Pool

Beats by Drag

Flat and Sharp - So I feel like I need to have a separate place to discuss this, otherwise I'll end up repeating myself every time I have to bring it up in each card for this series. I appreciate the balance of Sharps and Flats in the team, with fewer Sharps and a flexible Sharp/Flat mean you can easily balance the team's stats in the various leader/ally combinations. As a minor music nerd I also really really love this concept and you used a lot of creativity to adapt these ideas which gets you tons of props from the get go. However... Flat and Sharp stat effects may be underwhelming. Sharp is nearly equivalent to giving the team amelioration column dissolve bonuses, and Flat's HP doesn't seem incredibly impactful unless you really need the HP, and otherwise beefs up the already beefy dragon HP. Without any sample stats this is just speculation but that's how it feels at a cursory glance. In a world where QG already exists, maybe the HP buffs are necessary, yet then you're then shackled to always bringing enough Flat members just for HP. It opens up a lot of problems, because I know you balanced the leader multipliers and team skill effects on the flexibility of this mechanic, and I feel it may not be fully thought through. Also, there are no Consonance or Dissonance effects for the commons which is unfortunate. They're clearly not meant to be used as leaders but I was expecting some sort of effect for them. The effects themselves are ok though. I will get into each ones' later. I have a problem with the wording though: do you need a team of _only_ Dragonic Rhythms for these effects? It isn't exactly clear. If I have a team with just L/A DR will I get a Consonance effect or none at all? With numbers balancing, the Flat/Sharp effects could be overpowered, or ineffectual. It just comes down to what their stat distribution ends up being.

Seal Format - In a game that allows you to challenge its content with a Team consisting of 1 leader, 4 members, and 1 ally, its strange that we don't TC a lot of cards to be specifically members. We tend to gravitate towards doing this for multiple reasons, but the most important for me is because the Seal Series system as it is now, only exists as a gacha cash grab. In fact, the requirement to build a large team, and having to delve through the gacha for good members as well as your good leader is part of the gacha cash grab. To an extent this is a bit of tin-foil-hat-wearing conspiracy talk, but the crux of it is: don't feel bound by this system in designing a Seal series. You don't need to fill your series up with gacha filler! But in the spirit of the game, some cards are leaders, and some are members, and we can make TCs for both. Just throwing that out there because when y'all create TCs in this format its the first place my mind goes.

Dragostea - nice meme. Also a phenominal active skill. A much needed utility for Dragons. With it having a Flat though, it makes it a valuable member in Eroica, while less useful in Uta IMO because of the Consonance/Dissonance you get. Because its Flat it balances out its offensive active skill's nature though which I appreciate. Dragostea will outlive all other cards in this series.

Queen - Another iconic music choice, and another great utility granted to dragons, combo help and race rune generation. This is an incredible all in one. Piercing defense and combo help is a damage boost all its own, but creating dragon runes and having it on a low CD takes it to another level. Limiting it to exclusively dragons is pretty important, we've seen first hand what kind of staying power combo helpers are with existing cards like Zhuge Liang. Together its a balanced package. Stronger members and weaker leaders make for a very balanced seal. The only thing I hold against this card is that it is offensively focused and is a Sharp key member. So it double dips in power just by bringing this excellent card around. I can't say it should be swapped to Flat, but its just a sticking point that it may be a bit centralizing in how much extra power it contributes to a dragon team, let alone a DR team on its own.

Dies - My eyes and my brain hurt. This active skill is still bloated and really a pain to read through but you get the gist of it. Dissolve fire runes every turn for a scaling damage boost. It explodes hearts every turn that its active. Drop the active and you get slapped. All of that is pretty nutso considering he's a set and forget member in Furioso, and you have the audacity to make him match Furioso and also be Sharp key. Alongside Furioso's crazy strong Consonance this is actually a crazy strong combo. I'm sort of ok with all of it, because it seems fun, and the gameplay hook is fine. Hearts are worthless to dragons, but not for completing enemy skills so that gives these teams a glaring weakness which helps its balance. In a world where Furioso didn't exist I'd be much more comfortable with his existence, but as it is, it makes me feel a little weird. If this were to exist in game it probably would not be problematic, it just worries me from a team building and gameplay critique angle.

Killshot - Seems busted, a variable damage snipe, up to billions of damage. With the drawback that you can't double it up with additional attacks that turn. An immediate flaw that arises in my mind, is if you clear a wave with this, you're facing the next wave locked into having no team attack. So it can save you when you need a huge snipe, but screw you if you don't plan it accordingly. In all its certainly unique, I can't say its toxic gameplay either, and its trade off seems balanced for what it gives you... I just don't know if this is the kind of utility we need in this game? Like this does a lot of stuff, its a speedrun tool, its a snipe, a non attributive attack, it can double your burst across multiple turns ala Septem but with more freedom as to when you deal that damage. All for a lower CD than Septem as well. So iunno about this one man. At least its Flat.

fourthirtythree - Nice meme. I hope that the "bgm" for this active playing also would prevent the sound of enchanting runes sfx lmao. Its a great active, flexible use and requires skill to use in the moment. I have a huge issue with that CD though. 3 CD for 2 turns of dragon runes is INSANE. I don't care if you're halving the damage of the team, but race runes are suuuper busted for getting around enemy skills. Not to mention you shed the outgoing damage reduction in the second turn, where you still gain 3 columns of dragon runes. 75% damage reduction on its own for CD 3 is busted. Along side everything else its unfathomable. This is another set and forget dragon member, it just does so much. And it gives you flexibility in triggering Consonance or Dissonance in your team which is unreal. I can't even recommend how to adjust this. There's so much going on it can't just be a CD nerf. I get the meme with it all but this is probably the biggest offender of the series.

Furioso - Another offender, with crazy strong consonance and dissonances, and some strong synergies with other DR members. Not to mention a combined board setter + hazard removal active AND with CD reductions in the Consonance and Dissonances. So yeah. That's a lot. It definitely will shift in power between building for the Consonance versus the Dissonance, but they're seemingly balanced. With stats included for these we'd be able to tell for certain. That seems to be the goal though, to balance the damage throughput between the two, but provide a different bonus. With the Consonance you gain consistent damage without using the Consonance by having a team full of Sharp members, and giving them a utility hazard removal tool, and for the Dissonance you reward opting for less throughput every turn, by giving them a very strong burst. The main thing that you'd gain over choosing the Dissonance is to try and reach a certain HP Threshold probably. The burst option is exceedingly strong, but not as strong as the Consonance utility + passively higher attacks. So yeah. Also the costs for Dissonance and Consonance feel arbitrary. They both should cost 100% for how strong they are. I'm mostly complaining that this feels like its giving a lot away for free and that it seems too strong but it might be on the weaker side. It is going to be absolutely flooded with fire runes if you bring Dies. Even if you don't you could easily still have 10+ fire runes every turn that would be quite difficult to always dissolve. And with no runeshare the team's damage lives and dies by being able to dissolve the whole board.

Eroica - Another great reference. The elves tie in throws me a bit for a loop, not understanding how to trigger consonance and dissonance if it doesn't have a key note but i guess that means you don't need a team exclusively of DR for those effects. But the effects are balanced and the gameplay is solid. Nothing more to really say here. I think the Consonance should cost 100% but I'll end up saying that for all these.

Uta - Now we get Machina too. I get the reference but this feels like something that should've been more omnipresent than only exist in these rares. Anyway this is a neat concept. Seiya but for dragons. Downside is when you let machinas into the party they ruin the fun. I can theorize the following team and it makes me throw up a little in my mouth thinking that it works with Uta:

Uta - Schrodinger, Schrodinger, Delta, Earth Lionel - Uta

A mini Schrodinger engine, that sacrifices one turn of uptime to meet the condition to have 3 attributes in the team. It would work reasonably well too. You will hardly ever be able to hit the ex = combo requirement though, 8 combos -> one group of 8 and 7 groups of 3 because of the random runes that will be under Uta, but even without it, the team has pretty high damage. Not counting the machina jank, it seems really fun to play. It might be bringing a bit too much to the table though. Both of these Consonance and Dissonance effects are crazy good. Too good. And both of these actives are super super good. Ophestra is on a very low CD and does a lot to improve the team's longevity. Imperial Death is nuts with Dragostea, and even on its own. In all I can't say that its overpowered or bloated, you ask the player to spin to get most of the power in this team. Despite giving it tons of hazard ignoring potential, its still fine. Uta probably has the most flexibility of all the rares, utilizing the other DR's very effectively as well as supporting machinas which opens up its utility on par or more so than Eroica.