Introduction

Hi, everyone! With the second run of Sacred Relic Dragon Saga that arrived on August 17th, I just wanted to evaluate the top rarity again. However, I felt that the last article was a bit lengthy, so this time, I’m splitting up my analysis into five personalized articles for each respective top rarity card. Hopefully, my perspective provides you with some insight into how to use the card to its fullest potential.

Though I’m not going to take a good look at any of the bottom rarity cards, here are some highlights of the machine:

• Polowne (5★)
• Lampeid (5★)
• Shivnia (6★)

Analysis

Stat	Lv.99	+297
HP	4642	5632
ATK	1150	1645
RCV	25	322

[5966]Dwarven Warrior, Grigory
ドワーフの戦士・グリゴリー
Physical / DragonAvailable Killers: Machine / Healer

Active Skill: (18 ➧ 18) Not Inheritable
For 15 turns, Fire and Wood orbs are more likely to appear by 15%; Changes to [5967] for the duration of the dungeon

Leader Skill: [1/36/1]
6x ATK when matching Fire and Wood

Stat	Lv.99	+297
HP	9285	10275
ATK	2253	2748
RCV	65	362

[5967]Ferocious Flame Dragon Warrior, Grigory
焔猛龍の戦士・グリゴリー
Physical / DragonAvailable Killers: Machine / Healer

Active Skill: (8 ➧ 8) Not Inheritable
For 1 turn, bypass void damage shield effects; Change all orbs to Fire, Wood, and Heal orbs

Leader Skill: [4/400/4]
[Disable Poison & Mortal Poison orb effects] 2x all stats for Physical type; 10x ATK when matching Fire and Wood; 1000000 additional damage when matching Fire and Wood

Everything about this card screams TPA, top to bottom. Let’s start with the most obvious hint.

Grigory possesses a staggering 7 TPA, which gives him a personal 17.09x ATK multiplier when matching four connected Fire or Wood Orbs. No other card possesses seven of this awakening naturally, though the three cards that can reach 7 TPA via SA (Super Reincarnated Haku , Roche , Rehven ) all have a significantly higher attack stat. In addition, assisting an equip with one TPA would augment personal damage to a crazy 25.63x ATK, while utilizing Phantom Dragon’s Halberd, Infinity Rage (Core Equip) would boost personal damage to a ridiculous 38.44x ATK.

The only problem lies in the inherent inefficiency of the Two-Pronged Attack awakening. I believe that its problems are best illuminated by a comparison to arguably the most efficient damage awakening in the game, Enhanced Combos.

• When comparing net value, Enhanced Combos is highly efficient as a source of 2x ATK that is consistently achievable because the majority of natural boards contain at least seven combos. TPA, on the other hand, only provides 1.5x ATK, dilutes combo count, and is somewhat more restrictive due to its orb-hungry nature.
• Due to the difference in magnitude, Two-Pronged Attack becomes a highly space-inefficient awakening. Remember, every card has a maximum of nine possible awoken skills. A higher magnitude per awakening allows cards to reach certain levels of personal damage output with less awoken skill slots. For example, Grigory requires a staggering seven of his nine awakenings to be Two-Pronged Attack in order to reach a personal 17.09x ATK multiplier, whereas Fagan-Rai requires only four of his nine awakenings to be Enhanced Combos in order to reach a slightly lower personal damage multiplier of 16x ATK. Thus, Rai has many more available awoken skill slots to allocate, while Grigory is far more limited with only two remaining.
• The real kicker is in the nature of how damage awakenings stack. Awakenings like Two-Pronged Attack, [L] Increased Attack, and VDP all have unique activation clauses for damage multipliers that only apply to the combo that fulfills said requirement. Therefore, each of these awakenings cannot multiplicatively stack with one another because of their mutually exclusive activation requisites. For example, a match of four linked Fire Orbs can never activate an [L] Increased Attack. Even if one were to match an L and a TPA, each combo would gain the multipliers of each respective awakening, and then cards with both awakenings would just add the damage together. However, Enhanced Combos (and Super Enhanced Combos) apply a flat damage multiplier after reaching a certain combo count, which does not mutually exclude other awakenings. Thus, if one were to match seven combos and a box of nine linked orbs, cards with both Damage Void Piercer and Enhanced Combos would have the damage stack multiplicatively on top of each other, at least for the one box combo.

Regardless of all these weaknesses, Two-Pronged Attack is extraordinarily simple to activate and requires very little skill and time to pull off, making it quite a convenient awakening for speed-based challenges and/or some ranking dungeons. Furthermore, many aspects of Grigory’s active(s) and his leader skill try to mitigate the aforementioned inefficiencies of the Two-Pronged Attack playstyle.

For example, I mentioned that TPA is slightly orb-hungry because it requires four orbs of one attribute to activate. Therefore, Grigory, upon transformation, helps to remedy that via a lengthy increased skyfall buff of both Fire and Wood Orbs. For shorter dungeons, fifteen turns should be more than enough, but for arena-style content, the same fifteen turns is probably insufficient. Fortunately, the Puzzle & Dragons Christmas Tree can provide a similar skyfall effect (albeit at a significantly lower percentage) that lasts for much, much longer (99T). Post-transformation, Grigory allows the team to pierce through damage void shields and generates a tricolor board that perfectly matches his color requirements while also creating Heal Orbs to recover; the void damage void effect is more important than it initially seems because of the previously mentioned way damage awakenings stack.

Grigory provides quite the formidable package (not unlike Yugi) in his leader skill, with poison damage immunity, a large automatic true bonus attack, and immense stat multipliers overall in exchange for a dual color match activation requirement and a passive typing requirement. While TPA isn’t necessarily required, Grigory’s awakenings basically make it a secondary requisite or an opportunity for damage control. Of course, the first concern for any transform leader is achieving the required 18 eSB needed to transform. Some subs, among many, that can alleviate this problem are:

• Golem Battle Mode, Ludsev & Salerm (Shaman King Collab)
• Pixel Yog-Sothoth, the Youthful One (PAD Academy Seasonal)
• Holy Festival’s Hell Phantom Heiress, Romia (Christmas Seasonal)
• Shocking Draconic Songster on Electric Guitar, Marthis (Draconic Orchestra)
• Relentless Destroyer, Grand Tengu (Farmable)
• Ascending Volcanic Dragon Berserker, Duval (Sacred Relic Dragon Saga)

Anything other than the transformation requirement is generally dungeon-specific, but Grigory’s pool of subs is generally quite shallow. Luckily, there is a future farmable (Gawain ) that is quite an ideal fit despite its relative cheapness.

In terms of pairings, an identical Grigory is a natural choice, but may not be the best choice because a lot of the benefits Grigory provides (mainly the immunity to poison damage, automatic follow-up attack, and increased skyfall buff) are not magnified with a second Grigory, which means that all a second Grigory really provides is his leader skill multipliers, another damage stick and a second void void active to reduce dependency on VDP.

Instead, a leader which adds combos via leader skill effect may be best because it mitigates the slight loss of combos that comes from the inherent nature of Two-Pronged Attack. Two leaders that stand out to me are Ludsev & Salerm from Shaman King Collab and Hiyori Sarugaki from Bleach Collab; both promote Two-Pronged Attack in their own ways and provide a decent amount of eSB to aid with transformation while also providing extra combos in the leader skill for matching combos of Fire and Wood Orbs. However, it must be noted that both also come with their own weaknesses; Ludsev & Salerm boosts HP but not RCV, so additional recovery will probably be necessary for dungeons with hard-hitting preemptives such as AA2, whereas Hiyori Sarugaki does not provide any HP or RCV (though she does bring a shield) and limits combos to a minimum of four linked orbs.

Conclusion

Basically, Grigory is quite a strong leader who provides numerous effects and powerful multipliers that is held back by an inferior playstyle and a somewhat shallow pool of subs. However, if Two-Pronged Attack gets buffed in any way, Grigory has to potential to explode onto the scene as the next top-tier leader to dominate the game.