Pearl Best Build Guide

[Overview]

Another Stoneheart that's now available, Pearl is an Ice Elation sustain, designed to supplement existing Elation teams and fill the awkward spot of 'missing dedicated Elation sustain'. She provides both healing and shielding, and can regularly cleanse debuffs from allies, and even has passive damage reduction for the team as well. In true mono-team fashion, she provides additional benefits based on the number of total Elation units on the team, and her mechanics are tailored to assist existing Elation DPS, even going as far as being able to provide a real extra turn to one ally with her Ultimate when the whole team is Elation. Naturally she is also able to deal some damage of her own, and can use the stats of the ally she used her Ultimate on to deal said damage, meaning it can actually be quite significant.

[Intro]

Elation Hyacine is here. Have you ever thought to yourself while using Elation 'This team is really good, but I really wish I had a proper Elation sustain that could heal, shield, cleanse, deal damage, and also give an extra turn! Woe is me!'.

If that's you, then congratulations, your fantastical whimsical desires are inexplicably made manifest with Pearl, who literally does all of the aforementioned, and even gets to directly circumvent the inherent mechanics of existing Elation characters!

This character is a joke, she perfectly covers every single want you could have in Elation teams while also being an excellent sustain without really trying. You don't even need to care about optimising your build for damage since she steals the stats of the ally she buffs with her Ultimate when she deals damage, so as long as your main Elation DPS is adequately built, Pearl is going to be automatically providing decent damage as well.

Like I said, Pearl is doing the exact same thing Hyacine did for Remembrance (without the absurd damage of Ica of course), and being generally great outside of the intended team as well, only this time it'd be like if Hyacine had an effect where she can directly charge the Ultimate of the anniversary DPS and deal massive AoE damage herself as well... Wait—

She also comes at a hilariously inopportune moment, since we've gotten teased about the (allegedly) totally real Aha coming, and I don't even want to think about what misery that might bring. But because Pearl is verifiably powerful, and the HP of the endgame continues to reach stupider and stupider heights, don't you want to make sure your Elation team is as good as it can be in time for THEIR arrival?

Teambuilding is so completely dead.

[Abilities]

Pearl's Talent lets her use her Certified Banger as something called Repellency. Each point of CB is equal to 200 points of Repellency. This is then consumed as a resource when an ally takes damage to reduce the DMG taken by 60%. You can think of this as a shield that blocks 60% of the damage and whose HP is equal to your Repellency. In addition to this, when an ally's HP is at 50% or lower, they gain an additional 30% DMG reduction for free.

The second part of the Talent is that Pearl's Certified Banger lasts indefinitely and has a max limit of 50.

Both of these effects are incredible. Unending Certified Banger is mostly there to prevent you from losing Repellency value, but Repellency itself is insanely powerful. You're constantly reducing the damage that the whole party can be taking by a very significant amount, so much so that if a team with Pearl in it is getting one-shot, everyone else has been dead for several turns. Having the extra 30% DMG Reduction on top means the shield gets even more efficient and protecting your team when you've already taken sufficient damage.

Do note, that when Repellency reduces the damage taken, since it is DIRECTLY tied to Pearl's Certified Banger points, this means you will LOSE CB points when taking damage. This is why the duration is indefinite for Pearl so you don't suddenly lose the shield from just taking turns. Realistically, with the max shield value being 10000 and with the amount of Certified Banger replenishment present in Pearl's kit (as you'll see), you should pretty much never be in a situation where you're completely empty on Certified Banger, and therefore shield, unless the fight is just egregiously difficult or some other shenanigans are afoot.

Pearl's Ultimate costs 180 Energy, immediately grants her 20 points of Certified Banger and the Deep Learning state, and then designates one other ally to become the Aesthetic Archetype. She provides the Aesthetic Archetype a variable action advance depending on the number of Elation characters in the team; 1/2/3 Elation characters will result in a 10%/15%/30% action advance.

If there are 4 or more (what) Elation characters, the Aesthetic Archetype will gain 1 extra turn, during which the affected ally will gain 30 Certified Banger and 60 Punchline, expiring at the end of the extra turn.

Do note, these effects of 1/2/3 Elation and 4+ Elation stack. Yes you read that right. At 4+ Elation characters, the ally getting buffed gets both a 30% action advance AND an extra turn. The 30 CB and 60 Punchline mean that whichever Elation character gets boosted will always be able to utilise their own respective Talent effects during that extra turn, so you don't need to worry about getting some CB first if you've run out.

Pearl has three variations of her Basic ATK. The first and most simple is she deals 90% DEF to one enemy. The other two variations are Enhanced versions from the Deep Learning state, and which one you get depends on the Path of the ally you buff with her Ultimate.

Non-Elation Aesthetic Archetype makes Pearl's Enhanced Basic deal 100% DEF to all enemies, and restores HP to all allies equal to 8% of Pearl's DEF plus 160. If the Aesthetic Archetype is on the Path of Elation, this Enhanced Basic ATK will additionally deal 15% of Pearl's DEF as Elation DMG if Pearl has Certified Banger (which is always).

Both versions restore 30 Energy and gain 1 Skill Point. You get damage, healing, SP, and Energy all rolled into one, it's very good. The Deep Learning state lasts for 3 Enhanced Basics, after which it will be removed. Deep Learning will also allow Pearl to deal an additional 60% Ice Elation DMG whenever she deals damage. This extra Elation DMG is actually calculated using the stats of the Aesthetic Archetype, meaning that not only will you factor in the much higher values of Certified Banger, but you'll also get to utilise the CRIT stats as well.

All of this combined makes Pearl a surprisingly significant contributor to the team's overall damage, and she gets to continue doing her job of a sustain and support while she does it.

Do note however, and this will be brought up later as well, that since this is an extra turn, you can do a lot with it. It's not simply something to be used exclusively on your Elation DPS (especially on a SW999 without thinking about it first and wasting an Enhanced Basic of Silver Wolf's), there's plenty of ways to utilise it to grant extra turns to the character who can benefit the team most at the moment. Energy is... really of no concern for Pearl, so don't feel like you need to be always saving the Ult.

Then of course are her Skills. The regular one gives her 15 points of Certified Banger, and restores health for all allies equal to 12% of Pearl's DEF plus 240. The ally with the lowest HP percentage gets this healing a second time.

Pearl's Elation Skill is a buff that also changes its effects based on the number of Elation units in the team. When there are 1/2/3/4+ Elation characters in the team, Pearl's Elation Skill causes all allies to deal Elation DMG of their corresponding Types equal to 10%/15%/20%/40% to the attacked targets after their next attack. More damage is more damage, and this will almost always end up being procced during the Aha Instant, but can sometimes end up being held longer if you're not attacking during the Instant (like SW999).

Important to note that Pearl's Participant ID is 104, lower than even Yao Guang's, meaning that Pearl will always be the first one to act inside the Aha Instant (until someone with an even lower ID comes out).

Lastly, the Technique is worth mentioning, as it can set up an early Aesthetic Archetype by using Pearl's Technique and initiating combat with the character you want to be the Archetype (not Pearl herself though). This opening Deep Learning state for Pearl only has 2 charges instead of the usual 3. The Technique also gives an extra 20 CB points at the start of combat for a larger initial value of Repellency.

Oh, and yes, the temporary Certified Banger and Punchline she gives from her Ultimate can in fact trigger permanent effects, such as the 60 Punchline instantly filling Silver Wolf 999's Ultimate, and the 30 Certified Banger giving an Energy influx to Evanescia.

And we're not even done yet.

[Bonus Traces]

A2 is a stat conversion Trace. I know, I know, this is my shocked face. When DEF is 2400 or higher, Pearl gains an extra 32% Elation. For every 100 DEF over 2400, she gains an additional 3% Elation. A max excess of 3600 DEF may be accounted for, meaning the total Elation bonus maxes out at 140% Elation when you reach 6000 DEF. Pearl will also get 20% of her total Elation as bonus Outgoing Healing Bonus.

That's a lot, for a lot of reasons. It massively boosts the sustain capabilities of her kit by rewarding you for building a stat you were already going to be building. With all the stuff discussed prior about her healing and shielding and damage reduction, hopefully now you understand why Pearl is kinda destroying the competition when it comes to the sustain role as a whole (though you are probably not going to be using Pearl outside of Elation teams).

It's not important to stack this super high unless you're really struggling with healing and overall survival. Getting high SPD is far more important on Pearl, and quite a bit more difficult than her Elation peers since she has slightly below average base SPD of 99, and if you want to be able to reach the coveted 3 turns in 1st wave of MoC, you need to hit at least 173.4 SPD (with Vonwacq) to be able to do that. Obviously it's just a more well known example, but the point is that hitting your specific SPD thresholds for what you want to be doing in a fight is always priority number 1, if you still have DEF to stack after that, go nuts.

A4 grants all allies 50% Effect RES while Pearl has Certified Banger (which is always). A4 will also allow Pearl to gain 5 Certified Banger points whenever any ally's turn starts. Her limit of 50 is unchanged, and this 5 CB gain can only happen once for every Pearl's turn. In addition to this, using Pearl's Enhanced Basic ATK or Skill will dispel 1 debuff from all allies.

While it's not the persistent cleansing that someone like Huohuo offers, it's still very much appreciated since it's literally free, though do keep in mind that it may be worse for getting through pesky Crowd Control that can affect you between turns. The other part of this Trace is equally silly, as it constantly refreshes the amount of Certified Banger she has, consistently adding to Repellency value and helping allies who benefit from any and all CB gains (like a certain pink fox).

Oh yeah, FIFTY PERCENT EFFECT RES. Certified Banger, more like certified bruh moment [sensible chuckle here].

Lastly, the A6. After entering combat and using her Ultimate, if the Aesthetic Archetype is an Elation character, that character's next Ultimate usage will restore a fixed 90 Energy for Pearl. This effect cannot stack.

Now, this is getting really ridiculous. Don't be put off by 'cannot stack' that just means back to back Ultimates won't restore Energy several times, but this effect most assuredly can be triggered repeatedly. This is what I was alluding to earlier when I said that Pearl doesn't really struggle for Energy, and with this effect present, you can be using her Ultimate A LOT. Like an excessive amount actually. It's really damn good, and is what can lead to you being able to flex her Ultimate onto supports like the Elation Trailblazer or Yao Guang to help them get their Ultimates back quicker for even faster and stronger rotations, oftentimes guaranteeing at least 1 extra Ultimate from Yao Guang or the Trailblazer, and sometimes more than that if the fight goes long enough. This will be expounded in [The Rest].

Impeccable kit.

[Eidolons]

You know the drill by now. Having said that, and as mentioned for Waventurine, early verticals in Eidolons especially are getting more and more compelling as time goes on, and the same is true for Pearl. If you are intent on using her long-term, you should consider whether or not you might stand to benefit from pursuing these Eidolons (even in the wake of Aha coming the patch after).

E1 will provide yet further Elation stat bonuses for the team based on the number of Elation units present. 2/3/4+ will grant 10%/20%/60% more Elation. If you still haven't gotten the memo by now, Pearl is for mono-Elation, okay. In addition to this, when an ally would be knocked down, they instead recover 50% of their Max HP and do not go down. This can happen 2 times per battle.

It's a little bit of extra damage for the Elation comp and some extra guaranteed safety on top, good value but nothing crazy. Good value blueberries, if you will (though I swear to god, if this is actually a warning about the type of enemy damage we'll have to deal with, I am going to scream).

E2 is the sauce. All allies' Elation DMG is Merrymade by 15%. Oh yeah, we're getting this as early as E2s now, so you better buckle up buster. A 1.15x final multiplier for Elation DMG specifically is nuts, especially since it's coming so early. In addition to this, when Pearl uses her Ultimate, the action advance that's applied to the Archetype will ALSO apply to all other (not Pearl; not the Ult target) Elation characters in the team, and the temporary CB points and Punchline gained in the extra turn are doubled.

This is a 30% action advance to everyone else on the team. That is 6% more than DanceDanceDance. Pearl, the sustain character, has a DDD effect on her E2. Oh great heavens. Clearly the devs thought 'it's such a shame there's no space for a Harmony character on the Elation team to be able to use DDD... ! I have conceived an idea most ingenious—'. Truly the wait for this character was worth it.

It should be noted, because people may be upset if I omit it, that blindly action advancing on the Elation team can cause... unintended side-effects. Side-effects that are likely not a concern for the majority of people reading this, but that can be very significant for the optimisers. These are things like inadvertently accelerating the decay of Certified Banger for your Elation allies, and also potentially ruining a perfectly planned Aha Instant by advancing someone ahead of Aha when you actually wanted them to be after.

The DDD effect IS great, but how useful it for you will depend on a lot more things than just Pearl, including your own player skill, so be forewarned.

E4 will increase the Elation DMG multiplier of Pearl's Elation Skill effects (the next attack buff) by 100%. Surprisingly pretty okay for an E4, but still not worth being a stopping point.

Lastly the E6. While Pearl is in Deep Learning, all allies have their All-Type RES PEN increased by 20%. Pearl's Enhanced Basic will now deal additional Elation DMG equal to 240% of the stats of the Aesthetic Archetype. Funny numbers.

[The Rest]

This is mostly just going to be mentioning how you might expect to use Pearl in her specific teams, all of which are with Elation characters exclusively. I won't be going in-depth on the specifics of these other Elation characters, so please read their respective reviews if you want to know the overall thoughts on them prior to Pearl's release, because a few things may end up changing.

I'll start with Waventurine since he's the most recent one prior to Pearl. You can definitely play them together. You can. Whether or not you should depends on a bunch of other account related stuff though.

One of the biggest draws I mentioned about Waveflair Aventurine is that he is an Elation DPS who does not (have to) care about the rest of the Elation stuff since he fully facilitates all the necessary parts himself in a Follow-up team. There are arguments to be made about which of his two teams actually has the higher ceiling, but they're not really that relevant right now because both teams are dynamite in a kiddie pool.

If anything, Waventurine's value in this regard has actually risen, since, while he can also be played alongside Pearl, he doesn't benefit as much from the many otherwise odd quirks in Pearl's kit like the temporary Punchline and Certified Banger. For some other Elation DPS, these effects straight up enable you to circumvent ramp-up that would otherwise be mandated, and Waveflair Aventurine can let you run two teams of Elation DPS very comfortably, and without taking away the immense value that Pearl offers to the other Elation DPS.

As privileged as he is to be able to go elsewhere, you can still pair him with Pearl, it's still all the same crazy value you'd expect from Pearl's kit, and it functions very smoothly and easily, with the extra turns actually allowing you more opportunities to potentially refresh Waventurine's Skill tally, or just go for more Elation Skills overall by Ulting Yao Guang or the Elation Trailblazer.

Also Waventurine's own verticals are just way better than an E0 Pearl, so y'know. But she is still great.

For Silver Wolf 999, you are even more incentivised to NOT use Pearl's Ultimate directly on her, at least not without thinking about it first. See, SW999 gets her Hidden MMR from anyone gaining Punchline, so it's not actually imperative for her to be the recipient of Pearl's Ultimate to charge her cartridge; the 60 Punchline's gonna be converted into Hidden MMR no matter what, and giving Wolfie an extra turn before she's in her Enhanced state is just gonna be a waste.

Instead, focusing on granting more opportunities for ally supports to gain more Energy for their own Ultimates is going to be much more impactful in a general broad view, and even when Silver Wolf is in her Enhanced state, it can still be more useful to have Pearl Ult a support instead. You still only get 3 Enhanced Basics as Silver Wolf during her Enhanced state, so unless you specifically need to accelerate the rate at which you expend them, you may end up not making the most of them and actually dropping out of the Ultimate entirely at a bad time.

Advancing the supports and giving them extra turns during Silver Wolf's Ult can also allow you to fish for more Lootbox procs by expending SP, especially true if you're running SW999 with Sparxie for instance. Maximising Lootbox usage is an important part of optimising Silver Wolf 999's gameplay, so it's definitely something you should be considering.

But of course, if you're looking to pump up the damage numbers and get a final Enhanced Basic in during the cycle or when the enemy is broken or what have you (or to get the stellar skill buff extension), then naturally giving the extra turn to Wolfie is going to be very good, especially if it helps you to reach the 120 Hidden MMR threshold for the maximum multiplier boost.

For Evanescia, it's a lot more chill. Pearl already kinda plays herself, and the only difficulty comes from who she's paired with and the unique headache those characters bring. Eva doesn't really come with that much headache, and the two play into each other perfectly. The constant churn of Certified Banger (excess is also accounted for even through Pearl's cap of 50), both from being generated and from being consumed via Repellency, means Eva's Energy income is magnanimous, and she'll be holding on to even bigger chunks of Certified Banger than before. Seeing 999+ on the bottom left of her avatar is a normal Tuesday at that point.

But of course, sometimes you still want to use Pearl's Ultimate on a support for the aforementioned reasons, and you can do that just fine because Eva also still gets to benefit from the temporary bonuses given. There's a slight tradeoff with losing access to Huohuo's Energy generation here, but with the other benefits you get (and some skillful decision making on your part) this is more than offset, and frees Huohuo to go to another team.

That's really the takeaway from this. The question of 'who do I use Pearl Ult on' is 'it depends', but as long as you understand why you're doing it, you should be able to figure out the best recipient at any given time. It is fairly hard to go wrong because so much of the benefit is passive and exists for just, well, existing. You should take care to try and not waste the 90 Energy from Pearl's A6 if you can, but this really shouldn't be a problem most of the time, and a few trial and error runs will result in enough understanding for pretty much everyone to go 'oh, I get it now'.

[Wrap up]

Simple but effective unit, with a lot of in-team flexibility on how you use her and pretty good effects for Elation as a whole moving forward, so she'll probably be quite relevant for a fair bit.

It's also just very helpful having another highly competitive sustain option, because people without the likes of Huohuo, DHPT, or Hyacine have been struggling for a while now, and especially if you're in it for the long haul of Elation, you should absolutely see about getting Pearl. 

Anyway, ABSOLUTE cowardice to make the female intellitron a conventional soft-skinned woman. Where's the Bionicle aesthetic?? I've seen Screwllita, I KNOW you have the technology.