Serah
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 4 / 6 / 7
Bahamut choose 3 / 4 / 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 sphere: Focus solely on raw ATK, not Magic ATK, to boost her battery & damage. Her buddy Noel's is best!
C Sphere: She has encouragement armor. Paladin Cecil, Refined Paladin Cecil are absolutely best and Lilisette is good as well. These should be the only considerations that you need. No others are even remotely close to as strong as these 3 for Encouragement Armor characters.
E Sphere: Focus solely on raw ATK again (Seymour strikes again), but if you want to give her Quistis mBRV aura, it’s a reasonable alternative.
If you'd like her Echo attack to raise her BT effect stacks, drop her an Ultimecia, Relm, Tidus or Setzer sphere! This also means you have to coordinate with the units/calls you pair her with as if she can't inflict a debuff, her stacks will not increase!
How-To-Play Notes
Open with Paradigm Shift Combo (LD) to gain access to her relevant framed buff and frame all current buffs applied on Wave Start. Future uses of LD should be used to maintain this buff!
Note: Using her LD right after applying debuffs will extend them making it tricky for Serah to reapply debuffs if she's too fast.
Since all her debuffs are at wave start now, her auras are immediately active after LD.
Moonlight (S2) will also be your biggest hitting skill with 5 split HP attacks. It also applies ATK down on enemies and ATK/mBRV up buffs on the party!
Wound (S1) applies her powerful poison and mBRV Down debuffs. If enemies have too many buffs to place debuffs, Wound now removes 2 buffs from each enemy! This is also best to use if enemies cleanse her debuffs!
Ultima Arrow (EX) is a single target BRV shave. You want to make sure that the target is broken after the BRV hits, or else you won’t get the 100% splash. This recharges in 2 skill uses.
Advance All (AA) is useful before Force Time to give allies a little more boosts!
Feral Link Reunion (BT) provides a strong BT effect where Serah's support skyrockets. To get it's full effect Serah will need to take 2 extra turns inflicting debuffs each turn to get 3 stacks. (Again note, using LD right after BT or during BT phase may risk being unable to inflict debuffs if Serah is too fasts or enemies are delayed too much as LD extends her debuffs 1T and she can't replace them. Some of you who tried using her in DE:T Tier 9 mid remember).
It also let's lightning steal more turns in spirit as she provides Serah an extra 3 HP attacks to enemies.
If you LD right before BT phase she can do:
S2 -> LD -> S2 -> EX -> S2 -> FR. Otherwise her BT phase is:
S1 -> LD -> S2 -> EX -> S2 -> FR
Wound Torrent (FR) asks for:
Target a debuffed enemy on turn (5% per debuff, 40% max)
Battery the party on turn (20% for allies, 40% for Serah)
Serah can comfortably raise her FR bonus by 80% while allies can only hope for 60%.
She also has a unique FR time effect where allies will gain BRV after using HP attacks which can be great for allies who don't do so already.
Removable Passives
BRV Attack+ Up (never used)
You may want to slow her down as the unpredictability may cause for awkward FR time setup:
Break Speed Up (10% SPD for 1T after breaking)
Debuff Initiative (10% SPD)
Debuff Initative II (30% SPD)
Wound Lite
Moonlight Lite
In-Depth Analysis of Early Echo Era Damage Dealers
After many questions and requests of whether to chase Vivi, Serah or Squall or if Rinoa can keep up or are Mog and Serah really worth it outside of support, we crunched a few numbers and so did our friends!
Estimates of Expected Damage by Cel
Burst Damage Estimates by Destroth
Quick FAQ
Units chosen were mainly favorites/recent units/convenience
Estimates may have slight innacuracies
Estimates don't take into account launches/linked follow-ups/FR bonuses
Tifa is still a solid damage dealer (12 HPs to target + extra true damage) and can be used to great effect. In Single Target focused fights, she can focus the main boss better than Vivi, however in 2+ target fights she would offer the equivalent of 12-14 HP attacks over 2 enemies (about 6-7 HPs per target avg) and while it scales great with launch, it's still slightly behind the listed units and she offers no unique utility or significant mechanic. (See reminder below)
Notes of Pros/Cons of early Echo Era Damage Dealers
REMINDER: All these units are amazing damage dealers and unless fights have specific requirements, they can each heavily overkill content for months
His own FR offers 50% HP DMG Limit, but having allies to boost FR Bonus may be difficult
Follow-up attackers can benefit nicely from his 50% HP DMG Limit
Can pump out tons of damage for newer players who lack access to UW, supportive HA+ and many BT+ options
Very reliable damage, but his own FR offers no HP DMG Limit
His own FR may also be difficult for allies to raise if there is an HP regen present
Tied to an element which may be restricted in fights
On top of her strong damage, she offers great support if opting to not BT phase (everyone in party can dish out good damage)
Bow UW may not be easily accessible for those who can't decide on which damage dealer they want to use
His HA+ holds him back
His BT phase can feel weird to plan for, but is a great support if no BT phase needed (everyone in party can dish out good damage)
On top of his strong damage, he offers great utility in the form of auras, confuse and enchant
He is tied to elements that may be restricted in fights which extends to the party
No access to FR Echo means she is either relying on her own FR and allies may struggle to mean the HP condition or she's relying on allied FRs and can't echo to raise the bonus before BT phase
She can however use her own FR and S2 to 8T to leave 1T for allies to summon and echo for any remaining enemy HP
While she has a super high damage ceiling, she needs extreme help to reach it as Ultima is 1 BRV + HP done 9 times and BRV gains have strict limits meaning she'll need modern batteries and potentially Prishe/Iroha LDCA. Especially vs 3 targets.