Short (?) post about crowns and ranking dungeons, and past crown cutoff and top scores. Since everyone on NA and JP are working on their scores on the current Ranking Dungeon, I figured this is a perfect time to have this post out!

As well – Congratulations to our very own PDX Discord moderator, Flandre, for scoring his 30th crown on JP!!

(Also my first post on this end of the site! Nice to be not writing news once in a while… Can’t have Chu, Ken, Cate, and Blaze have all the fun! :D)

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Ranking dungeons: What are they?

Ranking dungeons (JP: ランキングダンジョン [ranking dungeon], or ランダン [Ran-dan, short form]) are event-only competitive dungeons that pit players’ skill and/or wallets against each other. These are solo-only dungeons where players are scored based on performance, and more often your team-building skills in handling the dungeon. Scores determine the rewards players get when the ranking dungeon ends, and rewards different ranking to ranking.

Those who score in the very top percentile (1 – 6%, depending on the tournament, see below) will receive fancy crowns on the orbs next to their names. Each additional crown will upgrade the crown, which are all shown in the next section.

If you happen to fail to clear the dungeon or wish to try for a better score, you can run the dungeon as much as you’d like until the cutoff time (if you have the stamina). The dungeons are typically no-continue, and recent dungeons give no dungeon drops as well.

Note that one of the available Quests requires obtaining crowns, under Maniacs category. Getting 30 crowns, which is a hard achievement, unlocks a solo-only badge called No Skyfall Combos Awoken Badge. This badge is amazing for late-game and end-game players who loves speeding through dungeons, especially ranking dungeons when speed matters!

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Factors that contribute to your ranking score

As seen from the image above, there are many factors that contribute to the overall score. The goals you should keep in mind while clearing the dungeon are:

• Having a high average combo count (500 points / 0.1 combo, maximum is 15.0 combos).
• Having a high amount of time remaining (500 point / 1 second). Time can be negative!
  
• Having highest Max Damage (total damage dealt) to an individual monster in one turn (maximum score of 10,000).
  
• Working with Skill Only Defeat if you think you can handle the score penalties from clearing a floor using active skills. You gain score in the time remaining score in return, assuming you clear fast.

These four factors combined will give you a score with which to rank you against other members of the same server.

For great details on the scores and how each second/combo affects them, see fether’s subreddit post.

Which factor is more important?

They all are equally important! All this really comes down to the teams you use, and your strategy to counter all mechanics in the dungeon, and the ranking dungeon itself. If it’s easy to cap the damage in the dungeon, then focus on other factors. Remember that even if you own all cards used by the top players and can build the same teams, it does not necessarily mean you can match the same amount of combos at the same speed (I know I certainly can’t, maybe you can…).

In general: Use your resources, know your cards, and use what is suitable for you. A crown team does not necessarily mean it has to be the same as ones on YouTube videos or what everyone else is running. This also means you don’t necessarily need to be a whale (players who spend a lot of money in the game) to build the “perfect” team!

Another thing to keep in mind is that teams used in Top 10 are very specialized, and most often you don’t need to build the same teams to achieve scores in the crown range.

Also – Practice making combos and improve orb-matching skills, since you’re working with time constricts and pressure!

See also Flandre’s advice in scoring high in ranking dungeons for advices from a 30-crown player.

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All crowns in PAD

When you first receive a crown, it will be Bronze, then move to Bronze Sparkle, then Bronze Shine + Sparkle. On the fourth crown you move to the next tier, Silver. Then you move as in Bronze, with Silver Sparkle then Silver Shine + Sparkle… and so on.

Here’s a list of all current crowns (June 2018), taken from Skyozora.

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All Ranking Dungeons

Giant table now moved to here!

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Getting 30 crowns is possible!

Flandre, one of the moderators in our Discord server, has been working towards obtaining 30 crowns since the first crown-able ranking dungeon in September 2015. Scoring 30 crowns isn’t an easy task (especially on JP server), and he achieved that! Congratulations again!!

Note: He’s not the first to get the No Skyfall Combos awoken badge on JP.

His celebratory post is on Reddit as well.

Now to wait until 30 ranking dungeons available in NA… Sigh.

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How much should you care about crown?

Well… It depends on you, your Monster Box, how many Magic Stones you want to spend on stamina, and the ranking dungeon itself.

I’m certainly not as good of a player as Flandre myself, and I don’t have half the amount of his crowns and I’m content with that. I certainly know the limit in my skills and won’t go for the crowns I can’t get, especially those ranking dungeons where I cannot get a consistent high scores from. Maybe by year 2020 I’ll have 30 crowns like Flandre does. Maybe.

While it’s cool to have a crown by your name, your competitive mind will not be satisfied with just a bronze crown. You’ll want more crowns once you score one. One big reason I try for my crowns myself is so that I won’t be stuck with the ugly Silver crown… and now I’m down this rough path of ranking dungeons.

In fact, some moderators on our PDX team miss having the little orb by their name instead of a crown.

With that aside, I do see my playing skills improving a lot from playing ranking dungeon. The time pressure, team composition theorycrafting, and repetitive attempts do help in the long run (or… short run if you’re going for crowns, haha).

What I will add is that if you’re a newer player and have the skills, fixed team ranking dungeons are good time to see how your skills compare to the rest of server, especially since it’s indepdent of your box. As well, some dungeons give decent EXP to rank yourself up quickly, while shooting for higher percentile (But that, of course, requires you clearing the dungeon).

If you aren’t a new player, not ranking so much from running ranking dungeon, and have limited number of Magic Stones or saving the stones for other purposes — Just do your best with what you got. Aim for the rewards instead of a crown. Or even, just get the Magic Stone and improve your box instead. With a limited box as a fresh player, there’s only so much you can do. Don’t sweat it, remember that there’s always more ranking dungeons ahead!

And that’s all from me today. Back to running ranking dungeons on both servers myself!

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Image Source

Paimon Tamadra: パズドラくがき 0826, by H糸くず [ Pixiv ]