Mini Going in Blind: SBB Zeromus with only P Cecil, WM Rosa, Edge, Kydia, AT Kain, and 4* Rosa

Shorter post this time because I'm short on time and energy...

It took me a few tries but I finally took down Zeromus using only lore appropriate units. As usual, I did the fight blind. As any of you that cleared the fight already knows, the pattern is pretty simple (although I never did figure out the exact pattern lower than 50%. I knew when osmose and big bang were coming but the other moves kept changing patterns).

To stay within lore as much as possible I also only allowed myself to use summoned monsters espers eidolons that are in FFIV. That means no Diabolos for that demon killer....

Fight 1

(technically attempt 3 or 4 but the previous fights were just learning Cecil's rotation and testing out some ghetto chaining. I didn't take notes for those fights).

First try I used only 5 units (no 4 star Rosa). I had Kain jumping, Rydia summoning whenever she could or chained with Rosa or Cecil on turns when Kain would land his jumps. Rosa did all the healing. Edge was set up with provoke/doge and threw everything he could (spoiler: that's not nearly as effective in FFBE as it is in FFIV...) Cecil handled cover, breaks, SPR/DEF breaks, support chaining, and MP recovery...

Pattern was pretty easy above 50%:

Preemptive: Whirl (99% HP damage - most likely fixed attack)

1. All-Flare (AE fire magic), Whirl

2. All-Flare, Meteor (it's meteor...)

3. All-flare x2

4. Big Bang (big AE magic attack), Black Hole (dispel on everyone)

After 117 turns I eventually died due to all the extra Big Bangs and AE osmose...

Fight 2

Screwed up and died early on to Big Bang because I didn't have SPR buff up....

Fight 3

I put Cradle of Horns on Edge so he could buff SPR/DEF on turn 1 of Zeromus' rotation (turns after dispel). But that required making WM Rosa my provoke/dodge tank. (Even with Locke's STMR, I didn't have any free materia slots unless I allowed myself to use tetra sylpheed who isn't in FFIV). That let me put Ignis' TMR on Edge to handle MP healing.

I got past 50% again but died due to lack of MP...

Fight 4

Big changes this time. I brought along 4 star Rosa to handle HP and MP. I maxed her LB (100% HP, 50% MP heal) and geared her for LB generation. For the 6th unit, I bought my own P Cecil (I'm as shocked as you are that it worked).

Kain switched to chaining instead of jumping and Kydia switched from maxing esper summon damage to maxing summoner skill damage. Kain's water based chaining move is the same family as Rosa's chaining move and gave a nice imperil for Kydia's Mindflayer attack.

Being an idiot, I forgot to properly equip Kain (saved the build but forgot to reequip it) so I ended up doing pretty crappy damage (but way better than my first try). I ended up dying with Zeromus at 9% on turn 123. Yup, probably would have won that one if I actually had the team geared right.

Fight 5 & 6:

Kept dying at random points. On fight 6, I had Black Hole followed by All-Flare wipe out everyone but Cecil and I couldn't recover from that. I didn't even know Zeromus could lead off with Black Hole (never saw him do that again)…

Fight 7

With Zeromus' rotation getting really evil under 50%, I figured I'd focus on a faster kill. I said fuck it, got Kaito's prism then STMR moogled him. Between that and Locke's STMR, I was able to get Edge with 100% provoke and dodge and still equip Cradle of Horns.

That let me build WM Rosa for ATK to speed things up a little while still having 100% fire resist in case I ran into another Black Hole All-Flare turn. I also was able to give her a water weapon to get better chain multipliers.

This fight had a lot of close calls. Whenever I didn't have Cecil's 75% mitigation, magic mitigation, 180% SPR buff, and 65% MAG break on Zeromus on Big Bang turns, I made sure WM Rosa had reraise on both Cecil and herself. That paid off a couple times and recovery was a nail biting experience.

It was a slog of a fight but I finally won in 65 turns!

Final thoughts

This is the most fun I've had in FFBE in a very long time. I planned on doing this since the Zeromus fight was announced in JP and am very happy that it was possible to do.

For any of you considering trying this, it is extremely gear dependent. Cecil had 200% fire resist, 27446 HP, and 1881 SPR before the FFIV series buffs and he still barely survived some Big Bang turns.