OFFICIAL STARTER GUIDE · teams
Aegis Forge v13: break armor, then spend the opening
Three tested team options and one bounded attacker swap. Learn what repeated hits solve, why solitary attacks still matter, and what the clear data covers.
Read the armor and Heat together
Use this article for newly entered dungeon-balance-v13 runs. An already-paid run keeps its pinned rules; do not apply a new counter window to an older saved encounter. These optional full-team examples are transcribed from the committed editorial guide. They do not guarantee a clear for every account; keep experimenting with the heroes you own.
Repeated damaging hits remove armor. A solitary damaging strike does not do that job. On v13 Very Hard and above, each attacker can weld plates and add Heat only once between Colossus turns; further solitary strikes by that attacker are neutral to plates and Heat, not armor breakers. A support cast is different from a solitary attack. This is a scoped late-Forge rule, not a buff to single-hit damage in every mode.
Periodic Reforge preserves progress while armor remains and rebuilds an exposed shell. A completed break vents Heat. Watch the next HP gate and the visible response-cycle pressure; spend burst when the shell is exposed, before repeated failed cycles overwhelm the party. Overheat can melt barriers and bypass defense. Damage prevention can help, but stacking ordinary defense indefinitely does not replace breaking the shell.
Three named team options
- Lycan: Gemini Male, Lycan, Tengu, Orion Male and Gemini Female. Lycan's triple-hit pressure and self lifesteal, Tengu's variable six-hit burst, and Gemini Female's two-hit basic/recovery give this lineup a coherent cadence.
- Storm: Gemini Male, Samurai, Tengu the Storm Raven, Orion Male and Gemini Female. Samurai's two-hit basic, lifesteal and wounded-target execution pair with Storm Raven's ramping six-hit attack and critical-chance cast.
- Phoenix: Gemini Male, Lycan, Tengu, Orion Male and Phoenix Female. Phoenix Female (10004) replaces Gemini Female's cadence with wounded-ally healing, party healing/barriers, revive/cleanse and once-per-battle Last Dawn protection.
The bounded Lycan-Storm alternative replaces Tengu with Tengu the Storm Raven in the Lycan team. It is a tested complete combination, not permission to mix every listed hero freely. Gemini Male and Orion Male are the only two heroes shared by all four combinations; that overlap does not prove either is individually irreplaceable.
Build and evidence scope
All four complete combinations are fresh frozen v13 Forge examples from the committed editorial guide, covering floors 6–8 and paired SSS+0, +10 and +50 equipment variants. These documented finite fixture builds provide no clear-rate or speed guarantee.
The ordinary non-Chaos late recipe uses five Z200 heroes. Floor 6 uses three floor-5 Bastion items per hero, two active affix lines and six five-star Heroic +12 Sigils; floor 7 uses floor-6 gear, three lines and Legendary +15; floor 8 uses floor-7 gear, four lines and Legendary +15. Choose whole items from the finite pool in the build-plan article, with support-weighted HP or four Fury Sigils for damage/hybrid roles. No refinement, Overdrive, mastery or collection/account multipliers are assumed. These are finite fixture builds, not proof that names alone win.
Diagnose a failed attempt
If the armor never breaks, inspect landed hit counts and whether the attacking skills are actually available. A single-hit healer is not a substitute for the repeated-hit counter. Missing repeated-hit coverage is a warning to recheck the team. If the break happens but the team collapses, inspect Heat, exposure timing, recovery and the complete loadout rather than replacing every attacker with another healer.
Recovery is useful, but the editorial guide also records reduced-recovery Forge examples. Whole-hero changes alter more than healing, so they do not prove a particular heal is universally required or useless. The older v12 Phoenix/Pisces failures remain older-policy evidence and are not silently combined with the v13 wins.
Keep your other dungeon teams
The tested Venom/Eclipse specialists did not become Forge teams, and Phoenix did not become a Venom/Eclipse universal. The editorial screening did not establish a universal squad across all three bosses. That supports specialization in this tested set; it does not prove no possible universal roster can ever exist. Serpentress is excluded from general recommendations, and untested hybrid lineups remain experiments.