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Thursday, June 2, 2011

Buddy Rush: Botherella's Skills (Update 1.2)

(This article is obsolete. An updated version for Update 1.3 can be found here.)

Update 1.2 has more description for the skills. As such, the previously unknown effects of certain skills, such as Botherella's Charity skill, have now been explained. That is, unless one's skill is at level 15, where there would be one big colorful 'Master' instead of the description. At least, that is true for the skills of other characters that I have at level 15.

So for those of you with Charity (or any other of Botherella's skills) at level 15, I have the screenshot of the skills below, before level-15. I have also included what I noticed about the skills.
Summon
Botherella's Summon skill calls forth Wolfgang (or Wolfgan as he is called in Betty Jr's introduction). Wolfgang acts like an additional buddy who will attack Oblins. However, he is a little more independent and will stay behind even when the party flees battle (by clicking rapidly on an empty space) to regroup.

Wolfgang has a special attack: his bite, where he will affix himself onto an Oblin for a brief period of time. Wolfgang's bite has an interrupt effect, like Nagne's Leaf Slash. Oblins interrupted while performing a skill will redo its skill again from the start, even if the damage-dealing portion of the skill has been done. Thus, if interrupted at the wrong time, the target can potentially perform its skill twice, which is bad if the target is a boss attempting its ultimate attack.

Wolfgang's bite distracts its target for a while, buying more time than Nagne's Leaf Slash. And certain enemies, such as the Pelicano brothers, are immune to the interrupt effect.

New in Update 1.2: Wolfgang summoned by the main character can pick up mission items (not treasure chests and potions) and activate mission events, but only in Chapter 8.

Beware the long casting time of Summon. Do not cast while Botherella is in danger of being stunned. Otherwise the skill may be canceled and she has to wait for the long CoolTime to try again.

There is evidence that suggests that increasing Botherella's stats (Att, Def and HP) will increase Wolfgang's stats. This has yet to be confirmed. An easy experiment to see the effect is to take three Botherellas with different stats on a mission and see how long their Wolfgangs last compared to each other.
Curse
Curse reduces the Att and Def of Oblins around Botherella. The area of affect increases with skill level. At level 10, the skill covers all but the back of the screen.

From my observation, the reduction in Oblins' Def is more effective with high Hit Speed and skills that hit multiple times like Worrier's Chopchop and Skully's Spiral Shots. This is because the reduction in Def affects each individual hit. The effect is relatively less with skills that deal one high-damage hit like Nagne's Kiss of Death. Those skills already have high damage due to high SkillPow and possibly high Att. Thus, the reduction in Def does not result in a large increase in final damage.

It is uncertain with skills that deal many, many little damage like Thornbush as Def may not be applied 100% against it. No conclusion can be made without the mathematics involved in such skills. Or lots of observation and statistics.

At high skill levels, Oblins who are Curse-d tend to die quick. In addition, they do little damage due to reduced Att. This makes a tough battle much easier. In addition to that, less HP will be lost by the members of the party.

However, bosses are less affected by this skill. Curse lasts for a much shorter duration and it may be possible that the penalties each boss suffers is less, way less. But the bosses are still affected, so expect a little extra damage.

In Raid Mode, it affects the extras normally so they can be defeated quickly for potions. Strangely, the two giant Reaplins at the start of Farjegnon's Raid shake off Curse rather quickly.
Thornbush
Thornbush is Botherella's only offensive skill. It does area-effect damage. And in addition to direct damage, it poisons, doing extra damage over time to affected targets.

As with all offensive skills, increasing Att also increases the damage done by Thornbush. If Thornbush is used untargeted, Botherella will aim for a spot in front of her. 

To target an Oblin simply click on it. To use this (or any) skill untargeted, click on the ground and drag in the direction you wish to attack. Then, as Botherella faces that direction, activate the skill.

Incidentally, a really strong version of Thornbush can be seen in Raid Mode when an overpowered Thornbush with a huge area of effect (larger than the SFX) is cast by a Boorseye main character (by activating certain pillars). With high Att. And Sneak active. And Att buffs (Aikilu's Roar and Attack Up gems).
Charity
Update 1.2 added some more descriptions to the Charity skill. Charity buffs Botherella's Curse and Thornbush skills, increasing the durations, giving more time to defeat the affected Oblins. It also claims to increase the effectiveness of Curse but I am too stingy to reallocate my skill points just to experiment. :p

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