Guide: Rush Combo chaining in Star Ocean: Anamnesis

Here are some tips on Rush Combos and how to use them. I see players make these mistakes all the time even in JP so best try to learn this stuff early.

Does the order of the Rush Combo chain matter?

Yes. Rush Combo chains give increasing damage bonuses just like the cancel bonuses for combos – 1st is base damage, 2nd does 150%, 3rd does 200%, and 4th does 300%. Since Rushes have by far the highest multiplier in the game this means that these cancel bonuses are important too. Generally speaking, the Rushes with the highest multiplier goes last.

Let’s say you have a party of Miki (RC multiplier 2000%), Maria (3000%), Fidel (3000%), and Cliff (4500%). If Miki goes last this is = 600% (4000% more than usual), whereas if Cliff goes last = 13,500 (9000% more than usual). So you would definitely want the Rush order to be Miki -> Maria -> Fidel -> Cliff.

When Rush multipliers are tied, generally speaking the character with the better stats/weapon (elemental or anti-race) should go later. In this example Fidel’s ATK is higher than Maria’s (most of the time Attackers will have higher ATK than other roles), so unless Maria’s weapon is considerably better than Fidel’s, she should go first.

Rush Combo bonuses (the stuff like +X% damage for 20 seconds etc.) do not trigger until after the whole chain is finished, so these can be ignored for purposes of ordering the chain.

I can’t memorize Rush multipliers!

In battle if you hold down on a characters Rush button a little popup will tell you what the multiplier is as well as what Rush Combo bonuses are. You can do this even on other characters in Multiplayer. Be warned that if your Rush gauge is full when you do this you may end up triggering your Rush by accident.

That said if you play long enough, you’ll memorize general patterns. Usually Healers have the lowest multiplier, followed by Shooters/Defenders, then Attackers. Obviously there are lots of exceptions but it may be easier to memorize the exceptions rather than try and remember everybody.

Older characters often also have lower multipliers than newer characters (until Awakenings). At launch for instance, most characters had around 3000% multiplier. Right now in Japan, the ‘standard’ multiplier is 4000%, with ‘Finisher’ type characters having 4500% or 5000% whereas support types may be more like 3500%.

Is there ever a reason not to do a Chain/just do a solo Rush?

Yes. Activating a Rush interrupts whatever the bosses are doing and also wipes all projectiles from the screen. Several bosses have large AoE, easily telegraphed (but sometimes hard to dodge) attacks; or long-lasting projectiles that really mess with your ability to sustain offense; and depending on the difficulty you’re playing at, it may actually be in your best interests to activate a Rush to cancel it. Obviously it’s best to do this with a character who can easily re-charge their Rush. The character in the game with the fastest-charging Rush is Nel (even now in JP she is the fastest).

Nel also has another reason to do a solo Rush, which is her Rush grants herself a permanent Strong Poison buff for the rest of the battle. Since it’s permanent rather than lasting 20 sec. you might as well buff yourself, and the vast majority of the time you’ll be able to re-charge your Rush before the rest of your party maxes out their gauges.

Is there any time I shouldn’t do a Rush in general?

Rushes also cancel Stuns, so if you Rush a Stunned boss you’ve effectively wasted a Stun. That said, there are some situations where this is ok (if the chain is going to kill the boss anyway, or if you have a strong buff that’s about to run out. For instance Claire gets a whopping party-wide 80% damage boost for 20 seconds on her Rush, so if you do her Rush and re-charge Rush before 20 seconds are up, it’s may be better to do another Rush chain even if the boss is Stunned.)

My Rushes charge too slow!

This could be for two reasons: one, your character just has a slow-charging Rush. Two, you’re using the wrong moves.

If you can read Japanese, a JP player continually updates a spreadsheet that lists all characters Rush Gauge capacity and the amount each of their moves charge. So you can see that Nel has the smallest (=fastest charging) Rush at only 6400 points, most other characters are in the 8000-12000 range, and pre-Ascension Evelysse had the slowest, requiring a whopping 24000 points. Each character’s moves also charge the gauge by different amounts, and sometimes certain moves are absolutely terrible at generating gauge. For instance, Victor’s Makousen only generates 264 points, while his other moves generate between 800-1400. Now certainly the animation time of the move in question also factors in (since really it’s gauge-per-second that’s more important rather than absolute gauge) but be prepared to experiment with different battle skills to see how you can charge more quickly.

Also, one easily-forgotten thing is that the higher your combo count is, the faster you charge gauge. This is usually not an issue in Multiplayer, but in Single if you’re having trouble consistently keeping up a 150+ hit combo there will later be characters with Talents or various Accessories that can help.