Rift of Worlds – Analysis and Basic Guide by XelNecra
What is the Rift of Worlds? The Rift of Worlds is similar to a regular dungeon boss, with the exception that three players fight the boss simultaneously. The battle is always set to auto, which means after starting the raid you have to rely on the AI. This is not as big of a deal as it sounds at first; your goal for all PVE content is to be able to auto it at some point in order to farm it, so on the long run the “mandatory auto mode” does not really make a difference. It does however mean that picking the right monsters and monster compositions becomes really important, since this is the only input you can give. With that in mind, let’s look at the bosses abilities and the unique mechanics of the Raid.
Unit Placement
Before you can start your first game, you will notice that the Rift Raid’s monster select screen looks a little different than normal dungeons. You have a total of 8 monster slots, 4 are labeled with “Front”, and 4 are labeled with “Back”. This is due to a new mechanic that has been introduced in the Rift of worlds. We will look at that one more closely when we check out the Boss’ abilities, but basically monsters in the back line will take less damage as long as there are monsters in the front line to protect them. This mechanic will play a major role, so keep that in mind. However, despite there being 8 monster slots, you are only allowed to bring a maximum of 6 monsters. This allows for some decision making when setting up your monsters. You can choose to put more monsters in the front like to protect your back line and make sure nobody dies, or you can choose to bring less monsters in the front line and instead add more damage dealers or healers in the back line.Leader Skills
The second thing that is unique to this monster select screen is the “Leader” button. In other areas of the game, the first slot is always the “Leader slot”. However, in the rift you can tap the “Leader” button and then proceed to make one of your placed monsters the leader, activating that monster’s leader skills. As already mentioned, you are playing alongside two other players. Leader skills are shared among all monsters in that raid. So if you are going with a 33% HP Leader skill, your teammates will benefit from this as well and also enjoy a 33% HP boost. Be aware that leader skills of the same Type do not stack with each other. For example, if two players decide to bring a speed leader, only one of the leader abilities will come into effect. So make sure that your team brings diverse leader skills. In the Rift raid, only leader-skills without area restriction will work. Arena- or Guild-Battle-Leaders will have no effect. The Rift raid also does not count as a dungeon, so Dungeon Leaders unfortunately fall flat, too. One-Element-Leaders however will work – but the element restriction still applies.The Boss Abilities
Below you can find a table containing the boss abilities (source: http://summonerswar.wikia.com/wiki/Rift_of_Worlds). In the “Comments” column, I will elaborate on what these skills mean for our monsters and team compositions.Skill | Description | Comment |
Breath of Doom | Attacks all enemies and decreases their Attack Power and Attack Speed for 2 turns. Puts them in an oblivious state for 2 turns after the attack. The harmful effect activation rate will increase as the level of the Raid increases. | This boss is not stingy when it comes to debuffs. This means we need to bring solid team debuff removers. Oblivion-debuff means that Veromos is at a disadvantage, as his debuff-removal ability will be nullified. |
Crush of Doom | Targets the frontline of the enemy and unleashes an attack that ignores all beneficial effects. The damage increases substantially as the target’s Defense decreases. This attack will target the backline if there are no Monsters left in the frontline. | The damage of this ability is insane, but as long as there is a frontline, it will only deal glancing hits to monsters in the backline. This is why you want all your squishies placed in the backline. Also, high defense monsters take significantly less damage, so using defense-type monsters for your frontline will make your life a lot easier. |
Rageful Roar | Becomes enraged whenever an enemy gets a turn and the skill will activate automatically when enraged 16 times. Attacks all enemies, removes all beneficial effects and recovers the HP in proportion to the number of removed beneficial effects. This attack will also stun all enemies and permanently increase the Boss’s attack power. | To simplify, I will sum up what this means: he screws up your monsters big time, recovers HP, and becomes stronger. This means you are basically on a timer when fighting this boss. Bringing a Heal-Breaker is also really important to make the boss-fight as fast as possible before he gets strong enough to wipe your team. |
Total Annihilation | Attacks all party members whenever the boss loses 25% of the HP. All harmful effects will be removed and the boss’s stats will substantially increase when this skill is activated. Crush of Doom and Breath of Doom will gain an additional hit whenever Total Annihilation is activated. | The boss will perform this attack a total of 3 times maximum (once at 75%, 50%, and 25% health each), no matter what, so you don’t have to worry about him healing back up and then perform the attack again. This just puts you on a timer even more, since he grows even stronger every time he uses this ability. |
Carnage | When the boss eliminates an entire team of Monsters, the boss’s attack speed will increase and will start attacking all of the nearby enemies. | Once one of your teammates falls, the head of the boss will attack the nearest opponent. No fun. If an ally player gets wiped, chances to defeat the boss dwindle. |
Destroyer’s Revenge(Passive) | The damage of the next attack will increase in proportion to the number of the enemy’s turn. The damage will reset after the attack. | This means that slowing down the boss, speeding up your team with ATB-Buffers, or Violent-Procs are punished with increased damage. |
Ruler of Chaos(Passive) | The 3 heads of the boss will share the attack gauge at the start of the battle using its chaotic strength. Also, the boss will mitigate HP proportionate damage it receives by sharing a single HP among the 3 heads. | This basically mitigates the effect of “damage proportionate to the enemy’s max HP”. It does not make it worthless, but it also prevents the exploit of everyone running a Spectra/Lyn and kill the boss off in seconds. |
Summary and TL;DR
So what does all this mean for our team?- The boss grows stronger over time, so we need to bring sufficient damage. Slow-but-steady teams will not work.
- We need an AoE debuff remover (cleanser) other than Veromos. A great choice is Konamiya, as he has his cleanse on a rather short cooldown.
- We need at least two Tanks for the frontline, preferably defense-type. Since we are on a timer, it is not a bad idea to bring Monsters that deal damage based on defense, especially since the Boss has no means to Armor-Break. Copper comes to mind here. A reliable Defense-buffer to go along with is advised.
- Defense-Type monsters usually have a lot of Defense but a low HP pool, so healers that heal for a fixed amount gain value here. A Mihyang, for example, might heal a defense-type monster by 100% if she has enough Attack, while a max-skilled bella would only heal by 36%.
- Bringing some speed-control is fine, but if you go with something like Violent Verdehile and Violent Hwa, the boss will unleash an extremely powerful attack once he gets a turn. Additionally, Hwa’s and Verdehile’s important abilities are passives, which will be ruled out when the boss places oblivion with Breath of Doom.
- The boss throws debuffs out like nobody’s business, but his accuracy (especially in his early phases) seems rather low. This means one of your teammates should bring a resistance leader. This is extremely important, if not mandatory.
- Do not waste team slots on redundant debuffs. Remember, the boss shares all debuffs. If two players bring a reliable armorbreaker, you do not have to bring a third armorbreaker, and can instead throw in more damage, for example.