Dbzboz

BATTLEOF Z BEGINNERS GUIDEWritten and made by NightmareGamma (Nero De Angelo)

Welcome new warrior / Veteran who seeks for answers to his questions.

This is my „Dragonball Z: Battle of Z“ beginners guide. In this guide I will try to help newcomers to get more easily into the game, as well as helping Veterans to find some new things about this game they might not know, or if they seek help for certain Teams and Missions.I hope everyone will find what he/she is looking for.

Table of Contents:1. About the characters and how you build your team.2. Recommended Teams3. Recommended Cards4. Tips for fighting Online5. Ultimates6. About Bonus Conditions

1. About the Characters and how you build your team.Battle of Z has a really good Character selection, and each Character has one or two of 4 Archetypes:

Melee TypeCharacter is normally played in close combat. Melee Type techniques can include Rush Attacks, in which your character travel long distances and then hit the target, Assault Attacks that only travel a little but hitting an target several times with hard attacks and Charge Attacks, which will mostly cause guard break and send the target flying.

Ki Blast TypeCharacter is normally played from mid- to long range distances, shooting strong beam and sphere attacks, hitting several targets at once etc.

Support TypeCharacter is normally played defensely and from some distance. Normally does not involve in combat, but is supporting the other Characters by healing them from Damage, several Status effects and even Knock Outs.

Interfere TypeHow to play this Archetype differs between each character. Some are better in close range, some are better from a distance. Can snatch enemys away from an attacked player, stun enemys, cause their lock on to turn off for a moment or set the lock on from the actual target to the interfere character and so on.

At the beginning of the game, it is okay to experiment around with some characters and try using different combinations (even if the selection is really small in the beginning). However, the farther you get in the game, the more you will notice that just randomly picking Characters won‘t work anymore. So having a balanced team is important. But which characters too choose?

Before we get to that part, we have to talk about the Stats of some characters, and, most importantly, the RETRY‘s!I noticed that during online play that many people just use the strongest characters they have: SSJ3 Gotenks, Bills, Kid Buu and SSJ2 Teen Gohan! And then they wonder: „HEY! Why are we already dead? I just died once!“ The answer to this question is simple: THOSE CHARACTERS ARE TOO STRONG!!! Or better: The give you no retrys! What most people seem not to know is that each character gives a certain amount of retrys: Weak Characters most times give up to 2 Retrys at once, while most normal Characters give you 1 more retry. However, the strongest Characters (Namely every Final Boss for each Saga (Except Vegeta)most final forms of characters (LSSJ Broly, Final Cooler etc.) and everything from SSJ2 onwards, except SSJ2 Goku) will give you NOTHING! That is the penalty for playing with the strongest Characters! How many retrys you get from a character can be actually seen while chosing them. You can see it here in this Picture:

Remember: Retrys are shared between all characters, so even if you have 1 retry, but everyone else has 0, and one of them dies, they use up YOUR retry! So having a team that is strong, but also give you at least some retrys would be a good thing. To make it more easy for you to choose, I made a chart with all characters, the number of card slots for each stat they have, there base HP, base overall strenght and the amount of retrys you get for them. Check it here (Note 1: I didn‘t listed the slots for the special cards and Items, because everyone has 2 Slots for Special Cards and 1 for Items)(Note 2: To see the EXACT stats of a character, which means each stat he/she has, not just the summarise, go to your character in the game and press triangle. Those diagram shows you exactly how high the stats of a character are:

This are characters, that are strong and still give you retrys:SSJ2 GokuSSJ GotenksSSJ BrolyEvil BuuMeta CoolerDaburaMajin VegetaCell perfect form (not perfect Cell)

Those are all some really strong characters, especially Evil Buu. Using one of them might come in handy in later battles.

2. Recommended Teams:

Those are my preferred teams from my first run. You don‘t have to use them, but with those teams I have beaten the game alone. So it is worth checking.

Note: (N) = Normal Story Path(A) = Alternate Story Path

Play the Normal Path (N) first. This will unlock most of the evil characters that you can use in the Alternate Paths (A). The characters listed on the normal path are usually already avaiable at the beginning point of the Saga or after a few mission on the normal Path.Also, many characters are only unlocked if you get at least an „S“ ranking in their respective Missions.

Saga: Player: CPU1: CPU2: CPU3:

Saiyan (N) Goku Kid Gohan Krillin Piccolo

Saiyan (A) Vegeta Nappa Raditz Saibaman__________________________________________________________________________

Freezer (N) Goku Kid Gohan Krillin Piccolo or SSJ Goku or Vegeta

Freezer (A) Freezer Final Freezer 2 Ginyu Jeice__________________________________________________________________________

Cyborg (N) SSJ Goku Teen Gohan Krillin (One of the or SSJ Vegeta Characters you or SSJ Trunks (w/S) didn‘t choosed as or SSJ Trunks player Character) or Super Trunks

Cyborg (A) Perfect Cell Android 18 Android 16 Android 17 or Cell 2 or Cell 2__________________________________________________________________________

Buu (N) SSJ Goku Android 18 SSJ Gohan (One of the or SSJ Vegeta Characters you or SSJ2 Goku* didn‘t choosed as or Majin Vegeta player Character)

Buu (A) Majin Vegeta Evil Buu Dabura Majin Buu

*SSJ2 Goku is unlocked in the first Mission of the alternate Story path if you get an „S“ ranking there.

Sometimes a movie- / Side-mission Stage will appear. In this Stages you usually can choose freely between each character you unlocked.After you beat all missions on all Paths until the end of the Buu Saga, including the Movie- and side- Missions, you get the ability to choose your characters free for every mission!

Finally, there are 4 Stages in which you are forced to use an specific Team that can‘t be changed, not even after unlocking the Free Character Selection mentioned above. Those are:

Mission 1: Only Goku avaiableMission 2: Goku as player, Krillin as CPU SupportMission 3: Kid Gohan playable, Krillin, Tien and Yamcha as CPU supporters.Mission 45: Goku as playable, Krillin, Piccolo and Gohan as CPU supporters.

Free Selection:After you unlock the ability to make your team of the characters you like, you should look for yourself what works best. However, if you want a good team, I‘ll provide you with one.

Player: CPU1: CPU2: CPU3:(Character Android 18 Evil Buu *(Read below)you can playbest with)

Android 18 is the best healer in the game so far as I can tell. She has big AOE healing that also heals herself, as well as those little green blasts that can heal a lot and home in to the character that is locked on. She is a real lifer safer.

Evil Buu Is a really, really strong character, with an base Power of 800 and 26000 Hit Points. He has that Move with which he killed the population on earth in the Manga/Anime, which is quite Powerful and mostly will hit the enemy because of the ridiculous Homing capabilities. And finally, he can transform the enemy into chocolate, which stun the target and heal every ally near the transformed target. really cool, altough pretty much useless against Giants. But you know what is the best thing? Even while having the same power as Perfect Cell and SSJ2 Teen Gohan, he still gives you one retry!

*So, what is the deal with CPU3? That depends... do you use an Ki-based Character, like Vegeta? Then put a Melee Character like Goku on to that spot. You use an melee character yourself? Put in an Ki-Type! You die way too often? Put in another healer! That way the group will be balanced and can handle nearly every situation, especially if there CPU Level is maxed out.

Also, if you have Vegetto, you might want to add him in Slot 3. He is ridiculously Powerful and can help you always out. But don‘t forget: He gives you no retrys!

My personal Team favourites (switch sometimes depending on mission)

Player: CPU1: CPU2: CPU3:SSJ Goku Android 18 Evil Buu Majin Buuor SSJ2 Goku or Vegetto or SSJ Teen Gohan

3. Recommended Cards

Choosing the right characters is good and all, but without the right cards equipped, your adventure could end faster as you can say „Porunga“.Actually, there is nothing you could do wrong during the customization, just put the highest Stat Boosts into each Slot you have. There is no benefit in using weaker cards, so remember that. However, what is a lot more important and a little harder to choose, are Special- and Item-cards.Each Character has 2 Special, and one Item Slot. There is a great option of Special and Item Cards to choose from, and what you equip really depends on your own playstyle. However, here are some of my favourites that brought me through the whole game.

Special Cards:Ultra Combination Crash: This card is a rare one, but it can be unlocked in the Premium Shop. It increase the AI of your CPU comerades about 1, and increase your Attack Power as well. A really good card, but remember, the CPU can only be brought up to 10. So if your CPU Characters all are already on Level 10, the AI increase won‘t work anymore and you should put another card into it‘s slot.

Energy Absorption System A and B: This Cards can also be bought in the Premium Shop. Equipping EASA will absorb the enemys Ki and refill your own with it through Physically attacking the target. EASB is the same, except that it drains Ki through Ki-based attacks, instead of Physical. Both of them might come in handy if you play a support role and running out of Ki.

Potential Lv.3: This just increase your defense largely if your HP sink. The lower you HP, the Higher the Defense Boost. If the enemys are depleting your health fa-ster than any Android steals someones Ki, then this card might come in handy. it is not the best card, but the defense boost is noticeable and guarantee that you sur-vive a little longer than usual.

Fighters Pride: Increase all your stats by a small amount, without any drawbacks. Sure, it is not much, but I see me using this all the time, and it helped a lot. There are still better cards, but if you think none of the others suits your playstyle, this card comes in handy as filler!

Saiyan Power: Increases all Stats after a knock down. Oh trust me, this thing is a beast! if you play with lots of weak characters, that gives you a lot of retrys, and also have good healers and people that can revive you, than this is will make any enemy scream in fear! Wouldn‘t it be fun to see Vegetto being beaten by a Saibamen that came in like a wrecking Ball? I sure think it is fun.

Dendes Miracle: Now, the „Dendes Miracle“ Card series is actually really special: There are a total of 7 different „Dendes Miracle“ Cards, one for each Stat, and one for Items. What this card does is increasing the amound of Card Slots for a specific Stat by 1! So instead of Goku having 3 Slots for health, he can get 4, just for an example. There is also one „Dendes Miracle“ Card that will give you one more item slot, effectively making you able to equip 2, instead of 1 Item Card. Like Fighters Pride, that can be a good filler but can also be used to power up an character even further! But remember: More than 5 Slots for each stat are not allowed, so if you have already 5 Slots in a stat, and try to equip Dende for a 6th Slot, it will say to you that this is not possible.

Item Cards:Actually, there are just two Cards I would advice you to equip:

Senzu Bean 1/2: A great card, that only cost 8000 DP and is practically a instant reviving extra retry! That is especially useful if you use many strong characters so that you have just a few lifes. This card revives you with half of your Maximum HP. But remember: it only works for you who equipped it, so if you have 0 retrys, and an CPU/other player dies, it will still be game over.

Senzu Bean: Just the same as the 1/2 version, but it will revive you with FULL Health. Costs 30000 DP for ONE bean, but it is totally worth it, especially if you think that you get a lot of DP already form just one battle.

4. Tips for fighting Online Co-op

This are some general tips for fighting Online Co-op, but some of these tips also work for offline mode, so it is advisable to read this even without intention to play online.

I: Keep an eye on which characters are chosen, and choose yours wisely.If you are inside a lobby, stay calm and watch what characters the players are chosing. You see many Melee and Ki-Blasters, but not healer? Then I would advise you play the healer. You see many power houses and none of them provides you a retry? just take a weaker character to get at least some. Sure, you might not want to play as a healer, or as weak Character, but it is still better than going into mission 59 and lose nearly instantly before anything really happened, because someone didn‘t pay attention and died. The team might thank you for it, and trust me, playing a healer can be fun as hell and you will always paying attention to everones health!

II: Don‘t hesitate to give some advices via headset.If you have a headset and see something like the above mentioned examples really happening, don‘t hesitate to talk to the people and say that they should change character because of the high risk of dying. I have done that some times and except once, I always got positive feedback! Like I said earlier, many people don‘t know about some of the mechanics and stats, especially not about the retry thing. Talking to the others is really helpful and most times they appreciate it and you, as well as the others, have even more fun while playing.

III: Revive fallen allyEven if you have the best healers around, even if you try to take of target, sometimes it can‘t be avoided to lose an ally. However, if a character is knocked down, it is not ultimately his/her end. As soon as the ally comes in contact with the ground after losing his/her health, a timer of 5 seconds appears (10 seconds if an CPU dies offline). If that countdown reaches 0, the ally is dead and will be revived, wasting an retry during the process. however, if a player reaches the ally before the countdown has ended, and press triangle while being locked on to the ally (more about „lock on“ below in the „5. Ultimate“ section) will revive the fallen ally with 1/3 of his/her health and NOT wasting any retry for that! But be careful, because the enemy could follow you, trying to stop your plan. Good ways to reach a fallen ally even with characters that don‘t have any reviving ability (like kid Gohan) are with their unique Abilities. SSJ2 Goku for example knows teleport. He can use that to get to the enemy faster, BUT can also be used to reach an ally faster, even fallen ones. Rush techniques like Kaioken are great too! They have a long cooldown, but if used fast enough you can still be able to press triangle for a revival. Also, sometimes you can cancel Cooldowns but just pressing L1 to block. Sometimes the animation ends and you can instantly act after releasing L1.

IV: Protect the healerSome enemys have the bad habit to attack the healer even if he/she doesn‘t involved in to the fighting itself. If the healer dies, it can get really ugly. How to prevent this situation? Just sometimes watch on the health bar of the healer. If it rapidly depletes, and the healing comes less frequent, you know that somethings wrong. Look at the healers Character Icon. if it is blinking red, he/she is targeted by an enemy. Look for the healer, see who‘s the enemy and get there to smack the enemy target a little until you get his/her attention. The healer can then go back to work! Also, if you see the healer running out of ki, than you should share some ki with him/her. Even if the situation looks good enough, the tide can change instantly, so sharing some Ki with the healer is always a good idea. If no enemy is chasing you, and the other players don‘t need help for the moment, take a little time to replenish some oft the healers Ki.

V: How a healer should actThe healer should stay away from the actual fighting, except on some situtations. More about that later. Try to get some distance between you, your comerades and the enemy, BUT NOT TOO MUCH! If an Enemy is chasing you (and some like Bills/Beerus are often try to take down the healer), try to move around. Someone should notice that the healing is not provided as often as it should and might come to safe you. While running away, still try to fire one or two healing shots to a damaged player, and then move further until the enemy is not chasing you anymore. If you are not chased, observe the situation, and do one or more of these three things based on the Flow of the battle.1. Look for your comerades health. If the health is sinking, keep on healing your teammates. That is why you are here!2. If there is nothing to heal, look at the Ki-Bar of your members. If you see that a character is running out of Ki, share yours with him. Target the Ally the same way you would do to heal him, and press Circle. That will fill his Ki slightly. That also won‘t deplete your own Ki, so that as often as you like, or as often as the situati-on let it happen. If you feel confident enough that you have enough Ki and that you don‘t need that much, then hold L1 while pressing circle while targeting an ally. That will replenish his Ki much more than a normal circle replenish, and it will also reach him faster than normal, but it will cost you Ki yourself.3. Follow your teammates fighting. If you see that they are doing a synchronized attack, or an Chain, just take advantage of that and lock on to the enemy, rush to-wards him/her and hit him to increase the strenght of the Synch- or Chain-attack. BUT don‘t forget to take some distance after it again. Don‘t forget: You are the Healer, so avoid unnecessary involvement in combat.

5. Ultimates

Ultimates... just one advice: STAY AWAY FROM THEM!!! Many people tried it (including me), regardless if online or offline... but it never worked (except once). The problem is the damn long charge up sequence, in which you can get killed really easily. Sure, you get definately a „Z“ ranking for ending the battle with a finisher, but it can only be done if the last Boss of the stage you are playing at is there (which means in Missions where you have to fight hundreds of Saibamen, you need to get to the last one to use the ultimate).You need a really good team online in order to properly activate and use an ultimate, here are some general tips:

Characters: One Healer should AT LEAST be there! The heal will make sure that the HP of the ultimate user won‘t drop to 0 during the charge, and he/she should make sure to do NOTHING ELSE than healing! Also, characters that can drag the enemys lock on to them or disable their Lock on for a few seconds would be nice too, also snatcher like Piccolo who pull the enemy away from the ultimate user.

If YOU are using the Ultimate: the most important thing: Make sure you are not targeted by an enemy! Otherwise, as soon as you start to charge your attack, the enemy will instantly try to take you down. And you by yourself can‘t do anything during the charging. However, if you make sure that you are not targeted by an enemy, you get some time to charge the ultimate without worrying too much. Even if it is just 5 seconds, that is, in this case, already a lot of time! any second counts!How do you can check if you are targeted or not? by looking at your character icon: if it glows and pulse in read, an enemy is after you. If there are no effects at all, then you are not targeted. That is how it looks:

If you are not targeted, begin to charge the ultimate. your allys should then do what is written down next:

If you are NOT using the ultimate but are one of the supporters, do the following: If you are a healer, concentrade in healing the ULTIMATE USER, and NO ONE ELSE as long as isn‘t necessary. Don‘t pay attention to the fights, just heal! If you REALLY need to heal someone else, just lock on to the comerade by scrolling through your partners with the right analog stick, heal the partner and then switch back. Little tip about lock on: If you want to scroll through the enemys/Allys, just use „up/down“ on the right stick, not left right. up down scrolls through the Enemys/Allys in order of how they are on site of the screen. Also, if there is no need to heal, instead share your ki with the Ultimate user. Why? Because this will fasten up the charge time of the Ultimate!If you are a Interfere type, try to blend the enemy, pull him/her back, bring their attention to you, do whatever is necessary to prevent the Enemy CPU for attacking the ultimate user.If you are a Melee Type, try to force the enemy into close range combat. Some characters like SSJ Goku and SSJ 2 Goku have really long attack combos, which can even be extended using some of their Special Moves or by cancelling attack strings to another string by using L1 during an combo to cancel and attack again. Some enemys might be able to teleport out of it, but keep on giving them pressure! Ki-Blaster should do what they can do best: Shoot Blasts ;) However, the distance to the Ultimate User is important. don‘t go to far away from him, so that you can interfere if the enemy begins to attack the Ultimate user, but also don‘t be too close, so that an attack that should be hitting you hit the other player instead.

If you keep this tactics, and are patient enough and have a really sturdy finger, you might be able to pull off an ultimate finish. Congratulations for that!IMPORTANT!!! When you use an ultimate successfully, you and the entire Party will NOT GET ANY PP FOR THIS MISSION!!! Not even if you get an Bonus Condition! So if you are farming for PP, you should not use ultimates!

6. About Bonus Conditions

Finally, we reach a topic that also a lot of people seem to not know about. Bonus Conditions! People might already have noticed that they sometimes get an „Bonus“ Score in a mission or at the end of a mission. These Bonus Scores not only give additional Score, but also are ranking you up! by fulfilling a Bonus Condition, you get „S“ and „SS“ Ranks a lot easier, but how can I look at those conditions so that I know how to fulfill them? The good news: It is easy to look at it. The bad news: You have to finish the specific stage first or lose on it and get to the result screen in order to look at the Bonus Conditions. If you are at the result screen, press triangle and scroll down on the window that opened up. At the end, you find what the Bonus Conditions for the battle you have thought are.It looks like this:

Some Missions have more than one Bonus Condition, and for each one you get points and a Bonus Rank. This way, „S“ ranking every mission becomes a lot easier.

Well then, that is the end of my little guide, I hope I was able to teach you a little about the game you didn‘t knew already.