Mega Man StarForce 2 Online Battle Guide

This guide is written by, and is the property SpaceMan. You may not reproduce it on your forum or site without SpaceMan's permission.

This guide teaches you the essentials of online battling on Mega Man Star Force 2, and also some tips to face cheaters, hackers. You will prove that Auto Tribe King sucks and defeat Auto Tribe King users to teach them a lesson. This guide is primarily for users who cleared the game. I know Mega Man SF 2 is expired, but review it so you can face the new challenge(RnR3).

A good online player should have 3 to 6 of them:

  1. Beat the game, and even have all 6 stars
  2. Can beat any in-game bosses, final bosses.
  3. Played online battle over 100 times
  4. No Wave Command Card, just Ability Wave
  5. Win by skill not power.
  6. No Auto Tribe King, Wave Command Card.

Table of Contents

  1. The basics of online battling
  2. The online environment
  3. The facts of Wave Command Card
  4. Things to avoid
  5. Setting up the folder
  6. The basics of advance
  7. The failsafe guard
  8. Stopping your opponent from moving
  9. Counter attack
  10. More combos
  11. 1 hit VS multiple hits
  12. Unleashing the Tribe power
  13. Playing with Panels
  14. Overusing the underused Cards
  15. Breaking the chain
  16. Facing Auto Tribe King users and cheaters
  17. Practicing offline
  18. Conclusion
  19. Links/Resources

The basics of online battling

So you want to get into online battling, you must know the changes between the Online battling and offline(in-game) battling.

Here's a list of basic strategy that are widely-used:

The online environment

You understanded how to battle, but you must know the envorinment, it's not as easy as it said.

When you started online battling, you will first face opponents that has almost same HP and power as you, which is very fair unlike in Shoddy Battle, it allows newbies battle newbies while pros battles pros.

Most newbies are not cheaters, but some newbies used Auto Tribe King, which is a cheat. You will face newbies disconnect more often, which is a bad behavior that you should not learn.

After you are pro, you will face opponents with higher power, and more cheaters. Auto Tribe King are very powerful with Mega and Giga Cards, it will own you in less than 10 seconds if they are lucky enough, that's why I don't recommend you to use Auto Tribe King, because it won't make you learn anything.

You found a "good" opponent(because you always win) opponent, you won all the time, but if you always won, your opponent will gone, or disconnect, and you will do same thing if you lost.

I suggest you not to quit if you lost because bad luck, keep challanging. If you can't win even with good luck, then you can quit, why decreasing your win record?

However, I spotted a minor bug here: When you chose "Quit match" and your opponent also chose "Quit Match" you will meet your opponent again, which is an annoying bug, disconnect and reconnect if it keep happening.

Things to Avoid

Wave Command Card is a good power-up, however, if you abuse them, you won't practice in strategy, instead, you will seek for more powers, which will hit the top eventually.

Yes, you can still use Wave Command Cards, however, don't ever use the following Wave Command Card: it's Auto Tribe King as described in the following video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CMHwkS3Tf1c

The Auto Tribe King did give you power. However, if everyone use it online, then everyone's power are equal, and everyone's strategy will decrease, it also make you can't even face the 1st boss in Ryuusei no Rockman 3 if you and everyone overused it.

Other Wave Command Cards are also useful, but if you started to win every time, stop using it and challenge the extreme.

In this guide, you will fight w/out Auto Tribe King, maybe just some Auto Tribe such as just Green Shinobi.

Setting up the folder

Setting up the folder is important. A good folder lets you always have a combo to pull off, and a good folder also saves you in a pinch.

Paralyzing makes a good combo, add more paralyze/freeze Cards such as paralyze/freezePlus, ElecSword, Sticky Rain, Harp Note, etc.

You also need support, defense, something the best offense is defense. Get some Panel Cards, supportive Cards, Barrier 100, Recovery 300, etc.

Did you know that you freezes your opponent when your opponent is hit by your Water-type Card in a Ice Stage, so Ice Stage is a good supportive Card. You will know more as you read.

Every Card has weakness, every Cards can be stopped, defended, countered, it even applies to Giga Cards.(read more...)

The Facts of Wave Command Card

Wave Command Card is a new feature in Mega Man StarForce 2, and Capcom made it is intended to make it act like Star Carrier power-up in previous versions of Mega Man StarForce. In Capcom's eyes, they think Wave Command Card isn't widely-used, and it can only be used by a few lucky players, however, the fact is different, the UnderSquare, and many other communities shared the Wave Command Cards, so that's why they were abused.

Look at this screenshot from the Ryuusei no Rockman 2 official site:

WCC should not be shared (according to RnR2 Official site)

According to a little of my Japanese skills, it states that "The design of the Wave Command Card is to prevent game fan-sites to share Wave Command Card codes, they will inflate the revenue from Wave Command Card books."

However, Wave Command Card is still abused, because the game fan-sites are not dumb, they know how to use an illustration to share the codes. They will be sued if they are found, but Mega Man StarForce 2 is expired, and the Wave Command Card kits will be deprecated, and Wave Command Card kits are not the real part of their revenue.

The basics of advance

Here's a list of basic strategy that are widely-used:(again)

You built your folder, but you need to use it wisely. You must count accuracy, failsafe, speed to choose your Card.

Here are some tips at ordering:

  1. When there are many paralyze/freeze Cards, choose the one with highest accuracy such as a 3x3 range Card with paralyze/freezePlus, Cancer Bubble, then use ElecSword, MummyHand.
  2. Remember: Invisible and Recovery First, then Trap Cards.
  3. When the mix of paralyze/freeze and non-paralyze/freeze is the only choice, paralyze/freeze your opponent first then use the non-paralyze/freeze one, example: ElecSword > MummyHand > HeavyCannon, because it's faster and failsafe.
  4. Your last Card will cause flinch, because keep shooting at paralyze/freezed opponent isn't good enough, or never end your attack with a Paralyzing Card.

Your location is also important, facing directly, facing an object can cause a big difference.

Here are some tips at location:

  1. When you are about the use Gemini Spark/Cancer Bubble/etc., don't face your opponent unless it's failsafe with barrier, Invisible, because facing your opponent is a risk(even your opponent is paralyze/freezed).
  2. Avoid face-to-face if possible.
  3. Be aware the panel you are standing, if it's a trap, experiment with failsafe protection.
  4. Track your opponent's location, attack when they are not standing on HolyPanel.
  5. You can trick or force opponent's location by changing panels.
  6. Predict, attack, and defend.
  7. Practice makes prefect.

The failsafe guard

You wanted to attack, you wanted to win, but you opponents also wants to win, they also paralyze/freeze you and make you unable to move, so you need defense, sometimes, the defense is the best offense.

The supportive Cards, mostly recovers your HP, changed panels, avoiding the damage, are very useful, esp. when you are taking risk to use a Battle Card on a trap. It will decrease your loss of HP.

If you cleared the game, you will probably use FirstAura, it is a good guard makes you take advantage at the start, however, you can't depend on them because it will vanish sooner or later. So supportive Cards are important in a battle. In fact, I won more with supportive Card used.

Barriers, Auras, Invisible are very useful, when your opponent is using a Dim screen attack Card, you just press A to guard, then... your opponent will waste a high-attack Mega or Giga Card mostly.

When you are facing Traps, you will need failsafe guards!

The most annoying thing is when your opponent is keep using high-attack, paralyzing Cards(mostly hackers, cheaters, ATKers), then you need the guards or your HP will be cut down badly.

Now here's the important part: how to save your from Mega and Giga Cards:

The best guard I've ever seen is HolyPanel + Aura, it will defend you from almost all Standard Cards.

(watch this video, it answers everything)

Stopping your opponent from moving

Paralyzing is the best and most widely-used combo, as you battle more, you will know, but which combo and folder setup is optimized for paralyze/freeze combos? That's what you should learn.

First, review these things:

Then, read some advanced concepts:

Adding a Defensive Card after Dim Screen Card is also a good idea bacause you can defend your from traps.

Counter Attack

Your opponent is about to unleash a powerful attack, or you were in flinch, you need to escape from flinch and counter attack, but how?

NOTE: We are talking about both Counter Hit and just normal other way to deal with opponent's attack.

In order to grant a Counter Hit, you need and non-Dim screen Card, there are too much choice, but which one? There are many answers. I think the best ones are:

So Vulcan, Gatling, and AirShot are good idea. However, Countering is still very hard even to newbies due to many factors.

Here are some more tips at Counter Hits:

  1. Attack power isn't important.
  2. Paralyzing is a waste if you are very sure that it will Counter Hit.
  3. Look at your enemy...
  4. Practice makes prefect.

When your opponent is about to use a Mega/Giga Card, you can also counter by using a Trap Card, it's a part of a failsafe guard.

When 2 players were both using a multiple-hit Cards, the first one used counters, the difference may be just a fraction of a second.

Countering is most about Traps, the SpiritFury is even more useful because it will make your opponent paralyze/freeze if it exploded.

More Combos

Combos are an important part of a battle, some Cards can only be used in a combo, we are not talking about Paralyze/Freeze chain in this part, but we are talking about combos that increases the attack.

First, it's doubled damage combo:

  1. (IcePanel) + (any Water attack to freeze) + SyncHook
  2. (GrassPanel) + (anyFire attack)
  3. ChainBubble/CancerBubble + (Electric paralyze chain here)
  4. (create an object in front such as PoisonPharoh) + TorrentWave/SnowBall
  5. AmbushPanel + (paralyze/freeze chain here)

Then increase damage dramatically, and just remember: Use Elec attacks when opponent is trapped in a bubble, use Fire attacks for opponent on Grass panel, and use Breaker attacks when your opponent is frozen.

There are some "Storm" attacks that requires panels to use, they are best way to get used to combos.

1 hit VS multiple hits

There are many Giga Cards, they were built up with 50 attack with 10 hits, or just 500 in an instant, but what's the difference between 1 hit and 10 hits?

First, 1(one) hit Cards has high damage in instant, they just hit and over, if your opponent has just a 10HP barrier, they it will be a waste, but it will mostly break Auras.

Multiple hit Cards has small attack power in every hits, they lasts long, and it can break barrier, however, it cannot break aura because most multi-hits Cards has less than 100 attack power per hits. Also, you can't guantee every hits will land for non-Dim screen Cards. Multiple hits Cards' attack can be increased dramatically if you just use Attack+10 Card.

Assume 2 Giga Cards, one has 500 damage and 1 hit, and the other one has 50 damage and 10 hit.

TypeDamageHits+CalculationFinal result
One hit500110(500+10)x1510
10 hits501010(50+10)x10600

You can see the second one applied +10 to every hits, which became 100 damage. However, it still didn't reached 100 per hit to break auras.

Unleashing the Tribe power

Auto Tribe King is for losers, however, the normal Tribes are not. You must master the Tribe power, and also get into legitmate Tribe King without being knocked back to plain Mega Man.

First, you should add an Ablity Wave that automatically transform to a Tribe, It saves turns and increases the chance to become Tribe King.

Now 2 Brother Cards are shown, you can activate Tribe, however, which one? It depends on your opponent's status, element. Choose one that can decrease the change of getting hit by a weak element. Such as activate Berserker instead of Shinobi if your opponent is Fire Dinosaur.

Always put Fire Dinosaur Tribe in higher priority if you are facing Auto Teibe King users, because Tribe King doesn't have Water in their Charge Shot.

After you became Tribe King, use all Megas and Gigas you have, to give massive damage as a Auto Tribe King user did, maybe you don't have too much Megas and Gigas, because you are not cheating.

Also remember to use a Charge Shot to knock your opponent with Tribe back to plain Mega Man.

Playing with panels

Panels, are part of the battlefield, and it's also the part of strategy.

There are many type of panels, such as Grass, Poison, Holy, Trap, and more, they can also have big affact to the battle, I will won because the HolyPanels protected me, and I will also lose because PoisonPanel sucked my last 1 HP. You must master the environments and panels to win.

Your opponent set some traps? Don't panic, use a HolyPanel, to override the panel you are standing in, there are many other override rules, such as:

  1. HolyPanel overrides the current panel, and doesn't affect other panels.
  2. 2 traps can exist at same time, when a Trap was set, some Holy and Elemental(Grass/Poison/Ice) panels will be cleared.
  3. When a Elemental panel was used, the old ones an Holy Panels will be overrided.

That's all of the override rules I figured out, so there may be some exceptions. Overriding panels can decrease the threat to high damage, counter attacks.

Panels are important, but objects are also important, you will need it to block attacks, explode it, and also use it as a part of your combo. One day, a RockCube stopped my combo, and another day, I used TorrentWave to double the attack just like SnowBall expands on objects.

Overusing the underused Cards

When I'm just a newbie, I never use Cards such as Invisible, Panels, I just looked at attack, that's very unacceptable because you must read the description, to see what will the Card do.

Support cards can save your from thousands of damage, and Panel Change will also generate a combo, as you learned.

Mind the hit counts, don't think a card only deal 30 damage and that's it.

Some cards can only be used in special conditions, but they can be useful if the condition was met.

Breaking the chain

You are paralyzed and being hit over and over again, and your Mega/Giga/Trap/Barrier/etc Cards on hand are useless... No they aren't. When your opponent is about to use a Card that dims the screen, you can press A to make your Cards useful, as long as they dims the screen.

Using a Trap Card before your opponent is using a powerful Card is a very useful counter-attack.

Remember using Cards that just change the panels can be a big chain-breaker. Everything counts.

When your opponent is using a Card that doesn't paralyze/freeze, and they just doesn't flinch, it's a good idea to escape!

Facing Auto Tribe King users and cheaters

You started to find a online battle, and you faced a Auto Tribe King user, and what to do?

Now there's nothing more to say, but just remember skill is important.

Practicing offline

If you can't beat offline bosses, and why online? Here's some tips at praticing battles offline:

  1. NEVER use Auto Tribe King
  2. Use less Wave Command Card, as your skill improve, disable Wave Command Card data.
  3. Fight DX bosses, and G-size viruses, that's the benefit of Wave Command Card: increasing the challenge. If you keep getting hits, you will lose.
  4. Use a less powerful folder, no Mega/Giga
  5. Fight, don't escape, or your skill won't increase.
  6. Make more high-power Best Combos and share w/ your Brothers
  7. Try to Counter Hit more.
  8. There may be more, so you can always come up a new idea.

Conclusion

Now you've reached the end of the guide, and you learned basics and advances of online battling, if there's something you don't understand, read carefully and also read some newbie guides for Mega Man Star Force 2.

There are still so much to learn, so much combos to build, so feel free to explore, expierence.

Now here are some links to other Mega Man Star Force 2 guides that will answer your questions and extend your knowledge.


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