Board 8 > ~FIGHT!~ Crono, Juliet, Geese and Alice vs. Sonic, Tifa, Lara and Selvaria Bles

(+) Yeah! (+)

Crono, Juliet Starling, Geese Howard and Alice Liddell have challenged Sonic, Tifa, Lara and Selvaria to a fight! Location of the fight: Barious Desert - As seen in chapter 7 of Valkyria Chronicles, a rocky wasteland of a battleground with bits of cover and trenches all about. No tanks or soldiers are present, and access to the temple or any sections not seen in ch7 is barred. Attackers will start by the Bathomys' spawn point, whereas defenders will start by the Barious Ruins.. Which side will win?


Guidelines

- The fight will occur in real-time (like an FMV sequence). Gameplay mechanics are less important than how the characters would function in a real-time environment.
- The members of each team are ideal teammates capable of a pre-selected plan of battle.
- "Broken" refers to a lot of things, including insta-death, auto-effects, a variety of status effects (e.g., Imp, Silence, Stop, *not* Poison), and revival. Unless stated otherwise, nobody has them, though do use your own discretion.
- There may be SPOILERS from all of the games the characters are from.

Rules for Voting

-Bold your votes (using bold HTML tags).
-You do not need to require justification for your vote, though the admins reserve the right to disqualify votes in the advent of obvious alt voting and other similar scenarios.
-Leaders cannot vote for their own teams (and players from the same pool may not vote as well), but they are free to argue their case.
-If you want to switch your votes simply bold the change; there's no need to delete your post, though you may if you wish.
-This match will end in 24 hours.
-The following conventions are in use for match topics: www.gamefaqs.com/boards/570224-mercs/75290480/878106427


Crono is as he appears in Chrono Trigger (DS), with his best non-broken equipment and all his techs save for Life. Dual/Triple techs with other Crono Trigger characters are allowed.

Juliet Starling is as she appears in Lollipop Chainsaw, with all her abilities and upgrades, including those utilising Nick, with the exception of the Chainsaw Blaster. She also cannot activate Star Soul Power.

Geese Howard is as he appears in the Fatal Fury and King of Fighters series, with all of his moves available.

Alice Liddell is as she appears in Alice: Madness Returns wearing the Checkmate dress and equipped with the Vorpal Cleaver, Octo-grinder, Knightmare, Catnip Cannon, Umbrella and Clockwork Bomb, all fully upgraded. She also has the Ice Wand, Jabberwock's Eye Staff and Blunderbuss from American McGee's Alice, with her will regenerating over time. When near death she will enter Hysteria mode for 20 seconds, but only once.
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~VS~

Lara Croft is as she appears in Tomb Raider (2013), with all of her character upgrades, as well as fully upgraded dual Magnum Pistols, Competition Bow, Combat Shotgun, WWII SMG and Climbing Axe. Walls do not necessarily have to be comprised of craggy rock for Lara to be able to scale them.

Sonic is as he appears in the Sonic series and Smash 4 (minus game mechanics), in his base form at his canon levels. He does not have any emeralds, Chaos Control, or weird things like that.

Tifa Lockhart is as seen in Final Fantasy VII, with access to all of her non-broken equipment, all Magic Materia aside from Transform, Exit, and Destruct, all Command Materia aside from Manipulate, and all non-stat boosting Independent Materia. She also has her moves from Kingdom Hearts, and anything seen in the Compilation of FFVII.

Selvaria Bles is as seen in Valkyria Chronicles, with access to her Valkyrur lance and shield as well as her Rhum machine gun. She cannot use her Valkyrur Flame self destruct power.

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Duel in the desert! Who will be swallowed underneath the burning sands? FIGHT!
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@Luis_Sera89
@DeathChicken

The floor is yours.
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DC's argument:

So as the former owner of Selvaria in Mercs 4, I shall let you in on a secret. Barious Desert is actually a pretty bad terrain for Selvaria. It’s one of those boss arenas where in order to give you a better shot at dealing with Selvaria’s admittedly overpowered ass, the stage itself is filled with trenches, buildings and all manner of things to get in the way of Selvaria shooting you. Furthermore, my team in this battle starts on the high ground where Selvaria would normally be turning up during her game. Selvaria and company have to wade in through the terrain and get up to my crew.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=b9qqHAcL54g

They’re down by the oversized tank in the video, I’m up at Selvaria’s temple where she turns up at 15 minutes in. So there is no immediate danger of Selvaria sniping anyone, since she literally can’t do it without closing in for a clearer shot.

Now the biggest gun on my side is Alice. Allow me to properly hype Alice, since I don’t think it’s ever been done in Mercs. Her biggest strength is that she moves like a bat out of hell, spamming teleporty flash steps to rarely be hit. Your best chance is to get her in the brief moments where she’s standing still. This is frankly not much of a chance as she will be right up in your grill to chop you up with the Vorpal Cleaver.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5RPYlPB-x3M

I personally made this video to show off what she can do. You can see in the video the Catnip grenade launcher (sprays acid in a large cloud on detonation. It’s corrosive enough to melt the armored cards, who otherwise are immune to bullets). Her gatling gun, her spam dashing the invincible teleport *everywhere*. I dropped off some of her Bunny time bombs too for the hell of it, demonstrated the Knightmare sledgehammer, which restores her health with each hit. The Vorpal Cleaver reduces any damage she takes by 50% while she has it out (she can swap between it and the sledgehammer on the fly). The Checkmate costume doubles all of her damage automatically. Her umbrella can block projectiles and send them back the other way. She can shrink at will, making her a much smaller target.



Oh yes, and should she actually get near death, she turns into a wailing banshee that can’t be hurt by anything (even bypassing the usual Mercs rule that shuts that down. I was careful to check that in the last go around) and doubles her damage yet again, as well as giving her infinite clips for her guns while it’s up.

Oh yes, and she also gets stuff from her original game, like the Blunderbuss, a giant gun that I’m pretty sure would instantly kill anyone on the other team besides Selvaria…

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WlnDm-ogyvQ&t=2m0s

And other things like the Ice Wand that can throw up protective ice walls and otherwise freeze things solid (very important when you’re trying to buy time versus gunners), and the Eye Staff which rains down lasers from above. So yeah, Alice is frankly a disruptive force of nature and if the other team has ideas of opening up with their guns, they’re going to get knocked all over the place by Alice’s combination of ice walls stuffing up the line of fire, Catnip grenades and the Blunderbuss spreading exploding death, and Alice literally going invincible for 20 seconds at some point to go wail on them.
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And then I have other guys, primarily cruel melee. Meanwhile for as mean as Selvaria is her huge weakness is, in fact, good melee and the fact that her powers go bye bye if she’s disarmed of her lance.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0YzzdjSR5sM&t=1m50s

Feels like Juliet would be a terrible matchup for her in particular (Selvaria's screwed if the Magic Saws All kills her lance), and so would Geese with his habit of punishing the PREDICTABO and disarming them. Her team can’t stand up very well if she goes down, and with the geometry of the terrain, the other side is going to have to come to us if they want to accomplish anything. End result, my team can turn this into a brawl (if it's necessary, forcing the issue via Alice raining down grenades over their heads from the high ground), and then they win fairly handily.
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Nice wall of text kanzaris kelshen that's a classic kanz strategy if I've seen one
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Outside of the odd trench and section of ruins, Barious Desert is a mostly open expanse - so really Selvaria can just go to town here. She's a clear step above anyone else in terms of ranged options, as well as combat in general. Alice has some range, but it isn't really on the same level. She also has the best support in Master of Magic i.e. GameFAQs Tifa.

That's probably enough by itself, but in Lara there's the only other 'real' guns in the match, on a terrain that favours that kind of combat.

Sonic has... a lot of space to run around in?
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Anyway having read like no arguments if day selvaria is super good here iirc no cover?
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The cover is "My guys are way up on that temple plateau and she's down where the giant tank would ordinarily be. She literally can't hit anything unless she takes the path to get closer.
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All I remember about selvaria is pinpoint accuracy and her long jump feats
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Anyway, without reading arguments, at least watch my mad (lack of) videogame skills playing Alice. Does a nice job anyway of showing off that she's stupidly absurdly fast
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Alice is a nuisance for sure, but she's effectively being asked to solo, since the rest of her team is having a rough time getting close. She also doesn't have the benefit of buffs like Selvaria's team does. She merits her upkeep, but besting a buffed Selvaria (not to mention the other three team members) is too much of an ask.
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Also she can throw up ice walls to block off bullets, can rain down lasers with the Eye Staff, and turns completely invincible for 20 seconds upon dying
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Initial thoughts are that this terrain really plays to Lara and Sonic's strengths

Alice's teleports are nifty but highly televised and kind of useless against someone like Sonic
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I don't think it's required that Alice solos anyone here. She just needs to cause enough mayhem for Juliet with her handy doom blade to disarm Selvaria, then she loses her magical girl powers and is essentially porked.
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Also she can reflect projectiles (like Sevlaria's lasers) with the Umbrella. I stopped to do so about 2:00 into the video just to show it off.
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Selvaria.

Far and away the strongest, plus buffs, plus other gunner, plus Sonic.
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Can Alice heal herself with the Knightmare sledgehammer while she's in banshee mode? And if she can, will banshee mode retrigger when she dies again?
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When near death she will enter Hysteria mode for 20 seconds, but only once.
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DeathChicken posted...

Anyway, without reading arguments, at least watch my mad (lack of) videogame skills playing Alice. Does a nice job anyway of showing off that she's stupidly absurdly fast

I will take you up on this when I'm not mobile and sitting waiting for my happy pills in public

Mostly for poor game play
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See now the problem here is that even if Selvaria can't snipe, Tifa is probably the second strongest fighter on the field when buffs are considered, and Selvaria can wreck with the point blank Rhum Machine Gun as well. Like I just don't see Geese's team winning under any interpretation of the terrain.
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One shot of Hysteria. Yes, she can heal herself while she's in it (I just booted up the game again and let her get beaten to death...which takes forever since she also has a silly amount of HP)
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wait is this a non KoF Geese match?

What madness is this?
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I owned Tifa once upon a time. I hyped Tifa incredibly and still feel she's underrated. Alice would hand Tifa her ass so badly it isn't even funny.

She's a better match for like, Geese
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Alice probably beats Tifa

Tifa with time to buff probably beats Alice though
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I mean even with buffs, Tifa is all melee (we've long since established she's never going to hang back and cast offensively). Alice has an ice wand that locks you into a big ice cube. That's...kinda it for a melee person.
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To say nothing of the fact that Alice can just butterfly bamf away from her forever and shoot her in the face until she dies. You don't want to be the poor goon who has to actually chase down Alice and try to punch her, it won't work.
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No way in Hell Tifa beats Alice. Hell, even post buffs, I don't buy her beating Geese, and Juliet is a big 'maybe'. Aggressive brawler tactics that are easily countered play into Geese and Alice's hands so easily.

My issue is that Sonic is excellent disruption. He doesn't do enough damage to put Alice into hysteria, but he's great for baiting people out to get into Selvaria's range and racking up the ducks for her to shoot. Alice is definitely overwhelming in melee, especially after entering hysteria, but it's all for naught if it's triggered earlier than reaching Selvaria. And I'm having a tough time seeing Alice perfect dodging, seeing as no other member of her team is particularly good bait for Selvy to focus on.
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I think you guys are massively underrating the impact of haste or massively underrating Tifa. Not sure which.
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Haste is only good occasionally pal

Also alice beats tifa i think n e way
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Given the size of the desert, I kind of doubt Tifa's buffs would even hold up by the time anyone actually gets from where the tank is all the way up to the temple.
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I feel like Tifa + Selvaria is really powerful especially with the teams starting really far apart and sonic here to be able to annoy the other team away from closing the gap here. Hasted Selvaria is an unholy hellcat of destruction unless someone on the other team is really good at hiding, really adept at using cover, really extremely like Sonic-tier fast, or armstrong durable enough to just tank her stuff to the face. Juliet I absolutely don't but being any of those things. Alice...less sure of.

In a smaller terrain Juliet + Alice do some work, but this seems to play to all of team Selvarias strengths and none of team Juliets.
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Well I mean, Alice is *literally invincible* for about half a minute, so I'd say that's a pretty good tank
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You can recast buffs and it's not like the base duration is short

Maybe if like, Juliet's team was particularly stealthy, they could drop an attack when buffs are expiring but yeah I don't see why it isn't in effect when fighting starts.
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This is that hysteria mode right?

Yeah so I guess its like "can Alice kill the entire team before her 20 seconds of hysteria expire" which like I guess depends on how close she can get to the other team before dying enough to even activate it.
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I remember we timed out the actual duration of Big Guard during M4 and came to the conclusion "This doesn't last very long because Haste actually makes the duration of the Protect/Shell fizzle quicker", but I don't recall how long specifically it lasts. In any event, Tifa isn't exactly a font of MP to be casting it repeatedly.
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I don't think Alice has to kill everybody. I think she just needs to open up things enough for Juliet to take out Selvaria's lance. I have little doubt Juliet can do that, given how badly Alicia hands Selvaria her ass in melee. They seem pretty alike in fighting style.
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Okay i watches dc's video. Thoughts:

1) Alice as played by DC is a solid 2 upkeep
2) Alice is actually super super hard for Selvaria to kill. Like we are talking a counter imo


My reservation is that Selvaria on this terrain is just very good. Iirc its an open desert, no cover. Her lances huge drawback is how long it takes to operate. However here with everyone in sight without much cover at all and a considerable distance ... well, basically, her drawback is super mitigated.

This fight is a lot closer than it seems. Gut says Team selvaria pulls it off but its gonna be bloody. On thr flip side, alice probably doesnt get valkyr lanced... which is good for team alice
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Also alice absolutely is the only merc capable of taking down selvaria i think

Gonna go eat lata
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In my defense I wasn't trying to kill everything lickity split there, I was trying to dance around long enough to show off all of Alice's tricks
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Also haste is good in crossing a map
Ok bye
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DeathChicken posted...

I don't think Alice has to kill everybody. I think she just needs to open up things enough for Juliet to take out Selvaria's lance. I have little doubt Juliet can do that, given how badly Alicia hands Selvaria her ass in melee. They seem pretty alike in fighting style.

Well of course you don't that's the one way I can even think of where you win this fight is if everything you just said is something I believe.

Id say the biggest issue here is that I dont see Julliet holding up particularly well vs Selvaria's lance any more than I see Alice doing so and the only way things work out the way youre saying is if Selvaria has some reason to prioritize Alice over Juliet, because otherwise I don't see what you're saying as being particularly likely..

I don't have a vote here so I am really just trying to argue this out.
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Selvaria obviously draws the eye, but lets not forget Lara has some pretty significant range as well. Alice is going to have a very hard time avoiding explosive arrows given her blinks only last for a split second, and that isn't the kind of projectile Juliet can parry either.
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greengravy294 posted...

Okay i watches dc's video. Thoughts:

1) Alice as played by DC is a solid 2 upkeep
2) Alice is actually super super hard for Selvaria to kill. Like we are talking a counter imo


My reservation is that Selvaria on this terrain is just very good. Iirc its an open desert, no cover. Her lances huge drawback is how long it takes to operate. However here with everyone in sight without much cover at all and a considerable distance ... well, basically, her drawback is super mitigated.

This fight is a lot closer than it seems. Gut says Team selvaria pulls it off but its gonna be bloody. On thr flip side, alice probably doesnt get valkyr lanced... which is good for team alice

Yeah the boys and girls of squad 7 mostly had to use the Edelweiss for cover on this map. And DC has no Edelweiss.

Man where's the Squad 7 merc, I feel gipped.
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Missed opportunity for combo merc week. Damn.
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Just renewed my licens3

Anyway now i ponder on it i actually think sonic is moderately useful somehow. He seems like a really good distraction for a ranged gunner to take advantage of

I mean he sucks but he has a use
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Why wouldn't Juliet be able to take out the lance? It's made of ragnite, which isn't some super durable substance, it's more like Magicite where it's meant to channel magical energy. Juliet meanwhile can do this

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=R5BG9ONBxIc&t=40m35s
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For the record i went from thinking team alice wins to back to team selvaria because of fucking sonic



What is wrong with me i even thought knux was moderately useful what is this world
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Because she probably dies like miles away from Selvari's Ragnite lance, was my thought.
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I'm thinking on this kind of terrain Sonic gets ahead of the pack (because why would Sonic wait around to be buffed? That's *too slow*), runs into a group of guys up by the temple and dies
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