Cater Solo Guide

Writeup by Vayne Novus of our Tonberry Troupe!

Cater from Final Fantasy Type Zero is a meme no more. Her EX+ arrives guns blazing, ready to solo DE: Entropy Tier 1-13! Here I'll be creating a general guide on how to solo her, specific information for each tier as needed, and video links of my run with her. Caution: Cater solo runs are RNG runs. So if you are not a fan of resets, this might not be for you. You have been warned! With that out of the way, let's begin!

I. Setup

  • Weapons: 15cp, 35cp, EX weapon, Bloom stone, should all be maxed!

  • Levels: Crystal level and Character levels should all be maxed!

  • Character Boards: Best to max her character boards for an easier time

  • Removed Passive: Speed Buff

  • Spheres: Cater's Sphere

  • Artifacts: Various; Will be detailed in the later section

  • Summon:

    • Ifrit – Best summon all throughout as Cater likes more ATK but requires you to NOT get hit below 80% HP or you will lose your ATK +25% blessing

    • Shiva – Alternative to Ifrit if you do not want to reset from getting hit below 80% HP

    • Diabolos – Good for more tiers where defense spikes up significantly (Tier 7-13). To best utilize Diabolos, you should drop below 60% HP to get the boost to weakness damage +30% alongside other summon passive below 80/60%.

    • Bahamut – Good for tiers where enemies like to spam HP attacks, dropping their BRV to zero, allowing you to break often and capitalize on the 100% break bonus blessing.

II. General Skill Usage & Strategy

  • Skill Usages

    • BRV++ (Charged Shot - High Turn Rate): Attack that gives Cater cashback to avoid getting broken. For solos, almost never use this, even if it’s just one enemy.

    • HP++ (Wide Shot): Attack with splash. Always use this as it better charges your EX being not high turn rate

    • S1 (Blizzara ROK - High Turn Rate): Strong Blizzard Attack. Use only for launches and speeding up your EX charge

    • S2 (Triple Slip): Lets her gain Evasion & ATK Up buff including Ice enchant. Use only when your buff is about to run out

    • EX (Consecutive Rounds): Strong AoE Attack that inflicts Ice Resist Down on all enemies, Land mines (aka traps that explode), ATK/mBRV/Overflow/BRV Regen buffs. Use when up given that evasion is up. In certain cases where the trap did not set off yet and the EX is already up ie. when summoning, best to let the trap trigger first before reapplying for back to back trap damage

    • AA (Blizzard Shot): Gives Cater additional 40% evasion. Paired with Triple Slip, total of 130% evasion. Use only when at the end of the fight. Though when things are tight, you can reserve your AA when all your Triples are out and rely on that 40% evasion – this is only for a last resort and is not really reliable.

  • Strategy

    • The way Cater works is that she has 90% evasion from her buffs + summon passives and while she evades, she counters them. So you want to maintain her evasion buff from Triple slip at all times.

    • Cater’s EX has imperil and she has enchant from S2. This makes her not locked out from any stage as elemental weakness bypasses weapon resistances.

    • In terms of break order, you want to manipulate the break order when possible to allow Cater to have more turns evading and countering.

    • Cater solo run is an RNG run but 90% is doable though much harder when the enemy bosses get tankier in the later tiers.

    • Summon wise, in more difficult tiers you want to use this as buffer and not have your evasion buff up during this time. However in earlier tiers, feel free to do so as you’ll have better burst damage.

    • Skill management is key with Cater so keep an eye on them!

    • Artifacts matter a lot for Cater but not all Tiers require perfect arts. See below for the ones I used for you to use as gauge.

    • Is it worth soloing with Cater? For Tiers 1-8, if you want to free up units for future use, yes. For Tier 9-13, if you have a 3-man team built for those tiers, just use them as it doing so will only cause you headaches; trust me. But if you are a solo enthusiast, hop right in!

III. Tier by Tier Breakdown with Videos

Cater Solo by Tier

IV: Tier 13 Special Guide

WARNING: 1. Attempt this RNG heavy run your own risk! 2. Do NOT attempt this with only two perfect cursed artifact UNLESS you have three ATK spheres (up to 40% ATK) if you don't want to lose your sanity. I thoroughly tried this already so let me share my findings. My initial setup was 2x perfect cursed artifact, 1x sphere which was cater's sphere. I tried with Diabolos/Bahamut/Ifrit, pre-Alex & post-Alex boards and you won't just make it. So far Ifrit comes out the winner as the best summon with full HP. If you can get hit below 60%, Diabolos is a contender. Bahamut strategy is also viable and you'll have to rely on the 100% break bonus. Eitherway, I recommend just farming 3x perfect cursed arts as it is less harsher than reseting for the 100th time and failing.

Special thanks to Christian Ordonio from Dissidia FB Group (for Bahamut strategy and kudos for doing this pre-Alex boards!), rickyshwu from TCC Discord (for beating this with 2x perfect cursed arts + 3 spheres), and Ayman from TCC Discord (been completing several DE Tiers with him which allowed me to learn more about better strats on Cater).

Without further ado, let's begin!

I. Setup

  • Removed Speed Passives: Speed Buff

  • Spheres: Cater's Sphere

  • Artifacts:

  • 3x Charged Blizzard ROK Triple Slip

  • 3x Buffed Attack Boost Up

Summon

  • Ifrit - Best summon if you don't have 3 ATK spheres (at leasts 1 is recommended) but requires 3 perfect arts

  • Diabolos - If you have 3 ATK spheres and 2-3 perfect arts; requires you to get hit below 60% to proc all summon passives with extra ATK & iBRV, and the boost to elemental weakness by 30%

  • Bahamut - If you have 3 ATK spheres and 2-3 perfect arts; can be done pre-Alex boards but very tight run


II. Strategy

All waves have two enemies and have "status ups" wherein they increase their base stats on certain HP threshold, most notably, their DEF. They key to optimizing this fight is to focus on one enemey at a time to delay the other enemy's status up. This results in you dealing more damage overtime as you are dealing with 1 enemy stat up longer VS trying to even out their HP which will result you in dealing with 2 enemy stat up very early. You need to figure out which enemy has a greater stat up so that you can delay it from happening by focusing on the other (except for wave 2 since both are the same).

Skill Usages

  • -BRV++ (Charged Shot - High Turn Rate): Never use this

  • -HP++ (Wide Shot): Always use this

  • -S1 (Blizzard ROK): Use only for launches and speeding up your EX charge

  • -S2 (Triple Slip): Use only when your buff is about to run out

  • -EX (Consecutive Rounds): Use when up given that evasion is up. In certain cases where the trap did not set off yet and the EX is already up ie. when summoning, best to let the trap trigger first before reapplying for back to back trap damage

  • -AA (Blizzard Shot): Use only when at the end of the fight

Note that your ending skill count and charge & dodge framed evasion buff is very important to keep track! Every turn counts!

Wave 1

Skills Available: S1 - 13/ S2 - 9

Here, the Spark eye will be tankier with its Capacitance lvl 3. So as mentioned above, focus fire on the Elvore until a little more than half its HP, then focus on the Spark Eye. Before firing the final shot, check your skill counts and evasion buff if they are good.

Wave 2

Skills Available: S1 - 7/ S2 - 6

Evasion Buff - 5 Turns

AA - Use 1 here; 1 left

Same strategy to focus fire on one though here, you can choose whichever since they are the same enemy. Fun fact, I've learned to look at the turtles in the eye whenever they will raise stone to intimidate them from missing =)) Also since these turtles just retreat then raise stone dropping their BRV to zero everytime, break bonus is your friend thus where Bahamut summon really shines. This is probably the wave that will require most resets as they can one-hit you with every attack.

Wave 3

Skills Available: S1 - 4/ S2 - 3

Evasion Buff - 2 Turns

AA - Use 1 here

In this wave, you want to focus on the Marilith Tempest (right) then a little more than half HP, start shifting the focus on Marilith Gloria. I tried summoning early, mid and late in this fight and its best to summon early. Since you will not have the evasion buff during summon to save on skills, you lose the 20% ATK it grants. Don't be tempted to use 2 EX attacks in a row in summon as it is less damage compared to letting the traps go off first before using another EX. Feel free to use your last AA in the last triple slip skill. In the kill shot, you'll notice I have 2 evasion buff left which means you technically have that little wiggle room for any mistakes. This just makes you realize the power of spheres on solo runs. Well, that's a complete! Enjoy