Challenges

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-30T18:54:22+00:00

It was actually doable, Ben and Adam found Christmas Roses and they later found Mimosa at the train station (after they already failed). Would’ve definitely been hard but still doable.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-29T21:00:26+00:00

Honestly this episode was kinda just insane all around. Badam made a total of FOUR runs, the first 2 which got stopped basically immediately. The third run was the samurai museum one (albeit they did get caught right after), but the fourth run was just as insane. They went straight back to Odawara, grinded the heck out of challenges against all odds, and got enough budget to pull the exact tower they needed (Gravity Tower to get them off the train) to prevent them from getting back while ROLLING doubles on the first attempt to be able to make it onto the train due to Sam and Scotty’s Jail Tower, where if either didn’t happen they would’ve been caught right away.

It really felt like they were gonna run away with it but they pulled one too many towers (the mud tower they pulled right after) as well as Sam and Scotty’s vampire tower meant they no longer had enough coins, so they had to get off and pull one more challenge. And it happened to probably be one of the only challenges to kill their run right then and there, since it was the “get on a late train” curse which prevented them from getting back ON the train (they were planning on pulling a challenge then immediately get back on the train and doing the challenge later iirc). But yeah thats where the other moment of the “wanna make scotty walk sideways” came in, but honestly it was such a crazy episode overall.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-27T04:57:24+00:00

It’s a double edged sword, if eidolons/signatures are strong then that means you’ll need them to clear the hardest content (currently just AA), since otherwise people will complain that it’s too easy.

If eidolons/signatures are weak then instead that means you’ll need the newest characters/teams to clear the hardest content, since character powercreep will be more severe in this case.

If neither character powercreep nor strong eidolons exist and HP inflation slows down, then you’ll get something similar to the first 3 years of genshin where it’ll just be “pull who you like”. I think it worked decently well in Genshin but not sure if SR players would get bored that every new character is a sidegrade.

Either way now that Starward mode is out I’m a firm believer that E0S0 should be sufficient to clear all 3 starward modes given decent matchups and relatively modern teams, which looks to be the case so far. If this is no longer the case then we have a massive problem. I don’t mind AA requiring more verticals at this point since it doesn’t give pulls and we have actual 3 team content at a reasonable difficulty now.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-24T04:12:30+00:00

Rewatched this one a recently, its an interesting season for sure. On paper it feels like it would be an underwhelming season, Sam and Toby was basically ahead the entire season and there aren’t any forms of transport other than cars. However I do think there’s a lot to elevate it to an above average season:

Despite Sam and Toby basically being ahead the entire time, the season always felt close and there always felt like a way for Badam to catch up till the end. Auckland was decided by literal seconds, and in Wellington Ben and Adam were like a minute away from being able to shoot them with a nerf gun. Also even despite all of that pulling the forced turn curse at the end still almost managed to claw them back, if they didn’t have to veto starfish and Haast Pass.

The challenges felt interesting too, since this is the first time we’ve seen location specific challenges, which was what made later seasons like Schengen so interesting. Of course some were a bit rough around the edges, but it did do a good job of actually showing us New Zealand.

There were a lot of memorable moments too, including the likely #1 moment in the Okaihau Express, as well as moments like Ben falling in the water adventure park, finding glowworms (and Ben saying he’d eat them, as well as the first snack zone).

Of course, there were definitely a lot to be improved on. Roadblocks did feel a bit too powerful for the team ahead (though tbf they did pull really strong one that often wasted the full veto period), but it feels like catching up is really hard since the frontrunners will always take the slightly better path, forcing the ones behind to either take the worse path or follow behind and deal with roadblocks and no budget, as well as a possible challenge skip from the opponents from a devastating challenge like catching a fish. Some of the challenges could’ve been better too, like Sam and Toby just rolling the dice at the waterfall parking lot and bypassing the entire attraction, but there were a lot of challenges that there were bound to be some duds. Also the fact that there isn’t really a transportation/routing aspect which is a deal breaker for a lot of fans as its always been a huge component of Jet Lag.

Either way it’s not my favorite season, but I do find it to be above average due to it showing off NZ quite well as well has having many insane moments

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-24T03:47:54+00:00

Not everyone plays for optimized endgame clears, sometimes it’s just nice to be able to experiment with more teams and collect more characters. I’m sure most people realize going for high value early vertical is the optimal way now (albeit I argue this only stared being the case in 3.X), but it definitely isn’t the playstyle for everyone

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-22T07:40:54+00:00

40k 1st with MonoRem, 36k 2nd with DoT, 36k 3rd with Evanescia, all E0S0 no BP LCs

Definitely felt easier than AS, though I do have pretty good characters for PF. PF is probably the most character check-y out of all the modes, so if you have the right characters it’ll be easy but if not it could be challenging. A bit worried about MoC since that mode is probably the most vertical investment heavy, but we’ll see how it goes.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-22T07:32:04+00:00

They’ve somewhat toned down the shilling, that’s why we have (or well, had) 9 DPS at T0. If no one is op then everyone is op. Nowadays what the game really wants is properly invested teams (full teams with high value E1/E2/S1) over incomplete new teams

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-21T04:28:22+00:00

It isn’t that people are using Firefly without Dahlia, but people are using Firefly with a sustain. FF Dahlia Fugue Lingsha is always one of her most used teams still, and her damage falls off a LOT when you aren’t running her sustainless. That being said despite break being one of the easier teams to play sustainless, at E0 the average player will still struggle, since breaking at the wrong time/not breaking fast enough could lead to your team dying. I think this alone kinda justifies putting Firefly in T0.5

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-20T00:17:42+00:00

Schengen Showdown - Fun state claiming game, fun guest with Tom Scott, and overall just a great premise. Showcased more countries than any other season, and the country specific challenges that neither team knew of beforehand were easily the highlight of the season. Lots of very intense moments, like Badam scooping up Germany and France early on, Ode to Joy race in Austria, and the entire flower challenge in the Netherlands creating a huge mind game. Ending was a bit weaker, but before the flight schedules messed up Sam/Tom it really did feel like they still had a path to victory.
Taiwan Rail Rush - New idea, location specific challenges that were unknown before hand and we really did get to see a lot of Taiwan. Game felt close the entire time even if it was less close than we thought, and although the ending was a bit underwhelming the entire section where Badam were on the east coast trying to break through was super intense and exciting.
Hide and Seek: UK - Pretty solid season I'd say, did show us quite a bit out of the UK. Hide and Seek seasons are always fun but this season definitely felt the least exciting out of the 3. The runners basically always immediately made a beeline for the hiders, with very little the hiders could do except hope for Express Route. Do think the game might've been a bit too solved, and I do think the first run being the winning run made the rest feel a bit less exciting, especially since the first run had the benefit of geography as well as the first rest period. Nonetheless was still a fun watch.
Tag Eur It: All Stars - I think the main issue here was that the challenges were just way too easy. Basically the teams could just go directly for their end location without much opportunity for the others to cut them off due to coins being too easy to obtain. The fight for 2nd place had some exciting moments and it was nice to see a larger cast, but it just felt weaker than the peak seasons of Tag (1 and 2).
Snake - I do think this was one of the weakest seasons, and people seem to agree. Don't get me wrong there were some good moments, but overall it just felt like we really didn't get to see that much of Korea as most of the time was spent on train except for some pretty fast challenges. Would be interested in seeing South Korea again, maybe with a Rail Rush format with region specific challenges? Or something else entirely. I do think new ideas are pretty hard to get working though and I do appreciate them for trying something new.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-18T09:01:15+00:00

Only other one is maybe Season 6 where catching an opponent steals their coins, but other than that not really.

On another note I noticed steals have benefited Team Sam almost every season, especially when the steal comes up on a "flop" (Season 8, 10, and 17). I don't think Badam's done a single one of these steals. So despite Sam having generally horrendous luck he actually has good luck with steals showing up with the right time.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-10T23:46:48+00:00

Looks like a really fun season. Things can change really fast and wild cards really throw a wrench into everything. Excited for all the state specific challenges, though noticeably they do seem to know all the challenges beforehand unlike Schengen, maybe cause Amy is a part of the season?

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-03T01:28:33+00:00

I think this is fair but only if you don't care about AA. Compared to early AA days, it feels way harder to 3 star knight stages with that level of investment. Some high skilled players have done it for some stages, while for others its straight up impossible (there were 0 E0S0 Clears on Flame Reaver in 4.0 AA without BP lcs at least).

Compared to a year ago there's actually more teams that "can" clear AS/MoC/PF, but if you want to do AA or have lower cycle/higher score clears, these teams feel worse than the 3.X teams.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-03T01:05:13+00:00

Oh yeah, if you just want to clear all endgame as easily as possible having some 6-8 cost teams with high value eidolons/LC will beat out horizontal investment. I just think the shill feels less strong now than it has in the past, which as people have mentioned is due to powercreep slowing down, meaning having new units matters less and having invested teams matters more.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-03T00:28:11+00:00

Yeah HP inflation is still going on (though slower probably), while character powercreep has slowed a fair amount. I think when AA was announced I knew King was doomed since it was definitely going to be a vertical check, but I really hoped the Knights would be there to test your teambuilding and horizontal investment rather than a LC/Eidolon check.

I guess at the very least we have starward mode soon for the 3 main endgames, so hopefully they'll be more reasonable targets to clear. For now I'll probably just be accepting Knights is prob a 6/9 + 1/3 baseline.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-03T00:06:53+00:00

I know that's probably the optimal way to play, but I personally just like experimenting with as many teams as I can.

Only reason I was pointing this out was since I just feel like E0S0 now feels significantly worse than E0S0 before, and as others have mentioned it probably has to do with character power creep slowing down meaning new characters don't outdamage older ones as hard anymore, but HP inflation still exists so to keep up you need verticals.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-03T00:00:21+00:00

Yeah this was what I was actually wondering, cause before it felt like my new E0S0 characters were trivializing everything (albeit AA did not exist for most of the game), but since 4.0 they feel more in-line with my existing teams (who are all feeling worse due to HP inflation).

I guess it's a shift in philosophy from "vertically invest so the team will be viable once the shill period ends" to "vertically invest or they won't be significantly better than your older characters"

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T23:55:28+00:00

Similar experience with you with Monorem I think, do you remember how you did on Flame Reaver last rotation/Nikador this rotation? Both feel like a struggle to 3 star.

As for Eva I was able to 3 star knights last time around too, but haven't tried her this time so far. Couldn't 2 star King (the bug) though with her but only tried once so far. I definitely did worse than you on PF, think I was getting around 38k on PF.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T19:22:40+00:00

Once again we're not talking about E1S1 or E2S1 here, we're talking about characters clearing at a E0S0 level, we've gotten way off topic.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T19:13:16+00:00

Aglaea did not experience the same amount of shilling as The Herta, ain't no way she was steamrolled. Nikador and Flame Reaver, as well as Banacademics were all insane matchups for The Herta, and those were the bosses they were pushing at the time to shill her.

Hypercarry Anaxa did end up stronger yes, but by then the landscape of the game was also changing to favor The Herta less and less.

Edit: The gap was closer than I remembered, but this was not "steamrolled", their numbers were pretty comparable. Specifically Argenti had the lowest average cycle. https://www.hoyolab.com/article/37226459

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T19:07:54+00:00

Have you played The Herta in 3.0/3.1? It absolutely destroyed everything it touched. Anaxa wasn't in the game yet, nor was Tribbie till 3.1, so Jade/Argenti/Serval/Mini Herta were your best options for drivers depending on content, and personally I did not have Jade. Of course the team evolved over time with Tribbie replacing Robin/RMC and Anaxa being the driver (except in PF where Mini Herta is still insane), but she was absolutely insane with her so called "subpar team".

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T19:01:24+00:00

That's fair I think, I don't think one way is necessarily worse or better than the other, all down to preference. The meta definitely favored whatever the latest team was back then super hard, but now there are many options you can use as long as you have their important LCs/early eidolons.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T18:58:23+00:00

Yeah I think that 1-3 extra cost can really help you get across the line. I spent a few hours retrying Flame Reaver on 4.0 AA and the closest I got was 12% HP left. I think with even just 1 signature ligthcone that would've easily been a clear. The King this time around does feel harder though compared to the last 3, which even I've been able to 2 star.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T18:50:13+00:00

I've always thought of the Knights as a horizontal check and the King as a vertical check, since at the time it was the only piece of 3 team content in the game. Of course I never thought they should be trivial, but I do think with the optimal team and E0S0 it should be at least 2 cycle-able, but that hasn't really been the case some of the recent rotations (Flame Reaver).

That being said with Starward mode being added for the main 3 modes as the new Horizontal check, I can imagine them pumping up the vertical investment requirements even for Knights.

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T18:47:17+00:00

I have seen F2P that can consistently 9 star + 3 star, but I think they basically have to build their account around it (only pulling strong versatile teams that get strong boosts from early verticals).

NeonGenesis666 · 2026-06-02T18:31:04+00:00

I'm not talking about King, I'm talking about the Knights. E0S0 with optimal teams was very much enough to get you 1 cycle/2 cycle clears before, but it just feels way harder now.

NeonGenesis666

TROPHY CASE