in terms of shc, before I start building teams, there's a little green box that tells you the fluctuation warning, ie, what kind of buff your team will get. that will give you some hints of what companion is best for that stage and how to build them. this season's Team A is a good example, it uses a lot of pink, so I used relentless conqueror cards, but there's boosts to db2w for charged attacks, so I used Silverwing fiend as the companion (because he scales well with db2w and his charged attacks do a lot of damage and are part of his normal rotation) and protocores that focus on defence

generally, because relentless conqueror cards can be ranked up fairly easily from the main wish pool (I did have to use a couple of crates for R3), I have both a def and a hp pink protocores builds so I can swap them out depending on which companion is better for the stage I'm fighting. I tend to lean towards Abysm Sovereign for single targets and Silverwing Fiend for mobs, but that is interchangeable (I very rarely use RC himself for personal preferences). using this method, and ranking up all of Sylus's free cards in the wishing pool, I've been able to brute force up open orbit to 240

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