[DFFOO] Soulcage CHAOS Boss Overview

Soulcage Raid Event is arriving on 12/4 at 6PM PT (12/5 2AM UTC)! Included in this event are six level 70 awakenings, a Raid co-op challenge, and two new EX+ realizations (Kuja and Lilisette). In this article, we’ll be focusing purely on the CHAOS level fight, and it’s a doozy! More after the break!

Soulcage CHAOS

DissidiaDB bestiary

Soulcage Stats

Level: 150
HP: 3,200,000
Elemental Weakness: Holy
Elemental Absorb: Wind
Elemental 90% Resist: Thunder, Dark
Debuff Immunity: None

Abilities

The ability names are translated from Japanese. As such, they may change upon global release.

• Leaf Swirl: Recast ability
  • BRV heal, AOE magic BRV+HP attack
  • Inflicts ATK down, DEF down, SPD down, iBRV down, mBRV down, Turn rate down debuffs for 2T
  • Becomes Fire Blades when on fire
• Fire Blades: Recast ability
  • Higher potency fire element Leaf Swirl
• Fira: ST fire magic BRV attack
• Leaf Blast: ST magic HP attack
• Shockwave: AOE magic BRV attack
  • Inflicts ATK down debuff
• The fire started: Gain BRV, SPD up, ATK up, DEF up, iBRV up, mBRV up (starts battle on fire)
• The fire went out: Cancels all non-framed buffs, and stat ups from The fire started
• Mustard Bomb: ST magic BRV attack
  • Inflicts Fire resist down, DEF down debuffs
  • Medium chance of inflicting ATK down debuff
• Wood Spear: ST melee BRV attack
  • inflicts iBRV down, mBRV down debuffs
  • high chance of inflicting SPD down debuff
• Burn Spear: ST melee BRV+HP attack
  • inflicts iBRV down, mBRV down, SPD down debuffs
• An eerie air permeates: SPD up, ATK up, DEF up, iBRV up, mBRV up at 80% HP threshold
  • iBRV Down aura to all party members
    
• An eerier air permeates: Even more SPD up, ATK up, DEF up, iBRV up, mBRV up at 50% HP threshold

Missions

TARGET SCORE: 450,000
NO K.Os
Turn Count: 105 or less
HP Damage taken: 10,000 or less
CHAOS Clear rewards: 5 Ruin’s adamantine nuggets, 10 Refuge’s adamantine nuggets

CHAOS Overview

This fight is only two waves, but do not be fooled! It’s by no means a short fight, as you have 105 turns to meet the requirements. The first wave is our good old friend, Wight Priest. This is the boss from Eiko’s event. The basic mechanics of the Wight Priest is that it will begin with Perfect Dodge, which is 100% evasion and cannot be hit by BRV or HP attacks until the two additional ghosts are defeated. The priest also begins by casting Hastega, increasing their speed. The difficulty here is that these are no baby adds, they have 200,000 HP each! Since you cannot attack the priest until the adds are defeated, he will likely hit one of you with an HP attack. Be sure to make a team that has some sort of healing (Warrior of Light, Sherlotta, Lenna, Porom).

Once the adds are defeated, the Wight Priest will cancel Perfect Dodge and gain 35,000 BRV. The good news is it is slightly slower in this form, and also highly susceptible to launches. If you do NOT defeat it before it’s turn, it will re-summon the adds and go back into Perfect Dodge. Clearing it on the first shot is imperitive if you want to make the turn count. However, it has 1,000,000HP, so you will need help to defeat it. Bring a Cloud friend here. Use Finishing Touch then Cross Slash+ to guarantee a paralysis.  Your team should be able to beat it before re-summoning with the help of two paralyzes. Alternatively, you could use a Quistis friend to delay it, but this will deal less damage than Cloud.

Wave two is Soulcage, a giant tree who’s upset because his head is on fire. His gimmick here is he is stronger when he’s on fire, but you can put the fire out with Ice based attacks. Depending on your team, this may or may not matter. Fortunately for us, he does not begin the fight with his recast ability, Leaf Swirl/Fire Swirl, and AOE BRV+HP attack, plus 6 nasty debuffs. This attack charges up after 4T and he uses it on the 5th turn.  The good news is the debuffs only last for 2T, if you decide not to bring Lenna or Aphmau for 100% debuff evasion. Also make sure you recast buffs to push off the debuffs as they are not framed.

As a side note, if you do bring both Lenna and Sherlotta, together their debuffs can total 110% iBRV reduction.  This doesn’t work quite as well as Garland’s boss as this time, the HP threshold aura will increase Soulcage’s iBRV so it no longer breaks at 0. However, it does make the fight very manageable and allow for more breaks with a lower iBRV.

Knowing these mechanics, the fight is very straightforward. The only issue here is that it has 3.2 Million HP. This will be a marathon fight. Keep your health up, deal as much damage as possible. When it gets below 50% HP, the attacks become more powerful, and if you brought Warrior of Light, his shields become paper-thin because of the iBRV down aura. This is why team composition is important, with proper debuffing of Soulcage or iBRV buffs to your team, WoL’s shields can survive the AoE HP attacks! Save your burst damage for when it becomes red HP and summon and go hog wild!

Team Building

DPS: Kuja (3/3 EX+), Ultimecia (3/3 EX+), Squall (3/3 EX+), Cloud (3/3 EX+), Tidus (3/3 EX+)
Support: Lilisette (1/3 EX+), Lenna, Sherlotta, Agrias (3/3 EX+), Selphie
Tank: Warrior of Light (1/3 EX+)
Friend Unit: Cloud, Sherlotta, Quistis
Summon: Shiva

Synergy characters

• Kuja [infographic] – Rework brings Kuja into top tier magic DPS. Holy weakness means Ring Holy deals incredible damage.
• Lilisette [infographic] – Incredible battery, buffs, and debuffs. EX+ brings more longevity, AOE overflow, BRV shaving, and damage. Note: Lilisette’s healing is limited to herself.
• Lenna [infographic (L60)]- Her debuff immunity is GOLD here, iBRV debuff, buffs, BRV regen and healing
• Palom – Has ice based attacks to put out Soulcage’s fire, but lacks CHAOS level damage.
• Zidane – As a primary DPS, just not enough damage even with synergy
• Rydia – As a primary DPS, just not enough damage even with synergy

Successful JP clears

The most used characters in inkwelder’s Early CHAOS clears spreadsheet were:

Warrior of Light – 17
Lilisette – 16
Ultimecia – 10
Sherlotta – 8
Lenna – 7
Kuja – 5
Cloud – 4
Porom – 3
Agrias – 2
Squall – 1
Selphie – 1
Tidus – 1
Relm – 1

Check out the link for the full list of team compositions, video links to clears, etc. It’s an amazing resource!

Soulcage will be a challenging, marathon fight that will test your team’s limits. I’ve been enjoying the challenge of CHAOS and look forward to more! Good luck everyone!

Thanks and credits to: Remski, Bard, inkwelder and the Tonberry Troupe, Rem (DissidiaDB), Black Nero (YouTube), and the DFFOO Crystal Chronicles Podcast Discord.