Reverse: 1999 Psychube Guide: Best Combos for Every Role

Psychubes are the one piece of gear your Arcanists actually wear. There's no gacha banner for them either - you build your collection by playing, day after day, which makes the whole system feel a bit more honest than most. The catch is that a matched psychube can swing a character's output by a nice chunk, and a mismatched one just sits there doing basically nothing. So it pays to know which cube goes on which role, and where the upgrade materials come from, because those are time-gated and easy to waste on the wrong piece.

How Psychube Stats and Skills Interact With Incantations

Every character carries exactly one psychube. Any Arcanist can hold any cube - there's no rarity or character lock - and you can swap them freely, even mid-battle by dragging the cube between portraits. A psychube hands over two things: a block of flat stats, and one conditional passive.

The stat block is ATK, HP, Reality DEF, and Mental DEF, plus a single special stat that's fixed per cube. That special stat is often the real prize. Thunderous Applause gives Critical Rate 16% at max level. That Inquisitive Dear gives Healing Done 18%. Brave New World hands over Ultimate Might 18%, and Yearning Desire runs Incantation Might 15%. Those last two sound similar but do different jobs: Incantation Might boosts your normal hand of cards, while Ultimate Might boosts the big Ultimate casts. A character who lives in their ult wants Ultimate Might. A character whose basic cards carry the fight wants Incantation Might.

Reading the trigger line

This is the part people skip, and it's the whole game. Each passive has a trigger, and the trigger is written in the game's own card language. Your hand is dealt in Incantations every round, and each card carries tags - Attack, Buff, Debuff, Heal. When That Inquisitive Dear says "when the carrier casts a basic Incantation debuff," it literally means: this character played a normal (non-Ultimate) card with the Debuff tag. If your healer's cards don't have debuff tags, that passive never fires, and you've strapped a fancy paperweight to them.

Other triggers watch different events:

• Ultimate casts, and sometimes the shape of the ult - Luxurious Leisure only counts 1-target Ultimates, Her Second Life only counts mass (AoE) ones.
• Kills - His Bounden Duty and Hopscotch pay out per enemy defeated.
• Critical hits on single-target attacks - Thunderous Applause territory.
• Extra actions and Channel status - the newer crit cubes feed off these.
• Round starts - Laughter and Laughter stacks up this way.

Card merging makes some cubes better

Playing two identical cards side by side merges them into one higher-ranked card, up to rank 3, and higher rank means a stronger effect. So when Brave New World says "after the carrier casts an Ultimate, the next incantation gets +20% to +40% Incantation Might," you want that boosted follow-up to be a merged rank-3 card, not a stray rank-1. Cast the ult, then drop the merged card on the same turn. Little sequencing habits like that are free damage.

Upgrades come in two flavors, and they matter later in this guide: Engrave raises the psychube's level (stats scale up to the level 60 cap), while Amplification pushes the passive through five ranks - that 60% heal on His Bounden Duty becomes 120% at Amplify 5.

Best Psychubes for Damage-Focused Timepieces

Your main damage dealer earns the best cube you own. Match the trigger to how the character actually fights and you're most of the way there. Numbers below are max-level (Lv 60) values, with the passive shown at Amplify 1 growing to Amplify 5.

| Psychube | Key Lv 60 stat | Passive (Amp 1 to 5) | Who it fits | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | His Bounden Duty | ATK 410, DMG Bonus 12% | On kill, heal 60% to 120% of ATK | A Knight, Marcus, Voyager, X | | Brave New World | ATK 370, Ultimate Might 18% | After ult, next incantation +20% to +40% Might | Regulus, Sonetto, An-an Lee, Noire | | Luxurious Leisure | ATK 380, Ultimate Might 18% | After a 1-target ult, DMG +5% to +9%, 3 stacks | Melania, Pickles, single-target boss killers | | Hopscotch | ATK 370, Incantation Might 18% | On kill, Ultimate Might +4% to +8%, 4 stacks | Centurion, Eternity, wave-clearers | | Thunderous Applause | Crit Rate 16% | Single-target crit grants Crit DMG +16% to +32% | Lilya, Matilda, crit carries | | Blasphemer of Night | ATK 360, Incantation Might 18% | Attacking a target with 2+ Neg Statuses: DMG +12% to +24% | Druvis III, Isolde, Windsong, 6 | | On the Hand of Time | ATK 380, Crit DMG 24% | Channel attacks gain Pen Rate +14% to +28%; extra actions grant Crit DMG (3 stacks) | Windsong, Jiu Niangzi, extra-action units | | Outside the City | Crit Rate 16% | 1-target attacks via extra action: Crit DMG stacks, +Crit Rate at 10 stacks | Anjo Nala, Flutterpage, 37, Ezio |

The generalist pick

His Bounden Duty is the safe default for a carry that clears waves. It has the highest ATK line of the shop cubes (410 at Lv 60) plus a flat 12% DMG Bonus, and the on-kill heal of 60% ATK, up to 120% at Amplify 5, quietly keeps an aggressive front-liner standing. Snowballing units love it - every kill pays rent. If you grabbed the free 6-star selection box from the login rewards and had no idea what to take, this one's rarely a regret.

Ult-driven carries

Brave New World rewards a rhythm: ult, then dump a big merged card. Regulus and Sonetto-style units that cycle ultimates often get a lot out of it. Luxurious Leisure is the boss-killer version - it only counts single-target ults, stacking +5% (to +9%) damage three times, so it's wasted on an AoE unit and great on someone like Melania who hammers one target with ult after ult. Hopscotch flips it around: each kill grants Ultimate Might, up to four stacks, so a wave-clearer mows through trash and cashes a fat ult into the next pack.

Crit carries

Thunderous Applause is the old reliable: 16% Crit Rate as the stat line, and landing a single-target crit grants Crit DMG +16% to +32%. Lilya and Matilda are the classic users. The newer cubes push further - On the Hand of Time brings 24% Crit DMG built in, gives Channel-status attacks up to 28% Penetration Rate, and lets extra actions stack even more Crit DMG. Outside the City does something similar for units that spam single-target attacks through extra actions, topping off with a bonus 8% to 12% Crit Rate at ten stacks. If your character gets extra actions or lives in Channel, those two beat the classics.

Debuff-team carries

Blasphemer of Night wants the enemy carrying two or more negative statuses before it pays +12% to +24% damage. Pair it with a debuffer and it turns into one of the strongest carry cubes around. Isolde, Druvis III, and Windsong-style units that fight inside a pile of statuses are the natural homes. Solo, with nobody applying statuses? It's a stat stick. Skip it.

Best Psychubes for Support and Control Roles

Supports don't need ATK on their cube - they need the passive to match their job. Raw attack on a healer is mostly wasted points.

| Psychube | Key Lv 60 stat | Passive (Amp 1 to 5) | Who it fits | | --- | --- | --- | --- | | That Inquisitive Dear | Healing Done 18% | Casting a basic Debuff card heals the lowest-HP ally for 24% to 48% of ATK (once per round) | Tooth Fairy, Medicine Pocket, Balloon Party, Necrologist | | Her Second Life | HP 2800, ATK 10% | After a mass Ultimate, heal all allies 32% to 64% of ATK | Sotheby, APPLe, Mesmer Jr., aliEn T | | Laughter and Laughter (5-star) | DMG Taken Reduction 10% | Each round start: Healing Done +3%, up to 4 to 8 stacks | Tooth Fairy, Medicine Pocket, APPLe | | Melodies Old and New (5-star) | HP 2600, HP 8% | Entering battle: Healing Done +12% to 16%; each round, allies gain DMG +1% to +3% (3 stacks) | Vila, Fatutu, Yenisei, Sotheby | | The Third Commitment | HP 2800, HP 16% | Bullets grant Crit DMG; deployed Arrays give allies +6% to +12% Incantation and Ultimate Might | Getian, Ezra Theodore, Lopera |

Pure healers

That Inquisitive Dear is the classic 6-star for medics who throw debuff cards - 18% Healing Done as the stat, plus a 24%-of-ATK (rising to 48%) spot heal on the most wounded ally every time they play a Debuff card, once a round. Check the tag first though. A healer whose cards are all Heal and Buff tags gets nothing from the trigger. For ramping sustain, Laughter and Laughter is a 5-star that punches way above its rarity: +3% Healing Done per round, stacking up to eight times at Amplify 5, plus a chunky 10% DMG Taken Reduction. Long fights are exactly where it shines. Melodies Old and New is the newer anecdote cube that a lot of the current healer lists put first - it starts the battle with +12% to +16% Healing Done and drips a small team damage buff every round.

Ult-happy supports

Her Second Life pays a team-wide heal of 32% of ATK, up to 64% at max Amplify, but only after the carrier casts a mass Ultimate. That fits supports whose ult hits the whole enemy field - the Sotheby and APPLe types. It's a big HP cube too (2800), which keeps a squishy support alive to do its job.

Buffers and array supports

The Third Commitment is built for the buff-archetype units: when their deployed Array is up, every ally gets +6% to +12% Incantation Might and Ultimate Might, and the carrier's own Bullet effects stack Crit DMG onto them. On the right kit that's a team-wide damage boost hiding on a support's gear slot. For everyone else, cheap 5-stars hold the line fine - A Free Heart cuts damage taken by 10% when the wearer drops below half HP, and Yearning Desire (+8% to +16% damage into debuffed targets) makes a decent hand-me-down for a sub-DPS while you save the big materials.

Farming Routes and Materials for Upgrading Psychubes

Psychubes unlock once you clear main story stage 2ND-10, "The Chew-Chew Potion." From there the pipeline is steady but slow, and it never touches the gacha.

Where cubes come from

• Pneuma Analysis - the daily resource stage. Runs drop low-rarity psychubes plus the thought currencies used in the shop. This is your daily chore, and it's worth doing even when the drops look like trash, because spare 3-star and 4-star cubes become Engrave fodder later.
• Fragment Shop - the cube store. Two currencies: Thought Element for the cheap tier, Thoughts in Entirety for the serious stuff. A 6-star psychube runs 300 Thoughts in Entirety, with 30% off your first copy (so 210). A 5-star runs 200. Stock has monthly purchase limits, and new cubes get added as versions roll in, which is also where you buy duplicates for Amplification.
• Events, Anecdotes, and modes - limited cubes come from version events, character Anecdote chapters, and the roguelike mode. These don't rotate into the shop later, which is the whole reason the next section exists.

The material bottleneck

Engrave materials are time-gated. You'll get them from daily Pneuma Analysis runs, event shops, and the monthly shop resets - and that's about it. Long-time players still complain their cubes aren't maxed, so go in expecting a slow burn rather than a weekend project. Every Engrave also costs Sharpodonty on top of the materials.

A sane order to spend it:

1. Get your main carry's cube to a working level first. That's where the damage lives.
2. Cover your healer next - sustain is a threshold, and past it, more healing does less for your clears than damage would.
3. Fill situational slots for sub-DPS and buffers with matched 5-stars.
4. Leave bench units on whatever's lying around.

Amplification costs duplicates

Pushing a passive from rank 1 to rank 5 takes duplicate copies of that same psychube - 5-star and 6-star cubes only. That's why the Fragment Shop sells each cube more than once: first purchase discounted, then repeats at full price on a monthly limit. Five extra copies of a 300-cost 6-star is a serious pile of currency, so Amplify the pieces you're sure about.

When to Save Limited Psychubes Versus Using Generic Ones

The split here is simple. Generic cubes (the Fragment Shop stock like His Bounden Duty and Brave New World) can always be bought again - slowly, but the tap never shuts off. Limited cubes from events, collabs, Anecdotes, and the roguelike don't come back. Once they're gone, they're gone.

So who gets what?

Equip generics on anyone, any time. Swapping cubes is free, and levels stay with the cube, not the character. A generic on a bench unit costs you nothing - take it back whenever someone better shows up. The "match, don't hoard" rule applies: a perfect cube sitting in your bag helps nobody.

Never feed limited cubes into Engrave fodder. The Engrave menu will happily chew up spare psychubes for experience, and spare 3-stars and 4-stars are exactly what it should be eating. A duplicate event cube you truly can't use might still be worth keeping, since you can't rebuy it and a future character may want the trigger. The 4-star and 3-star cubes with no passive at all (Bow, Covet, Meek, and friends) are the correct fuel.

Amplify generic triggers before narrow ones. Amplification locks five duplicates into one cube, so put them into passives lots of characters can share - on-kill payouts, ult-rhythm boosts, debuff-team damage. A cube whose trigger needs one specific mechanic (bound allies, a specific Array) only pays on the one or two units built for it. One honest caveat from the long-run community view: the launch-era shop cubes still work fine, but newer versions have added stronger ones, so think twice before pouring all five duplicates into a day-one cube if a newer generic is within reach.

The day-5 selection box. Early on you'll get a free 6-star psychube selection box from the login rewards. A flexible pick like His Bounden Duty or Brave New World ages well, since it slides between carries for months. A narrow pick only wins if you already know the character it's for.

The short version: levels are cheap and movable, duplicates are precious and permanent, and the trigger line on the passive is the only part that can't be fixed later. Read that line before every purchase in the Fragment Shop, and your Thoughts in Entirety will stretch a lot further than most players' do.