Oerba Dia Vanille/Gameplay

Final Fantasy XIII


Vanille concentrates on casting magic from a distance, as opposed to the close combat style of Lightning and Snow, although her casting animation is slow compared to most other party members. Despite being able to use the Attack command at the start of the game, she cannot use it after Chapter 3 because she does not have the Commando role, which she unlocks in Chapter 10.

When the player first acquires Vanille in the Pulse Vestige, she already has three ATB slots as she is already a l'Cie, though unable to select magical abilities or utilize paradigm shifts. She's the only one able to fight her Eidolon with five ATB slots as it's possible, albeit difficult, to acquire a third-tier weapon before that.

Roles
Vanille has the second highest Magic stat in the game, making her a good Ravager, and she can learn all elemental spells up to the -"ra" rank with Fire and Ice being her -"ga" specialty. She lacks the elemental strikes. She learns Fearsiphon and Overwhelm, but does not learn Vigor.

She is an effective Saboteur, specializing in abilities that lower the enemies' defenses. She is the first of the party to access Saboteur and is the most developed SAB for the majority of the game. She learns every spell except for Slow, Curse and Daze, and has a weapon that boosts the success rate of debuff spells.

She has the only Full ATB skill that is not a Commando or Ravager ability: Death, a Saboteur ability that deals heavy non-elemental magic damage to an enemy and has a 1% base chance of inflicting instant KO, but the success rate is boosted by the SAB role bonus and the number of status ailments on the enemy. Unlike Snow's Sovereign Fist or Fang's Highwind, Vanille's Death does not clear the enemy's chain gauge and benefits from the En-spells, allowing her to reach the damage cap and do so repeatedly.

Vanille's greatest strength lies in her Medic role, where she rivals Hope when it comes to effective healing as both learn all MED skills and, due to her higher HP stat, is less likely to be knocked out by powerful attacks. She learns the MED spells earlier, but Hope tends to have higher MAG so he can heal for more.

Vanille and Fang are the only party members who can access the -ra level buff spells as Synergists, and she also learns Veil, Vigilance and the Bar-spells. She doesn't learn Haste and or En-spells.

Compared to the other party members, Vanille makes a weak Commando or Sentinel. As Commando she doesn't learn Blitz or Launch and has low STR, but can cast Ruin and Ruinga for damage, although she doesn't get Ruin until stage 7, and Adrenaline until stage 8. She learns Reprieve and Mediguard as Sentinel.

Stats

 * Base statistics

Eidolon


Vanille's Eidolon is Hecatoncheir, a multi-armed, Earth-elemental Eidolon that transforms into a bipedal mech with four machine gun turrets. Vanille calls her Eidolon by the pet name "Hecaton" (a nickname found on the inner circle of his summon symbol, rather than "Hecatoncheir").

Weapons


Vanille's weapon is a binding rod. Its headpiece resembles a pair of antlers and the body consists of four long wires with hooks that deal damage to enemies by latching on and pulling, similar to a fishing rod. Vanille is the only character who has no weapon when she first joins the party.

Vanille starts with Binding Rod that boosts her STR, but as Vanille doesn't have many physical attack abilities this weapon is quickly outclassed by her other weapons. Pearlwing Staff provides the highest MAG of all her weapons and has the synthesized "Magic Wall" ability.

Her Belladonna Wand has the "Improved Debuffing" passive ability that boosts the success rates of Poison, Deshell, Deprotect, Imperil and Dispel by x1.2, while Lv II boosts them by x1.4, and has the ability to synthesize "Buff Duration".

Healer's Staff has "Improved Cure that augments the healing of MED spells by 10%, and 20% at Lv II, but has low max stats. Rod of Thorns is her balanced weapon with equal STR and MAG and the ability to synthesize "Magic Wall". Heavenly Axis has "Stagger Lock" and high MAG, but seeing that Pearlwing Staff gives more MAG without the Stagger Lock this weapon is not so useful for her.

Mistilteinn has "Ally KO: Power Surge" that provides a 110% boosts to damage dealt by Vanille for each KO'd ally, while Lv II boosts 130%. With this weapon fully upgraded and two KO'd allies, Vanille can potentially do x3.6 damage and still add to that with "Low HP: Power Surge", but the benefits would be situational.

Tigerclaw is the weapon available for Vanille from Gilgamesh, Inc. with high max stats but with "Leadenstrike" that considerably slows her down.