Moran (Treasure)Information and Guide

Moran fights competitively for the gold medal in the “Best Treasure Released” Olympic Games. The real best Treasure unit varies depending on an account to account basis, and especially on the priorities of a player. Regardless of whatever we think about her though, Moran has re-entered the realm of PvE in spectacular fashion. A comeback for the ages! A must build for all accounts, in our opinion, at least. Let's get right into this one now, shall we?

Can you give me a brief summary about this unit?

Moran – a Nikke already known to be as one of the strongest PvP soldiers to exist thanks to her ability to tank damage well – receives massive buffs that allow her to work in all contents as an absolutely amazing B1 unit, almost anywhere, with her re-worked universal kit. 

In PvE, she now becomes a CDR, with her Burst Skill CD reduced to 20 seconds. Her said Burst Skill now gets a team wide ATK buff on top of Damage Reduction, Attract and Life-steal – making her one of the hardest Nikkes to die in the game. Fights that deal a lot of damage, such as the returning Storm Bringer in Solo Raid Museum, or some Campaign bosses like Black Snake and Ziz, will extremely favor her because she allows the team to survive with ease.

Her impact in mob stages cannot be dismissed either, aside from the ATK buff that benefits any DPS, the Damage Reduction can allow her to tank some attacks that almost guarantee the team dies without her notably from Elite Wheels and Bronchus. Her Attract, however, is a double edged sword; it can make Sentries stun her so that a more important unit doesn't eat the stun instead, resulting in a retry, and she can tank Jellyfish when she gets targeted and with enough healing, but attracting all the mobs can lead to her quick death on extreme deficits if they aren't dealt with fast enough. Crown S2 Attract will still have target priority for mobs than Moran if she is on the left side of Moran, keeping her safe for its duration.

The ability to burst every rotation also allows her to realize the damage potential she was expected to have back when she was released, offering a good amount of damage despite her very supportive role. This is more notable against Electric weak enemies, especially in Bossing, as using her in the standard Electric team can outperform even the likes of Rouge, despite buffing Cinderella less, due to her personal damage. Nikkes that can buff her well, like Anis Sparkling Summer or Trina, might see potential use with her in Electric-Weak Solo Raids/Museums as a standalone team. 

In PvP the main improvement is the ATK buff. Since her CD reduction skills only work when “a Rapture appears”, it is impossible to happen in Arena (as of her release), but it's still a good buff  nonetheless, increasing the team damage enough to matter.

Should I get her Favorite Item?

Absolutely Yes! The changes to her kit make her one of the strongest and most versatile Burst 1 in the game, covering buffs and survivability while having some personal DPS contribution. Practically speaking, she is META for all game-modes now. She almost rivals Siren, in terms of usability as a B1 unit, just that she provided a different variant of QoL.

Phase 2 is needed for her to start becoming usable in PvE game modes, because the CD reduction is locked behind them. Meanwhile, Phase 3 grants the much desired teamwide ATK buff making her reach her full potential. 

Kit Analysis

Skill 1: Self CDR (Phase 1)

Activates when Raptures appear. Affects self. 

Fervor: Cooldown of Burst Skill ▼ 20 sec continuously.

Moran, despite being an incredible tank due to her 35.14% team-wide Damage Reduction buff, Stacking 3.51% DEF for every 1% HP she loses, Attract, life-steal and emergency self HP buff at 20% HP, was not good outside PvP because of her 40s CD Burst and her lack of any other supportive buffs, meaning you could only burst once every 2 rotations and still need an external CDR to have a working team. 

This change fixes one of her problems, reducing her burst skill CD to 20s allows her to normally rotate which contributes to her usability and makes her tanking potential more accessible in PvE. She is not bound to another B1 unit any longer.

In addition to that, her personal damage when bursting is actually good for a Burst 1, which also gets buffed by having the ability to use her Burst every rotation. 

This does not affect her PvP performance in any way as Raptures cannot appear there, so no abusing that in stall comps. 

Skill 2: Team CDR (Phase 2)

Activates when entering Full Burst while in Fervor status. Affects all allies.

Cooldown of Burst Skill ▼ 7.48 sec.

With a non-conditional CDR skill, on top of being a 20s Burst 1 in PvE, Moran can be the sole Burst 1 for any team. This significantly increases her value as she can also be used as an off-burst CDR for teams with a better main Burst 1 (like MirandaTr). By timing her Taunt on the last bullet, she can tank some single target attacks even without bursting thanks to her relatively high DEF and emergency HP increase, which could prove useful.

Her on-burst tank potential can also be fully realized since all the restrictions she had basically got completely removed. It is so insane, so much so that her ability to protect the team alone can make her viable if needed without compromising on basic team CDR needs. One of the best examples of this is against Black Snake, where the best teams against it rely on Anchor Innocent Maid and Helm Treasure to simply survive. However, Moran can now replace Anchor completely, freeing up her slot for more offensive buffs, or using both if your deficit is high enough to need this much sustain to survive.

Even without enemies that deal crazy damage, she pretty much guarantees your team will survive in Solo Raid without taking an extra slot away, and in-directly increases the team damage by minimizing any need to cover or have to deal with most projectiles. 

Since this needs Fervor to work and that needs a Rapture to appear, this is also a completely useless upgrade for PvP.

Burst Skill: Team Buffs (Phase 3)

Affects all allies.

ATK ▲ 42.57% of caster's ATK for 10 sec.

She can now take cover during her Burst. 

Having a decent ATK buff on top of all the protection she provides for the team is the cherry on top. Survivability aside, just the ATK buff and her personal damage is enough to make her outshine most B1 we currently have. She completely replaces Rouge in Electric teams and can directly compete with Liter in most teams, where Liter wins when buffing DPSes with front loaded damage (Helm Treasure and Liberalio being the main ones), or when used with Grave. Aside from those cases Moran Treasure provides similar or more damage for the team, she can even rival neutral Rapi Red Hood as a Burst 1 (provided she isn't being buffed by Ada Wong).

Having more duplicates and max level OL gear makes her ATK buff better as it scales off her own base ATK.

But when you take into account the QoL and survivability Moran provides, her value starts to show, covering buffs exceptionally well while keeping the entire team alive and healthy. She can also now cover during her Burst, useful when you need to i-frame projectiles. 

This time there is a noticeable improvement to PvP too, the ATK buff works there normally which could be the difference that makes your team win, and can be the difference between an attack being lethal or barely missing the mark. 

For team order:  If you plan to use Crown S2 or any other Attract to re-direct attacks from Moran, make sure Crown is on the left side of her. This is because if multiple Nikkes use Attract the leftmost one has the target priority.

Tier List & Usage Analysis

Campaign: SSS

Her Damage Reduction is situationally overpowered, her Attract is an advantage if used right, and with a solid value ATK buff during full burst: you can't go wrong with her. She hard counters Bronchus and Wheels, and against Jellyfish stages (with enough healing on your team), she will come back strong from anything that doesn't one-shot her. You can check out these clears that highlight those use cases. 

https://youtu.be/JXdlTBp1Xug

https://youtu.be/zDjtYII2pko 

Moran is, unfortunately, a target for sniper mobs. Past the 35-40% deficit range, she is quite susceptible to one-shots by any random mob, making her likely to die first for your team (the Tia experience). She also doesn't help with the Elite Launchers that spawn mobs preventing the team from bursting, meaning you'll need to prioritize those mobs, and time your burst based on the mob spawn times which is a disadvantage (something that Siren can more aptly help against thanks to her Team Aim QoL).

We internally discussed whether she'd fit in SS or SSS better because she is somewhere in between, not as comfy or impactful as Siren but also not as weak as RRH or RH B1. However, because Moran unlocks some stages that cannot be previously cleared by Siren with ease thanks to her taunting dangerous mobs, Damage Reduction and ATK buff, we think she fits SSS better. This will also be in line with the fact that Moran is BiS for certain bosses in Campaign, although those are more for the Bossing TL. 

She also completely powercreeps Rouge in Tetra Tower, but only if you use Ade Agent Bunny as your Burst 2. She can be used in Blanc teams as long as Blanc has an enabler (Noir/Rouge). You can also use someone like off-burst Ludmilla to abuse damage reduction (must be to the left of Moran; not auto-Burst-friendly).

Make sure Crown is to the left of Moran, so her S2 works. 

Bossing: SSS

Moran’s Favourite Item version at Phase 3 solidifies herself as one of the best Burst 1 Nikkes against Bosses. CDR alone isn't enough, of course, to be considered the best. Peak team damage isn't everything when it comes to ratings either. Technical ability that helps the team often in various situations matters a lot, and that Moran has, a unique one too while we're at it.

While a unit like Siren provides Burst Generation, Off-Burst team Aim, and DPS for the team, Moran specialises in Survivability, a trait not yet seen in the other 20s B1-CDR role. The team-wide damage reduction, ability to tank and taunt away single target damage, as well as competitive team buffs + DPS which allows her to rival the likes of Siren and Liter (in terms of overall Team Damage dealt—do note some units like Grave & frontloaded DPS like HelmTr may prefer Liter more than Moran) are highlights of Moran's performance, and her rating reflects as to how good we think she is in her role!

Her tanking capabilities are actually insane. If you find yourself dying to any boss in the game or don't want to deal with any mildly annoying attack patterns just use her, more likely than not, you'll survive without even breaking a sweat. (She still can't save your team from Anomaly Interception Elemental Damage Bonuses tho, that's just too much unfortunately)

In single-team Electric Weak bossing content, she simply outperforms Rouge, even though Rouge buffs Cinderella and xMaiden, just by buffing the rest of the team better, in addition to her noticeably high personal damage. (The damage is more noticeable the more Elemental Damage lines she gets on her OL gear). Her damage can also get buffed by Trina to the point that it might be a good idea to build a team around her. This idea will be mainly restricted to Solo Raid/multi-team Electric content though.

On Neutral Bossing, her main value is her CDR, ATK buff, and team survivability: making her an amazing pick against any boss. Her personal damage is also decent for a Burst 1, which contributes to her usability.

In Union Raid she can be used as the 3rd Burst 1 unit in your teams, be it any element (except for Wind). Lower-sync players should try to take advantage of her survivability to maximise their damage dealt. For them, she might be a Team 1 unit if their usual teams have healers.

PvP: SSS

Moran is still the same insane tank she was before her Treasure, tanking enough to not get nuked before bursting. She is also a defender meaning she can benefit from Biscuit’s S2 invulnerability and an Electric Assault Rifle benefitting from Trina’s buffs and invulnerability at start. Her Damage Reduction buff also makes the team significantly tankier along with her long Attract duration, even more when stacked with more Damage Reduction buffs enabling stall comps. 

The PvP boost she gets from her Treasure is the ATK buff, which is impactful especially for DPSes that need a buffer to perform well and gives more insurance for strong ones to get the kill, it can be the difference between a win or a loss. It doesn't change her teams much, it just makes them stronger. 

Investments

Gear Investments

Moran can work without any specific OL lines, since most of her use-case is just her tanking. Her ATK buff is caster’s ATK buff, which is not affected by OL lines.

For Electric weak content, however, you want to give her the usual DPS build. She will want Elemental Damage and ATK lines. Ammo is useless on her, since she has unlimited ammo during her burst. Ideally, you do not want Max Ammo lines on Moran. Crit lines are passable. For PvP, DEF is also passable.

• Ideal: 4× Ele, 4× ATK

• Filler: 4× Crit Damage, 4× Crit Rate, 4× Defense

• Priority: Medium

• Note: Base OL for CP padding and base stats alone is worth it, but less priority than main DPS.

Skill Investments

• Skill 1: 4/7/10

  • Contributes to her personal damage and her tankiness in PvP. 

  • Burst CD reduction doesn't scale with levels.

  • Stop at 7 to save Gold Skill Mats if not interested in PvP. 

• Skill 2: 10

  • Her CDR skill should be maxed for faster rotations. 

  • Increases her emergency HP buff, very useful for PvP.

  • No excuse not to have this skill at Lvl10.

• Burst Skill: 10

  • More damage reduction is always worth it, in all game modes. 

  • Should be raised for her ATK buff.

  • Ideally, have this skill at 10 to get the most out of her.

Cube Investments

In PvE, the highest level cube lends the most damage (Destruction will win if there are frequent parts too), while Tempering provides the best tanking. 

Doll Investments

Moran is just a universally strong B1 CDR. Campaign, check. Bossing, check. PvP? Well, she doesn't have CDR, but Damage Reduction & self-survivability are insane, so... PvP, check. She has risen from one of the worst units (outside PvP) in the game to one of the best. Holy ShiftUp simping for her!

We rate her priority as the highest among all Treasures, followed by PrivatyTr & HelmTr. Get her ASAP!

This is even more true if you don't have Siren for Campaign.