationship between GF and memory loss, penultimate ending music and also Rinoa having Squall's ring, maybe Rinoa BT or even a FF8 chapter soon? XD

I went a little harder than usual (100 ticket+) for FFVIII and Irvine did not disappoint me. So finally I get to use him for the first time.

Boss related:
Non-lethal Orb: 10/40 (permanently gone at 35+)
+1: Taking dmg when HP dmg up debuffs exist
+3: Taking Range type dmg (weakness not required)
-2: PC takes an action
Count attack removes all debuffs, restart counter, and bosses put on full resistance on both all elements and attack types. They also take 100% HP dmg less for 2 turns.
When the orb is removed, they take 30% increased HP dmg.

Reduction: 70/70
At 49% threshold, they would put on a HP shield. Not particularly hard to break nonetheless.

Their attacks still put debuffs onto you, but we are far from the time where Alphinaud's LC came out, and they pretty much moved their re"unison" action to being an orb attack kind of deal, so overall they should be less tricky to engage, unless ofc you are using non-range type characters.
Characters that uses up many turns are naturally at a disadvantage here, but with range follow-up characters like Prompto, you can get off-turn orb count management in that fashion. He also dodges most of his ST attacks so he can be a really solid pick to burst boost the orb to remove it early on.

Irvine:
By no means he is a must-have meta character but a solid one nonetheless. Somehow FFVIII tends to do a lot of similar things in different fashion. Just like Seifer, Laguna and Irvine, they throw out alot of debuffs and they have quite a lot of AoEs, while Quistis, Zell and Selphie delays people to oblivion.

His LD does not have an actual attack, it is a free turn buff refresher (that extend all buffs by 1 turn) that adds use counts on his new (2) Dark Ammo BRV+ and (1) Pulse Ammo HP+ on each use. He does start with the buff and 1 dark shot use right off the bat.
Dark Ammo inflicts the Dark shot debuff that lowers 50% of enemy's hit rate, 20% DEF down and HP dmg up and 100% iBRV poison. Pulse Ammo is a full on DPS button that has 4 HP dumps and 50% splash dmg. Both of these special attacks increase recast by 20%.
Irvine's HP dumps across all skills do not vary alot, averaging around 3-4 dumps. you can use his ordinary skills instead of spamming Dark Ammo/Pulse Ammo all the time and save Dark Ammo for its debuff, since it is actually a really good and useful one. Do beware that most of his AoE attacks are split (splash for Pulse Ammo) and S1 is ST, so you may need to give him some support to do full dmg when facing 3 targets. He may also need C88 or additional BRV cap increaser as he is largely dependent on BRV hits.

Darkshot debuff:
Dark ammo, his S2 and EX all inflicts range imperil at the first HP attack now. So he should be easier to use. Dark shot also inflict the spd down on his S1, and is AoE in nature, so you can start with that to throw all of his debuffs at once should you choose to. His buffs are still scattered on his S1 and S2 though. Still he should not be complicated to use.
It seems that Darkshot and generic blind debuff does not stack, at least not addictively to 100%. However when use together with Leila's 30% framed buff I do notice the whole team dodging alot (not 100%). So not sure if it simply doesn't work with another 50% one.

Oddly enough they give him a built-in speed up to go along with the EX recast up in his EX extension. My guess is devs think he was too slow to throw out his share of dmg and keep up with his debuffs. The extension also adds party-wide 20% ATK, overflow and self HP dmg up by 20% to his Snipe EX buff. It already had ATK, mBRV and range BRV overflow (another odd thing) before, so he does offer quite a bit of overflow to range parties.

Irvine Calls:
Both Irvine CA and LDCAs are actually really solid. Both of the CAs inflict range resist downs (compendium may have made a mistake of not marking the normal one as capable of this) and his LDCA is his BRV+ Dark Ammo. It inflicts all of Irvine's debuffs including Dark shot, which to my considerable surprise, seem to have retain its full functionality (50% hit rate down down, 20% HP dmg up, 20% Def down and 100% iBRV poison) for 4 turns. It is a very consolidated and practical LDCA to use.

In terms of the range imperil CAs, while Fran's debuff offer a wider variety of parameters, it also is a very gimped version (mostly 10% on the important ones and 20% on generic ones) and it requires time to build up to 10 stacks. However, it can be extended by a use of the normal CA.
Irvine's CA has a narrower scope but is more potent and it requires no build-up, though it only lasts for 4 turns. So choose (or use both lol) accordingly.

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