Aranea
Infographic (July 2023)
Character Notes & Recommendations
Have updates or suggestions? Contact us via Reddit or Discord, find our info Behind the Scenes!Summon Board Passive selections:
Odin choose 3 / 6 / 7
Bahamut choose 4 / 5 / 6
Usuals:
Ifrit, Shiva, Ramuh, Brothers 4 / 5 / 7
Leviathan, Pandemonium, Diabolos, Alexander 4 / 5 / 6
For more details and help with summons, check Summon Hub!
Sphere Recommendations
A spheres - King and Bartz have absolutely excellent spheres for her, since she is persistently inflicting breaks. Any ATK/BRV DMG is great, and mBRV secondaries are good as well. There are plenty to choose from, so click the link to head to our Sphere Hub.
E sphere - ATK/mBRV spheres are the biggest boosts to stats. Vanille sphere adds utility to her already strong kit. Physical/Ranged ATK spheres are also great!
How-To-Play Notes
Aranea can open with any skill as it should cause a break in most fights and then use S2 on the free, instant turn she got from breaking to apply her debuff and pass the turn. Shortly after she should use LD to make sure her Magitek Lance effect stays up.
Using her EX or FR later should maintain her Overclock buff for the entire fight.
With BT her playstyle becomes a launcher as she gains a personal follow up on her launches (similar to Raines).
Dragoon Dive+ (S1) is a massive delay against a single target.
Highwind/+ (S2) both versions, are big AoE damage skills and they inflict her powerful Vitalcrusher debuff, which guarantees critical damage. The + version has more HP attacks. Aranea has massive BRV damage boosts when she’s dealing critical damage, so this debuff can fuel her high damage as well as the party's.
Air Superiority (EX) recharges in 3 skills. This added time to recharge is because of all her free turns. These free turns come from her EX buff, which gives her a free turn whenever she breaks a target. Thanks to her LD overhead, she *always* unbreaks targets, meaning she should always break enemies on her turn (unless they have ridiculous defenses or are immune to BREAK). So she essentially always get 2 turns back to back.
Set Overclock (AA) is helpful if you don’t want to use a non+ version skill when Overclock falls off or even to weave another couple more turns in.
Outstanding (BT) puts the "High" in "Highwind" and lets Aranea start launches on her own and follow-up for monstrous damage. This makes for a ridiculous BT phase; just make sure to bring some form of battery for allies.
Before BT phase, use LD for a free skill use then:
1 Target : S1 -> LD -> EX -> S1 -> S1 -> FR - Finisher
2 Targets: S1 -> S2 -> S1 -> EX -> LD -> FR -> Finisher
3 Targets: S2 -> S1 -> S2 -> EX -> LD -> FR -> Finisher
Speerstoßwelle (FR) reapplies Overclock, applies her Vitalcrusher debuff and provides a thicc 50% HP DMG & Limit aura to party for dealing critical BRV DMG! Powerful FR worthy for this former GL first!
Her FR Time asks for:
Any kind of delay (including BREAK delay): 40%
Crit BRV DMG on turn: 30%
These incredibly generic conditions and strong FR effect make her a menace as the Force Time.
Team Synergy Notes
She's mainly well paired with other aggressive units to take advantage of the space she creates delaying/breaking enemies away however when enemies start to warp she can work with counters/trap units that can break for her FR condition while keeping the party safe.
Dorgann LOVES her especially if there's an Iris or Sephiroth in party for more breaks.