Warning: preg_replace(): The /e modifier is deprecated, use preg_replace_callback instead in ..../includes/class_bbcode.php on line 2968 [Wind Archer] A Wind Breaker guide by SienZ
Okay let’s start off with a brief introduction . I’ve recently played and basically completed a Wind Breaker in terms of level and job quests . My objective of writing this guide is to share my build as a Wind Breaker and justify it . Do note that this guide is not newbie friendly as I expect a reader of this guide to at least know the basics of MapleStory (eg . How to find quest NPCs , How do I train efficiently etcetc. ) This guide is meant to be as concise as possible to ease players to just tab out of Maple and quickly refer to .
Without further ado , let us begin with the creation of your Wind Breaker aka Wind Archer in gMS .
Before lvl 10 ,for skills , I would say get anything you’re happy with . Personally I went for Three Snails and Recovery . Reason being that Three Snails now does not require snail shells and nimble feet doesn’t benefit a wind breaker at all as Thrust gives you maximum movement speed anyway .
After you reach lvl 10 follow Ninetails instructions and finally talk to your Job Instructor . You’re finally a Wind Breaker . Here is summarized AP build and SP build :
AP : Basically DEX all the way , until you need to pump STR . Eg. You want to use a Metus as your end game weapon , which requires 95 STR . Assuming you don’t have equips that add STR , you start pumping your AP into STR from lvl 74 , which will result in you getting 95 STR at lvl 90 .
Justification :
Spoiler!
Okay now I know a lot of people will now start asking ……Why pure dex ? Well personally I’m pure dex but even if you’re going normal , it is more beneficial to go pure dex at the start , as STRless bows ( Maple Bow , Maple Soul Searcher , Maple Gandiva Bow , Bow of Magical Destruction ) are available to you until lvl 65 . Then when you finally need the STR to equip a higher lvl bow you pump STR all the way for a couple of lvls until your desired lvl and bow . ( This requires a lot of planning early on ) . Many people ask , then is damage going to suck until I reach lvl 35 ? Basically , if you’re unfunded + your KoC is not linked to a high lvl character resulting in a low lvl Bless of the Fairy buff , yes . But don’t worry . One unique point of a KoC is that there are quests available exclusively for KoCs that almost spoonfeeds you to lvl 30 ( Note the word almost , other quests I would recommend to help you lvl fast are the NLC Mayor welcoming quiz at lvl 10 , and the 99 mushroom quests at sleepywood ) . From that point you have MCPQ to get to lvl 35 .
Skill Build ( 1st job ) :
Lvl 10 ~ Storm Sprite lvl 1
Lvl 11 ~ Eye of the Amazon lvl 3
Lvl 12 ~ Eye of the Amazon lvl 6
Lvl 13 ~ Eye of the Amazon lvl 8 , Double Shot lvl 1
Lvl 14 ~ 20 Max Double Shot
Lvl 21 ~ 27 Max Critical Shot , lvl 2 Storm Sprite
Lvl 28 ~ 30 All into Storm Sprite .
Justification :
Spoiler!
Firstly , once you become a Wind Breaker you’ll start using a bow . And a big headache most bowmen have at low lvls is that when monsters get too close , instead of shooting an arrow , you start swinging your bow in an attempt to knock it away . Storm Sprite hits and prevents most monsters from getting too close , and enables you to shoot freely . Next that is needed is Eye of the Amazon that will maximise your range , allowing you to shoot further and speed up killing by not having to walk too much . Double shot is maxed before even putting a point in critical as during training , it is damage consistency that counts while criticals help more in bossing , which is why it is upgraded at lvls 21~27 , when you’ll most likely need it against King Slime , should you choose to KPQ . Lastly , remaining points go into Storm Sprite as Focus IMO is not worth getting since it does not stack with Bless .
Skill build ( 2nd job ) :
Lvl 30 ~ 37 Max Storm Break , Bow Mastery lvl 2
Lvl 38 ~ 43 Bow Mastery lvl 19 , Wind Walk lvl 1
Lvl 44 ~ 46 Max Wind Walk
Lvl 47 ~ 48 Bow Booster lvl 6
Lvl 49 ~ 55 Max Thrust , Soul Arrow lvl 1
Lvl 56 ~ 70 To be honest , this phase is completely flexible , but here’s what I ended up with :
Maxed Eye of the Amazon , Maxed Double Shot , Maxed Critical Shot , Maxed Storm Sprite ( it wasn’t maxed yet at 1st job ) , Maxed Storm Break , Maxed Bow Mastery , Maxed Wind Walk , Maxed Thrust , Maxed Booster , Maxed Soul Arrow , lvl 1 Final Attack and the rest I put in Focus .
Justification :
Spoiler!
Storm Break 1st over Bow Mastery as there is no point having stable damage if all you have to use is a crappy skill in the form of Double Shot . Storm Break is uber pwnage when maxed , hitting 6 targets with 100% knock back rate . ( Note , for some reason the knock back doesn’t work on monsters that are too big =.=“’ ) After it is maxed , naturally mastery lvl 19 is needed to stabilise your damage . Wind Walk is then gotten as the WW ~ SB combo will be your signature move for another ….well basically until you get decent 3rd job skills to use . I know some people who still use it at lvl 11x . After that lvl 6 booster and max thrust is gotten to give you maxed movement speed and a form of attack speed boost . The reason the whole build goes flexible after that is that there are no real must have skills at that point . Soul Arrow won’t be needed until 3rd job , Final Attack is completely useless , Focus as I have said earlier is not worth getting , while Storm Sprite is completely redundant at this lvl . So ….what I did was max Storm Sprite , Booster and Soul Arrow , while putting just a point into FA and some points into Focus , just to be able to cast them and check out their animation from time to time XD . Do note that for KoCs , FA is an active buff , meaning you can turn it on or off . So the old “Max it or don’t up it at all” rule does not apply .
Skill build ( 3rd job ) :
Lvl 70 ~ Albatross lvl 1
Lvl 71 ~ 7x , Basically , lvl up Wind Pierce aka Magnum Shot ( the skill that shoots out a big arrow that hits 6 targets in a straight line ) until you have enough damage to 1 hit ko any monster you’re training on . This is very subjective to training spot and equipment . After that max Albatross .
It gets very flexible from this point . But remember to save up SP from lvl 94 onwards so that the moment you get Storm Arrow aka Hurricane at lvl 100 and Bow Expert at lvl 110 you can max them both immediately after obtaining them . No matter how you assign your 3rd job SP you should end up with this :
Maxed Albatross , Maxed Wind Shot , Maxed Wind Pierce , Maxed Storm Arrow , Maxed Bow Expert , Maxed Strafe and Maxed Puppet with the remaining points going into Arrow Rain .
Justification :
Spoiler!
Albatross and Wind Pierce are THE skills that will help boost your training speed . Arrow Rain is just not that worth it as it has the same damage % as Storm Break . Strafe is a must to help you easily kill the Black Witch in the KoC lv 120 final quest which grants you your Echo of Hero , Captain Knight’s Medal and unlocks your divine mount quest . This is because the Black Witch casts damage reflect after its HP hits below 50% , causing you to die instantly if you’re using Hurricane . Don’t worry about using Wind Shot on Black Witch , when I used it while she had damage reflect on , it only reduced me to low health , not 1 hit ko .
Lvling Walkthrough :
Lvl 1 ~ 10 Do quests at Erev
Lvl 10 ~ 13-ish Do Ninetail’s quest + NLC Mayors welcome quiz ( 300 EXP per correct answer )
Lvl 14 ~ 30 , Mix of Ninetail’s quest , 99 Mushroom quests ( Green , Horned and Zombie ) and KPQ , Wedding Photos quest (20k exp ) and Lith Harbour family quests ( more than 20k if completed )
Lvl 30 ~ 45 MCPQ .
Lvl 45 ~ 64 Truckers / Roids
Lvl 64 ~ 72 Muddy Banks 1 , mp3
Lvl 72 ~ 78 mp3
Lvl 78 ~ 120 , Personally what I did was log in my friends bishop account and spam myself , so here are some spamming spots if anybody is interested in leeching :
Lvl 78 ~ 85 Sky Nest 2
Lvl 85 ~ 105 Ulu Estate 2
Lvl 105 ~ 108 Along the Ulu City
Lvl 108 ~ 120 Revived Memory
Note : Since the new EXP formula was introduced leeching is now horrendously slow. I would only opt for it whenever I get a cheap Bishop and when I'm in situations where I am forced to be afk.
For those who want to grind , I would recommend sniping maps such as Jr Newties . Help from Bow masters / Marksmen appreciated if you guys could suggest some sniping maps to expand this area of the guide .
Current suggested locations for grinders :
Lvl 78~90 Vikerolas
Lvl 90~100 Himes with party
Lvl 100~120 Jr Newties
Suggested training spots by fellow forumites :
You should add Hill of SandStorms in Ariant for levels 20-30. It's really pretty good exp.
New Section : Things to get for your Wind Archer ~
Okay, so this is assuming you have the funding. If you don't have the funds, I would recommend that you do some quests to get some scrolls and / or do some Merchanting, as Lvling a completely unfunded Wind Archer can be a serious pain. A good lvl of Bless of Fairy buff is useful too.
In terms of Priority :
Glove > 10 DEX Bathrobe > ZHelm > Pink Cape > Good Maple Gandiva > Final Bow > Luxury items
For attackers , Gloves are always given the most priority. Reason being a good glove will be your companion throughout the time you play your character. Only get Attack gloves for Wind Archers. DEX gloves are just pointless as although it is the main stat that affects your damage, a perfectly scrolled DEX glove still loses out miserably to a wa 8 glove.
10 DEX Bathrobe. The cheapest item almost every DEXless SIN / Warrior / Brawler and every Archer gets at lvl 20. Costs 35k each for the scroll in Kerning Swamp, while the bathrobe costs like 30k .
ZHelm , it's importance is interchangable with the Pink Cape but I'd say the massive stats and defence boost of the ZHelm would help more given that the Wind Archer has to play like a Warrior at 2nd job without the HP of a Warrior. Plus the STR which comes with it will help in planning your STR Cap.
Pink Cape. For Archer classes, WA is always your primary concern. So this cape is highly recommended. If you can't afford a godly Chaosed one, just get an average wa 2 PC and scroll it with DEX / STR.
Maple Gandiva, if you have been following this guide in terms of lvling your AP, this bow would be your bow until you hit the lvl requirement of your final bow. Eg. if your final bow is a Metus then you'll be using your Gandiva til lvl 90, so be sure to get a good one that will last. Personally I'm still using a Maple Gandiva Bow at lvl 120 as I'm Pure DEX, but low STR always beats Pure DEX in terms of damage as WA means a lot more to Archers than DEX.
Final Bow, that is if you aren't Pure DEX. Most people I've seen go for the Nisrock or Metus, using Horntail necks and Scarlion Helms and Belts as their sources of STR. I discourage from people getting the Reverse Bow, as I feel it isn't worth investing too much in a character that can bearly survive a Zakum run at lvl 120 wearing normal atk gear.
Finally, luxury items . For people who have chosen to equip their Wind Archer nicely despite my previous advice that KOCs aren't worth investing in. Stuff like MoNs , Egged HT necks and Reverse Sets all under this category. For people who can't afford these things don't worry. I lvled my Wind Archer to lvl 120 in less than a week and my most expensive equipment at that time was my ZHelm, which is an underaverage one.
That’s all for now .All comments are welcome , no flaming please .Thx .
Note : I'm currently having trouble producing screenshots. Sorry.
Last edited by SienZ1991; 16th December 2009 at 03:20 AM.