In-Depth Analysis: Dragonbound/Dragon Caller Machine

Introduction
The long-awaited DBDC is finally here. It's amusing that this is the blog's first post and first REM review, as pretty much every special REM we receive in the future will be worse than this one -- all downhill from here, apparently! This machine is littered with great cards that excel in their niches, with very few mediocre rolls and just one "bad" card. In particular, Li and Kiri are the treasures of an already stacked machine. Li is our first inheritable leader swap, a completely gamechanging mechanic that is discussed more below. Kiri has incredible and unique potential as a sub, lead, or assist, something that is not true of almost any other card in the game.

(No, we didn't forget about Ideal. For most players, Ideal is a luxury -- a gorgeous powerhouse of a luxury, but still a luxury. She is not the true prize of this machine.)

DBDC also features some of the most interestingly designed cards that I've ever seen GungHo attempt, and huge props to them for this. Tardis and Kiri in particular really caught our eye as having creative and well-designed combinations of leader skill, active skill, and awakenings. The machine offers novelty, but it's good novelty, and quite honestly, that almost makes us as happy as the quality of the machine itself.

Even though it is a 10-stone REM, players of all skill and progression levels should be aiming to do several pulls in DBDC, as it is just that good. Farmers will also appreciate what it has to offer, and both of us will be dumping quite a few rolls into the machine.

Note that none of the Neys are in this review as they are already available from the standard REM. It's honestly kind of annoying that any Ney can be rolled at all, both because she is normally available and because she is straight-up worse than almost every other roll. The ultimate troll diamond.

Card Ratings and Analyses

You can click on a rarity or a card's name to jump to the corresponding section of analysis. The arrow ↑ at the bottom right of each analysis will take you back up here. Please see this page for an explanation of the rating criteria.

Rarity	Card	Sub	Lead	Assist	Overall
7	Ideal (Light)	S	B	A-	A
	Ideal (Dark)	B+	A	A-	A-
6	Enra	S-	A-	B	A
	Weld	B	B+	B+	B
	Tardis*	S	A	F	S-
	Li*	C	D	S	S
	Nees	B+	C+	B+	B+
5	No. 6*	S	C-	B-	S
	Kiri*	S	A	S	S
	Shazel*	S-	B-	B-	S-
	Rathios	C+	C+	B	B-
	Kulia	C	D	D+	C

   * denotes a card with substantial or unique (or both) farming usage.

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Light Ideal [Sub: S | Lead: B | Assist: A- | Overall: A]

HP: 4206 | ATK: 1852 | RCV: 1503 | WT: 1292 | Dragon/Healer LS: 2.5x ATK when 3 colors (2 colors + Heal) attack at once, 13x when 5 colors + Heal; Extends time to move Orbs by 3 secs. [1/169/1] AS: Delays enemies' action by 2 turns; changes all Orbs to 5 colors + Heal Orbs. [CD: 13]

Overview. Even though Dark Ideal evolves from Light Ideal, we evaluate them as different cards because they serve different purposes and the Diamond Dragon Fruit evo mat is not trivial to obtain. This is the sub form, and man, what a sub it is. With stats that make revos look like trash and an awakening lineup straight out of your dreams, she is nearly as powerful as she is cute. Her usage is straightforward: put her on an appropriate team, pick content that doesn't emphasize damage control, and watch enemies melt.

If you are unsure of which form to make, keep your Ideal in Light form. Light Ideal is stronger overall and Diamond Dragon Fruits are difficult to obtain.

Sub. Unparalleled. If you are aiming to blast enemies to bits, there is no better all-purpose sub for it. With nearly 1300 weighted and three 7c awakenings, her damage is ludicrous. It's amusing that the other form is the one with the Rainbow Defense Break awakening, since Light Ideal can often simply smash through high defense spawns straight-up. This is especially valuable in content that emphasizes damage checks instead of damage control (ie. non-Arena content). Having access to two team HP awakenings and functionally the best RCV stat in the game (no, neither Apolluo nor the 2000 Days TAMADRA are functional cards) is just icing on the cake. Note that she does come with the slight caveat of essentially requiring multiple Fujin actives to run in Arena-style content, but this is honestly a small price to pay for excelling everywhere else.

Lead. A pure rainbow lead with no typing or other conditionals and a reasonable multiplier. This LS is strong but not notable, and is comparable to leads such as Yuna or either Roots form. The 3 seconds of extra move time is a nice touch, which gets even nicer with two Ideal leads. You can plausibly mix Ideal with any of these or similar leads and clear content through Arena 3 with the proper setup. Triple 7c gives her a ton of damage no matter where she is on a team. She certainly does not excel as a lead, especially compared to Dark Ideal, but can hold her own.

Assist. Assisting Light Ideal is a bit sad, since much of the time you'd rather sub her instead and use her active that way. However, her active is one of the best for rainbow. GungHo has been releasing many challenges and dungeons featuring spawns who are both delayable and too tanky to want to reasonably one-shot, and Ideal's active gives rainbow teams a highly efficient answer to this trend. The active is still usable for this purpose on some kinds of combo teams. Outside of this, you may not want to inherit Ideal even as a delay, since rainbow boards tend to be unreliable and low damage for other types of leaders.

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Dark Ideal [Sub: B+ | Lead: A | Assist: A- | Overall: A-]

HP: 4512 | ATK: 3500 | RCV: 431 | WT: 1294 | Dragon/Devil LS: 3x ATK when 2 combos, 15x when 10+ combos; Extends time to move Orbs by 3 secs. [1/225/1] AS: Delays enemies' action by 2 turns; changes all Orbs to 5 colors + Heal Orbs. [CD: 13]

Overview. Do not make the mistake of thinking that this card is anything like Light Ideal. This evolution is not a direct upgrade -- Dark Ideal serves a totally different purpose. Also, for some reason, GungHo thought it would be neat to throw the Rainbow Defense Break awakening on the one with a combo LS instead of the one with rainbow LS. Yeah, we don't get it either.

Sub. If you are looking for a sub, don't make this. This isn't to say Dark Ideal is a bad sub, as her awakenings, active, and titanic stats can bring a lot to the table. Unlike Light Ideal, however, she does not come close to being the best option on any team, and nearly all of the time you'd rather just have Light Ideal instead. Her ridiculous Attack stat also hinders her ability to hit enemies with low absorb/void thresholds. Other cards with TPA or 7c can damage control by opting not to activate said awakening, but there is no way to turn off Ideal's 3500 base Attack, which can prove problematic at times. Not a bad sub, just not an exceptional one.

Lead. This is definitively the leader form. Interestingly, Dark Ideal is one of the only straight-up combo leads in the game -- no active clause, no attribute requirement, no need for multiplayer. Only combo count. As such, she can run any subs whatsoever, and is a powerful option for 7x6 swaps with Li (more on 7x6 swapping in Li's section). Her awakenings are also favorable, as she supports any lead pair with +10% team HP and +20% team RCV. As she has a reasonably good damage multi but no tank multis, look to swap in something with HP/RCV multis. The time extend component of the leader skill is a sweet bonus, granting the equivalent of 6 TEs. Properly utilized in this way, Dark Ideal can lead teams capable of all content. That said, if you are not aiming to run 7x6 swap pairings, you almost certainly should not make Dark Ideal, as the opportunity cost is too much.

Assist. See Light Ideal; the active does not change when Ideal is evolved. It might be tempting to make Dark Ideal to inherit for stats -- particularly that massive Attack on something like Zeromus. Don't do this. Samurai Zaerog's equip evolution gives more Attack, is farmable, and will be in NA soon.

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Enra [Sub: S- | Lead : A- | Assist: B | Overall: A]

HP: 5711 | ATK: 1603 | RCV: 325 | WT: 1000 | Dragon/Devil LS: 6x ATK when HP is 80% or more, 2x ATK & RCV when HP is 79% or less; 2x ATK & 25% reduced damage when 2+ Fire combos. [1/144/1 or 1/16/4, 43.75% shield] AS: Changes Water & Dark Orbs to Fire, Jammers & Poison Orbs to Heal. [CD: 9]

Overview. Enra's a real powerhouse. This is one of NA's first triple 7c cards, and she is here to make her mark. With a solid stat distribution and a stellar active to boot, Enra will demolish your enemies and is a fine addition to nearly any team that doesn't care about damage control. Unbindability is just the icing on the cake of an already spectacular card. Just watch the lack of TE if you're bad at this game like irinya is.

Sub. Two words: she hurts. Three more words: she really hurts. Just for making seven combos, Enra's Attack stat hits nearly 17k. Her potential as a sub is straightforward: in any situation where combos and huge damage are rewarded, she's a superstar. Three 7c awakenings might seem like overkill for most things, but they are welcome in today's endgame dungeons and give her strong usability on today's color-agnostic combo teams (ex. Blue Hunter). If you are subbing her on such a team, it may be nice to inherit something over her base active that doesn't flood the board as much. Rare colors and unbindability are just icing.

If you are an early/midgame player and looking to stick her on your Krishna/Shiva/etc. team, you should just lead with her instead. Her sub potential on most midgame teams is simply overshadowed by her being NA's best non-farming Fire lead.

Lead. Though her LS might at first glance look like an inferior Yog, she is actually a much better lead than Yog for most content. The main reason for this is her RCV multiplier below the 80% health threshold. It is typically quite difficult for a Yog team to heal above 80% if they get knocked significantly below it, often forcing them to burn actives to deal damage and stay alive. Enra suffers much less from this problem, as a passive 4x RCV is almost always good enough for a full heal. Her damage multiplier, though only slightly above average, is more than made up for by how much of a powerhouse she herself is. If you roll her and have a decent box to support her with, definitely give her a spin. Her damage control is about as bad as Yog's, which can make Arena 3 in particular quite tricky without Fujin-style actives, but she can stomp most other content up to endgame dungeons and challenges.

(Note that Yog is still the best choice for Multiplayer Descended Rush, as his subpool fits that dungeon much better.)

Assist. Enra is a decent and straightforward assist, though in most cases her sub value so far outstrips her assist value that assisting her is a bit of a waste. Note that if you are using her as a hazard clear, she will not give you a kill board on Beelzebub, as she breaks hazards into hearts.

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Weld [Sub: B | Lead: B+ | Assist: B+ | Overall: B]

HP: 3601 | ATK: 2206 | RCV: 596 | WT: 999 | Dragon/Attacker LS: 3x ATK & RCV, but can't erase 3 connected orbs; 3.5x ATK, 25% reduced damage when Water & Fire attack at once. [1/110.25/9, 43.75% shield] AS: Delays enemies' action by 1 turn; changes all Orbs to Fire, Water, & Heal Orbs. [CD: 11]

Overview. What a strange card. Weld does have a lot going for him in his high stat total, powerful awakenings, reasonably good leader skill, and great active. These features make him a natural choice for the sadly few teams that can use water TPAs, including himself. Most water TPA leads are midgame leads, and so he is a great roll for early/midgame players with reasonable water boxes. Moving into the lategame, Weld's relevance shifts to his active and his equip evolution.

Sub. Weld is a numerically solid but slightly awkward sub due to the lack of fitting team archetypes. Some of the teams that would greatly benefit from subbing him (ex. Revo Hermes/Sun Quan) are better off just leading with him instead. He shines the most on mid-game Water TPA teams, such as Rukia, Revo Lakshmi, and Weld himself. Beyond this, however, he starts to lose steam, as teams that demand Water TPAs aren't common nor effective in the endgame. Weld's best endgame home is probably on Blue Hunter, though a sub with 7c instead of TPA would often be preferred.

Lead. For those not averse to the match-4 style, Weld can make for a quite capable lead. Simple activation and a sky-high RCV multiplier allow him to brutalize essentially all early-game and mid-game content. In Arena-level dungeons, Weld will run into the same annoyances with absorb shields and combo shields that all match-4 leads have; even so, it is possible (though annoying) to kill all of Arena 3's absorb spawns without a Fujin-style active. (The exact method is team dependent, of course.) He will begin to falter in content beyond Arena 3 due to his average multiplier and the natural limitations of the match-4 playstyle.

As far as subs go, Scheat blows all other Weld subs out of the water as far as damage goes, as you will be hitting unbelievable numbers with just a TPA. Orochi is also just about perfect for this team, with less damage than Scheat but an incredible stat and awakening spread. A dupe Weld, though having average at best HP, has an excellent awakening distribution and active for the team as well. Look for TPAs, high HP, and TE in your subs of choice.

Assist. Weld's active is easily his most endgame-relevant feature and can see use as an assist in all sorts of red and blue teams. An Urd board bundled with delay is more useful than it might sound, since GungHo has been releasing many challenges and dungeons featuring spawns who are both delayable and too tanky to want to reasonably one-shot. Weld's active, naturally, is great at dealing with this. His Equip Form's main draw is the TPA. It is not worth sacrificing your only Weld for this purpose, but if you have two Welds and no interest in leading him, the equip evolution is a great way to give some of your other TPA cards an extra kick. Scheat (Weld) is the kind of stuff memes are made of.

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Tardis [Sub: S | Lead: A | Assist: F | Overall: S-]

HP: 6021 | ATK: 1842 | RCV: 91 | WT: 1000 | Dragon/Physical LS: 4x ATK for Wood Att., 2x HP for Water Att.; 2.5x ATK on the turn a skill is used. [4/100/1] AS: Extends time to move Orbs by 1 sec for 1 turn. [CD: 1]

Just to get this out of the way first: the F is not a joke or a typo. Please don't inherit him. We will cry.

Overview. Tardis is of high value, and one of the coolest cards in the machine. His most immediately noteworthy feature is a short 1-CD active. This alone is not impressive, as Gunma is a farmable card boasting the same trait. Tardis, however, is a much more powerful base card, with an impressive stat distribution and far superior awakenings. The actual active is much better as well: one second of movetime every turn is substantial and can allow players of intermediate skill to slightly deprioritize TE on their teams, potentially opening up sub options. It also immediately cancels time debuffs, which can be invaluable especially in newer challenge dungeons. Finally, rolling a Tardis saves you the trouble of having to farm Gunma. Screw that thing.

Sub. Tardis will find a home on nearly any team with an active skill clause. If you are running any Anubis pairing, this is pretty much the best there is (though Gunma's autoheals might win out in no-RCV content). If you are irinya, you will be hunting for Tardis to throw on your Revo Isis team because why the heck not. There are many possibilities for this cool dude.

Lead. Tardis is also powerful as a tanky lead. His AS and LS fit each other flawlessly, allowing you to hit the skill use portion every turn without any effort. The lack of an RCV multiplier is partially offset by his three Team RCV awakenings, which sum to a substantial +60% RCV from two leaders and complement his 4x HP well. As the LS does not inherently reward style of matching, you may build a team in any way your box allows.

Note that there is NO damage multiplier for Water, only HP. As such, it is perfectly okay to forgo one or two blue subatts in the name of team synergy. In addition, cards with green subatt will fully benefit from his multiplier, enabling you to potentially use things such as Beach Fujin or Awoken Andromeda if desired. With the right setup, Tardis is capable of clearing end-game content.

Farming. Finally, Tardis has strong farming potential. His LS is strictly superior to Awoken/Revo Liu Bei's, as there is no linked orb requirement and the potential tankiness from subbing Water cards (ex. Whaledor) is substantial. With sufficiently powerful or specialized subs (looking at you, Shazel), it is possible to kill floors with just 3-4 orbs. This allows players to use a rowmaker like Leeza, save 3 orbs while wiping a floor, then press Tardis active and match the remaining 3 orbs to wipe the next floor. Strategies like this allow for selectively high active efficiency as Tardis active will generally always be up at the beginning of a floor to enable your multiplier. He will occasionally suffer in comparison to ALB/RLB by being bindable; a clever farmer will know how to work around these situations. A final quirk is that he is the lowest possible cooldown base for inheriting Li, opening up single or double Ganesha possibilities for numerous dungeons.

In all, an interesting option almost no matter who you are. Can you tell we really like Tardis' design?

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Li [Sub: C | Lead: D | Assist: S | Overall: S]

HP: 4335 | ATK: 2503 | RCV: 195 | WT: 999 | Dragon/Attacker LS: 10x ATK & RCV when HP is 20% or less; Resolve when HP > 50%. [1/100/100] AS: Becomes Team Leader. Changes back when used again. 3x ATK for Dragon Type for 1 turn. [CD: 22]

Overview. This is one of DBDC's two main prizes. As PAD's first inheritable leader swap, Li is a total game changer. Since essentially any monster can be leader swapped, this mechanic is intrinsically strong and somewhat future-proof, as its power is not limited by playstyle, power creep, or metagame. In other words, it is very difficult to think of a way that GungHo could make Li significantly less good, which kind of earns her an S by default. (If you really want to play around with swaps but don't manage to roll Li, it's not the end of the world -- you will get another chance when the inheritable leader swap GFE comes to NA.)

Sub. Honestly not the worst ever since she has okay stats and awakenings, but that active is almost always terrible if you're subbing her, and 22 turns borders on impractical to inherit over. Probably don't sub her though.

Lead. There might be one or two situations in which this is useful ever. Probably don't lead her either.

Assist. The real gamebreaker. Tired of making three crosses on 6x5? Too hard to make 10+ combos on a normal board? Want to increase the consistency and damage of just about every leader you play? Li solves all these problems and more.

As an example, let's say you wanted to play a Rushana team, but in order to more consistently activate and spike harder, you wanted to play her on a 7x6 board. Traditionally, you would be forced to pair with something extremely subpar, like Shazel. The crappiness of Shazel's leader skill undermines most of the benefits of having the 7x6 board in the first place. However, if you have Li, you can sub Rushana (Li) and immediately swap when the inherit comes up. Since the board size cannot change mid-dungeon, you now have Rushana x Rushana on a 7x6 board with none of the downsides. There are plenty of similarly powerful and borderline gamebreaking things that Li can accomplish. Your creativity is the limit.

As previously touched on, Li's flexibility is such that new mechanics could increase her power unpredictably. (This is always sorta true in PAD, but especially so here.) The Rainbow Haste awakening, for instance, was claimed by many to be garbage when it was announced. Reco answers these detractors with some very clean teambuilding and a great concept, clearing Alt. Arena using Halloween Sonia Gran's Rainbow Haste awakening to rapidly charge up an inherited Li. Again, instead of limiting what Li can do, power creep would simply open up more doors and use cases for her.

Farming. Li is uniquely capable of enabling single or double Ganesha farming builds by swapping to a far superior leader. This is most relevant to Tardis, who is a formidable farming lead with a short 1-turn CD. For instance, Ganesha / Tardis (Li) builds are plausible in content such as Machine Hera.

tl;dr -- Li is exceptional. Be very, very happy if you get her.

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Nees [Sub: B+ | Lead: C+ | Assist: B+ | Overall: B]

HP: 9200 | ATK: 2098 | RCV: 196 | WT: 1404 | Dragon/Physical LS: 4x ATK & 25% reduced damage when Dark & Wood attack at once; 2x ATK for each Wood or Light or Dark cross. [1/1024/1, 43.75% shield] AS: Recover 50% of max HP, Awoken Bind by 5 turns; changes Fire Orbs to Dark, Water Orbs to Wood. [CD: 10]

Overall. Screw you, GungHo, for making us analyze this bizarre card. It's honestly difficult to generalize about Nees because of her niche min-maxed nature.

Sub. Very situational. On most teams, her ludicrous weighted is not quite good enough to offset her minimalistic awakening lineup. The main exception is Kamimusubi. Nees' awakenings might be minimalistic, but they do fit what a Kami team would want. Additionally, her outrageous HP complements Kami's low HP nicely and adds considerable tankiness to the team. Finally, the active is tailor-made for Kami as well, as it is a straightforward all-in-one that gives the lead both the HP and the orbs that it needs to stay alive and kicking. All these positives are nearly good enough to push her up to an A- for sub value, but the awakenings are simply not enough.

Nees doesn't fit as well on most other teams, but the awakenings she does have aren't objectively bad and that HP can be used to reach some otherwise impractical thresholds. It would be reasonable, for instance, to toss her on an Anubis x Diablos team to tank a hit in a challenge dungeon that would otherwise demand a shield active.

Lead. A mediocre cross lead. 64x for one cross and 256x for two is pretty bad, though this is offset by her ability to use light crosses in addition to her activation colors. Not totally awful and can definitely clear some content, but quite limited.

Assist. Awoken binds seem to be GungHo's trendy new way of telling us to go screw ourselves. As far as awoken bind clears go, this one's fairly multipurpose and actually pretty good. Bonus points for not having to deal with Nees only having four awakenings. She of course makes a great assist on a Kami team, as described above. She also has situational usage as awoken bind clear on a team like Blue Hunter, who doesn't necessarily care about red or blue orbs Don't forget the substantial stat boost (1019 HP and 152 weighted) from inheriting onto a dark card.

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No. 6 [Sub: S | Lead: C- | Assist: B- | Overall: S]

HP: 3194 | ATK: 2705 | RCV: 119 | WT: 900 | Dragon/Attacker LS: 5x ATK for Fire Att., 1.5x HP for Water Att. [2.25/25/1] AS: No skyfall combos for 1 turn; creates 7 Fire Orbs at random. [CD: 5]

Overview. No. 6's claim to fame is readily apparent: three God killers. His applicability is simple: Demolish Gods. While he cannot carry God Killer latents to augment his damage against gods further like Fenrir Viz, he can wield other killer latents, notably machine, devil and physical. To top things off, he wields a whopping 3200 ATK when hypermaxed, nearly guaranteeing the swift demise of any God-type enemy. No. 6 has little subtlety or nuance: Gods die when he is around.

Sub. Most of No. 6's uses as a sub have been covered above. He is a powerful option to smash through any and all God-type enemies, and does his job exceptionally well. In terms of actual endgame content, he faces stiff competition from the likes of Fenrir Viz, who can do his job similarly well but boasts far better awakenings and stats. He still has many viable uses on any team that can take him, but his best applications are in farming.

No. 6 is not generally recommended for Arenas 1-3. He forces too many Fujin-style actives for not much reward, as the damage from three God killers is completely overkill in Arena.

Lead. No. 6 provides an unconditional 5x to fire, which is great early on (especially in context of his killers), but does not scale well beyond the midgame at all. Outside of being a quality early-game lead, this is one of the worst leader skills in the entire DBDC machine and you almost definitely have something better to use.

Assist. Unremarkable outside of being a no skyfall active and largely replaceable with others unless you really want the orb generation. For what it's worth, this is the most accessible inheritable no skyfall currently in NA, as No. 6 is not hard to roll.

Farming. Straightforward and often irreplaceable usage on teams such as Yamamoto, Glavenus Hunter, Pixel Tyrannos, Pixel Echidna, etc. Also enables no skyfall x Ganesha speedfarming of various low-level descends, owing both to his God killing potential and his high base Attack as a button base. His no skyfall and orb generation active can find utility in allowing teams to dodge damage absorbs/voids. No. 6's only real downside as farming sub is his lack of Skill Boosts; his own skill being on a moderate short cooldown compensates for this slightly. 

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Kiri [Sub: S | Lead: A | Assist: S | Overall: S]

HP: 4189 | ATK: 1920 | RCV: 290 | WT: 899 | Dragon/Attacker LS: 3x ATK when clearing 6 connected Water Orbs, 5x when 8+ connected; Reduce damage from Fire Att. enemies by 75%. [1/25/1, 93.75% reduction] AS: Changes all enemies' Att. to Fire (ignores status shield); other allies' skills charge by 1 turn. [CD: 16]

Overview. Welcome to the most interesting card in DBDC (at least in irinya's opinion). Entire articles could be written on all of the different ways to use Kiri. As evidenced by how highly we have rated her across the board, she has exceptional use cases everywhere. Three Dragon killers, a unique active, and a deceptively powerful leader skill come together to make one of the coolest cards PAD has ever seen. The icing on the cake? Simply by owning Kiri you have saved yourself 250,000 MP, since you no longer need to buy Charité to run a color swapping team.

Sub. Three Dragon killers make Kiri a sub to consider in any sort of Dragon-heavy content from the early-game through the endgame. Her usage is very similar to Tsubaki's: she is great at sniping key monsters for huge damage on, say, a Blue Hunter team. Dragon/Attacker is a fantastic offensive typing as well, granting her access to crucial Machine, Devil, and Physical killer latents. Her main disadvantages as a sub are a relative lack of non-Killer awakenings and a long base active that is not always impactful or useful. (If you are running Arena 3, keep in mind that Kiri will hamstring your ability to kill any of the Radar Dragons without proper planning.) She is not a general purpose sub, but when she shines, she really shines.

Lead. Kiri as a lead is best thought of as a very specialized Revo Minerva. You will not be blindly taking her into dungeons expecting to easily clear; rather, with proper tailoring and fine-tuning, she can run teams that are straightforward and consistent in the hardest of content. As an example, Sorano has done an excellent writeup on playing through the fantastically challenging Alt. Arena using Kiri leads. We urge you to give that a look if you have any interest at all in leading Kiri, as he does a fantastic job in outlining her strengths, weaknesses, and teambuilding.

In a pinch, Kiri can also serve as a connected water lead, and potentially pair with something like Meri. This is a viable early- to mid-game use for her, but is definitely not her strongest usage case.

Assist. Completely unique. There are no other inheritable color swaps in either NA or JP at the time of writing. This opens up diverse possibilities for using Minerva and El Dorado for 100% Fire resist cheese, as you can simply sub or inherit Kiri instead of being forced to sub the very mediocre Charité. 100% resist cheese has utility in a surprisingly large amount of endgame content. To adequately cover this topic would require a writeup longer than this one, so this is sufficient for our discussion here.

Farming. Just magnificent. A huge portion of this game's enemies are Dragon type, and so Kiri represents a massive boon for blue row farming as a whole. As with No. 6, the incredible multiplier from killers can singlehandedly make or break various farming builds.

How does our new queen of Dragon slaying stack up to Tsubaki, the reigning champion? They fit different purposes. Some are straightforward, such as fire vs. water, three Dragon killers vs. two, and one Skill Boost vs. two. Though straightforward, these differences do matter, as the extra Skill Boost can be essential and Tsubaki's significantly better utility awakenings can often make her come out on top. Other differences are more nuanced. For one, Tsubaki has God typing and can be used on Dark Metatron teams for color-agnostic no skyfall speedfarming. Kiri cannot sub for Dark Metatron, so her best no skyfall leaders default to Meridionalis, who is not color-agnostic, and Awoken Raphael, who is color-agnostic but has a slow animation. Additionally, their base actives are vastly different. Tsubaki's base active is not generally useful for farming, but Kiri's can act as a powerful spike. On the other hand, Tsubaki is a much better inherit base, as her active is considerably shorter. Finally, though Tsubaki does carry that extra Skill Boost, blue teams with Kiri have the option to powerfully stack on-color Skill Boosts of their own via Blodins and Whaledors, and red teams have no such equivalents.

What does that all add up to? At the end of the day, Kiri and Tsubaki are both excellent cards that occupy different aspects of the same niche; neither is strictly better than the other. You should think carefully about which one is the better choice for your dungeon and farming team of interest, and it is absolutely helpful to have both of them.

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Shazel [Sub: S- | Lead: B- | Assist: B- | Overall: S-]

HP: 3369 | ATK: 1496 | RCV: 795 | WT: 901 | Dragon/Healer LS: Board becomes 7x6; 3x ATK & RCV when Wood & Light attack at once. [1/9/9, 7x6 board] AS: Changes Dark, Jammer & Poison Orbs to Wood Orbs; Other allies' skills charge by 1 turn [CD: 7]

Overview. The last of the triple killer cards. Like No. 6 and Kiri, three killers allow Shazel to wipe Devil types from existence, and can be tossed on any team where he works and is needed for this task. There aren't quite as many Devils as there are Gods or Dragons, but they are still numerous and give him good use cases, especially as a farming sub.

Sub. Shazel's primary strength is straightforward and has been covered above. The third killer can really give him an edge over Mito, particularly in the hardest dungeons and challenges. The ability to take Dragon killers is also helpful, as it significantly bolsters his lackluster matchup against non-Devil spawns.

Shazel is not recommended for Arenas 1-3, as Arena does not feature an abundance of Devils for him to feast on and you will be forced to either stall or Fujin Parvati.

Lead. Shazel is notable for being a 7x6 leader that works well in conjunction with Rushana and Li. (Refer to Li's section for the full strategy.) He is generally superior to Ma Chao for this purpose, as most dungeons you would go to the trouble of running this way feature tanky Devil spawns (ex. Alt. Arena). Otherwise, there is little reason to use Shazel as a lead, as his multiplier is terrible and unrewarding.

Assist. Simple and nothing flashy. Better versions of this active exist, but hey, if it does what it has to, you can't complain too much.

Farming. Shazel occupies a niche analogous to those of No. 6 and Kiri, and opens up the same kinds of speedfarming opportunities. He has some competition with Mito, as Mito is unbindable and can be used on Dark Metatron teams for no skyfall farming, but Shazel does significantly more damage and has a second SB. This decision isn't quite as nuanced as Kiri vs. Tsubaki, and many times it comes down to whether no skyfall is desired and Mito's damage is sufficient.

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Rathios [Sub: B- | Lead: B- | Assist: B | Overall: B-]

HP: 5504 | ATK: 1589 | RCV: 101 | WT: 901 | Dragon/Physical LS: 4x ATK when Light & Fire attack at once, but time to move Orbs is fixed to 4 secs; 2.5x ATK & RCV for Dragon & Physical Type. [1/100/6.25] AS: Reduces damage received by 35% for 3 turns; change left-most column to Light, right-most column to Fire. [CD: 12]

Overall. If it appeared in most other collabs, this card would be considered pretty decent. It speaks to the strength of the DBDC machine that Rathios is worse than most of the other pulls. A light row sub that makes columns is already a bit strange, and it doesn't help that the other awakenings are unimpressive. Dark resist can be handy, though.

By the way, Rathios is canonically a woman. It's a bit hard to tell either way.

Sub. Rathios has HP and a decent active, but nothing standout. An okay sub for something like Ilm or Ameno if you don't have better options, since the dark resist can be helpful in Arenas. She can work on various light row teams, but is unlikely to be a great sub past the midgame.

Lead. Reminiscent of a worse Ilm. The activation condition is slightly more generous and numerically fine, but this is held back by the subpool constraints and limited movetime. The lead's rows are also kind of wasted, as making rows with 4 seconds is fairly terrible and you would typically want to match TPAs instead. (It would be much, much better without the 4 seconds restriction.) Usable, especially if you have fast fingers, but nothing to write home about.

Assist. A bit on the long side, but not terrible. Something like Kenshin or Ilm could make reasonable use of this active skill to kill a floor and then tank some preempts. The abundance of the fire/light archetype increases the active's overall worth. Her Equip Form grants Time Extend and light rows. While it's not worthwhile to sacrifice either Rathios or your Jewels of Creation just for the extra Time Extend, the rows can occasionally be used to hit damage thresholds with, for instance, Yog in 3P UDR. 

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Kulia [Sub: C | Lead: D+ | Assist: D+ | Overall: C]

HP: 3794 | ATK: 2012 | RCV: 359 | WT: 901 | Dragon/Devil LS: 4x ATK & 25% reduced damage when Dark & Water attack at once; Extends time to move Orbs by 3 secs. [1/16/1, 43.75% shield] AS: Extend time to move Orbs by 1 sec for 2 turns; change left-most column to Water, right-most column to Dark. [CD: 8]

Overview. Kulia is probably the worst card out of the series. Her stats and active are passable, but there simply aren't that many places where she really belongs. The problem is that unlike Weld and Nees, who have similarly niche usages, Kulia just isn't that good of a card to begin with. Nonetheless, she's not unredeemably bad, and at least she's really pretty. For new players in particular, her straightforward activation and time bonus leader skill can be quite helpful. Her ability to pair with Dark Athena can help newbies get through previously impossible dungeons. Beyond this, however, her value is limited.

Sub. 7c is often the dividing line between completely unusable and occasionally all right. In this case, her combination of awakenings makes Kulia usable as double SBR coverage on Dark Athena teams. Dark Athena, however, is slightly dated and definitely not worth buying anymore, so even this usage is fairly limited. There aren't too many other teams that you'd want to use her on, as she often doesn't offer enough over other sub choices.

Lead. It's like Dark Athena, but terrible! Outside of the early game, she is awful. However, for newer players, she is passable as a Dark Athena pairing (please don't play double Kulia), as she is forgiving in tankiness, activation, and orb movement time. Has some viability in Arena 1, but not beyond. If you can already clear Arena 1 fairly reliably, probably don't lead with Kulia.

Assist. Kulia's active is not impactful to consider inheriting in most cases. She finds a small niche on farming teams as a way to break 6-combo shields if double row generators like Sado and Vaan are not available. Amusingly, the extra second of movetime can be quite helpful for this purpose.

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Summary

This is an unusual special machine in that nearly every player has something to gain from rolling. These monsters have incredible overall value and many are currently and foreseeably irreplaceable in their roles. We hope you saved your stones. Roll away!

Unusually, even new players can benefit massively from any non-Kulia roll. New players should normally not roll 10-stone machines. This is a rare exception, as in addition to yielding extremely high value subs, DBDC also yields midgame-capable leaders. Only Rii, No. 6, Shazel, and Kulia are not usable as midgame leaders, and the first three have substantial value despite this.

tl;dr -- roll this machine. Unless you are Reni, who managed eight Kulia in 12 or so rolls, rolling will almost certainly improve your box.