Bug Fables - Cave of Trials Strategy

This is a test of endurance and of flexibility. You can't just run in here with the same build you used on, say, ULTIMAX Tank and expect to win. You need to conserve as much HP and TP as possible, you don't want to rely on your items too much either, and you need a build that can handle anything that's thrown at it. For this reason, medals like the Poison medals aren't good here since they need an item to activate reliably.

For starters, I highly recommend being at max rank, and I also recommend having as much MP as possible. This does mean you might have to make the tough choice of sacrificing HP and/or TP, but being able to equip as many medals as possible can make up for having lower HP and TP. If you need to respec at Patton's, do it. You're also going to want every Heart Berry and Bond Berry you can find, as well as both the Super Pepper and Iron Seed from the Berry Salesman in Defiant Root (though he only offers the latter upon starting Chapter 7). Patton can let you reassign those too.

I also strongly suggest that Leif be your attacker. You're going to need AoE attacks here, and Icefall and Ice Rain are your most reliable options. A huge chunk of enemies are weak to ice, and any freezes you get can give you much-needed breathing room. Get his attack as high possible, through both medals such as Power Exchange and the Super Pepper.

However, both Icefall and especially Ice Rain can be very expensive. This is where the medal Life Cast comes in. By making it so Leif spends HP instead of TP, TP can be saved for Taunt and Vi's Healing moves. On top of that, it combos quite nicely with Last Attack as Leif will get the boost from it if the skill cost puts him in danger range. Just make sure he has over 10 HP so he can afford to use Ice Rain. As far as recovering his HP goes, I already mentioned Vi's healing (Sharing Stash in particular can work for the long term), but there's also the medal Prayer. With both Prayer medals equipped, Leif can restore 4 HP every time he does nothing, which is enough to afford Icefall. You can also use HP Core, but its effect is less immediate. I also recommend putting Status Booster on Leif to increase the chances of freeze on Icefall and Ice Rain.

Speaking of Kabbu, Taunt and getting your defense as high as possible is extremely helpful. Defense Exchange, the Iron Seed, and putting him in the back with Back Support are all good ways of doing that. I'd also like to bring special attention to the medals Reflection and Meditation, which will boost Kabbu's defense by a further 2 points and heal 2 TP to boot whenever he does nothing, making Taunt essentially free. On turns when Kabbu Taunts and does nothing, just regular blocking can completely negate many incoming attacks, and superblocking even more so. Be sure to equip Super Block+ to make superblocks even more effective, and Block Heal can even let Kabbu restore some health on a Super Block or save himself from death if he's on 1 HP. Prayer and HP Core can also work if you're using another strategy than Life Cast/Life Attack for your attacker, though I'd suggest putting Prayer on your attacker if you are using Life Cast and then putting HP Core on Kabbu (or just giving both Kabbu and your attacker a Prayer medal and an HP Core medal each).

In this strategy Vi's main job is just going to relay her turns to Leif or Kabbu depending on how lucky Leif got with his freezes, occasionally using Secret Stash or Sharing Stash on turns where Leif needs HP to use a skill. If you can afford the MP cost Heal Plus can make both moves even more effective, but it's not essential.

Other good medals include Miracle Matter (good on Leif since he's likely to be at low health a lot, on top of having negative defense if you're using Power Exchange), Triumph Buzz and Victory Buzz to restore HP and TP after every round, Spy Specs to see the HP of every enemy even if you haven't encountered them yet, Resist All to reduce the chances of getting a status effect if you miss a block or alternatively any medal that exploits a status effect (especially Shock Trooper, but Heavy Sleeper can also work), HP Plus and TP Plus if you need more of either, Strong Start to get a second action at the start of any given round (especially useful since it means Vi can heal and relay her turn at the same time), Spiky Bod to damage any enemy that Kabbu blocks, and Deep Taunt to lower enemy defense and give Leif a better shot at wiping groups out quickly.

While you don't want to rely on them heavily, bringing items is still very helpful. For this strategy, there's no better healing item than Queen's Dinners. 15 HP to the entire party, 15 TP, and cures status effects to boot. By this point in the game you should be able to find/afford the ingredients for them. You could get away with having nothing but Queen's Dinners here, but I can also recommend Miracle Shakes for an AoE heal and revive all in one, and Berry Smoothies for full TP heals (though I think you're better off with items that can heal both HP and TP here).

With my suggestion for a build out of the way, it's time to move onto in-battle strategies.

Generally speaking, you're going to be using Icefall with Leif 90% of the time. The other 10% of the time you'll be using Leif's normal attack or Frigid Coffin to finish off that one last remaining enemy or getting a freeze on an enemy that escaped it from Icefall, doing nothing to restore HP if you have Prayer equipped on him, or Ice Rain if you really want something dead. Kabbu should spend his turns using Taunt, doing nothing to boost his defense with Reflection/restore TP with Meditation, and occasionally attacking to break guards. As mentioned previously Vi's spending most of her time relaying her turn to Leif or Kabbu, occasionally healing.

If you see any enemy you know has an AoE attack, prioritize killing it or at least freezing it first before anything else. Particularly nasty enemies include Madesphies since they have nothing but AoEs and one of them inflicts Numb and is tricky to block, Zombeetles since they also use nothing but AoEs and hit like trucks, and Wasp Bombers for both of those reasons (on top of being able to inflict lots of other status ailments). After that prioritize enemies that have attacks that you have trouble blocking, that inflict status ailments, can heal/buff their allies, and/or are resistant/immune to freeze. Only use an item if you desperately need to, like when Leif doesn't have the HP to use Ice Rain when you need him to.

Particularly beefy enemies like Burglars, Wasp Troopers, and Chomper Brutes should be locked down with Freeze to limit the amount of damage they do while you're whittling their health down.

For most of the battles, so long as you're strategic with your moves and don't needlessly waste HP/TP/items, you should come out alright. Even if you do have to back out early to adjust your medals or shuffle your items around, you'll get to keep the rewards you earned on the way there.

About the only battles I'm going to make special note of are the last five, where the appearance of the ????s make things start getting really interesting. I'll have more to say about these mystery enemies in the video after this one, but for right now what you need to know is that they are the strongest normal enemies in the game, to the point where they're more like minibosses than regular enemies. They're beefy as heck and have hard-hitting attacks, many of which inflict nasty status ailments. They're all immune to freeze, but they are weak to Ice regardless. Ice Rain should be your attack of choice for dealing with them.

Also worth noting is battle 48, the two Golden Seedlings. You don't have to actually kill them to win the round; take some precautions to protect yourself if they do attack, but otherwise just let them run. If you need to heal this is a good time.

Treat the final round like a boss fight and pull out all the tricks you possibly can. Whatever items you have left you're now free to use; spam your strongest attacks and just do whatever you can to take out the two ????s before their hard hitting attacks and status ailments take you out. Thankfully they don't have AoEs, but screwing up a block here can end you, and it'd really suck to lose here.