Thread: HBC's FKG 6* Tier List

I have waited for this discussion cause we don't talk about SB much. I have got Dogwood a month ago and have a little bit experience using her. Just to say it right now: I see enormous potential in her!!!

Before i talk about Dogwood as a Unit i want to talk about Solarblast in general cause this section will play a big role in her Final Grading.

About Solarblast:

In my opinion SB is one of the strongest Archetypes in the entire game. Especially for Dolphins or Sharks cause for all other Archetypes you'll need Skill Levels and Equipment Slots to achieve their Full Potential. You don't need those for Solarblast Teams (still helps the girls increasing their damage outside of the Solarblast Phase) cause their Damage isn't dependant on stats. Getting Equipment Slots etc. might not be a problem for whales but for us dolphins it definetely is.

Here is a picture demonstrating how much damage a dedicated Solarblast Team can cause:


Here is the damage formula btw:
[ (Overall Force of your parties) / (10 * Number of your own parties [1 ~ 4]) - (enemy's defense / 4) ] * [1.01 + 0.01 * (Number of your own parties [1 ~ 4]) ] * (Ability Multiplier)

SB Girls are also really helpfull on Whaleship battles (which are some of the hardest maps in the entire game especially the new Maps where Whaleship Bosses attack 4 times in a row) cause they fill your Gauge much faster (optimum is 300% of course) allowing you to fire of a devastating SB at the start of each Whaleship Boss Encounter. That allows you to fill the stagger meter much faster.
The only real downside of SB Teams is that you can't use them on Raidboss Battles. But is that really worth mentioning?
I don't think so cause it doesn't really matter how good your team performs on simple Raid Bosses. You don't get anything if you nuke them.

But now let us begin with Dogwood's Grading, shall we?

Stats: (S-Tier)

20186 HP, 8164 Atk and 3190 Defense. WOW. Dogwood's stats are freakin amazing and balanced. Good HP, high Attack (which is usefull for her Ability set) and nice defense. She has one of the highest Total Power in the entire game.

Skill Damage and Skill Activation: (B-Tier)

Deals 3.8x damage to 2 enemies
24% (Lv1) → 34% (Lv5)

Her Skill Damage is pretty good for harder maps if you encounter two bosses at the same time. Her Skill Activation is nothing worth mentioning to be honest. 24 % on Level 1 and 34 % on Level 5 is the weakest Act. Rate amongst Rainbows. This section is good, not amazing though.

Abilities: (S-)

Starts the subjugation with the Light Gauge 100% filled.
Remember how often we criticised this Ability??? Well on a dedicated SolarBlast Girl this Ability is a godsend. Starting with 100 % Light Gauge means you only need another 200 % from other girls and you can fire the strongest possible Solar Blast at the start of each Map.
She is the only girl granting you 100 %, all other girls fill the meter only by 50 %.

Increases Attack for party members by 25% per 100% Solar Drive used (Up to 75%).
Other than Choco Lily's Ability this Ability works for the whole map. Remember that in the best case Scenario you have 300 % Light Gauge at the start of each map making this Ability an instant 75 % Atk increase for the whole party!!!

Increases Solar Drive's effectiveness by 70%.
Another Staple for SB Girls. Increases the effectiveness of your SB.

Increases Skill Activation Rate for party members up to 1.2x based on each member's affection.
Nice to have especially if you use a First Turn Skill Activation SB Squad.

In all honesty the only real downside of her Ability Package: She only has four Abilities. However The sheer power of those Abilities compensates for that.

Teambuilding:

The basic premise is to pair her up with other SB-Girls which have the following Abilities:

Increases Solar Drive's effectiveness by 70%. Bread and Butter for SB. Without it SB doesn't function properly.
Starts the subjugation with the Light Gauge 50% filled. If you want to maximize SB you want to be sure to fire it off (at 300%) asap. This Ability enables that.
Increases Shine Crystal drop rates for party members by 25%. It's nice to have this Ability. Collects necessary Shine Crystals faster which allows you to use SB more frequently.

Recommendation: Dogwood+Scotch Broom make an excellent SB Core. Scotch Broom also has the "increased Atk per Solar Blast" Ability. It's a little bit worse though.
After a 300 % Solarblast these two girls alone buff your group atk for 155%!!!

Another Recommendation:
Coral Bush for First Turn Action.

Conclusion:
Dogwood is the queen of SB. In my opinion one of the strongest Archetype in the entire game.
You could argue that she ain't broken by herself but she is the stable in every SB Team and contributes the most to the success of this broken Archetype (Remember Solar Blast deals insane damage).
This might shock some of you but i wholeheartedly believe Dogwood belongs to S-Tier and i stand by it.

Final Verdict:
S-

I waited for Dogwood. I'm not a big fan of her (she was even my least favorite 6* on Nutaku a long time ago) but she has some unique assets. Let's go! (with Paper Only tag)

Stats:
HP: She has average HP with 20,186. That's not bad but not good. But, due to her game style, she don't really need good stats.
ATK: She is in the top girls here. And that's good because it works well with her abilities.
DEF: Same as ATK. She has a good DEF stats but she don't really need it after all.

Skill
3.8x damage to 2 enemies, 34% skill activation.
It's my least favorite skill type (or should I say, the only one I don't like at all and I avoid as much as possible) so, I can't say it's a good point for her. Damage to 2 enemies is too... not effective. Damages are too low for a single target (like big lonely bosses) and can't hit everyone in pests groups (unless it's a group of 2 pests but that's a bit rare).
But, it's a not that bad ability on Aquashadow missions since some of them has groups of 2 bosses.

Abilities
And that's where and why she shines. A lot. Like the sun. I don't know where I can start. I will just start with the easiest ability I guess.

x1.2 skill rate for all
Same like every girls with that ability. It's good. Very common but always apreciated. For her and above all for her team mates.

+70% Solar Blast damages
SB is too underrated. Especially now with the 300% gauge. The only flaw of this game style is the need of a full 6* team to be efficient. You can't use 5* as placeholder or you will loose too much power unlest Crit team or Counter Team.
I don't know how it works exactly but SB damages is not an addition of all SB damages multipliers. Two +70% SB damages don't give you +140% but more. That's mean, +70% will give +70% if she is alone (and that's not that awesome) but a lot more if you use more and more SB girls. And that' how you reach insane amount of damages.
(I tried with my 5*. I should reach +100% with 3 +20%, one +15% and one +25% but it give me +148%).
Based on my test it seems it's: current SB bonus + xx% (bonus given by the girl) + 0.xx * current SB bonus.
With bit more maths (please stay here!) on my example we have:
We start with a +0% SB bonus
1st girl (+20% SB):
0% + 20% + 0.0 * 20% = +20% SB damages
2nd girl (+20% SB):
20% + 20% + 0.20 * 20% = +44% SB damages
3rd girl (+20% SB):
44% + 20% + 0.20 * 44% = +72.8% SB damages
4th girl (+15% SB):
72.8% + 15% +0.15 * 72.8% = +98.72% SB damages
5th girl (+25% SB):
98.72% + 25% + 0.25 * 98.72 = +148.4% SB damages.
And that's how we reach our +148% insead of the +100% expected. I hope I'm clear with how SB seems to be calculated. Because this is why SB team are so powerful.

Now, back to our dear Dogwood and her Solar Blast dream team. If every girl bring a +70% SB damages we will have a little +2314% SB damages if my formula is right and if there is no SB damages cap. A full 6* SB team gives you a bit more than 23 times more damages than a single 100% blast. And that's a lot of damages.

+25% ATK each 100% SB used
That's sound not good the first time but we are in a SB team. It's easy to reach 300% SB at the start of the mission. Above that, you don't even need to use all the SB gauge fillers in your SB team. You can put some of them in others teams (even if thoses teams will be a bit weaker) and pick all the bests girls for your SB team.
That's said, it will just give you +75% ATK for the whole team at the start of the fight. Just enough to finish the bosses if SB don't burned their bones.

Start with 100% filled gauge
It's just twice the highest SB filling for a 6*. Just with one Dogwood, you have 1/3 for the needed gauge to get her highest ATK boost and a broken ATK. It's the best SB filling of the whole game. That's awesome. Nothing more to say about that.

Team Build
Maybe her worst default. she is a Solar Blast girls, she remains to the solar Blast family and she will never leave it. SB girls alones are just meh girls. They will be OP only when they work together. And that's also why a SB team is harder to build. You must use the bests girls to reach the best build. Unless the other styles where you have a lot of possible builds, SB is more brainless. Get as much SB boost possible + Dogwood, click the death button and wait until the end.

Conclusion
SB is underrated, Dogwood is underrated. By herself she is not that strong unless some owerknown superstars but with the right friends she can be more murderous than every Crit team (almost).
Her abilities are perfect and she became the symbol of Solar Blast (at least for me) like Saffron is the Symbol of Counter.

Final verdict:
In almost every Final Verdict I say I put girls on S tier onyl if they are able to do all by herselves and carry their teams to victory but that time, even if Dogwood can't do that, I will give a her S Tier anyway.
It's not the same S Tier than Kerria or Saffron. If we rate her with the same criteria, she is not even B Tier. But She deserves a S Tier for two reasons. First, Solar Blast is extremely powerful if you useit correctly. And Dogwood is the best SB user, far over all the others.
Second, Dogwood is THE best Solar Blast girl and the only one with 100% gauge filled ability. She is THE must have for EVERY Solar Blast team just like Saffron is the must have for every Counter Team. You can't build a serious Solar Blast team without Dogwood. That's all. And I have no waifu feeling about Dogwood.

Wow, 2 S-tier on the girl I least expected? This is quite a surprise! Let's see if I ended up in the same conclusion or not.

Hanamizuki or well, Dogwood is much less mouthful. Dogwood is very underappreciated girl back then, and even now some would think she is not so good. But if you are like me, you will see her VERY often in ally list even not in dedicated SD team. And there's a reason for it. So now why don't we see why Dogwood is so popular?

1. Raw stat: Her base stat is very all-round, balanced, and on the higher end. She also has high speed to balance or break team speed as well. Every stat is higher than my cut off and it help her while waiting for solar drive gauge to filled up. Don't underestimated her outside of SD.
Grading: S-

2. Skill: deal 3.8x damage on 2 targets with 24-34% Now with newly rebuff for many girls it quite pale compare to others. It can do the job however.
Grading: B+

3. Abilities: This section is the most difficult to write because unless you experience the power of her abilities yourself, she's extremely pale on book. Dogwood will show you she's not just American wannabe however...
-1.2 Skill act boost is common, but it will help you a lot while you wait for SD gauge to filled. And if you place Dogwood in any team as wild card, then it will help you as usual.
-The rest three abilities sync together very well so I will group them as one. First you have 100% SD gauge filled at start of mission. We trash talked this ability back then because it help almost nothing to the character, this time is different, not only it help a lot in SD build it also help increasing atk for the team with her increases Attack for party members by 25% per 100% Solar Drive used and it capped at 75% max. This ability made Dogwood worth as wild card in any team if you don't have full team yet because... well 75% atk boost unconditional is great right?
The last ability is of course, needed for SD team with 70% damage boost for SD With maotd already calculated damage for me you will see why SD is great when stacked enough. And well, Dogwood is the cornerstone of this build. Her ability helped a lot in Whaleship stage as well.
Grading: S (for SD team, otherwise A- as wild card)

Team building: Obviously than any obvious, Dogwood is staple if not cornerstone of SD team. You can however, use her as wild card in any team if you need big atk boost or skill act boost. She is extremely valuable in whaleship stage as Wutan had said, 100% gauge filled means only 200% to go for full blast and even 1 blast can change between win and lose now that boss in whaleship stage can whoop you hard 4 times a turn. So the quicker you can break boss, the better chance for you to win, and Dogwood can help you turns the tide of battle with her ability.

Final Verdict: S as S in our meaning goes with 'turn the tide of battle' and 'deals enough damage to nuke everything' and Dogwood fit the first condition and partly fit the second. I already describe why she can turn the tide of battle (whaleship only though) and with optimal SD team, she can deal huge, def ignored damage to any bosses. So she deserved the first S in the rainbow army.

Extra: Good god I cannot described how much I used to hate her because I thought SD was suck. (It is now though, but with correct setup it becomes super broken instead) It turned out, I can never be more wrong. When I first got her from Danjou ticket I felt 'meh, her?' as I never a fan of SD. She proved me wrong however as she carry the team so well with huge atk boost. When SD was revamped and you can stack it up to 300%, her worth went skyrocket as she became super popular with helper team. Even her voice which I used to loath becomes very cute and soothing too. I guess Dogwood turns form 'bad first impression' to 'very dearly girl' in my team. with Stock as close second. Which will be talked about if this forum stay until then.

A bit late but at last.
Aint no one chainin this rebel mofu >:3

Just kidding. So lets get to it and make it quick this time:

Anemone
a.k.a Anewaifu

Her stats are well spread and while some may say her def or Hp is to low for a counter girl..... Anemone is no longer just a counter girl (we will get to that later so hang on). She is a bit on the slower side of things with only 400 speed though.

Skills:
3x 1.8 to single random enemy and then 0.5 to all after wards.
While the 0.5 after doesnt seem like much, thats still an additional hit. Other girls with this skill do not have that, so thats Anemones unique something.
Activation rate is the same as usual, nothing to write home about nor be ashamed of.

Abylities:

Ok here its where it gets interesting:

Standard DMG Buff - of whooping 30% ! Much stronger than the usual 22% so definitely a plus

Counter/Super counter at 4x. Not the strongest, but not the weakest either. Was pretty good back in the day though.

Defense/Guard/Guts - this is one of the best skills in game since its 3 different skills put into one and stucks well with any girl really, the higher her defense the better. Plus it benefits the whole team as well.

Crit Rate and Damage : Ok so Anewaifu got buffed not relatively recently and this turned her into semi broken nonsense as far as skill in vacuum go.
She has a 30% activation rate and 40% Crit damage. Holy shit of the shitting stone. I believe there are maybe two other girls who have this skill this high (Kuko and Loquat) in both rate and dmg. Insane

Ok so the thing with Anewaifu is that for a long time she was one of the prime Counter girls with nice Active ability. This all changes when she underwent a massive overhaul with her Bloom that turned her into a Crit girl. Not half assed one, not semi decent one, but a full fledged Crit girl that has also Full Fledged Counter due the Def/Guts buff.

This by itself makes her broken. Not in the damage terms but in terms of identity and her depoyment in squads. Both Crit and Counter are two prime skills and you do not put them together. Especially not if both parts of the skill setup have its secondary buffing skill (Crit Rate and Damage. Counter and Def buff).

I am tempted to give her S- tier simply because of the skill setup. Its more like A++ Or S--. Somewhere in the middle. But personally I think with the overall utility and the way she has been setup Anemone is S tier albeit of a different sort than either Saffron or Kerria.

**
Now for waifu factor.... well... its Anewaifu. What shoul i say
This girl has 2 or 3 additional forms, due to how popular she is. And only after several new girls finally came out she lost her prime position in the popularity poll. Finally. Honestly I didnt like her for a looong long time simply due to the crazy hype everyone sprouted around her. I think it wasnt justified. Her personality is on the warm/shy/composed side of things. Her looks are OK-ish, though nothing that literally speaks to me. But she is not unlikebale.
I have the Miko version and that one is plenty cute. But I have a weakness for the whole Miko aesthetics and such. I dont think I have the second version of her... not even sure what it was, but eh.
Anewaifu is just....there. She is not the shining diamond, but nor is she the dirty coal. She is the ever present and dependable like a solid rock and stone. Always with you, always prepared and ready. Always useful. She just ...IS.
And sometimes that is all you need.

Don't grab the bull by the horns as they say. Let's take a look at Dogwood

Analysis

Her stats are really good all around. Not the greatest of HP but still decent enough. Very solid defense stat. But wow! That ATK is really something to behold. They really didn't give her any Achilles Heel when it came to her stats. Very nice! While her skill is somewhat boring compared to the flashy skills of girls today, it's easy to forget she was still one of the early girls. So I'll give her a pass on that. But it does perform nicely and hitting to enemies for 3.8x DMG

As far as skills go this is probably one of the very few, if not only, girls to make effective use of the solar gauge. Increasing her already monstrous ATK and also her team mates every time by 25% by every 100% solar blast used. So damn. If you save up through the map to build up your gauge, you can trigger the solar blast and BOOM! You instantly maxed out the skill boost for that tough last boss. Very nice! She starts her with her gauge at 100%, much better than pitiful 30% like some girls. But she also increases its effectiveness by 70%. So not only will she hit harder after using solar blast, but she also makes solar blast work better too. Then the standard skill activation rate.

Overall, I can see why she gets so much love so far in these votes. I used to hear a lot that she, like Cactus, was not very good from early on. But they sure turned her around. I still stand by my statement that even with the 300% improvement to solar gauge, it is still not all that great for late game users. Most solar girls are trashed as well with the solar skills they get stuck with. So I'm not a big fan. But this? Dogwood shows how it is done right! FKG devs should take not and maybe make these kind of improvements to other girls they've essentially hurt with much lower lackluster solar skills. Decision: S Tier

Waifu Judgement
Oh wow! This girl has got some spice to her! In 2 out of her 3 artworks, she is winking at you with a big ol' smile. Yeah, she knows she's got the look. Long, beautiful pink hair. Small shorts/skirts around that shapely waist. Always exposing that sexy midriff. And a nice pair of round bouncy breasts. Magnificent! The overall package is one to adore and I can easily see why people would gush over her. S Tier

Dogwood Discussion is over!

GZ Dogwood.
You are the first girl which was able to snag herself a place at the top of the food chain

S-Tier it is!

Next Girl:

http://flowerknight.wikia.com/wiki/Daisy
Deadline: 15.07.2018

Looks like i have to take the first step here. I don't have Daisy so it's paper verdict only. Well i have her on Nutaku but that obviously doesn't count evaluating her on the DMM version.

Stats:

19636 HP
Her HP is on the lower end of the spectrum. There are still 22 natural Rainbows which have worse HP than her.

8256 Atk
Fantastic. She has one of the highest Atk in the entire game (Rank 8). This stat is the most important for her Skillset.

2874 Defense
Mediocre Defense. Still 30 Rainbows with worse defense stat than her.

Rating: I will give B+ here just because her Atk stat is so good and the most important stat for her.

Skillactivation and Skilldamage:

Skilldamage: Deals 3.6x damage to 2 enemies
Could come in handy for harder maps which feature 2 bosses instead of one.

Skill Activation: 30% (Lv1) → 40% (Lv5)
The only girl with better Skill.Act. is Cactus/Saboten. This is definetely a strong point for Daisy. Really good.

Rating: I like this section. Sure hitting only two enemies isn't as strong as Singletarget/MultipleHit nor has it the wide range of AOE Skills which hit all Enemies at once.
But like i said on some maps (with 2 bosses) it could come in handy. However her Main Selling Point here is her insane Skill.Act.
A

Abilities:

So here we are. Before i continue evaluating her it has to be said that there are only two other First Turn Girls for Crit Squads in the game atm. In my opinion both of these Girls outclass her heavily in terms of Abilities.

The two girls in question: http://flowerknight.wikia.com/wiki/Hollyhock
http://flowerknight.wikia.com/wiki/Wheat

I would give Hollyhock a final rating of B+ and Wheat a solid B. So this will definetely play a big role in Daisy's Final Rating.

Lets move on to Daisy's Abilities, shall we?

Increases Attack for party members by 35%.
Definetely her strong point here. It's a nice atk buff and way above average.

Increases Defense for party members by 14%, increases damage reduction when defending by 2.1%, and allows oneself to resist fainting with 1 HP remaining up to 3 times per battle.
Why??? Judging her other Abilities she clearly belongs to First Turn Crit Squads and that Ability does absolutely nothing increasing damage output. Also 14% is one of the lowest Def buffs of all Rainbows. Meh.

Increases Critical Activation Rate for party members by 20%.
Standard Crit. Activation Rate Buff. Solid.

Increases Skill Activation Rate for party members by 1.65x on turn 1.
Standard for First Turn Girls. Without that Ability First Turn Squads would not exist.

Increases Critical Damage for party members by 15%.
Way to weak Crit Damage Buff if you compare it to the Crit Buffs the other two First Turn Girls offer.

Rating: Sry Daisy but that's your worst section (also the section i value the most). You are heavily outclassed by your competition here.
C

Conclusion:

Daisy has fantastic Attack and a really nice Skillactivation/Skilldamage package.
However in terms of Abilites she is heavily outclassed by her Competition in Form of Hollyhock and Wheat. These two just buff Crit Teams way better.
I especially value the Ability Section cause at the end of the day this section determines a Knight's usefulness the most (I would rate SkillActivation/SkillDamage as the second most important section and Stats be the third place in terms of importance).
Maybe i am a bit harsh but since i would put both Hollyhock and Wheat in B-Tier i decided to put Daisy in C-Tier.

Final Verdict:
C+