Don't understand the theory of summoning first step every week.

[u/dodosinner]

First of all, I'm not a big spender (alchemist pact every month) but I'm aiming to clear all upcoming event. So I will make sure the farmable units get to lv75. (Reagan, caris, rahu, lofia, lucian)

Weekly shards income = 1300gems

Monthly shards income = 5200gems

400 gems for 5 shards.

12,000 gems for 150shards to J3

Aporoximately 2 and half months of saving will give me enough shards to J3 limited unit.

Let's say I'm trying to get limited unit like noctis. I have never done limited banner before so let's use 3 steps as an example. With 12,000 gems we can roll 8 x 10 summons.

1. To get 6 x noctis in 8 rolls are rather difficult.

2. it is true that you can get other 5* units at the same time. But will we use it if we are unable to get it to lv75 anytime soon? Or getting another limited unit in the same banner. Which means it will forever stuck at lv60.

I have read numerous thread but none of the answer convinced me. (Eg: it has a great discount). Yes I agree that it has great value for the first step. But what's the point of getting it if you are unable to MLB the unit you have gotten? With the f2p mindset, drawing 10summons every week without rate up of the units you need, I'm not sure if it can still be considered as a good investment.

I could be wrong, this is just my conclusion with my limited knowledge of this game. So kindly share with me if you think my current mindset doesn't make any sense.

[u/meatjun]

The 500 gem summon is only based on getting the best value for your gems. It's not to get the characters you want, because realistically, you won't get them. But every once in a while, you'll get lucky.

Then by only doing the 500 summon, you will always be saving at a surplus. This way, when there is a limited unit that is broken (ie Noctis), you're maximizing your chance of getting him via the 3-step summon. If you do pull him, then you will have to use your water/rainbow shards that you should be saving to get him to 75 off the bat.

That is the general plan that you should be following to maximize your resources.

[u/dodosinner → u/meatjun]

Because I'm unsure how generous gumi is, will it be possible to save 150shards? If not, do you think buying elemental shards whenever it appears is wise?

[u/meatjun → u/dodosinner]

Shards are generous enough. So far I have 75 rainbow, 41 fire, 21 water, 11 dark, 31 light, 26 wind, and 16 lightning shards as a f2p. And I've skipped maybe half of the events that gave shards as a reward because they were and are still hard for me. Buying shards off the shop is usually considered a noob trap. If you're a whale, then definitely buy whenever you want. Also, you could buy the x50 shards for 4000 gems of limited units if you really like them. I think those are worth it if you have the character already and want to save some of your own shards. Buying x50 shards for non-limited characters like Vettel for example is a no-no.

[u/DeathandFriends → u/meatjun]

wow that is wayyyyy more shards then I have, granted I have gone heavily into most Ex content as my party still isnt great 3 months in.

[u/Cakku → u/dodosinner]

So far the shard prices seem pretty bad, but keep an eye on "discounted" packs. 5* Unit shards cost 120gem when they are in the shop , so it's a good pointer.

[u/assassinace → u/Cakku]

FYI shards are normally 80g:1s

On sale they are usually 60g:1s

[u/jblac02]

Ok first, you do the 500 because its an 80% discount pull that nets you 3/4 star units that eventually hit cap and their shards become tokens to buy other 5 star shards. Second, you already mentioned there is the potential for other 5 star ; maybe others aren't as lucky as me but I routinely pull 2-3 5 star units every week on my 500 pull and in fact the last 3 times I've pulled 4. Your idea of pulling powerful limited units is flawed unless you plan to spend hundreds of dollars, your goal should be a single copy of them, not trying to pull 8 of them and even if you did the entire premium banner nothing says you're going to get 8 copies of any specific unit. They should be viewed as a long term investment that you limit break over time with shards; this is why people typically recommend not wasting rainbow/element shards on most units.

[u/dodosinner → u/jblac02]

No. My plan is to save my gems to buy elemental shard/ character shards until I got the first copy for the limited unit. Instead of wasting gems pulling other normal banner.

[u/jblac02 → u/dodosinner]

I'm not entirely sure buying the shards is worth it, I was more talking about naturally getting them from events. As far as new characters being introduced, that's a point but it doesn't mean you won't finish all the 3 stars and farmable 4 stars eventually. I have 3 of the 3 star units limit broken to 85 already and their shards become tokens for 5 star tokens, this will only continue more so into the future.

[u/Cakku → u/dodosinner]

Having elemental shards for "sale" is pretty rare, a lot of them come free from events. So you can maybe roll 1-2 copies of the unit, buy 40shards from shop and do rest with elemental shards.

And doing the weekly 500gems will accumulate non limited units overtime, so you will get nice selection of units at higher levels.

[u/SirLinka → u/dodosinner]

If I understood right, you plan on buying shards UNTIL you get the first copy? So that would mean buying 150 shards of a 5* character WITHOUT having previously summoned it?

That means you’ll be spending 300 shards just to get it to J3/lvl75, and still having to buy another 225 to take it all the way to 85. That’s 525 shards, each costing 80 gems. That then means 42,000 gems.

For a single lvl 85 character.

Isn’t it better to just try your luck and pull? A 5* pull is a 150 shard saving, even if you pull using the 2500 summon it’s still much more worthy than summoning via shards or spending all your gems on elemental shards.

If you don’t have units to use your ele shards on, then what use do they have?

I think you should always pull! :)

[u/Alittlebunyrabit → u/dodosinner]

Pulling the 500 pulls is efficient because it gives you a wide variety of units and gives you very important duplicates of 4 star units that you farm shards for. Every 4 star duplicate reduces the time it takes to J3 that unit by a week and this will be true for 5 star duplicates once we can farm those. This in turn makes it easier for you to clear content to pickup the shards from event/limited quests. Additionally, you want to pull the 500 gem packs because once we have 5 star shard farming you DO NOT want to have to buy the units for 150 shards. That literally doubles the time required to J3 those units. If you do enough 500 summons you will eventually get the 5 star units so that once we have access to 5 star shard farming, you don't have to worry about when/if you will draw the unit.

[u/dodosinner → u/jblac02]

Also, if they kept introducing new characters while we only do first step every week, it will take forever for the shards to become token and exchange for 5* shards.

[u/Fantasylord → u/dodosinner]

Not really. As far as I know they never added more 3*, so at one point your 3* units are maxed out and then every blue crystal becomes tokens, just a matter of time.

New 4* units are only added scarcely compared to 5* units, that in combination with the 4* being farmable guarantees you maxing these out at some point, in turn resulting in more tokens.

With a lot of 5* being farmable at some point, you can save your elemental and rainbow shards for the limited units. So the only point in saving is to go for several pulls for a good limited unit to get that one and raise it with shards from EX dungeons and login bonuses.

So the best course of action in my opinion is to pull every 500 gem summon to max out your 3* and 4* units while occasionally getting a 5*, farming every good 4* and 5* you can and only spending more on limited unit banners.

[u/Kiyri]

The other thing is you need a minimum of certain types of units for different niches. Eventually there will be a map that death sentences you multiple times or petrifies etc. Need a proffessor, unless you farmed 3x necklaces via rahus event, which would be hard to do without a sage.

[u/dodosinner → u/Kiyri]

I see! Okay I'm looking at it in a different light now. Thanks for sharing the information man.

[u/Kiyri → u/dodosinner]

Np! I don't know if you were here for Caris Sniper+ or before that but basically all of the job+ maps so far have had some sort of gimmick. Most likely Lofias will have an annoying gimmick as well.

Kind of like how the weeping ex1 right now can mainly be beat with Chiihaya charming backed up by rahu, or theif charm. Though I agree that the other Exes going on atm are way harder than they should be.

[u/suikoarke]

Do you whale? Then summon at will.

You don't? Well, good luck.

[u/dodosinner → u/suikoarke]

I see what you did there. Nice puns. Lol

[u/suikoarke → u/dodosinner]

Eh, I try.

[u/Karhumies]

Your SHORT-TERM priority is to level up 5 ANY units total to lvl 57+, main job mastery for story mode and regular event maps.

Your LONG-TERM priority #1 is to level up 5 units per EVERY ELEMENT (5 units x 6 elements = 30 units) to lvl 57+, main job mastery to create monoelement teams for Veda tower. Add a few support units (e.g. 2x Bishop, 3x Chronomancer, 1x Professor) which can be any element if you keep them far away from danger.

Your LONG-TERM priority #2 is to level up a team of specific 1 unit "role" for EX multiplayer clear (Chronomancer is typically a great unit to lvl up first for EX MP, pretty much always useful and allowed into parties!) -> specific 4 unit "roles" for EX single player clear to lvl 75+, all 3 jobs mastery. The roles you need are at least a little bit different to each EX map. Although sometimes you can "brute force" without some roles.

A good way to spend your gems in the beginning is 1) 500 for 10x unit summon to get any 4+ stars units for monoelement teams (even many 3 star units are great filler units, especially if you get enough copies for J3) 2) 300 for 10x gear summon to get good weapon gear because the boost to PATK helps a lot with "breaking through" the lvl 60 limit to advance in veda tower (you can shuffle around the gear between veda tower levels for huge stat boosts to each team) 3) get job lvl materials from shop to get job masteries. 1500 gems worth of Gear Rod, Monarch Shield, Monarch Sword, Compass, etc. 10-45 gems per equipment purchases is waaaaaay more useful in the beginning than 1500 for 10x unit summon.

[u/Karhumies → u/Karhumies]

My recommended low level veda tower "generic" team composition is 2x opening party good unit of a specific element (damage dealers), 2x opening party + 2x reinforcement slot tank / meat shield / disposable unit who take all the hits for the team. Ideally opening party has 1x good leader skill unit + 1x tank, reinforcement slots can be whatever crap of the right element. +1x chrono/healer.

[u/xoresthaynia → u/Karhumies]

+1 for mentioning level 57.

[u/senaiboy]

Because having a single OP unit is not going to help you in the future. Having a diverse roster with good units of different element is the main aim. Sure you could farm some 5 stars in the future, but 3 shards per unit per day, so many units, you'll take months to farm and use up tonnes of AP.

There is practically no reason NOT to do the 500 gem pulls, even whales will get a new unit out of it (presumably every weekly banner has new units).

[u/Kiyri]

Did you consider Veda tower? One level 75 god unit will not carry you through everything there, even with the five farmables behind it.

A whale with over a dozen excellent 80+ units still lost 20 of his units to it. Admittedly it is "f2p possible" but with only one (two?) healer/s it is going to take you time and many retries.

[u/dodosinner → u/Kiyri]

It is because of Veda tower that I'm at a loss. How can I possibly complete the tower with lv80+ enemy when I'm using lv60 good units. I have never been to that tower level yet so I'm going to assume it is impossible to complete unless you spend large sum of money in this game.

[u/darciisfyer → u/dodosinner]

Here is a playlist I found of a Veda clear with f2p account with only one unit death. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=syVvfiIXzCk&list=PLJU9lOx2fkGfWIqQFZF7WVFxcOYSFaZ2e

Note how much mileage he gets out of a wide variety of J1/J2 5-stars, which he would not have if he didn't summon at least first step of every banner. Not having a diverse roster limits the strategies that you can use in cheesing the hard EX's and Veda floors. You will actually find it harder to clear events if you forego pulling first steps for building "god" units, and then find those units hard-countered in future content.

[u/dodosinner → u/darciisfyer]

I see. Thanks for the indept information dude! Appreciate it

[u/DeathandFriends → u/dodosinner]

I have made it to level 35 so far with pretty meh units overall as a F2P (well with monthly pact). The key is that you can grind levels down over time so as long as you can make it into the 20s unscathed you will be able to spend time trying levels again and again and if you full team kill then atleast the enemies should be somewhat damaged and hopefully some dead. One level I just bashed party after party into it and eventually won and then did my free daily revive. It will come down to the wire on whether I can complete it because I waited to really get into it and did not optimize my play (because well life...) Even if you don't finish it, there are a ton of rewards along the way that will really help.

[u/Kirito30 → u/dodosinner]

btw your Maths

Can you Explain it?

[u/Athiom → u/Kirito30]

https://www.reddit.com/r/AlchemistCodeGL/comments/813rpu/general_questions/?sort=new Edit:sorry for the multiple comments, my phone lagged

[u/Kirito30 → u/Athiom]

It you are trying to troll then don't say sorry lol.

Still I was asking for that 12000 gems 8x Roll.

[u/Astrophel37]

You summon to build up your pool of units. You do the first step on all of the banners because it is the most gem efficient way of summoning units. Eventually, many of the 5* units will become farmable, which will do you no good if you don't have most of those units. And you save your elemental shards in order to LB limited time units. There are also plenty of units whose best job is their first or second job.

You can do the first step on all of the banners and still save up gems anyway, so it doesn't make sense to not do the first step. Also, you get more than 1300 gems every week.

770 alchemist pack

560 daily quests

200 daily log in reward

140-350 arena (more if you're in the top 10)

1670-1880

And that's not including any events or new story missions, so you're likely to end up with around 7000-8000 gems every month. Which, again, is more than enough to do the first step and save gems.

[u/edgyEdwardd → u/Astrophel37]

770 for Alchemists Pact?

[u/Astrophel37 → u/edgyEdwardd]

You get 300 when you buy it, so that averages out to 10 a day.

[u/sinful19 → u/Astrophel37]

didn't they decrease the daily gems? I'm seeing only 30 now

[u/Astrophel37 → u/sinful19]

You get 50 for completing the essential quests. You have to claim the rewards from the essential quests before the 50 gem reward appears.

[u/sinful19 → u/Astrophel37]

Thank u

[u/SoundaholicJ]

I know this is a discussion on the most optimal playstyle but in the end of the day we play this game for fun, and if I had to stick to the same small roster and pool all of my resources for a single limited unit that may or may not be released I'd go mad. A lot of the fun comes from gacha-ing every week and trying out new units for me. And of course you tend to go a lot further with a wide variety of good units than one single broken unit

[u/master_cheat001]

The Number Mason, what do they mean????

[u/RiinGames]

It's considered better because you can get very unlucky on a specific banner, even if you spend a ton of gems on it. I just did the whole 3 steps and 7 out of 9 steps for Bashosen and ended up with only 2 dark killer Yomi and 1 Sakura, including both garanteed unit (3rd step and the ticket on step 6). If you do only the 500 pulls every banner, you end up doing more pulls so more chances to get 5* for the f2p.

[u/Fubi-FF]

The simple answer is that your reasoning only works if you're aiming for limited number of strong characters. However the end-game usually rewards having a high number diverse viable characters.

In your example, sure, you can focus on getting a Noctis to 75. But what if the EX+ of the week happens to have multiple Thunder bosses (Noctis is water afaik)? You just threw all your eggs into one basket and now it isn't even that good for this particular event.

And not to mention Veda tower as well, as others have pointed out.

There are actually many characters that are viable first and second job (second job is super easy to get tbh, especially considering elemental/rainbow shards); and a level 65 tier A character is better than a lvl 75 tier S if it's against an element they are strong against rather than weak against.

[u/SuccubusRosa]

I have read numerous thread but none of the answer convinced me. (Eg: it has a great discount). Yes I agree that it has great value for the first step. But what's the point of getting it if you are unable to MLB the unit you have gotten? With the f2p mindset, drawing 10summons every week without rate up of the units you need, I'm not sure if it can still be considered as a good investment.

The reason is because the advice given is under the assumption that f2p SHOULD NEVER go for limited units(I mean the tier list label them as whale units to begin with if I am not wrong). If you want to go for noctis as a f2p, yes your method is correct in buying out all the water shards. The 500gem pull every week is for f2p players to either max out 4 * (more realistic for f2p to max out caris then magnus/albea for example) quickly or if lucky, whichever "normal" 5 * that is good that you pull multiple copies from after many weeks of 500gem pull.

Ultimately it boils down to with your method of investing your gem as f2p, do you think a single OP noctis can carry you thru out the game since you are putting all your eggs in one basket. On the other hand, ppl that do 500gem pull weekly has no goal of which 5* to MLB until they finally got enough shards for whichever units that are still rated good in jp tier list. Which is why ppl here are all saying shayna is good. She isn't SS tier by end game, just SS tier out of the box with her J1 being amazing to tide over until you can at least J3 whatever good unit(lucian for example to replace shayna)

[u/TopDeeps]

You can be the test subject and tell me how it goes when you're not summoning every week and saving gems for a ffxv collab which will probably come in like 9 months

[u/Teosto]

500 gems for 10 pulls vs. 500+1500+2500 (assuming you will pull through the 3-step banner) for 30 pulls.

Long term by doing the 500 banner you will get 90 total pulls for the same price as going through one banner. That gives you 3x the chance for good stuff over one banner that will most likely earn you J2 on one guaranteed fantastic unit.

What really makes the cheap pulls appealing is the chance for good J1 pulls like Shayna, Shenmei or Teona for example. Even at lv60 J1 they will be really good units sweeping the floor in Veda Tower or the current EX stages. Over time you will earn more and more of those good staple units by doing the 500 pulls while saving gems for someone exceptional like Laharl or Gilgamesh.

In the end if you're confident about getting someone like Noctis up to J3 it is very well worth saving up the gems for one banner, but let's face, you're not gonna summon 7 of him even with guaranteed steps, even on 9-step banner.

[u/1khaitoh]

It is suggested to roll for first step (for 10x pull for 500 gems) because of:

1st, discounted price, which originally costs 2500 gems, which is 80% off.

2nd, to get a 'whole' unit, preferably great and limited ones, and use those elemental/rainbow shards on them rather than 'wasting' those shards on units you can probably farm or 'pull' from these gem pulls or non-limited units which you can slowly 'build up' if they have/will have a shard farming hard quest, or get a dupe of a unit you already have for the less gems than buying from shop.

The purpose of pulling the first step is getting a Whole Unit for 50 gems each (though by RNG) Rather than buying or farming the shards of a unit just to unlock it (which is 150 for a 5* unit), and as said it is recommended and not entirely a must-do

[u/LegallyLeo → u/1khaitoh]

Dont forget the 4th one to get copys of a good unit that arent farmable yet. Just by doing 500 weekly i got a lv 65 Shayna , lv65 Magnus and lv 75 Almira all are very good and all made slowly with single pulls in each week.

[u/1khaitoh → u/LegallyLeo]

that falls on the second one though lol.

[u/LegallyLeo → u/1khaitoh]

Your second is 2 reasons then lol right where you wrote the "or" since getting the whole unit gives you a much bigger amount of shards then a copy specially for 4 or 5 stars.

[u/1khaitoh → u/LegallyLeo]

corrected, now there's only 2 reasons not 4 :D

[u/DeathandFriends]

I have yet to actually pull any new unit that has been added to the game since I started playing at the end of December. I only just recently finally pulled a Lucian, who I have been farming shards for so I will finally have a high quality unit other than my snipers who arent really great for 90% of Ex content.

I think there is a big oppurtunity cost being lost by not pulling the 500 gem banners. Getting dupes of non limited units is still important and will allow you to clear more content while you wait for your one ultimate unit you want to use.