Breaker 101 (A guide to breaking/ getting the title of a breaker)

What is a "Breaker"?-

A breaker is a role taken by someone in a party (pt). Their goal is to locate the breaking points on bosses and break them (hence the name) in order to maximize rare drops for his or her party.​

What is this? Where did this come from? -

A day or so ago, I posted a question on the General Discussion board about what determined the "Final Breaker Score" at the end of boss fights with pts. To my surprise, I found that no one actually knew. So, gathering my courage and a few random people in front of the Boss Colon, I set off to find the answer! : D​

What you should know beforehand-

Here are a few things you should keep in mind while reading this guide
A) These are exerts taken directly from my original post found here => http://toramonline.com/index.php?threads/question-of-a-long-time-newb.2039/
B) Please note that these studies are far from conclusive, and that a non foreseeable error may have occured while collecting data
C) If I have made a mistake like mentioned above, please point it out to me in the comments
D) This is a WIP guide, and will be updated frequently​

The Tests-

The following text is a summary of my experiences and data I have collected from party boss battles. It will go over what I believe determines the Final Breaker Score (FBS). Please note that it is inconclusive before reading.​

Spoiler

Test 1, Are breakers mandatory?-

I instructed my assistant to stand to the side and allow me to kill BC with my auto attack. Unfortunately, he autoed and dealt 24-30 dmg. When the role screen came up, I found that the breaker role is and will always come up completed. Not only that, but the minimal attacking my assistant did affected the chart, as his 2-3 swings took 5% of the breaker role.​

Test 2, DMG = breaking? [1]-

I instructed my assistant to only attack with his auto when the BC was at 2/3 health. Along with this, I unequipped all weapons. After I had dwindled the BC to 2/3 health, my assistant procceded to attack it. My average atk was 1-10, while his was 12-14. Along with this, my aspd was 2.1k and his was a little over 200. When the role screen popped up at the end, it showed that he only got 10% of the breaking credit.​

Test 3, DMG = break? [2]-

This time, my instructions were almost the same as the last time, attack at 2/3 health- but this time he was permitted to use spells and attacks other than auto. After defeating the BC, I found that he was once again only credited towards 10% of the breaker score, despite inflicting 40% of the DMG.​

Test 4, what does aspd have to do with breaking?-

Me: lvl 21 mage breaker build with int > agi> dex
Assistant : lvl 48 knight build with str > agi.​

Note that the only stats we had that were similar was aspd, he had 1.1k unequipped, I had 1.05k unequipped​

The tests we conducted were against the BC again, both of us had no equipment on. After each b. battle, I screen capped the results of the final breaker score (fbs). I don't have them on my phone, which I'm typing on, but sometime soon I'll attach them. Instead, I'll describe them. Each one of the fbs were very similar (we conducted this experiment 3 times). He was credited 51-52% of the fbs (reminder that his aspd was 1.1k) and I was credited 48-49% (aspd 1.05k).​

Test 5, Tapping- This one is pretty easy to explain, I had one assistant sit back and tap places where the monster (Excavated Golem) would break. I would stumble it, and he would tap the button once stumbled. The screen did not credit him with any breaker points.​

Test 6, Auto vs. Stumble- This test, I'm afraid to say, yielded rather unfortunate results. For this, I set my assistant up with a set of failed knuckles that I had just made, and instructed him to auto while I stumbled the Excavated Golem repeatedly. In the process of 50 seconds, I had spammed Sonic Wave on the golem 7-8 times. After finishing this test 3 times, I concluded that he was being awarded the majority of the final breaker score (about 55-60%). I was going to try the test again, as I had thought he was working with 900 aspd, while I was with only 625 aspd. Upon questioning him about this, he revealed that his aspd had been at a shocking 368. What this means is that following the boss around and doing minimal damage is more proactive at securing a breaker rank than attempting to stumble the bosses to expose its breaking points.​

Conclusions-

While my investigation remains unfinished, I think I can confirm that:
A) amount of dmg≠ final breaker score
B) amount of dmg has no direct correlation with final breaker score
C) final breaker score will always be shown, despite no stuns, flinches, or tumbles
D) the fbs seems to very heavily rely on the aspd when determining outcome when no stumbling occurs.
E) tapping does nothing to your fbs
F) auto attacking > stumbling when determining the score​

How to Become a "Breaker"-

A breaker is someone who stumbles a boss, revealing its "Tap to Break" spots.In order to expose the "Tap to Break" button, you need to use an attack that either stumbles, flinches, or stuns a monster. The tree with a lot of these moves is the knuckles tree, which would be advisable to get. You should keep in mind that if you want to stay in a party, you should probably break that waffle. A lot of your time will be spent scouting locations for optimal breaking points. The amount of breakable pieces on any boss can be found in the Boss Menu> View boss Info, under the Drop Info. When scouting, you must keep in mind a few things:
A) What your tank is doing. If it's steering the boss, keep close, but not in harms way, as special attacks can very easily take large chunks out of your health.
B) Auto attack as much as possible. You're not going to do much damage, but it regens MP.
C) The most common breakable areas are located on the head, back, and external limbs (ex: wings, legs, arms). In cases like the Eerie Crystal, just use Smash while circling the boss and you'll find them.
D) It is advised that you don't tank mini bosses.
E) The best times to Tumble/ Flinch/ Stun is when the monster is recovering from pulling off a or a string of special moves, as the boss will be resting momentarily.
F) Scouting is only needed for the first couple times you fight the monster. After that, you should know all of the breakable points.​

The Lab Rats:
@.Keith
Keichan
[-----]

TL;DR-
Under construction.

 

I see now.....This might silly or you may think that im not reading... what if i did break... am i only one who sees the "TAP"and me only can do tapping? Or once i break ... all members can Tap the screen until glass audio heared?

 

A few points...:

1) Your investigation is good, keep it up!
2) Part B - You should mention that another reason to keep attacking is MP on-hit regeneration.
3) Part C - Most people know where breakable parts are, or can ask someone who knows, but screenshots for each boss's break area would be nice. :3
4) Part D - Tanking is build, party, and boss dependent. Real tanks are only needed for most mini-bosses, Flare Volg, and Forestia. A breaker with 1.5k~ HP with high dodge and evasion, complemented with the Bash > Sonic Wave (Consecutive) > Shell Break > (Consecutive) can keep and maintain aggro fairly well while taking minimal to moderate damage, and while getting all breaks in the process. However, real tanks are obviously better at their role, but my point is that breakers can fill the tank role to a fair degree of success.
5) To expose the "Tap to Break" area, a flinch, tumble, OR STUN will expose the area.

Good guide, keep going! :3

 

No, everyone can see the breakable parts when u flinch him or sth else.

 

From what I have observed these are the factors that effect breaker rank:*
1) Number of of interrupts (inflicted flinches, stuns, and/or tumbles).
2) Damage inflicted while Boss is in broken state (while red circle is visible only)
3) Number of natural breaks (from shell break skill and occasionally regular attack for knuckles)
4) Damage inflicted from skill that initiate a tappable break (that make white or red circle appear)
5) Total number of hits (that didn't miss, or get evaded, or guarded)

* From what I've observed taps are not even factored into to rank calculation

Again these are just observations, not facts. Also I don't know which observed factors carry more weight in the rank calculations in comparison to the others.

 

You might be right, in fact, I'm looking to begin investigating your #1 and #3 ranked factors. That being said, is there anyone interested in making a pure agi brawlers reading this? (lvl 20 will do) I might need some help collecting data, and the more controlled the independents are, the easier it'll be to read the breaker graph.

 

From my hours of playtime, I can assure you that factor 1,3 and 5 that was stated by @TheShadow are indeed contribute to the success gain of Breaker rank.
Thus... making accuracy/hit rate another big factor to secure breaker rank (proved by how hard it is for me to get it against Forestia...).
As for which factor has bigger rate to secure the rank... Now I only focus on cancelling all bosses skills (red aoe or single target skills) and so far have net me the rank 90% of the time. No more taps... (finally...).
Btw this statement is experienced from knuckle user with very little DEX.

Thank You.

 

I would like to thank you all for your support and help, as I've just finished the 3rd update!

 

Oohh, nice update! :3

ALSO PAY ATTENTION TO SPECIALS! lol. One special from any mini-boss or strong normal boss (Brutal Dragon, Ruin Golem, Astol, Flare Volg, Forestia; especially those last two) will decimate your HP bar and a second special will kill you.

Unless poisoned.

Not advised, just don't do it. xD

Could you explain why?

Scoot scoot scoot, xD. I always scoot when I fight

 

Hello
I do believe the one who spams the most skill gets the 1st rank of a "BREAKER" me and my buddy of mine experimented since he was a breaker which is lvl 57 atm and i on the other hand was a dagger user which is lvl 32 atm my breaker buddy spammed all his brawler skill combo and did all taping and all i did was spamming my "Throw Dagger" skills which i never spam my combo much but at the end of the boss batlle "Flare Volg" i got always 1st rank for breaking which is rly funny haha and oh and if u max ur throw dagger skiill it cost u zero Mana.

Skill of combo of his breaker(Brawler):
Smash[Concecutive]>Sonic Wave[Concecutive]>Bash[conceutive]>Shell break[concecutive]

Skill combo of my dagger(Bowgun):
Spike Dagger[consecutive]>Throw Dagger

 

@MonZeo
First of all, you can't have consecutive (or any combo setting) on first skill of a combo
Second of all if you look at my earlier post, you win for breaker can be broken down number 5, (and maybe number 2), since the dagger combo has more hits than the knuckle combo.
Also for info on daggers:
Toram Online Class Discussions > Secondary Trees > Daggers

 

@TheShadow
Lol haha my bad i forgo thatt all beggining skills cant have a skill in first combo haha
Just being sure haha thx

 

Updated

 

@L-28 spamming sonic wave has little contribution to breaker rank because tumble (as well as stun) has cool down. Also it's not attack speed, it's number of hits. Also damage may still be a factor, but not weighted as much in comparison to other factors, because makes cause get breaker occasionally. You would have to do a test of check whether number of hits earns them breaker or magic damage when boss is broken. You said you would investigate my points 1 & 3, but you should investigate all 5, thoroughly. Additionally, colon boss does not have any breakable parts, meaning that he cannot be used to test all 5 points, and cannot be considered a viable test subject. Also your tests should directly be used to confirm or reject each of the 5 points. I did not see any test relating to natural breaks, which is point number 3. I did not see how one could test interrupts with only sonic wave, while ignoring all other possible interrupt skills (power shot, hard hit, smash, bash, etc...). Lastly, looking at the attacker percentages will not help determine whether damage is a factor relating to my points 2 & 4, since they specify when damage needa to be taken, while attack shows all damage percentages regardless of when the damage was inflicted.

 

1) Thank you for informing me, of this, I will go back and see if flinching yields any different effects
2) You're probably right on that, however, I can't think of a way to test that. If you have any ideas, send them my way ^^
3) Again, possible, but I can't think of a way to test this
4) Yes, I know. I've been putting off #3 in order to get to Shell Break lvl 10
4.5) I'm considering moving onto Stone Golem next, to test theories that directly involve breaking a boss
4.75) Power Shot? Is that a sword skill?
5) Mind helping me with this? I'm going to need someone who knows what they're doing before hand.

 

As far as I've been able to tell, breaker rank has nothing to do with actually breaking parts. The taps and any other damage go to the Attacker rank. Breaker Rank is only about what other games call debuff skills. Debuff is any negative effect skill you have. For archers its power shot, meoba shot, paralysis, and snipe that all contribute to breaker. If you spam meoba shot than you can gain breaker rank #1 easy in 90% of your battles.mages can use storm to out breaker others.

 

back when my main was an archer, i got the breaker ranks using the combo amoeba - bulls-eye (no flinch,stumble,stun in this combo)
after that i changed my main from archer to 1h sword, with the 1mp consumption combo and the mp regen of trigger slash i can spam skills that gets me the breaker reward most of the time. my combo: astute - hard hit - trigger slash (with only 1 flinch skill)
i can beat all brawlers in the breaker rank even if they use the smash - sonic wave - bash combo.

so i think we can eliminate the idea that the most no. of skills that flinches, stumbles or stun determines the breaker rank.
my theory is the most number of skills cast during the battle.

 

Hard hit does flinch and its possible that your combo vrs the brawlers or other members of the party simple landed more. One issue brawlers seem to have is fast paced hits but alot of missed hits.

I still feel that breaker rank is awarded to the member of the party that lands the most debuffing skills on the boss. Debuffing skills also range to more than just flinch, tumble, and stun.

 

I have a full agi knuckle char...everytime i use skill or combo i lose my breaker rank to other party member, but when im not using any skill and just let my char doing auto attack i mostly got the breaker rank

 

Yeah, that's the thing. Auto attacks seem to contribute more to the breaker rank than spamable skills for lower lvl players. Kinda contradictory, eh? Idk...
But I'm glad you've brought this thread back up, cuz it's inspired me to do something I can't say I've seen before...