#yes the shiny icons on the squads are pretty but the struggle is TEW REAL😭

[hypaalicious]

IS4 thoughts

I’ve completed everything in this thus far and I remember I usually do a “review no one asked for” about Integrated Strategy iterations, so leggo

General improvements: the ability to choose which ending to go for rather than relying on RNG, fun Fordartal shenanigans, added perks to relics on higher Braving Nature levels

General annoyances: unable to stop the Collapse level from rising (unless you pick the Eternal Hunting Squad), being locked into Braving Nature 0 in the beginning, both the 2nd & 3rd end bosses being a DPS and/or ASPD check

Aiight so… best and worst categories GO

Best starting squad: Special Training Squad

The worst part about higher ascension runs is the +1 Hope cost for recruitment and this squad mitigates that. Made my BN 10+ runs a lot less painful LOL

Worst starting squad: Scientific Thinking Squad

Yeah, you end up with max Anti-Interference by like floor 3 but being blind up until then is annoying lol.

Best Fordartal: Sing

Listen. Hardly anything beats the endorphin rush of ASPD boosts anyway, but also I have not managed to beat the 2nd or 3rd end bosses without help from it.

Worst Fordartal: Hunt

I’m truly not tryna ASK to get my ass whooped outchea, y’all can keep this 😭

Least harmful Collapsal Paradigm: Convergence Consumption

For the most part I can just avoid getting screwed by this at all by skipping Bosky Passage nodes

Most harmful Collapsal Paradigm: Barometric Anamoly

Fuck this one to the pits of hell 😭 Have me mad as fuck watching my DP like

Easiest Emergency Node: Hands of Moss

Yeah, it’s a 1st floor stage anyway but like any of the others can steamroll you immediately if you have a poor starting lineup, this one is the safest bet cause nothing really changes about it from regular to emergency mode.

Worst Emergency Node: tie between March of the Dead & Stay Away From Strangers

If we being real? NO 5th floor combat stage is safe at high ascension 🤧 it will always be a fight for your life, but these two can be run-enders. MotD throws in two mudrock Colossi for funsies and SAWF will end in tears if you don’t have the ranged units to get all them drones gone and the swiftness to pick off all the Rot Eaters before they get too beefy to hold off.

Best Bosky Passage effect: Concentration Disorder from IS3 on steroids

I love set and forget shenanigans because I assure you, I will be setting and forgetting anyway! *grins in ADHD*

Worst Bosky Passage effect: too much Dominion

Don’t fuck around and get this while also having the Substantial Collapse paradigm. Whole map gonna have fart clouds on it. Pain.

Best new Relic: ‘Devotion’

Is it game breaking? No. But chip damage on enemies for healing racks up!

Worst new Relic: Frozen Whetstone

Way to make Bladedance absolutely useless LMFAO like honestly if there’s one thing is4 is good at is giving really good relics some disappointing handicaps.

Okay. Now onto the bosses!

Samivilinn aka that bigass ice mountain with an attitude

Very straightforward. Typhon will trivialize this boss and Reedalter will trivialize the stage itself by clearing it of all the ice in one s3 activation. The enemies on the right hand side tend to be more annoying to corral but if you have Eyjalter with her s3 it’ll keep the whole squad across the map healthy enough to push through.

Eikthynir aka the Snowpriest who really wants to be Usain Bolt

Full disclosure; most of my wins against him required creative stacking of Sing fordartals and proper timing/abuse of Goldenglow’s s3 to get him down most of the way before he speedruns the exit. But so many battles have ended up with him blowing past all my blockers with 1% health and me not being able to do shit but watch 😭

Crazelyseon, aka the teleporting Flying Spaghetti Monster

A menace 😭 Invulnerable 90% of the time, warping around the stage, dropping cancer squares of doom, and worst of all the time limit. If you don’t kill this thing soon after it starts warping three times in a row then you’re finished cause it’ll explode. I haven’t felt such a time crunch on an IS boss since BSL.

Best practice is to set up your heaviest hitters at two of its stopping points and only activate the device when it’s overcharged to get the most bang for your buck. You have GOT to time it right tho cause if you get impatient or your DPS gets wiped then the whole stage goes to shit really fast. Once again, I have never beat this boss without an ASPD boost of some kind.

Great Operators for IS4:

Ines - her invisibility reveal is goated

Typhon - really good for general carry on all floors but outside of the ice mountain boss her meta-ness falls off esp at higher ascension levels

Reedalter - her s2 will melt anybody including those Shattered Champions

Eyjaberry - frankly indispensable, her s1 holds it down and her s3 reaches everywhere

FedExecutor - his s2 allows him to dodge most bullshit and he holds his own despite not being able to be directly healed

Virtuosa - def a luxury pick and fairly new but a way better source of Necrosis damage than Valarqvin and just overall very fun to play

Ling - I usually do not play SummonKnights because I don’t have the brain cells but honestly the runs I’ve done with her were solid and fun especially with the Empty Fowlbeast relic

Ho’olheyak - rather mid as a Core Caster but with the relics that boost levitation effects she can actually hold her own

Jessica Wick - her deployable shield can buy you some time against these sprinting mobs

Yato alter: she’s a key FastRedeploynights operator for a reason!

Mlynar - full disclosure; I don’t really use him in IS unless I get him as a temp recruit because while his damage output is unrivaled, I hate how he can’t block shit unless his skill is up

Ethan - a low cost GOAT at crowd control. That Prisoner’s Night stage is trivialized with him

Other random tips:

Avoid the Nameless Hero stage. Please. 😭 If you come across the Always on Alert encounter, just dip. Expeditiously.

When going for the 3rd ending, don’t go in a Scout node until like floor 4. Why? Cause that Routeweave Net will make additional enemies appear in all your stages and it’s best to just put that off till the last moment. By floor 5 if you take the bottom most route the Prophecy node that’s supposed to be the fork to get to Eik’s stage will turn into the one you need to get the Boundless Gift to open up floor 6.

GG’s s3 is garbage for the ice mountain stage. She’ll target every individual ice square before she decides to hit any enemies.

If you pick up the Scarred Amber relic, maximize your slay by stacking hella Plunder or Migrate Fordartals

Always save your best Fordartal combos for end stage bosses! There’s no limit of how many buffs you can stack on a node so take advantage of that.

After a certain Collapse level is reached you won’t get any more Fordartals outside of what you can buy from Cannot or get from a unique Encounter

There are two secret Collapsal Paradigms to unlock. One obscures your operators and the other obscures the enemy health bars and how many life points you have left. Both are fairly annoying. BUT STILL BETTER THAN BAROMETRIC ANAMOLY

#and now we just wait until the Expansion where I revisit this maybe to bitch about that last boss(es) #for my sanity I had to stop doing BN 10+ clears though because it was killing my love for IS #yes the shiny icons on the squads are pretty but the struggle is TEW REAL😭 #明日方舟 #arknights #is4 #expeditioner's joklumarkar