With the latest patch, Arch Mages got a sizable buff to their tier 2 elemental skills. Across the board, the skills had their cooldown reduced to 0.3s and their damage during climax increased. In addition AP generation per second has also improved, even though AP per cast was drastically reduced.
The results are extremely good for Arch Mages. We might not get the numbers a stacked Elemental Master can pull off, but we can easily further boost their damage (and our own output isn't anything to sniff at either).
I. Skill Review - Non-AP Skills:
- Crimson Arrow - 5/5 - The Arch Mage Bread-and-Butter skill in other official servers and it's not hard to see why. Crimson Arrow's base damage of 1500% + 3000% already exceeds the damage of the other tier 2 elemental skills during Climax. In addition, its own damage jumps up to 1500% + 6000% during Climax. Illogically, the SPL bonus is added both to the initial damage and the explosion damage, giving this skill a further SPL modifier of 8*. And to wrap things off, it benefits from the insanely powerful All Bloom (Climax 4), doubling its already ludicrous damage. Alongside its drastically lowered cooldown, the DPS output on single targets easily exceeds comet builds. Don't sleep on this spell.
- Soul Vulcan Strike - 5/5 - The other major Arch Mage damage spell. As a ghost damage spell, Soul Vulcan Strike is boosted by Warlock Intensification, gaining a 3* damage multiplier. Like with Crimson Arrow, anything that isn't immune will take massive damage. In addition to the above, it also sports a surprisingly large AOE. Soul Vulcan Strike's monstrous damage is let down by its high cooldown of 0.7s and its reliance on Intensification. To get the most out of Soul Vulcan Strike builds, you'd ideally want to intersperse each cast of Soul Vulcan Strike with a cast or two of Soul Expansion, depending on your ASPD. (Due to a large part of the strength of this build being related to Intensification, as well as the large amount of equipment in iRO that can reduce intensification, Soul Vulcan Strike builds are one of the easiest and cheapest ways to gear up for farming Biosphere, though that might no longer be relevant as of the update).
- Frozen Slash - 3/5 - Frozen Slash mostly scores well due to being the most reliable way to charge AP: just mash the hotkey or set up a macro to do it for you. Otherwise, it has a decent AOE that's entirely outshined by Comet and, to some degree, the tier 1 AM AOE options, and has some value in being able to hit targets immune to fire (but you'd be better of just hitting it with Soul Vulcan Strike instead). 4250% during climax isn't terrible, but there aren't really any good Climax options to use with Frozen Slash.
- Rock Down - 3/5 - Crimson Arrow's little brother. Like Crimson Arrow, it benefits from having Violent Quake (Climax 4) to double its damage. Unlike Crimson Arrow, it's limited to a dismal 4250% skill damage during climax. It even loses out in value as a counter to fire-immune enemies that Crimson Arrow can't hit, since Earth does reduced damage against Fire property.
- Storm Cannon - 1/5 - The fact that you need Chain Lightning at lvl 5 to even get Climax means you already have a better Wind skill even before you get to AM. There isn't any real justification for Storm Cannon other than that it doesn't bounce like Chain Lightning does. Spending skill points in this is very questionable.
- Crystal Rain, Floral Flare Road, Tornado Storm, Stratum Tremor, Mystery Illusion - 2.5/5 - These damage over time skills are surprisingly powerful and extremely user friendly. Crystal Rain in particular has a 19x19 AOE at level 5 that makes it perfect for fire-and-forget against large swarms of trash, such as in Endless Tower or while farming. Combining 4 of these skills, especially with the Climax 4 resistance weakening skills, also allows for surprisingly competent damage against single targets. They get docked points simply due to not being good enough to outdamage Comet for now, but these are already on par with Comet, and they will get their time to shine in a later patch.
- The Rest - Not particularly worth commenting on at this time, likely a misuse of skill points, though I'm open to opinions.
- Two-Handed Staff Mastery - 1.5/5 - The only reason this doesn't rank any lower is due to Devil Wing Staff, a relatively cheap weapon that hugely boosts the power of Soul Vulcan Strike. In fact, Devil Wing Staff (and other 4th job skill boosting two-handed staves) would have been pretty good reasons to invest in two-handed staff mastery in the long run. Unfortunately, with the release of Ancient Prontera Book, there isn't any real reason other than short-term cost to use a two-handed staff anymore. Unless WP specifically designs a two-handed staff with superior stats, Ancient Prontera Book has effectively ensured that two-handed staves will never be best-in-slot.
II. Skill Review - AP Skills:
- All Bloom (Climax 4) - 5/5 - Arguably the signature Arch Mage skill, next to comet. If you're going into a hard boss fight against something that isn't fire immune, All Bloom + Comet + Fire Converters works wonders for boosting the entire party's damage. Coincidentally, it also boosts your most reliable damage spell too. 2x Fire Damage for the whole party.
- Violent Quake (Climax 4) - 4/5 - Technically the same as All Bloom, just that in this case, the Arch Mage (you) doesn't get to enjoy as much damage due to Rock Down being not as good. Also there aren't many Wind MVPs requiring this level of firepower.
- Crystal Impact (Climax 1) - 4/5 - 300 Def/100 MDef party wide. Amazing for hard istances and where your party members may not have enough MDEF. This lets your entire party no-sell Schulang's stone curse, for example. The damage reduction is small, but not insignificant, and sometimes every little bit counts.
- Destructive Hurricane (Climax 4) - 3/5 - +100 MAtk and +30% wind property magic damage isn't particularly significant for a Climax Skill, but if you're already going to be using Climax 4 for All Bloom or Violent Quake, it doesn't hurt to grab a 15 minute long 100 MAtk buff too. It's a questionable use of skill points, especially since it's hard to justify the three points in Tornado Storm, but you really can't go wrong with mroe damage I feel.
- Crystal Impact (Climax 5) - 1/5 - Placeholder. This is a 33 x 33 AOE spell that does 4000% + 4000% damage. It's currently ruined by a 6s CD that makes it entirely worthless and a waste of points for any conceivable purpose, but it is excellent for trolling and griefing in farming maps. This will change. Watch this space.
- Astral Strike - Why/5 - After the elemental rebalance, there is no longer any possible justification for spending so many skill points to get this skill, then having to invest in AP builders in the regular element tree, then building AP just to use this AP spender. Get Climax instead.
TL;DR If you're done with the Comet meta or would simply rather not be chained to Fenrir Card/Laphine Shield+Kardui Ears, give Crimson Arrow and Soul Vulcan Strike a chance as your main damage builds.
Edited by 3096230415192656890, 06 November 2024 - 12:57 PM.