Phantasy Star 4 Rika Solo vs. Xe-A-Thouls

[ladyabaxa]

Ahh, the Xe-A-Thouls, one of the 3 brick walls in the game for a solo character. (The other 2 are Gy-Laguiah and Dark Force 2.) I've fought them three times now with other characters and each time they presented something of a new challenge. First there was Chaz, who dual-wielded shields, spammed Nazan until he run out of tech points and still died a few times when he resorted to the Tornado Dagger for those last three hits. Then came Wren who couldn't equip shields, had Barrier to increase his magic defense and was highly resistant to the trio's spells only to get wrecked multiple times by their electric fingertips. (Talk about insult to injury, sheesh!) Finally, there was Gryz. Poor Gryz didn't have the defensive options open to Chaz or Wren and died A LOT because of his racial weakness to Wat spells. He did eventually win using a cheesier but no less valid strategy - something I will definitely be keeping in mind for other characters.

So Rika's time to challenge them comes up. I've tested the waters with them a few times and it isn't looking good. I remember HaShrike's solo Rika run that initially inspired me to try my own and see that zie had to level Rika up to 58 and use the other party members as meat shields. It's ok, though. I've got a plan!

First, Rika's stats.

Yup, that's right. I'm heading in still at the same level I challenged Lashiec. Rika swaps the Genocyclaw for the Plasma Field dropping her attack power to 99, increasing her defense power to 158, and setting her factor 2 resistance to 01. The factor 2 resistance is key here. Rika doesn't have any group attack spells like Chaz does so she can't equip 2 shields for maximum spell resistance. She's going to have to use Disrupts to trigger Thunderblast counterattacks, heal a lot, and hope to get lucky.

Make that ridiculously lucky. She needs to cast Deban in the first round and hope for lots of physical attacks since they'll bounce harmless off her physical defenses. Any combination of Giwat + Giwat + Giwat or Gizan + Gizan/Giwat + Gizan/Giwat is lethal. The trio needs to be locked up in Thunderblasts as quickly as possible to reduce them from 3 attacks per turn to only 1. As much as I would love to also buff attack power with Shift that's not going to happen. Rika only has time to cast one buff as her first action. The Xe-A-Thouls will NOT give her another chance and every round that goes by is another round that the AI could roll up a lethal combination of spells.

If Rika had less than 50 hit points at the beginning of any round she healed herself with Nares. This guaranteed she'd be put back at full health. If she had more than 50 hit points then she'd use Disrupt. With only one claw her damage is nothing impressive but will suffice.

Here's the play-by-play per round in the same order that each character acted.

1: Rika [Deban] 3 [attack - 3 dmg] 1 [giwat - 129 dmg] 2 [giwat - 127 dmg]
2: Rika [nares] 1 [giwat - 144 dmg] 2 [attack - 1 dmg] 3 [gizan - 90 dmg]
3: Rika [nares] 3 [attack - 1 dmg] 1 [gizan - 82 dmg] 2 [gizan - 102 dmg]
4: Rika [Disrupt - 208/208/204] all 3 [thunderblast - 31 dmg]
5: Rika [Disrupt - 232/191/228] all 3 [thunderblast - 30 dmg]
6: Rika [nares] 3 [attack - 15 dmg] 2 [attack - 1 dmg] 1 [giwat - 129 dmg]
7: Rika [Disrupt - 177/196/205] all 3 [thunderblast - 30 dmg]
8: Rika [Disrupt - 199/193/194] all 3 [thunderblast - 26 dmg]
9: Rika [Disrupt - 205/199/193] all 3 [thunderblast - 27 dmg]
10: Rika [nares] 3 [giwat - 118 dmg] 2 [gizan - 83 dmg] 1 [attack - 1 dmg]
11: Rika [Disrupt - 193/190/187] all 3 [thunderblast - 37 dmg]
12: 2 [attack - 1 dmg] Rika [nares] 3 [gizan - 91 dmg] 1 [gizan - 89 dmg]
13: Rika [Disrupt - 194/218/216] all 3 [thunderblast - 30 dmg]
14: Rika [Disrupt - 194/208/232] all 3 Xe-A-Thouls died to this attack
 

I actually got lucky fairly quickly and this only took about 6 attempts. Fortunately the only time a Xe-A-Thoul outrolled Rika in initiative they attacked for a measly one damage. She could have died right there or if one jumped the turn order in a Disrupt round and pulverized the Numan before they got locked into thunderblast. Phew.

Video Link: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=hdhe69G0kfc