Firepower Squad

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Floor: 3
Type: Combat
Spine of Epoch:
• Regular: 0
• Emergency: 0
• Catastrophes: +1

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Stage Analysis by Bait ▼

Firepower Squad is a stage which has 2 major threats that you need to handle. The first is the right lane where Anti-Armor Infantry (Cannon guys) and War Phantom will spawn. The property of the cannon guys is that their first attack is a ranged attack which does a sizable amount of damage (2179 attack on Emergency). While this is not unreasonable to tank, it is usually more reasonable to bait the cannon guy’s attacks with Gravel or Deep Colour tentacles so that there is less pressure on your tank. The War Phantom’s have 2637 attack on Emergency and thus are also fairly hard to tank. Exacerbating this is the first attack will also spawn Scrap (Attack drone) which will bombard the area the Phantom attacks. Thankfully the Phantom is also fairly fragile and as such we like to quickly kill the Phantom before our tank gets overwhelmed.

The second threat on this map is the Bomb Tails that will spawn from the bottom left. The Bomb Tails will drop their bomb and then do a lap around the map before entering the blue box. Thankfully they are also fragile which makes them relatively easy to kill. However their bomb can cause problems and as such also needs to be baited.

With the description of the stage done, it becomes clear what the strategy of the stage is. For the right side we want to have bait for the cannons and to bait the first attack of the War Phantom. We then want to hold them (usually by blocking) and then burst them down with our dps operators. For the bottom left Bomb Tails, we want to again bait the bombs and then use an operator who can hit air to kill the Bomb Tails. Usually this task does not require an especially strong operator but you can also use two ranged operators if your damage is lacking.

Stage Variants

Each wave of cannon guys can be replaced by a War Phantom instead. This is usually not a problem since how we deal with the enemies stays the same. There is also a 10% chance of the final wave of 3 cannon guys and phantom being replaced by 4 Dublinn Flying Soldiers (Hovering guys). They are fairly annoying because they will path down the holes on the left side which means the ranged tiles you’d normally use are all in range of their attacks. Their pathing also presents an opportunity though since it means if you stun them they will instantly die.

Finale Cadence

Doesn’t significantly increase the difficulty of the stage. Since this stage is so bait heavy, the cadence ends up getting baited too.

Notable Epochs and Debuffs

Commerce

Makes your bait more expensive which can make it more difficult to deploy them.

Sufferings

Makes your bait unable to survive a single cannon hit which is not ideal since it means that you have to wait for all the cannon guys to be in range before deploying your bait.

Oddities

Makes the Bomb Tails and Phantoms notably more tanky which makes the dps check to kill them significantly higher.

Gul’dul’s Silence

Makes the Bomb Tails and Phantoms notably more tanky which makes the dps check to kill them significantly higher.

Balor’sača’s Arrogance

Makes the Bomb Tails and Phantoms notably more tanky which makes the dps check to kill them significantly higher.

Recommendations

Have lots of bait, Gravel is an excellent bait for this stage. Gummy can bait the Bomb Tails though it means you won’t have her for tanking the right/top side. Have some decent anti air such as May to get the Bomb Tails.

Good Operators

• May can serve as a source of anti air (though cannot solo the bomb tails) and has a stun on skill 2 to get the hovering guys.

• Kroos Alter is may but better. She can solo the bomb tails.

• Gravel and Deepcolor are excellent bait.

• Rosmontis spawns pillars which are durable and can serve as excellent bait. To abuse it simply wait for the first cannon guy to move into range and then deploy Rosmontis. You can then replenish them as needed using any caster or sniper.