Hey everyone.

Sorry for being a little bit late today. I usually hope to get these unit reviews out at 5pm CEST buuut University (my last semester with exams – after that it’s just my Master Thesis! Yaaay) started again and I also began working at a new company. I will keep doing these unit reviews as you guys really seem to enjoy these but if things get a little bit too stressful for me, I might postpone the review until Saturday in the future. I’ll nonetheless do my best to deliver them by 8pm CEST on Friday, though. I really don’t like rushing things because rushing things means compromising on quality and that’s not something I want to stand for. Enough talk, let’s get right into King Behemy’s stuff (that didn’t sound as weird as it reads when I thought of that sentence…).

Behemy Overview

King Behemy (Behemy in the following) is a Phys Tank in Base and Brave Shift alike but with different sub (or actually main?) roles in either form. In Base he has some seriously good Support skills, whereas in his Brave Shift, he works well as a Support Chainer and LB Finisher (memes aside, that might actually work).

A few notable Abilities of his: In Base Form he can imbue Earth to the party and amplify earth at the same time by 20% for 4 turns to the party as well, which is a huge plus (just like the Swiss flag lol, sorry couldn’t resist) in comparison to the other tanks. He’s got a 90% General Mitigation Grandis but that’s a 1 time per battle use and after that, Behemy takes a huge hit in survivability. Pun intended. It often feels like Behemy is a Support Unit first and a Phys Tank second, which you can also see from the numbers down below.

The best thing about his Brave Shift is the 150% Demon Killer (P, M) to the whole party. While it may last for only two turns, it has huge implications for Dark Visions, where you want to burst as hard as possible without needing MM Xon. He actually falls off significantly in usability the more units get AoE Party buffs. We’ve seen people not use MMXon for Asura when they had Cleostar for example. Replacing MMXon for an actual DPS is a huge gain in damage done, obviously. Behemy can support chain (BS, AMOE, SR, and AK) as well as LB finish with his weird 5 hit frame LB at 180x Mod with DEF scaling. He’s gonna hit hard in a couple of weeks once we get NV Zidane’s STMR for the 300% LB damage increase.

Other notable things about his kit: He has all Status Ailment Immunities for the party as well as All Breaks Immunity, AND Stop Charm immunity for the party. All in one Skill. That’s rad. What's superb about Behemy is: Much like Faisy, he's got a Pre-emptive Phys. Cover! It's a superb feature of his kit which gives him a lot of wiggle room on the first turn (just like Faisy).

Conclusion on his kit: Bloated but with many very useful things that will keep the party alive more than it will keep himself alive. Which is kind of ironic.

TMR/STMR Evaluation

His TMR is a Greatsword with 100 ATK and 135 DEF, which also happens to provide 10% Phys Evasion. It’s an okay’ish TMR that won’t see use unless you’re shy of NV Snow’s STMR, which is soooo much better for Behemy. The 10% Evasion is pretty good though if you want to build him for Evasion. After upgrading it from the event, this TMR gains 30% DEF & HP, too. Ultimately though, I wouldn’t chase his TMR.

The STMR on the other hand is superb. It’s a Materia with 40% DEF (no conditions) and 100% TSW – True Single Wield. True Single Wield has been coined by someone on this reddit lately and reads “Single wielding with or without a shield”. It’s an amazing STMR for Snow and himself. It’s also going to be very sweet for NVA Gladio in a couple of weeks (or maybe next week already?). This also begs the question: We back to chasing STMRs again? Anyway, it’s veeeeery good.

Vision Card Evaluation

Behemy’s Vision Card, from my point of view at least, is kind of meh. While it provides the highest amount of Base HP (1100 at level 10), the Base DEF at level 10 (60) is pretty bad. Both Gabranth and Snow have way better Vision Cards in that regard. The passives on Behemy’s card aren’t that great, either. 20% Phys Evasion, 30% HP, and 50% DEF (Greatsword needed, FFBE units only) sound okay, but both Snow and Gabby have better passives. I wouldn’t use it, even the builder doesn’t want to use it.

Tank Comparison

And here we are at the most complex stuff for this unit review. Let’s start off easy with a very basic comparison of what each Tank does and what not.

In conclusion: Behemy does quite a lot for the party and more often than not, he’s actually winning. But the truth is: He’s going to be taking huuuge amounts of damage and needs far more support than Snow and Gabranth do. The following chapter proves that claim.

Damage taken Calculations

First of all, I’d like to steer your attention to this very screenshot as we’ll be using the gear and stats as a benchmark. I used the same gear and variables (300% DEF for all 3 of them to make it a fair fight) on the builder when I switched from EX 1 to 2 and finally EX 3. We’re NOT going to use Guard. Guard doesn’t accomplish anything because every single one of these tanks has the spare room to use it – contrary to popular believe, even Snow does. These builds are not practical at all and only serve the purpose to show off each units' theoretical maximum of DEF and the damage mitigation that follows.

I will do a more approachable set of gear later today!

Behemy mitigation calculation: (X/DEF) * 0.225 * 0.5 * 0.6

Gabranth mitigation calculation: (X/DEF) * 0.25 * 0.55 * 0.225

Snow mitigation calculation: (X/DEF) * 0.325 * 0.1 * 0.5

As can be already seen, the 0.1 multiplier is going to be the huge factor as to why Snow will shine here. Now, let’s not take DEF into account to get a first glimpse of how weak Behemy is:

Behemy 100 * 0.225 * 0.5 * 0.6 = 6.75

Gabranth: 100 * 0.25 * 0.55 * 0.225 = 3.09

Snow: 100 * 0.325 * 0.1 * 0.5 = 1.625

Behemy is taking 415% more damage than Snow, which is somewhat alarming. But that gap shrinks once we take DEF into account. Suppose x = 10,000,000.

If you want the full data and the full calculation for these results, please check out this screenshot. And here's Gladio NVA with max DEF with JP data but please keep in mind that gearing in JP is entirely different from GL. Gladio will have less DEF (he can reach up to 6852 DEF at EX 3) on GL but he should be on par with Gabranth nonetheless.

As is very notable: Behemy takes 370% more damage than Snow when adding DEF to the equation. I haven’t done the math on eHP but the result shouldn't differ too much. It should still be in favour of Snow & Gabranth but the difference is going to be lower as Behemy reaches absurd amounts of HP to offset his lack of defense mechanisms.

Budget Comparison

I got quite a few requests (Discord, Reddit DM, and in the comments) to do a budget comparison for these units. I also go the request to add Gladio to the list, which I will add soon™! This is the gear I considered for the budget comparison: Click me for gear and here's Gladio NVA.

Gladio Mitigation (85% avg Cover mit, 70% general mit, 50% phys mit): (x/DEF) * 0.15 * 0.3 * 0.5, meaning: 100 * 0.15 * 0.3 * 0.5 = 2.25 but keep in mind that his 85% avg Cover mit and his 70% gen mit are 1 turn duration buffs and thus imply that he'll need to skip one to reapply the 50% phys mit. This is super hard to account for and I'll just have to assume that he's able to hold it. Or else we're going to need different model calcs and trust me, this will get super complicated. I wrapped my head around this for the last 30 minutes and decided to leave it as is.

The most notable thing here being Gladio to be honest. He's pretty close to Gabranth and twice as tanky as Behemy but this is somewhat skewed. As can be seen in the pictures, neither Behemy, nor Snow, nor Gabranth use their own STMRs, which add a huuuuge chunk in DEF. Esp. Behemy skyrockets from 4926 to 5413 DEF. He'd still take more damage but the gap wouldn't be as huge. Still, for a NVA unit, Gladio can hold up with current NV Base Tanks at a budget level.

How does he fare in the meta?

Some people already guessed it: Behemy isn’t that amazing. He’s still a pretty decent tank but when it actually comes to tanking, he’s lacking. He hits high numbers in DEF and HP respectively but these numbers mean nothing if the rest of his kit with respect to actual tanking is bad. 40% personal mitigation is an insult to any NV tank if you’re asking me, as is 50% General Mitigation. Behemy is in dire need of Support units and actually has to be babysitted more than Snow which already is a bad sign. On the other hand: Behemy shines the brightest, when he can focus on support skills and just tanks on the side, which is kind of ironic as stated above. I’d place him at the bottom of all 3 tanks. He probably will be the weakest of tanks for the Genies Trial but the secret sauce to some Dark Vision caps in the near future.

Should you pull?

If you’ve missed out on a physical Tank in the past, now’s your chance to get one. While not being the best at what he does, he’ll surely get the job done with good support. If you already own Gabranth or Snow however, I’d advise to skip even though it hurts my soul as his sprite is just glorious. We’re getting NVA Gladio pretty soon, too. He’s a pretty decent Phys Tank, by the way! Just a random tangent at the end: After the Genies Trial, there are no further trials waiting for Phys. Tanks. So his shelf life is kind of limited at the time of writing this review.

I hope you enjoyed this review and best of luck should you decide to pull. Have a nice weekend, everyone! I’ll keep a close watch on the thread as per usual to answer as many questions/suggestions as possible. As always: I appreciate feedback and look forward to see your opinion!

Cheers

Livedili

Edit 1: I just added a Budget Behemy/Gabby/Snow Comparison to the list as requested.

Edit 2: Added Gladio NVA based on JP data to the comparison. He's pretty pretty good for a NVA unit.