A pleasant sunday to you.
I'm a day late due to a real crime: A friend of mine planning their party on a friday instead of a saturday. And well, as it had to be, I got a decent hangover and wasn't able to concentrate on writing properly.
This week we got ourselves revamps of the earlier base 5* units and a fantastic free unit in Machina, which I'll also review.
Normally I do not review most free units, but Machina is on meta level despite being free and has some awesome merrits.
Thus he shall be reviewed.

Other than that I hope you enjoy the review! See you on the other side.
SPOILER: This is quite a long post.

PS: After having to take a break from writing due to other plans, I sadly have to continue this on the next day. My sincerest apologies, but at 11:30 PM after a long day it does become hard to keep on writing without sounding like your tired grandfather. I hope nobody will be bothered for the additional delay to the delay for some more quality.
This review easily took 6 hours.

Generally, if you feel like something is lacking or changed, I'd appreciate your feedback :).

Banner Review: CG Ace WC Ace, BB Rem RemV2 & SS Machina MachinaV2 by Memel0rd

CG Ace Wild Card Ace:

Trust Master Reward : Wild Card (Throwing Weapon) - 44 ATK, 144 MAG, 20% MAG, 25% demon / machina killer

STMR : Vermilion Flag (Accessory) - 60 MAG, 50 SPR, MAG/SPR Break immunity

Overview:

First up is Ace and I'm glad they gave him the name Wild Card. I remember back then when Ace came out, he didn't receive a lot of attention. A friend of mine and I tried to convince some others that, the way Wild Card worked, he could be a competent damage dealer on par with Dark Fina, but sadly nobody calced units back. Even back then, Ace had the first magic ability that works like physical attacks.

Stat-wise WC Ace is very frail due to his low base HP and low base DEF. His MAG is really high and he also has high SPR. In terms of innate bulk, 60% HP and 40% DEF really isn't looking hot at all, but luckily through 80% SPR, innate MTDW and the newly added TMR from BB Rem turns WC Ace in a decently tanky mage. He also has 40% phys evasion and 50% magic evasion, thus really REALLY good chances to just ignore it. Additionally, he has a Guts passive that locks at 5% HP, thus, with an external guts materia or accessory, can technically survive two fatal attacks in one turn.
With his own TMR, WC Ace has a total 220% MAG as well as 100% MTDW. With only TMRs he won't be able to hit the MTDW cap, but get pretty close.
He also has an innate 150% demon / machina killer (175% with TMR), which is really good. In the current DV not too hot for the demon killer part and against the boss I also wouldn't use him due to the super high SPR. But later on you'll see why you still might want to use him.
With Confusion, paralyze, blind and stop resistance, he's decently prepared against a lot of the fights. Blind immunity will actually be important.

WC Ace can W-/T-Cast all of his abilities and has a few neat supportive capabilities, setting him apart from our usual meta mages.
He can also use any party esper, though on a damage dealer that often isn't the best call to make.

Firstly, ALL of his magic damage acts like physical attacks. This means that they will proc physical resistance on bosses and potentially bypass magic resistance.
But more importantly, this means Ace will benefit from weapon elements, imbues AND physical killers, making damage gains far more accessable compared to mages. Killers in some regards aren't as bad anymore, but imbues / weapon elements mean that Ace is not restricted to any element. This is already a huge boost over all other mages in DV who can only work when matching against their own preferences.

Talking about imbues, WC Ace can self-imbue himself with Spark or Freeze Card for 6 turns while chaining and imperilling, though his on-demand chains will also imperil.

In terms of support, Ace can keep up chains, even though weak, while either negating the next incoming spell such as Dispelga or Meteor through Blind Stud, or apply a mirage stack on your whole party through Support Hand . Both are awesome to have at any time.

This isn't where it stops as he can gradually improve on his HP Charge / MP Charge abilities. They start out as ST HP or MP recovers and use after use unlock better versions such as Giga HP / MP Charge up to Peta Charges after a total of 4 turns. Once you use the final version once, you'll unlock them until death. After the second tier, Giga Charges, the effects will be AoE. While MP Charge isn't that great with only an AoE 80 MP recover, HP Charge at the final stage can be handy due to chaining for decent amounts of damage while applying an AoE 20% Reraise, a self 5000 HP barrier and an okay-ish heal on the next turn.

Short Burst works in the same fashion as HP / MP Charge but is used to apply 100% AoE Stops. Sounds nice for arena but won't be available until your third turn, which is way too slow for the Arena.

But for on-demand chaining, Burst / Burst will also have the same upgrade system. The only difference between those two abilities is the family, either CWA or BS. We're using the BS chain in the rotation due to slightly higher chain values.

The way it works, it starts out as a 5300% chain while also imperilling both lightning and ice by 100%. Then on the next turn, Tera Burst has the same imperil but a 5500% chain. Then Peta Burst 110% imperil 6000% mod BUT for fire as well and lastly Exa Burst with the triple 120% imperil and a 6500% modifier. So even starting out, the difference in modifiers isn't that big of a deal. If Ace died, you don't receive a major penalty.

And even if you lost everything, at Turn 7 you can receive ALL final versions of all the graduating abilities that I've just described. Once you use them, they'll stay permanently.
If the fight lasts long enough, the additional support might net you the win or if you died on Turn 6 you can easily get all the progress back.

For offensive capabilities, Jackpot Triad, which is available at Turn 4, is a slightly stronger chain at 7000% while Attack Hand , available at Turn 1 with a 3 turn cooldown, provides an undispellable and 100% uptime 250% MAG buff.

Do you remember the 7* versions of the Type-0 units?
Do you remember 7 star Nyx?
WC Ace takes both ideas and turns it into a way better version. He can still sacrifice himself to fill your entire evocation gauge, but with a twist. This time, he also fills 40 LB crysts for your entire party! Basically a strong AoE entrust. Not on the same level as Emperor Foo, but he fulfills a different role.
Now sadly any sort of Reraise will be self-dispelled upon using it, so you gotta immediately revive him.

Every 7 turns Ace can also redirect all ST attacks to one ally for one turn. I'm not sure how particularly useful that'll be as if you do want to tank something, you likely bring a ST provoker anyway and the units who do redirect attacks onto themselves, such as Doctor Aiden, also have mirage mechanics built in.

His Limit Burst despite having a massive 7200% base modifier and the luxury of being filled right at the start due to Ace being a CG unit lacks LB damage. He doesn't surpass Elly's LB damage unless you have an external 50% LB damage buff. This assumes you do have an open materia slot for killers.
For Turn 1 shenanigans his Limit Burst is still very useful due to being a way higher burst than his usual Turn 1 allows. In terms of burst, it is also only slightly better than his highest burst turn and would deal less damage overall due to the loss in MAG and the loss in potential killer materias over LB damage.

How does he fare in the meta?

WC Ace easily takes the throne in average damage in comparison to all of our other options.

Not only damage wise does he exceed, in every other imaginable way except for burst he's better. His bulkiness due to BB Rem's TMR is almost on par with DS Sol's while still having his guts passive and really high evasion stats.
Then, on top of that, in comparison to every other meta mage that's listed in his damage calcs, he can swap his element by choice. Either through imbues or equips. He can also equip physical killers, which grants him yet another edge over others.

Despite having less burst than Physalis, I'd still rate him way above her for Dark Visions simply because he isn't only good in a few stages but potentially in every stage. Well, those where you'd want to use mages anyway, if the enemy has 6000 SPR but only 600 DEF then yeah, no.

In Dark Visions his Limit Burst can be a really good source of magic damage as finishing for every element you want, but without the use of an external LB damage buffer, his damage is subpar to Elly's LB. And using an LB damage buffer would "sacrifice" a slot to make WC Ace slightly stronger, which could've been filled up more efficiently.

In the future there are better LB damage buffers such as Pone or Ambie to bump WC Ace up in Dark Visions even further.

Even then, he has a really cool kit idea that works well and always having a mirage ability available is neatoo. The spell absorption is niche but when it can be useful it can easily save up an action of another unit who'd have to use it via an event materia.

The TMR itself isn't that great since many mages can't equip throwing weapons and even then it has significantly less base MAG than the other rods / the Dark Visions rod, but on Ac himself gives himself yet another 20% MAG for a total 40% as well as 50% bonus esper stats, which do make up for it.
His STMR I don't think is that desireable. It has 60 MAG and 50 SPR, which is good if your mage can't tank the incoming magic attack and you don't want to sacrifice MAG, but the MAG/SPR break immunity is... eh. Breaks only decrease your base stats and outside of ambushes can easily be prevented by using proper buffs.

Build Maths:

Wild Card Ace Damage Build:
https://ffbeEquip.com/builder.html?server=GL#0e08c030-c425-11ea-8219-c768f320c4e6

Realistic Build:
https://ffbeEquip.com/builder.html?server=GL#4dfa1310-c425-11ea-8219-c768f320c4e6

Wild Card Ace Damage

MAG post 250% buff: 3742
MAG post 150% buff: 3457
Assuming spark chains


Rotation:
Turn 1: Spark Card   Attack Hand    Burst  
Turn 2: Tera Burst  x3
Turn 3: Peta Burst  x3
Turn 4: Exa Burst  x2   Jackpot Triad
Turn 5: Attack Hand    Exa Burst  x2
Turn 6: Exa Burst  x3
Turn 7: Spark Card   Exa Burst  x2
Turn 8: Exa Burst  x2   Jackpot Triad
Turn 9: Attack Hand    Exa Burst  x2
Turn 10: Exa Burst  x3
Turn 11: Exa Burst  x3
Turn 12: Exa Burst  x2   Jaackpot Triad


Turn 1: 3457^2 x 39 x 3.556 x 1.5   3742^2 x ( 42   53 ) x 4 x 2 = 13128035954
Turn 2: [ 3742^2 x 55 x 3.6115   3742^2 x 55 x 2 x 4 ] x 2 = 17884984907
Turn 3: 3742^2 x 60 x 3.6115 x 2.05   3742^2 x 60 x 2 x 4 x 2.1 = 20334726477
Turn 4: 3742^2 x 65 x 3.6115 x 2.15   3742^2 x ( 65   70 ) x 4 x 2.2 = 23702239851
Turn 5: [ 3742^2 x 42 x 3.556   3742^2 x 65 x 2 x 4 ] x 2.2 = 20619817280
Turn 6: [ 3742^2 x 65 x 3.6115   3742^2 x 65 x 2 x 4 ] x 2.2 = 23250480379
Turn 7: [ 3742^2 x 39 x 3.556   3742^2 x 65 x 2 x 4 ] x 2.2 = 20291182704
Turn 8: [ 3742^2 x 65 x 3.6115   3742^2 x ( 65   70 ) x 4 ] x 2.2 = 23866593195
Turn 9: [ 3742^2 x 42 x 3.556   3742^2 x 65 x 2 x 4 ] x 2.2 = 20619817280
Turn 10: [ 3742^2 x 65 x 3.6115   3742^2 x 65 x 2 x 4 ] x 2.2 = 23250480379
Turn 11: [ 3742^2 x 65 x 3.6115   3742^2 x 65 x 2 x 4 ] x 2.2 = 23250480379
Turn 12: [ 3742^2 x 65 x 3.6115   3742^2 x ( 65   70 ) x 4 ] x 2.2 = 23866593195


Average Turn 1-12: 21,172,119,331
-> 169% of Dark Spirit Sol's damage ( 12,522,410,497 )
-> 153% of Lezard Valeth's Damage ( 13,790,027,420 )
-> 151% of Draconian Princess Fina's damage ( 14,006,112,259 )
-> 141% of Serah's damage ( 14,967,170,643 )
-> 129% of Four Winds Physalis' damage ( 16,424,984,030 )

Character Design: 8.5/10
Sprite: 9/10
Chainer: 9.5/10
Trust Master Reward: 7/10
STMR: 7.5/10
Arena: 5/10
Limit Burst: 8/10
Future Proof: 8/10
Free 2 Play: 9.5/10
Pay 2 Play: 9/10
Personal Rating: 9/10
Optimal Rating: 9/10

RemV2 Benevolent Beauty Rem:

Trust Master Reward : Knowing Tag (Materia) - Increase HP (10%) and MAG/SPR (30%)
Increase potency of healing items (200%)
Increase equipment MAG (25%) when dual wielding

STMR : Orichalcum Dirk (Dagger) - 22 ATK, 171 MAG, 120 SPR, 100% LB Fillrate, Enable Dual-Wield

Overview:

Back then Rem and Ace were probably one of my favourite units in the game despite me never having even touched Type-0. I'm very glad the Type-0 units are keeping me interested with actually cool kits!

BB Rem is back and has very similar base stats to WC Ace with the only except being that her pot stats don't focus on MAG but on MP. Back then it wasn't the worst, but generally focusing on MP is almost always suboptimal. With 230% innate MAG and an innate 125% MTDW as well as two more copies of her own TMR, she can almost reach the MTDW cap.
Unlike WC Ace though, she has an ... ace up her sleeve. Rem has the 6x chain cap! Wooo. This definitely makes up the difference in MAG. Her own bulk is also pretty good, especially with three of her TMRs. Innately she has 120% SPR with 70% HP and 40% DEF. Again, the DEF department is lacking but that's not unusual for mages. At least she also has a guts passive. BB Rem definitely has worse resistances compared to WC Ace with poison, silence and stop. But hey, she has that 150% demon / machine killer.

BB Rem can W-/T-Cast all of her abilities and has a few note worthy abilities outside of her main rotation that might see some use.
She can also use any party esper, though on a damage dealer that often isn't the best call to make.

For one, she has her old Healing Prayer back to cure all status ailments. This time around it has a higher mod but status ailment curing isn't nearly as important as it was back then but to be fair, despite also having Dualcast for Curaja and Reraise, she isn't a healer nor a true red mage.
Though if you have some pesky boss imbues on you, for example dark, an element that he'd absorb, you can self-dispel your entire party, too, to get rid of these.

More interestingly is that BB Rem can spend 20 LB crysts, which she doesn't really need, to recover your party's MP by 200. If we ever get a nasty MP drain boss again then she can still recover MP without spending MP. She can also act as an MP battery, though that's mostly not required and since she is a damage dealer would rather have someone else do the job.

If you are using Rem without the assistance of MM Xon, you get the pleasure of having AoE 30% demon / machine killer buffs at disposal. WC Ace had them, too, with even higher numbers but as self-buffs. After using her Accelerate CD ability, the buffs go up to 50% and since they last 3 turns can easily be used in Dark Visions.

In terms of chaining, BB Rem does have access to CWA chains through her imbues and Dagger Boomerang, but you'll mostly use them when requiring AoE damage as the modifier of Dagger Boomerang is significantly lower. Also, the three AoE imbues for fire, ice and lightning don't work as physical attacks while all the other ones do.

She has the same set of self-imbues as Bolting Strike chains, which will count for all following ones, while imperilling by 90% and the imbue also lasts 2 turns longer than the prior options for a total of 6 turns. Having three different self imbues allows for easy element swapping if needed and requires less external set up as many elemental magic weapons usually lack MAG stats.

Instead of Dagger Boomerang, BB Rem's new on-demand chain is Flying Daggers , which has a 4300% modifier by itself and after using Accelerate turns into a 4700% chain. Not the biggest increase but at least that means that she will barely lose out on any damage upon dying.

Two of her abilities match WC Ace's almost entirely. Almost.

Just like Ace, she has a self-sacrifice CD abilities with the same effects, too, but a shorter cooldown. Instead of having to wait 6 turns, you can cast it after 4 turns. That might enable some niche set ups-

Accelerate also has the same MAG buff, the same cooldowns and almost the same damage as Ace's Attack Hand with only less modifiers. Thus we'll use it every time we can since it also upgrades Flying Daggers Slightly.

To still give BB Rem some red mage vibes, she gains some really good utility via her CD ability Live On. Available at Turn 1 with a 4 turn cooldown, Rem can patch up team compositions including AWoL, enemy dispels or grant a neat headstart from your mage. Especially with two copies you could technically maintain the following buffs.
All of the buffs last 2 turns, including a 50% mitigation, a super strong regen that heals over 6000 HP per turn and a 100% HP Reraise.
If you actually do use two Rems, without any deaths or dispels, the regen and the mitigation can be kept up and might allow your tanks to focus more on support chaining or for some of the older tanks to keep up with trials if you got unlucky.

Her last CD ability shares the same cooldowns with Live on and her self-sacrifice while being used to imperil and up your damage at the same time! Triple 120% imperil for her three elements and a 6000% modifier? Yes and yes!
The imperil effectively lasts 5 turns, so even if you miss out on it for one turn, it's not the biggest deal.

If the dispel does run out, you could use her Limit Burst alternatively as it re-applies the triple imperil while having an innate 9000% modifier (including her passives), but outside of that won't see much use. She doesn't get her LB for free unlike WC Ace, so no easy Turn 1 strats with it, and the modifer as well as her MAG is lower than Ace's.

How does she fare in the meta?

BB Rem is extremely close to Wild Card Ace for the simple reason of having the 6x chain cap. Despite having way less modifiers and less MAG.
That shows how much of a difference the 6x chain cap really makes.

Outside of that, BB Rem can also perfectly chain with another WC Ace copy at any point in the fight for having on-demand CWA chains with Dagger Boomerang and on-demand Bolting Strike chains on her Flying Dagger , making WC Ace much easier to use in Dark Visions. The best thing about it? Their damage is almost identical.
WC Ace starts out slightly slower but has higher damage peaks while BB Rem is a lot more consistent.

In terms of bulk, BB Rem offers more stats but only slightly more while missing the 40% phys / 50% mag evasion, but in return has some awesome support in her kit. Her 50% mitigation might be able to save you up slots in a few Dark Vision areas and in trials while running a dupe or having a (busy) tank who can't (re) apply the damage mitigation can always help out. Remember, she's your damage dealer, having that kind of regen and mitigation on a damage dealer is always a huge pro.

All the other pros listed on Ace's meta comparison also apply for her as her abilities used in the rotation all act as physical abilities, meaning she can potentially utilise every element in the game and gear for physical killers, which grants more killers from almost all espers and more easily accessable ones to equip.

BB Rem's TMR is so amazing but puts the TMR mage builds in a very awkward spot. It can stack with itself, which is almost a phenomenon in GL for good TMR materias and boosts HP by 10%, 30% MAG/SPR and 25% MTDW.
This means we got ourselves our first source of MTDW in TMR form. As a materia. Excluding the killer slot, this means all mages have way better MTDW potential now while gaining bulk, too. It's absolutely worth using a moogle container for as three copies of her TMR aren't exactly easy to get.
Her STMR is a bit harder to rate. It's a dagger with a high 171 MAG and 120 SPR that also allows Dual-Wield and 100% LB fillrate. Here's the thing though:
Even though many mages can equip Daggers, those who do go for MTDW often already have innate Dual-Wield. And if they don't, Four Winds Physalis' TMR already gives DW and 50% MAG. And the dagger can't have the 20% MAG rare ability from Item World. I'd personally use it for the 120 SPR, but it's very likely not going to be part of a BiS build due to lower potential MAG passives. It's good but I wouldn't STMR moogle it nor chase for it.

Build Maths:

Benevolent Beauty Rem Damage Build:
https://ffbeEquip.com/builder.html?server=GL#cf54fdc0-c421-11ea-8219-c768f320c4e6

Realistic Build:
https://ffbeEquip.com/builder.html?server=GL#f85d9970-c421-11ea-8219-c768f320c4e6

Benevolent Beauty Rem Damage

MAG post 250% buff: 3525
MAG post 150% buff: 3275
Assuming spark chains


Rotation:
Turn 1: Cleansing Freeze   Accelerate   Seraphim Strike
Turn 2: Flying Daggers   x3
Turn 3: Flying Daggers  x3
Turn 4: Accelerate   Flying Daggers   x2
Turn 5: Flying Daggers   x2   Seraphim Strike
Turn 6: Flying Daggers  x3
Turn 7: Cleansing Freeze   Accelerate   Flying Daggers  
Turn 8: Flying Daggers   x3
Turn 9: Flying Daggers  x2   Seraphim Strike
Turn 10: Accelerate   Flying Daggers   x2
Turn 11: Flying Daggers   x2   Seraphim Strike
Turn 12: Flying Daggers  x3


Turn 1: 3275^2 x 25 x 4.9675 x 1.45   3525^2 x 35 x 6 x 1.9   3525^2 x 60 x 6 x 2 = 15835657779
Turn 2: [ 3525^2 x 47 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 47 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 21800007312
Turn 3: [ 3525^2 x 43 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 43 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 19944687540
Turn 4: [ 3525^2 x 35 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 47 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 20170485998
Turn 5: [ 3525^2 x 47 x 4.9675   3525^2 x ( 47   60 ) x 6 ] x 2.2 = 23932244562
Turn 6: [ 3525^2 x 43 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 43 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 19944687540
Turn 7: [ 3525^2 x 25 x 4.9675   3525^2 x ( 35   47 ) x 6 ] x 2.2 = 16844332570
Turn 8: [ 3525^2 x 47 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 47 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 21800007312
Turn 9: [ 3525^2 x 43 x 4.9675   3525^2 x ( 43   60 ) x 6 ] x 2.2 = 22732997790
Turn 10: [ 3525^2 x 35 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 47 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 20170485998
Turn 11: [ 3525^2 x 47 x 4.9675   3525^2 x ( 47   60 ) x 6 ] x 2.2 = 23932244562
Turn 12: [ 3525^2 x 43 x 4.9675   3525^2 x 43 x 2 x 6 ] x 2.2 = 19944687540


Average Turn 1-12: 20,587,710,541
-> 149% of Lezard Valeth's Damage ( 13,790,027,420 )
-> 147% of Draconian Princess Fina's damage ( 14,006,112,259 )
-> 138% of Serah's damage ( 14,967,170,643 )
-> 125% of Four Winds Physalis' damage ( 16,424,984,030 )
-> 97% of Wild Card Ace's damage ( 21,172,119,331 )

Character Design: 9/10
Sprite: 9/10
Chainer: 9/10
Trust Master Reward: 9.5/10
STMR: 8/10
Arena: 4/10
Limit Burst: 6/10
Future Proof: 8/10
Free 2 Play: 9.5/10
Pay 2 Play: 8.5/10
Personal Rating: 9/10
Optimal Rating: 9/10

MachinaV2 Steadfast Soldier Machina:

Trust Master Reward : Lævateinn (Sword) - 151 ATK, 30% MP, Enable Dual-Wield

STMR : Pluviale (Clothes) - 33 ATK, 38 DEF, 44 SPR, 50% ATK w/ Swords

Overview:

Now, for the gem of the banner: the free unit!
I also don't like having to write SS Machina. So we'll keep it to Machina, hope that's okay.

Machina's base stats are surprisingly good with high HP, high DEF and high ATK, and again, for a free unit, can get to surprisingly high stats when fully geared. His innate bulk on top of being a TDW unit is great. An innate 70% HP, 140% DEF and 60% SPR can definitely be worked with. In return, his offensive passives are severely lacking in comparison with only 140% ATK and 50% TDW, but he does get the 6x chain cap.
If you've build an esper up to max, for example Asura, Machina benefits from that a lot as he receives double bonus esper stats. Thus he gets a ton of free extra bulk, e.g. Asura with little trouble can give him 150 DEF/SPR.
He's resistant against poison, blind, disease and confusion, which isn't the worst but poison and disease resistance aren't that useful. You'd much rather want sleep and petrification. Or paralyze. The 50% demon / machine killer won't do a whole lot since he doesn't deal the highest damage, but why not.

Machina can W-/T-Cast all of his abilities. This is extremely important as he has some awesome stuff.
Unlike WC Ace and BB Rem, him being able to use all party espers can be beneficial for using e.g. Fenrir for the AoE Mirage, Golem for an AoE 70% phys mitigation or if needed, Lakshmi for an AoE heal. Depending on how you use Machina, he can have a free turn occasionally.

While Machina has poor average damage in comparison to other meta damage dealers, it doesn't hurt to gear him for high ATK as he gets a lot of natural bulk and once every 5 turns can deal actually good damage.
Through his CD Ability, L'Cie's Duty, he can buff his own ATK by 300%, the modifier of all of his chains by 2000% and chains with a 3000% chain. Combined with Fear Slash, which will end up with a 4000% modifier, you can have a total 11000% modifier on a turn with 6x chain cap and a 300% ATK buff, thus making him actually contribute to burst damage decently. You can also imbue Machina with fire or lightning innately for 2 turns to prepare for the burst.

Now, more importantly, Machina is an amazing free unit as a breaker for various reasons.

As his original version, he is all about the chaining and breaking at the same time and he does that way better now.

All of his chains are Bolting Strike chains, matching well with the other two banner units but can also be used nicely alongside MM Xon as he also has T-Cast.

Machina has on-demand 75% DEF/SPR or ATK/MAG break that last two turns and turn into 70% breaks afterwards. Due to the T-Cast they are extremely easy to maintain and thus should be seen as 75% fullbreaks.
They are ST but, yet again, you can apply two ATK/MAG breaks on Turn 1 if facing more enemies or if you set up the T-Cast you can apply up to three, which often enough covers all mobs.

If you need to dispel and re-apply breaks, he can do that, too. One of his breaks dispels first, then applies a 70% fullbreak and then re-casts the fullbreak on the two next turns, but be careful not to accidentally dispel your own debuffs.

In the same territory as his breaks, Machina can imperil and chain at the same time with Elemental Weakning. At first you have an effective 2 turn 120% triple imperil for fire, ice and lightning, matching BB Rem well, and then transition into 100% imperils. Again, since you can set up T-Cast and have 2 turns, it's extremely easy to maintain them.

My personal favourite part about his kit is that Machina not only is super fast and easy to use, but has 3 turn AoE 30% phys or magic mitigations. They aren't uncommon at this point but having them available just like that does make him stand out from other breakers as Rikku doesn't have any mitigations, neither does DoD Vanille nor Kryla and Locke only has magic mitigation. He also buffs DEF/SPR by 150% and cures the responding breaks, but those stat buffs likely only see some use if you skip tanks / healers for easier Dark Vision stages for example.
The phys mitigation buff provides ally counters, too, with a max of 3. Seeing as many tanks nowadays don't counter with normal hits anymore, the additional LB generation isn't bad.

Machina has the same self-sacrifice CD ability as Rem and seeing as he isn't a direct damage dealer and can definitely work around dying for a turn, having your breaker self sacrifice himself for an AoE 40 LB gauge fill can easily be built into a burst turn. Let's say you are just done with breaking and prepare for the burst: if you're using an LB unit such as AC Cloud, this will surely come in handy.

Lastly, in order to unlock T-Cast, Machina can either use his CD ability Awakening , which is available at Turn 1 with a 4 turn cooldown or his Limit Burst.
In both cases, the T-Cast will last 6 turns and thus can be super easily maintained through his CD ability alone. The additional 200% ATK buff makes his chains hit a bit harder, but isn't relevant for his main burst.

The Limit Burst itself should be used either for preparing burst damage or for protection against a strong threshold.
Beside the 6 turn T-Cast enable, the Limit Burst also applies an AoE 80% fullbreak. This break sadly only lasts one turn and his LB with 32 crysts is too hard to maintain to use it every turn. Even then, it would hinder him to use his kit properly. Thus having the option of going even higher to Rikku level of breaks is great for thresholds or bursting.

How does he fare in the meta?

Frankly, for a free unit, Machina is extremely impressive. Even in comparison to the prior ones.

He has the bulk, he has the easiness of use and he sets himself apart from other current meta breakers by constantly chaining all the time, being fast and bringing damage mitigation. He can even act as an LB supporter similar to Nyx did back then, but well, it kills himself.

I wouldn't put him above Rikku as she does a lot, too, while providing chains, imbues, mirage stacks and higher breaks. I would place him higher than Locke though as Locke, to be fully efficient, requires you to utilise Graviga, which does eat up two actions: using the Graviga and healing the damage done to yourself.

So while Locke has potentially higher breaks, Machina does everything else better. He's faster, has better mitigations, chains more frequently and has T-Cast.

Honestly there is no reason to not grab him. Especially for the following:

Both his TMR and STMR for being free gear are amazing. His TMR is a worse version of his prior version's STMR, but only by a tiny bit. You have a 151 ATK sword that grants Dual-Wield. This is great for units that prefer Dual-Wield but don't have it innately, such as the good old Cid, though he's a tad outdated.
While his STMR is an amazing free chest piece for any sword wielding unit. 33 ATK and 50% ATK is on the same level as a limited unit's STMR, Fayt, and matches even other STMR's ATK levels. Just like Quistis' STMR, no reason to not grab it.

Build:

Steadfast Soldier Machina Build:
https://ffbeEquip.com/builder.html?server=GL#9d93d230-c51f-11ea-8219-c768f320c4e6

Character Design: 9.5/10
Sprite: 8.5/10
Breaker: 9/10
Trust Master Reward: Free/10
STMR: Free/10
Arena: 3/10
Limit Burst: 8/10
Future Proof: 8.5/10
Free 2 Play: 9.5/10
Pay 2 Play: 7.5/10
Personal Rating: 8.5/10
Optimal Rating: 8.5/10

Conclusion

This banner brought a nice, fresh wind.
All of the units genuinely feel different from each other and bring uniqueness into the rather stale meta.
Wild Card Ace and Benevolent Beauty Rem both set themselves apart from our traditional mages that we have seen for the past months by utilising their original selling points. Using physical attack mechanics is a lot more beneficial, though also means that they can't be used properly against enemies with high physical resistances vs low / none magic resistance, such as Wicked Moon. On the upside, they do not get cucked by facing a fire resistant enemy and having nothing but fire elemental attacks.
Machina is a fast pace breaker with a ton of chain utility as well as damage mitigations with the potential to cast espers and being a strong LB support. All while being free.
This banner is a great catch up for those who have been lacking a proper breaker and mage as both Ace and Rem have way higher average damage than all other current choices while gaining easy tankiness.
Rem's TMR plays a big role in all TMR mage builds as well and thus will stick around.
That's how damage dealer banners should be like, actual kits with interesting, unique flavours.

I hope you enjoyed, even though it was a longer review I am glad that we finally got something new!

Memel0rd out​