Skyforge Archer Basic Guide

Skyforge Archer Basic Guide by Ginger Beard

Hello. My name is Ginger Beard, a 22k Archer in the EU server with ~100 hour of archer experience, this is what my experiences have thought me, and I hope it helps someone. If you have any questions, ask. All criticism is welcome.

Table of contents:

1. introduction (INT1)

2. Abilities (ABI2)

3. Talents (TAL3)

4. Symbols (SYM4)

5. Equipment (EQI5)

6. Order (ORD6)

7. Rotation (ROT7)

1. Introductions (INT1)

As an archer your job is to deal as much damage as possible in as little time as possible. There are three builds I use to do this, each with their own pros and cons. Which build you use is up to you, but considering it only costs 60 Sparks to switch it might be worth switching once in a while.

Build 1: DoT build (Group content/solo Content)

This build is mainly focussed on group content, and assumes you battle against high health, long duration fights. It’s useable in PuG missions without coordination.

Build 2: Burst them down (Coordinated group with alchemist/Solo content)

This build takes into account that in solo content you can easily burst bosses down fast and easy, and takes advantage of short lasting multipliers to burst someone down.

Build 3: PvP content (Mainly focused on CC and Burst, Proc Paladin symbol, wait, and burst)

This build is more about keeping them down, limiting your CC and picking off the DPS one by one.

2. Abilities: (ABI2)

Before I can explain each build I’ll have to clarify which abilities and talents you will use.

Single shot (lmb):

This is your bread and butter, you WILL, spam this, continuously. It procs impulse charges, which makes Spirit Obsolete in archers.

Pierced shot(lmb, short hold):

One of the best skills you have as an archer, combine it with easy target talent (crucial!) to deal 600% damage EVERY 10 seconds. If you use wildfire arrow to burn a group, wait ~4 seconds, Piercing shot in the middle, you should kill ALL trashmobs. It can deal ~50% of a advanced mob, and upto a bar on boss mobs. Basically, you’ll be looking at that cooldown counter constantly. Waiting for it to hit 0 so you can use the 600% boost again.

Rain of arrow(lmb, long hold):

Useless, don’t bother. Pack mobs are very easy to kill with wildfire arrow, and third charge of electric arrows is better.

Electric shot(rmb, lmb):

This attack is either very good (DoT build) or won’t be used at all. With the talents super conductivity(4 extra seconds) and fusion (+150% damage) it can be used to apply a strong, lasting DoT on bosses, but it won’t help you burst down fast. In lasting fights this is a very good skill. If you try to be done in a second, not so much.

Piercing discharge (rmb, lmb, short hold):

Decent AoE stun for mobs that are nicely aligned, not useful in PvE as everything dies too fast to be worth the stun (you kill them way before they kill you, so burst > CC) in PvP you can use it to stun a group of opponents if they’re stupid enough to align in a row.

Electromagnetic pulse (rmb, lmb long hold):

Great for daren facility boss (huge packs of annoying mobs) but that aside. I don’t really use it much. It’s a short AoE stun that can help out in PvP when opponents are aligned in a bad way but not really all that special for PvE. Dmg > CC again.

Fiery arrow (rmbx2, lmb):

Very fast way to apply DoT to a boss. Very good in bossfights. If the fire DoT is not on the boss. Apply it, same for PvP. That DoT has to be on the opponent. ALWAYS.

Aimed shot (rmb*2, Lmb short hold, charging):

Like electric shot, this attack is ambiguous, it’s either VERY good. Or just meh. Combine it with an alchemist buff, weapon with first hit % aimed shot bonus, jungle law (+60% dmg) and perfect aim(+100% dmg) to burst down a few bars from a boss in one hit (in solo content). After first hit it’s bad though. So it needs coordination if you’re in group content. If you make sure the alchemists buffs you, and NOONE attacks the boss before you hit it. It can be used. Otherwise, Just use this in Solo missions.

Wildfire arrow (rmb *2, lmb long hold):

Amazing to kill out trashmobs, In regions I just wildfire arrow packs, and walk, nothing else. Just apply wildfire arrows to five groups and watch the quests finish. In squad and group missions packs are gone in seconds. Add the biting flame talent (~50% dmg) and a weapin with % burning and watch things burn. Combine it with Electric shot and fusion talent to deal DoT damage to groups.

Electric/Fiery Rapidfire(1):

Okay so both of these are good, Electric is good in PvP to stunlock, and Fiery is good in PvE for free damage (20% chance for no cost) and high burst. Overall, I use fiery rapid fire and only apply it if you get the free proc on a fire arrow (press E to apply).

Jumpshot/Double SS(Z / Space):

Terrible, don’t bother. These skills are ridiculously buggy, and not worth the pain.

Smokescreen/gas Cloud (x):

Okay, so smokescreen is insane in PvP, but useless in PvE and Gas cloud is decent in PvE and decent in PvP. I personally use Smokescreen to hide myself in group fights. but Using gas cloud instead is understandable. Gas cloud is a AoE CC for ~10 seconds, smokescreen just hides you. PvE mobs still see you, so it’s completely useless in PvE, infact, you can hide the boss/mobs from teammates, which is actually detrimental.

trip (c):

Useless in PvE, good in PvP.

Electric barrier (V):

Insane in PvP, good in PvE. Extra survivabily, no CC, Sign me up. Use it as much as possible. If you’re a generous god, add the electric field talent to save teammates (so many people are not though :( ).

Ultimate (r):

Okay, so I hardly ever see other archers use this skill, and I understand that. It’s at most decent against bosses. But this skill isn’t made for bosses, you should use this skill when you face a large group of trashmob with advanced mobs. It bursts down the trash in seconds, and the advanced mobs too. Example would be when the MSM kraken summons kelps. you clean out the kelps and the kraken at the same time.

3. Talents: (TAL3)

The talents you always use are:

– Loading mechanism (20 conc)

– Easy Target(600% piercing shot)

– Biting flame (50% burning dmg)

– Electrocapacity (4 seconds extra Barrier)

The other four are dependant of your build.

Dot build:

– super conductivity (4 seconds Electric shot)

– elemental fusion (150% dmg electric shot)

Burst build:

– Jungle law (60% Aimed shot when mob over 50% hp)

– perfect aim (100% aimed shot when first hit in fight)

PvP build:

– Long Que (Electric rapid fire +4 sec)

– Pyrofobia (fire Fears opponents)

– Jungle Law (extra burst when opp over 50%)

Optional extras:

– Electric field (Allies get the barrier buff too)

– Pyrofobia (Good in solo content, HORRIBLE when you have a tank in the party)

– Explosive mixture (extra damage, but Probably won’t proc that much.

4. Symbols (SYM4)

Okay so this is the symbols you need in no specific order. priority in brackets

– Paladin Symbol (high)

– Archer Symbol (high)

– Kinetic Symbol (high)

– Alchemist Symbol (high)

– Berserker Symbol

– Slayer Symbol

– Mark of death (ASAP after getting godform)

– Ultimate strength

– Maximum recoil

– Mobilization

– Lacerated wounds

– Impact

– Element of surprise

– Warriors Creed (low)

– Ruthlessness (low)

Overall. Try to aim for the symbols you want, while unlocking the classes with good symbols, I’d say, as beginner start as Paladin, Get to Archer, Unlock Kinetic, Then go to Alchemist, Go to Berserker and then fix up on slayer.

You want the Stat boost symbols active at all times and as high as possible. Ult-str and recoil before mobilization though.

5. Equipment: (EQU5)

As pretty much every other DPS you’ll want Str/luck crit/acc rings.

Main hand should either be % burning increase or Single shot dmg buff. First hit aimed shot can be used when soloing to burst down bosses. Offhand should always be Barrier defense bonus. You don’t know how big 40% dmg reduction is until you’ve experienced it.

Try to get epic amulets with either Aimed Shot / Single shot or single shot / wildfire arrow (depending on build ofcourse).

I’m sad that there is no piercing shot amulet buff.

6. Order: (ORD6)

Chapels in each province:

1. Accuracy (or crit if you capped acc)

2. Accruacy

3. Crushing Blow

4. Temper (or Ranged damage of you don’t have much valor)

5. Accuracy

6. Crit Chance

7. Crushing Blow

8. Ranged Damage / Solidity (I don’t actually know how solidity works, This temple is fairly low priority)

7. Rotation: (ROT7)

Dot Build:

Wildfire arrow -> (!) Piercing shot -> Wildfire arrow -> Electric shot -> Singleshot till burning is on 3seconds -> Repeat from (!)

Burst Build:

Aimed shot (full charge) -> Wildfire arrow -> (1) Piercing shot -> Wildfire arrow -> Singleshot -> repeat from (1) when fire timer hits low.

Add in a few aimed shot against priority target when you have >160 concentration.

PvP Build:

Aimed shot (proc Paladin symbol) -> barrier to prevent CC -> Fiery shot (or wildfire if you’re facing a group) -> (1) Piercing shot -> fiery shot -> electric shot. -> repeat from (1)

Most important in PvP : KEEP THEM DOWN, DON’T GET DOWN. Impact and electric arrows are insane. Either that, or burst them down before they can kill you. (Barrier and smokescreen are VERY good at that). Also If you see a slayer. APPLY FIRE! One of the few things about fire is that it doesn’t disappear when he uses invisibility. So you can use it as a way to keep him in sight. You’ll know where and when he will appear. And you can piercing shot them when they uncloak. Also. focus on DPS targets. You can burst most of them down before they kill you. But a knight or paladin is just a pain in the butt.

Last but not least, MULTIPLIERS, MULTIPLIERS, MULTIPLIERS.

Getting 100 extra damage is usually worse than getting 10% extra dmg. And with stacking multipliers you can easily reach 10x dmg if you combine all. Example:

Element of surprise(3), Alchemist, Rapid attack(2), Warriors creed, Biting flame, Weapon with extra burning, kinetic symbol, archer symbol.

1.36 * 1.80 * 1.12 * 1.05 * 1.52 * 1.36 * 1.12 * 1.15 = 7.6 times Burning damage when mob has 50% or more health. ~5x when its below that.

Here is a link to what you should get:

Red being priority.

Orange is stats

Purple is 2nd priority

yellow whenever you’re close/done with others.