Impact LUK Mage o.o (*NOT A GUIDE*)

May 6 Update: Equipment (also more spoilers)

Halooo minna ouo ° Yami ° here, formerly known as Ewp. Call me Aoi or Ewp tho XD.

Please do not think that this is a guide. I'm asking for help to improve the build qwq.

So I was thinking about making an Impact mage, but with my LUK mage instead of a damager mage. My goal is to one shot Nightmare Roars, and tank with her the way I tank with my AGI brawler - by interrupting the boss' attacks - and doing a bit of damage while I'm at it. I already have an idea of how to do it (thanks to @orange's post somewhere), but I'd like to hear opinions from other people. Also I need help with it since I'm still nub XD. I guess I'll use the template thingy.

Plesh don't hesitate to correct any mistakes, and comment anything you could think of regarding the build.

Impact LUK Mage Build (for simplicity)

Spoiler: About the Build

The goal of this build is to enable a LUK mage to tank by spamming skills that annoy the hell out of bosses with attack interruptions and deal some damage while we're at it.

Some pros would be: 1) good aggro gain, 2) infinite MP due to Quick Draw + Shell Break, 3) physical skills help set up proration for Impact, 4) quite a bit of MDEF from INT, 5) more drops cuz of LUK stat.

Some cons: 1) low HP, 2) low guard stats, 3) lower resistance compared to shield users, 4) quite squishy, 5) good aggro gain, but not high, so some builds with heavy DPS can out-aggro you.

Main Weapon: Knuckle or Magic Device
Offhand Weapon: Magic Device if knuckle is equipped
Stat Distribution: whatever LUK mage stats you want ouo; I did 100 INT rest LUK tho

Skill Trees

Spoiler: Skills

Total SP Required: 151-186
*skills in this color are important*

Spoiler: Martial Skills: 35-40

• Smash - Level 10
• Sonic Wave - Level 5 (10 if with extra sp)
• Bash - Level 10
• Shell Break - Level 10

Spoiler: Magic Skills: 55-65

• Arrows - Level 5
• Javelin - Level 5
• Lance - Level 5
• Impact - Level 10
• Wall - Level 5
• Blast - Level 5
• Storm - Level 10
• MP Charge - Level 10
• Magic Mastery - (whatever sp is left)

Spoiler: Shot Skills: 20

• Shot Mastery - Level 5
• Long Range - Level 5
• Quick Draw - Level 10

Spoiler: Knight Skills: 1

• Assault Attack - Level 1 (for chasing bosses that move too much)

Spoiler: Survival Skills: 40

• Short Rest - Level 5
• Safe Rest - Level 5
• HP Boost - Level 10
• MP Boost - Level 10
• Drop Up - Level 10

Spoiler: Battle Skills: 0-20

• Magic Up - (whatever sp is left)
• Concentrate - (whatever sp is left)

Combo Section

Spoiler: Combos

All combos below are 1MP combos.

Short Combo
Smash > Shell Break (Save)> Impact (x)> Bash (Swift)
This will be your most basic combo. Replace x with Smite for damage or Swift for speed.

Main Combo
Smash > Shell Break (save) > Sonic Wave (Cons) > Impact (x) > Bash (Swift)
4 physical skills for proration, then Magic sweeps in. Spam this combo liek crazy ouo. Sonic Wave is there for insurance, just to make sure that at least one Tumble will trigger. Same as above for x.

Chase Combo
Assault Attack > Smash (Cons) > Shell Break (Save) > Sonic Wave (Cons) > Impact (x) > Bash (Swift)
Use this against bosses that charge/run all over the place. Same as above for x. Feel free to swap the positions of Smash and Shell Break to give Impact a small damage rise.

Ranged Storm Combo
Sonic Wave > Javelin (Save) > Impact (Cons) >Storm (Smite) > MP Charge (Swift)
For when you're not tanking, use this combo from a distance (max 8M for continuous casting).

Equipment List

Spoiler: Boss Drop Gear Choices

• Drills (Knuckle) <MATK xtal of choice> or <Aranea/Super Night Mushroom> if you need HP and/or MP - crt rate +100%; makes sure all physical skills will hit except if evaded; refine as high as you want to increase MATK
• Time Warp Watch (Special) <Granny> - TWW to cast physical skills faster; use with ASPD pots such as Giga Speed Potion; Granny boosts your MATK by a lot and hopefully will not affect Impact's cast time;
• Feather Cape (Add) <Candela> - for those who cannot afford TWW (liek me); adds +1,000 ASPD total;
• Knight Talisman (Special) <Granny> - to use with Feather Cape; adds 25% Aggro and offsets Candela's -200 MP;

Spoiler: Player Crafted Choices

• Just use your usual MATK gears ouo
• Avoid -ASPD tho
• Also try to get 800MP+ (with or without items such as Magiadd) to keep your MP pool infinite
• Or try: 2s (1s is okay) armor with MATK+7%, INT+12, Aggro+_% <Roga+Jade> or <Roga+Cerabes> if you need more HP (light remodel [I just cannot stress enough how important ASPD is with this build])

 

Can you share with us why it won't work o.o?

 

Yee, might not work. From what we've discussed on our lil private gc (lel), getting aggro here might be kinda hard. Unless u wanna spam provoke. And the usage of drills nullifies the idea for adding more damage in.

Altho, it's fun to have a build like this lol.

Then again, all this is just a might be. Some pro out there might prove me wrong… am a nub

 

yeah I was wondering what I could do about that too. In the end, I might have to rely on Guardian, etc. after all.

 

might work for boss, but not for roars, aoe of impact is not large enough to get/kill most roars in room. (even staff storm has higher range than impact)

 

Well of course we'd use Storm for farming NC XD. See Storm is at Lv10 in my skills section o.o it's also in red, indicating its importance. I only didn't write an NC farm combo with Storm cuz I think that's easy enough to figure out.

Well, cuz I can't find any other role for my LUK mage XD. I'm not interested in refining atm, so I thought 'why not make my LUK mage useful in boss fights?'

Then I thought Attacker rank can never be mine due to low INT, so I thought of breaker or tank ranks instead - both of which do not need high damage to achieve. After a lot of thinking, I finally reached my Toram knowledge limit and decided to make a thread about it to ask for help from people more knowledgeable than me.

 

Actually, I found this build to be quite interesting.

However, because you dont have VIT stat, it may be impossible to survive when tanking high difficulty bosses. (your build will have around 3500 HP using vita plus right?)

But, I think it will still be possible to farm tank normal difficulty bosses (with high enough armor and add refinement). But, it will be better for you to use Imitator's shield drop (forgot its name) which grants 30%aggro.

And actually, by using knuckles, you can skip learning quick draw. The proc rate of shell break is enough to ensure your infinte mp. It may be better to use the SP to learn some other skill such as Provoke, Shield Cannon, Sanctuary, or Guardian

 

Thanks for taking interest in the build

Yes it should have around that much HP, but with an HP set it could go to 5k+ with Vita Plus II.

If I use a shield, will Giga Speed pots be enough to counter Heavy remodel and the ASPD penalty? Or should I add points to shield mastery after all? And I can't equip MD with a shield u.u.

My main is a brawler, and I can say Shell Break is reliable. However, it does not keep my MP from reaching 0 even at Lv10 with 1.1k MP. I really think Quick Draw is an absolute must for the build.

 

Guardian and other shield skills require you to EQUIP a shield .-.
Which means you cant get knux + md or just plain md in general.
Which only leaves either knux + shield or staff + shield.
Now with knux impact doesnt even count as a proper dps and for staff too the dmg of impact is smaller than storm.
You may be able to tank by the aggro skills but breaker too will be impossible to win if a 2h, dw or a dagger halberd is in the party.
Which just makes the build more of a magic tank.
Its funny coz I am actually working on mage tank which I intend to post but If you want I can give you some spoilers through pm if you want ^^
You can change the stats from full vit to combination of int+luk mainly.

 

To be honest, i see more benefit of using shield rather than md as sub weapon. This is due to the very nice aggro bonus by equipping Imitator's shield. Also, i think equiping md will not substantially increase the damage you do.

As for ASPD, using giga speed pot on lv5 shield mastery+heavy remodel should make you have around 800 ASPD. Try to learn quick aura (halberd skill tree) if you still need more .

About shell break, my new remodeled gun fu had nearly unlimited mp even without quickdraw. And i think, even when it doesnt proc, you can quickly recover mp using normal attack. As you said that you have at least 800mp, your ampr will be 10+1%*800, which is 18. With 6 normal attack you will recover 108 mp . Also, quickdraw proc rate will be lower for non bow/bg user

 

According to the wiki I go to for info, Impact does 250% more damage when equipped with MD. If this is outdated and does not exist anymore, please don't hesitate to tell me, as this is the reason why I thought this could work in the first place.

I see. I've never made a proper tank before, but I do have plans. Also the wiki I rely on doesn't have Guardian and kinda assumed it's a no limit skill . Too bad.

My brawler has been tanking ever since I got my core skills and got enough cp. I usually party up with a Lv116 halberd+dagger guildie, or a Lv120 angelus mage friend and I've never lost aggro even once (unless my skills get interrupted multiple times in succession by the boss ). The only time I lost aggro was when a 2H was in the party vs Yozakura, but at that time I was only Lv70+ and he was Lv120. I'm hoping I could tank with him when I can come closer to his level.

What do you mean by magic tank o.o? A tank specializing in defenses against magic? Or a tank that could do magic damage? And I'll pass on the spoilers. I'll get too excited and probably harass you to post the whole thing quick XD.

If I were to be that squishy tank, I can't afford to auto attack during boss fights. It will probably (or definitely ) kill me, so I just have to rely on both skills.

Thanls for the ASPD tips

 

I havent checked the impact damage. However, using luck mage, the impact would at most will be around 10k damage. Which will be insignificant when compared to overall boss health.

Well, wont auto-attack be safer than spamming combos? I think for your build, you will need to position yourself before conducting your combos, and while you are doing so, it will be better to prorate a bit using auto attacks. Beside that, flinch, tumble, and stun also had cooldown for them to re-occurs.

And actually, if you want to further increase aggro, you may try to learn heavy smash to lvl 1. This combo should do:
Assault attack --> Shell Break (save) --> impact (consec) --> heavy smash (swift) --> sonic wave/smash (swift)

 

If you are referring to the japanese wiki for skills then i would say you shouldnt, they got a LOT of stuff about skills incorrect. Its only good if you wanna check stuff about smith skills, about stat/refine but for combat skills the only thing you can trust is their damage calculation formula.

Stuff like damage by md +250% can easily be misinterpreted as literal +250% damage when its not the case at all.
By +250% damage they say the difference in their multipliers is 2.5 [The multiplier is 5 for md and 2.5 for staff, making the difference 2.5)
But does that mean md will do 250% more damage than staff on impact? Nope.
If that were true you would be able to see 50k+ impacts but you dont coz by division 5/2.5 = 2 which when you convert to literal terms it would mean damage +100% not damage +250%.
Which means md impact will do twice the damage done by staff impact, I know all this math stuff will go above your head at first but it indeed is how it works.

And the magic tank is one of a kind tank that can use magic skills for prorating physical skills and also vice versa. Unlike the mainstream knux and 1h as main weapon it will have staff as main weapon but overall it can use any weapon with shield sub depending on the situation.

 

You have a point there although 10k is way too low. I did 12k vs Grylle with drop boost/MP set xD so I guess I'll focus on aggro/tank gears instead of damage?

Can you elaborate on the positioning ? And I don't think auto attacking is safer with this build since the goal is basically to not let the boss hit at all, and I can't do that if I'm auto attacking. I am aware that this is useless vs bosses like Jade and Nure who are allergic to such skills.

Thanks for the HS idea! I seriously considered adding it in, but can't really decide. I left it out in hopes of anyone recommending it

 

I see. So I should be careful with where I get my info. Can you link me to somewhere I could read up on skills?

Don't worry about the math stuff. It (used to be) my strongest subject after all . Thanks for the clarification tho!

Oh that sounds interesting it's how I wanna do damage with Impact. So is it like a tank STFU but with shield? (My friend calls Staff Fu as STFU XD)

 

I hit 28k impact highest with my magic swordsman when I had him, impact smite is a monster

 

Finally a testimony! combine that with a fast combo, imagine the potential damage

Although the fact still remains that I'm using it on a LUK mage

 

Yeah you aren't gonna hit jack diddly with luck

 

Theres currently no complete up to date 100% proven tested skill database. You will have to ask about every skill personally to people here if you want the best data. Yep that much homework is necessary.

Also @Alzarith check pm

 

Flinch and Tumble have very low cool down times, basing on my experience as a brawler. With enough ASPD, it is possible to keep the boss from attacking, although it probably depends on the boss too.

Stun, from what I was told, has a 30 sec cool down, which is why I put up a separate combo to cast it quickly and safely whenever it's available again. [EDIT] I was thinking of my brawler's combos sorry XD. Seems I put Bash everywhere. Well, I guess it's alright. It casts fast when swifted and Stun is a good bonus.