==>Bowman Guide List<==
==>Maplestory Leveling Guide List <==
The Ranger / Sniper FAQ:
Contents:
1) Does Final Attack work with 3rd Job skills?
2) Is Focus considered a useful skill to have?
3) What is the recommended build order for 1st/2nd Job Archers?
4) Strafe, how does this skill compare with other skills for archers and other jobs in this game?
5) Mortal Blow, how does it work? And how does it compare to PKB?
6) How exactly does puppet work? What are some of the uses of this skill? Do people max it?
7) Arrow Rain (Ranger) / Arrow Erruption (Sniper) related. How does this skill work?
8) Fire Shot (Ranger) / Ice Shot (Sniper) related. How do they work? What are the uses of these skills?
9) Silver Hawk Summon (Ranger) / Golden Eagle Summon (Sniper) related. What is the purpose of the summon? Is it practical? Do people max it?
10) What does Thrust do? What's the practicality of Thrust for archers?
11) Do archers ever play without Soul Arrow for the extra attack?
12) It seems that 3rd Job Archers have a great arsenal of skills, what's the general build people recommend?
13) What are the key differences that outline between a Ranger and a Sniper?
14) Are archers limited to training spots? Where do the 3rd job archers go?
NOTE:
Some terms such as item names, monster names, skill names... might sound confusing to global/SEA players because names from the original MS are used (kMS/jMS). This FAQ is intended for all audiences from all kinds of Maple though however. It is in no way limited to any version.
1) Does Final Attack work with 3rd Job skills?
No. FA does not activate via any of the 3rd Job Skills.
2) Is Focus considered a useful skill to have?
Archers should only max focus when they have enough SP for it. It helps just a little bit but not a whole lot (most likely not going to make any dramatic difference). You use it primarily for the 20 avoidability. There's also a bug in focus that sometimes when you take damage, your HP isn't lost. I have experienced this several times even on attacks that one-hit kill me but yet I still remain full life. Archers without focus does not experience this bug so I am concluding that it is related to it somhow.
3) What is the recommended build order for 1st/2nd Job Archers?
Basically, you choose these things:
a) Double Shot or Arrow Blow
b) Final Attack or Not.
With a little common sense, it is not difficult to see how Double Shot dominates Arrow Blow by far (this is not an opinion, it is research and analysis done by players including myself). Picking DS over AB seems to be the only logical first choice. I highly recommend you only keep DS or AB and not both (it is redundant not to mention DS is superior in all round situations).
Regarding about Final Attack, there are many reasons why you should not have it. One being that it don't work with Strafe (main attack in 3rd job), thus making the 30 SP from FA seem a waste. The other reason is that it comes out of Arrow Bomb and Iron Arrow, which can be considered as undesirable for every archer.
FA however does speed up training bit by bit in the mid 60s. The difference between going FA and 0 FA is the difference of having 5 Soul Arrow and 15 Booster vs maxing both Soul Arrow and Booster. Not too dramatic because both of these skills only increase in timer when they are higher in level, no difference in effect.
To summerize, archer's recommended 1st/2nd job build (assuming you are aiming to play pass 3rd job):
Max Amazon's Eye
Max Critical
Max Double Shot
Max Focus
Max Mastery
Max Booster
Max Soul Arrow
Max Power Knockback
Max Arrow Bomb/Iron Arrow
0 Final Attack
1 Arrow Blow
rest points into Amazon's Bless.
Above is NOT a skill order build, but what you should have in the end.
If you want to get FA, please refer to other topics about FA-builds in the forum.
4) Strafe, how does this skill compare with other skills for archers and other jobs in this game?
The single most spammable skill archers will ever get. With Strafe, you can forget that DS/AB existed. Even at level 1, Strafe is power. An experienced archer will tell you that most of their damage is relied upon triggering the +100% damage from critical shots. One of the reasons why DS dominates AB is for the simple fact that there are double the chances of activating a critical shot. For similar reasoning, Strafe dominates DS in this way (having 4 times the chance of activating critical). 100% x 4 and up to 800% damage with 4 criticals, what more could you ask really?
In addition to having more firepower, Strafe also comes faster than DS/AB. The speed of Strafe is unmatched (like hermit's Lucky 7) even compared to other 3rd jobs. Strafe can be spammed 90 times (with bow) in every minute, compared to slower skills such as Dragon Buster which is 57 times/ minute and Dragon Slasher which is 78 times / minute.
Graphically-wise, Strafe looks elegant and beautiful.
So when you hit 7X, you get more power and faster shooting speeds as well as eye candy graphics makeover... make sure you max this skill as soon as you gain your Ranger/Sniper title ^^
Rating: A+
5) Mortal Blow, how does it work? And how does it compare to PKB?
Mortal Blow is a passive ability that, when maxed, lets you have a 70% chance to shoot a 250% damage arrow instead of doing your minimum range bow swing. To make things more complicated, this Mortal Blow also has a 10% chance to 1 hit KO the monster if the monster's HP is less than or equal to half (prior to shooting MB).
Logically speaking, yes you don't go and try to shoot at melee range (you don't walk up to a monster, if you do that you mind as well quit as an archer). Yes the damage of 250% is not a big deal, when you could do a much better job using Strafe. The deal here is that MB is passive, it is here to make your life more so convienient (and therefore easier).
Up to this day I still have yet to find a way to explain the usefulness of Mortal Blow, but you could go ahead and try to train regularly, without using PKB, and try to count how often do you swing your bow at the enemies (in particular the mobs that spawn around/near you as you are trying to kill). Take this number and multiply it by 0.7, the result is the number of Mortal Blows you would have used. Take note of the pots you used by swinging your bow as well.
You could also use MB as a signal to let you know if a mob is too close (more so likely than not, you won't be able to pinpoint exactly the point your minimum range everytime).
Regarding about PKB, I am just going say one thing: higher level monsters won't be PKBed easily at all. The rate of PKB is dependent on your character's level vs the monsters, the % is capped at 60 I believe. From my experience, PKB usually fails until you are at least 10 levels above the monster. The monster's avoid might influence this rate too, and your accuracy may or may not affect it but I do not know the real answer. Last that I checked, at level 117, it was possible to PKB a lv 93 viking about 60% of the time. It was barely possible to do so when I was in the 100s. Put in other words, archers don't use PKB not nearly as much as before (and certainly cannot rely on it).
Mortal Blow although is a melee attack, but it does not replace PKB. It is just a passive ability that helps to your everyday training. Due to the nature of how MB works out, (that having a higher % of activation, higher % damage, and if you cared, higher % of 1hit KO rate) MB is recommended to be maxed, although not too early (will discuss later).
If you haven't fiugred it out still, Mortal Blow will not come out if you aren't shooting (pressing a skill/attack button). It is automatically triggered when an enemy comes into your minimum range (exception is Arrow Rain/Erruption, since they don't have a minimum range, MB does not come out of those skills, of course (which is a good thing)).
Did I mention that MB comes out fast? Trust me on this one, you won't like swinging your bow when you are higher levelled ^^
Rating: B
6) How exactly does puppet work? What are some of the uses of this skill? Do people max it?
Puppet can be considered as the single most unique skill in the game. Casting a puppet only requires marginal MP, and without much delay a scarecrow "Puppet" is placed about (less than) 1/3 screens in front of you (forward in the direction you are facing). In Maple Story, monsters (with a few exceptions) don't automatically target you if you haven't yet attacked them beforehand. By attacking a monster, you are setting this 'lock on' status on them so that they would try to come close to you and or (if they have) cast special attacks at a range. What puppet does is, basically, re-direct the monsters' attention to the puppet; in other words, the monsters would instead of following you or attacking you, they would start to target after the puppet. Becareful though, however, depending on where you place your puppet, the monsters might still be able to hit your character. In particular if the monster has splash ranged attacks (such as yeti's stomp), even though they are stomping the puppet, it dosen't mean that your character won't be taking the damage! Other means of ranged splash attacks include Bains' and Vikings' projectile and the like; these projectiles travel thru targets, including your puppet. Some more notes about puppet:
a) There is no restriction on the location of placing the puppet, as long as there is land/platforms. If you are standing at an end of a platform, and there are no further platforms in the range of puppet, then the puppet would appear at the corner spot on the platform you are standing on.
b) Once the enemies are "puppetized", hitting them again by your arrow attacks does not remove this status. This means that you can keep grinding them while they kept trying to attack your puppet without having to worry about being attacked.
c) While a group of mobs are "puppetized", as soon as the puppet disappears (whether the puppet's HP reaches 0, or that the timer runs out) the monsters will re-enter their 'neutral' state again (harmless, target-less state). Also note that you may only place one puppet at any one point in time, placing a new puppet results in the vanishing of the previous one (which would make the enemies enter their 'neutral' state again). If you have a mob that is already "puppetized", but wish to add more mobs into the group, you may only do this by placing a new puppet first, making all the monsters neutral again, and then start re-grouping all the mobs by luring and placing a new puppet. It takes a bit of practice to get the hang of puppet, but it shouldn't be difficult.
d) If someone else other than yourself attacks a monster that has been "puppetized", the monster will then start going after whoever that just hitted them. This property discourages archers to train with other members in the same platform.
e) Take note of Puppet's defense, it seems that the damage (whether magic or physical) the puppet receives has a very high % reduction. Even though a level 6 puppet has only 1k HP, however, that 1k HP can last more than 3hits from a yeti+pepe stomp (which is usually over 1k damage to players).
There are many several uses for puppet, but most of the time you use it for luring purposes. I am going to use the term "lure" by the meaning of, having to hit the mobs once (making them have a 'lock-on' status on your character), and then moving away from them, making the monsters run after you. By luring a mob of yeti, yeti+pepe into a corner, for example, a Ranger could make use of Fire Shot taking the full potential of the 6 target spalsh damage. Notice there is no restriction on the location of placing a puppet, so long as there is land (whether the platform you are standing on, or the platform to the direction you are facing has land). You could take advantage of this, for example, by luring a mob and then placing the puppet at a platform on top or below (anywhere where they cannot reach), rendering them sitting ducks for you to snipe. One other use for puppet is that you could simply use it as a means of escape tool - quickly getting out of a mob shooting at you, for example.
Note too that puppet does work on bosses. This means that as long as there's a place where you could place a puppet somewhere the boss cannot reach, placing a puppet would mean an automatic victory for you ^^.
At level 6, puppet lasts 20 seconds and has sufficient HP for regular training on tougher enemies (such as Lycanthrope). Anything below lv 6, however, is not recommended to be used. Every 3 levels in SP increases the timer and up to level 18 with its maxed timer at 60 seconds, which should be more than enough. Not everyone maxes puppet and even at this date there aren't many monsters who could destroy a level 12 or so puppet without difficulty. Difference of a level 18 puppet and a level 20 puppet is the difference of 5k HP vs 6k HP. Right now I don't see the benefit of having a high level puppet, but level 9 or 12 should be more than sufficient for most of the mobs around level 100 or so.
No Ranger / Sniper should ever overlook puppet, but at the same time don't overestimate its usefulness either. It is both a very fun & useful skill no matter how you look at it. Just don't put points in it too early though, level 6 should be sufficient for quite a lot of things.
Rating: B
7) Arrow Rain (Ranger) / Arrow Erruption (Sniper) related. How does this skill work? Are there any difference between Ranger's Rain vs Sniper's Erruption?
Both Arrow Erruption and Arrow Rain are pretty much identical, for their % damage and range (yes they are indeed the same range in radius). Just note however that Arrow Rain maybe a tad faster than Erruption due to the general speed of bows vs xbows.
Rain/Erruption is the single only active arrow shooting skill that has no minimum range (meaning that it can be shot anywhere even with mobs right next to you, and particularly very good at it). Being able to hit mobs around you is such a big deal that, it is often overlooked. Some people can say that Rain/Erruption works like an AOE spell such as Cleric's Heal or the I/L Wizard's lightning, but unlike them Rain/Erruption for archers actually helps much more so than that. Considering how archers' melee has always been a disadvantage (unlike magicians who have no minimum range), you would find yourself having a much much more comfortable time killing the mobs around you with Rain/Erruption instead of having to move away from them and shoot from a distance...
Both Rain and Erruption triggers critical shots (40%) and when critical does kick in, they do quite a bit of damage (although not all that powerful/consistent but the damage it deals should be well enough to serve its purpose for any archer). Note too that, the speed casting for these AOE spells are considered very fast relative to other jobs' 3rd job skills. If you are familiar with Iron Arrow & Arrow Bomb, you will notice that damage is well spread out. Rain/Erruption thankfully don't spread its damage, and often you would see it consistently knockback on many of the high level monsters.
Range wise, it is also very good. I am not sure what is the exact maxed radius range of the skill, but I can assure you that you won't be disappointed by it (especially on those platforms where you could "snipe" from above or under the monster using Rain/Erruption). Rain/Erruption has both good horizontal range as well as vertical range, unlike skills like Priests' Shinning Ray or Master Thief's Thieves (where their vertical range is much much relatively smaller than Rain/Erruption is). If you haven't figured it out yet, Arrow Rain/Erruption hits 6 targets around your character and in all directions.
Arrow Rain/Erruption is one of the most valuable gifts to any archer. Its usefulness for a ranged character should be well appreciated. Many often times you would find yourself spamming Rain/Erruption instead of having to get hugged by monsters walking your way out of mobs. Because Rain/Erruption can hit all targets around your character, it is natural that an archer may sometimes place a puppet after having to touch them with Rain/Erruption. As explained in the puppet description earlier, setting up a puppet requires 'luring', with the range and speed of Rain/Erruption along with the fact that they don't have any minimum range, they may just be the perfect tool for setting up your puppets. Not too surprisingly though, however, it is recommended that you get at least 5-6 points into Rain/Erruption before putting points into Puppet (unless you are using the Puppet for bosses/ Lycanthrope, etc).
Level 20 Arrow Rain/Erruption is recommended by me, (lv 21 will require a bit more MP and smaller increments in damage as it gets higher levelled). It is recommended not only for the damage, but perhaps more importantly the range of the skill. As you put SP into Rain/Erruption, you will note that the skill starts with a very small radius (rendering the skill not as practical as it should be), but this radius gets gradually bigger and bigger until up to level 15 or so, then the increase in range will start to slow down a bit. Maximum range of Rain/Erruption is level 30, the maxed level. Some archers tend to like to stop levelling Rain/Erruption at bout Lv 28, which is 158% damage (lv 30 is 160%). Whether you want to max it (I actually recommend that you do, especially those people who skip Thrust) is all preference based. But I do, strongly recommend that you at least get this skill up to level 28 and nothing below that.
Recall that Mortal Blow replaces bow swings with an arrow shot, since Rain/Erruption has no minimum range, naturally no bow swings would ever take place (and thus no Mortal Blow would come out of using Rain/Erruption). You might ask though, won't it be contradicting to be having a melee passive skill and a melee mob skill together? This is where a player's "style" comes into play, some prefer to be shooting with strafe and let MB fly off whenever a mob is close for them, while others might walk closer inside a big mob and spam away with Rain/Erruption. Using Strafe might be pot saving, but depending on the actual situation, it might not always work too well (for example, when many monsters spawn right at a point where you are probably hugging them). MB is really more for the convienice purpose, for usefulness it is nowhere near to an active melee skill (Rain/Erruption can be considered as melee) that is both quick and spammable. Don't forget also, that puppet works hand-to-hand with Rain/Erruption. It makes it work really just that much better. It is recommended that you level up Rain/Erruption as early as possible, most likely after Strafe.
I should mention also, that Rain/Erruption requires a single arrow to cast, although many arrows are shown in the animation ^^ (however you should ALWAYS be using Soul Arrow anyway so that shouldn't matter). When you shoot it, it comes off of your bow like a regular shot, but with flashy graphics of course. You can say that because it is shot by the bow, it therefore works with Bow/Xbow booster~~ which is indeed the case.
With their signature graphics (they both look very eye candy-ish, in addition Arrow Rain (not Erruption) also has a loud cool rain sound effect that makes other players hear it from a distance), along with the firepower and speed, melee range mob killing, there really isn't anything wrong with such a skill.
Some people have asked me about subtle animation differences in Rain vs Erruption and if A) Rain is slanted, B) Erruption will rely on terrain (ground) to hit flying monsters. The answers to these questions are already stated; that Rain and Erruption are both radius ranged skills and that they are identical in range. This means that Rain is not slanted (despte how it looks), and Erruption will hit anywhere that Rain can hit (including monsters not attached to a ground).
Rating: A
8) Fire Shot (Ranger) / Ice Shot (Sniper) related. How do they work? What are the uses of these skills? How do they compare with Rain/Erruption? How about Fire Shot vs Ice Shot?
When it comes down to distinguishing a Ranger from Sniper, perhaps this would be the most important difference. To get an idea of how these two skills work, it is best to get familiar with Arrow Bomb. Fire/Ice Shot is shot by your bow/xbow that, not unlike Arrow Bomb, an arrow is first shot out prior to "exploding" on impact, resulting in a long ranged area spell (and hitting up to 6 enemies around (in all directions) the spot of impact).
But unlike Arrow Bomb however, the impacting "arrow" does not actually do any damage; the damage is dealt when the flare stars/meteors rain down or when the blizzard freezes; in other words, there is no pathetic "impact damage" (Arrow Bomb's missile has a pathetic "impact damage"). I am not sure how exactly the damage is calculated, but from what I can see, Fire Shot (Ice Shot shouldn't be different) outputs much more stabilized damage (although still not that stable due to criticals) compared to Arrow Bomb. Despite the description in %, a 120% Fire Shot is almost gurranteed to output more damage than a 130% arrow bomb on average, against monsters not weak to fire even. At maxed level, Fire Shot is 150% (+100% critical and x 1.5 on monsters weak to fire) damage while Ice Shot is at 140% (x 1.5 on monsters weak to ice).
These skills are indeed elemental base, meaning a 150% multiplier will take place on monsters with weakness to your element (Fire or Ice).
Fire Shot and Ice Shot has two major differences:
1) Fire Shot works with Critical hits (40%), while Ice Shot dosen't.
2) Ice Shot freezes the monsters (up to 3 seconds at level 21 and beyond), Fire Shot has no state of change effect on monsters (this makes stacking mobs in a range easier).
The other difference between these two is the difference in bow vs xbow (that bows generally shoot faster than xbows; thus the quicker shooting speed of Fire Shot compared to Ice Shot.
Some people might think that Ice Shot is probably superior to Fire Shot based on the simple fact that it freezes, saving all that many pots not possible without. Yes indeed, Ice Shot does save alot of time/pots, however this dosen't make Rangers any inferior to Snipers. To begin, monsters strong/immune to Ice cannot be frozen, this single property makes snipers' Ice Shot skill pratically obsolete and discourages them from hunting Ice type monsters (some of which have the best of EXP and carrying very good drops). Rangers on the other hand, may still hunt firebased monsters using regular Hawk/Puppet methods for protection, as well as ultilizing Fire Shot's spread radius for luring. Note too, that the firepower of Fire Shot easily domintates Ice; Fire Shot itself even dominates Strafe at mobs of bigger sizes. The critical of Fire Shot is not something to be overlooked either, especially on monsters weak to fire, this 150% extra damage is multiplied to your +100% from critical resulting in very high final damage. As far as usage goes, Fire Shot can be spammed on mobs in a range (it works well with puppet using a little brain work to set mobs up) while Ice Shot isn't meant to be spammed (usually work better along the lines of Ice Shot, Iron Arrow or Strafe, and so on).
Regarding about the killing speed of Strafe vs Fire Shot, while it is true that Strafe will overpower Fire Shot, however, there are times when much of that extra power is wasted (overkilling) while the fire spread most of the time isn't (at least the damage is distributed across mobs). For example, killing three Yeti's at a distance, you might need 2 strafe to kill each one of them, resulting in 6 Strafe's total. Using Fire Shot to soften up the three Yeti's, however, may only require 1 Fire Shot plus 1 Strafe each to kill them all, resulting in (1+3) 4 shots total. They usually don't come in conflict, and Rangers do tend to use both skills. Another use for Fire Shot, for example, is maybe for times when you just want the constant knockback from Fire Shot to keep the mobs at a desired shooting range. Taking on an even more extreme case, spamming Fire Shot on a big group of mobs at a range (usually set up by puppet) generally lets a Ranger kill at a noticably faster pace. If you enjoyed Arrow Bomb for your hunter at killing mobs from a range, you would most likely love Fire Shot for a much better experience (frying mobs weak to fire in particular).
Ice Shot on the other hand can only be helpful no matter how you look at it. Freezing monsters, like Ice Mages' spells or the Knights' Ice Charged attacks, really just makes that big of a deal. A frozen monster is one that cannot move, cannot attack. Note that puppet although dosen't freeze, but monsters that are "puppetized" too can't really move nor attack out of the range captured by the puppet. But do recall that setting up a puppet requires a lure, however, plus the extra time needed for the actual placement of the puppet. Ice Shot pretty much eliminates all the trouble in luring/placing puppet, saving quite a bit of time here and there. Does this mean that Snipers wouldn't have much of a use for puppet ? The answer here is that well, Ice Shot is limited in only freezing mobs in one direction (and that the mobs need be in a stacked position where they can be frozen again properly) and while puppet is really not limited to anything. Indeed, puppet would not be as useful to a Sniper compared to a Ranger, but that dosen't mean that a Sniper will never get stuck inside a big mob (where puppet usually plays a bigger role, at least on mobs that cannot be killed easily by Erruption). You have to remember also, besides monsters strong/immune to Ice, bosses too, cannot be frozen.
Because Fire Shot is for damage, it is recommended that you put a lot of points into this skill (if not maxing it, at least put 20-28 points). Anything below level 20 is not all that impressive. A piece of advise from me is, if you are not putting at least 20 points into Fire Shot, I would recommend that you skip it altogether (in fact nowadays I actually recommend people max Fire Shot, seeing how other skills aren't all that meaningful). As for Ice Shot, because it is not for power, Snipers usually don't max this skill. Instead, allocating 21 SP for Ice Shot allows the maximum freeze timer (3 seconds) which is probably without question the better choice. Note that 1 second freeze (before level 11) can only be considered useless (100% of experienced Snipers would tell you the same thing) other than for those of you who want to play a bit of luring.
Depending on where you are hunting, there are certainly places where one skill would be better than another. But for now I vote Ice Shot being a more practical as well as a more helpful skill for an archer, for the simple reason that I prefer pot saving over a bit of faster killing. While Ice Shot is limited to monsters not strong against ice, Fire Shot is limited really to monsters who are weak to fire. This difference maybe balanced by the fact that most monsters are weak to fire in this game.
As mentioned before, Ice Shot has a freezing cold sound effect that can be heard by other players while Fire Shot is soundless (except for the player him/herself). Graphically-wise, they both look very detailed and smooth. Most people just can't resist the artwork. Another difference in artwork that should be noted is that the actual arrow of Fire Shot is actually burned in flame while Ice Shot is really just another plain arrow. Yay for Rangers ^^
For those clueless archers still wondering about the difference in Rain/Erruption vs Fire/Ice Shot... well, one is for melee/protection (Rain/Erruption) and the other is for long ranged (Fire / Ice Shot). Think of the difference between the Ice Wizard's Lightning Bolt and the Hunter's Arrow Bomb... They have their own uses and under completely different situations.
EDIT: I lowered Fire Shot's rating by 2, why? I realize that I had overrated Fire Shot's usefulness, or if you prefer, the value of SP. Basically, Fire Shot is very limited to be used in its max potential, besides luring monsters. Very high level monsters, especially those trained by Rangers, aren't weak to Fire unfortunately (those that are weak to fire have bad sniping spots). Can Strafe do all the work? With some skills in luring monsters and the use of Arrow Bomb, definately. Rangers can do fine without it really. It helps somewhat inbetween the time you fight Yeti and Pepe but the help is not as significant as it maybe. I realized this when I was writing up the part for Thrust, where practicality is rather important.
EDIT: I was told that the spread of FireShot gets larger as you level higher (at least a level 1 FireShot has a much noticable smaller radius spread than a maxed FireShot), I am not sure if every point matters on this. If this is the case, the same might go for IceShot. In any case, a Lv 21 IceShot is always "enough", this is from almost every single sniper you'll see. Keep your fingers crossed on this one.
Rating: B- for Fire Shot, A- for Ice Shot.
9) Silver Hawk Summon (Ranger) / Golden Eagle Summon (Sniper) related. What is the purpose of the summon? Is it practical? Do people max it?
The first note of fact you should know is that both summons are, despite their difference in appearance and with a different name, Silver Hawk (from Ranger) and Golden Eagle (from Sniper) are 100% identical skills. To make things easier to write/read, I will simply refer to the skill as 'Hawk'.
Like the other summoning skills in the game, Hawk uses up a summoning stone (5k each) in addition to some minor MP when you cast it. For Rangers, a giant uncontrollable silver hawk will appear above your character (slightly behind) and a golden eagle for snipers. When it appears, and (only) after about 3-4 seconds, surrounding enemies within range, in all directions around your character, will be attacked by a dive attack (by the Hawk). Enemies attacked by hawk undertakes a stun (under a very high % rate determined by the level of Hawk, and this % is an actual %, that is independent from the enemies' level/avoid unlike Arrow Bomb stun or PKB % rate) in addition to doing a tiny bit of damage. The damage of Hawk is.. well let's just say that it is very weak. I believe the damage increases although significantly as your level of Hawk is higher, but the damage it dealt probably isn't even worth mentioning. Granted, you don't use Hawk for damage, but the stun of Hawk can only be overlooked. The Hawk will remain for a duration of time, depending on the skill level (discussed below).
Because the Hawk acts as a seperate entity to your character, this ensures automatic protection from monsters in the quickest way possible; the Hawk automatically stuns monsters for you, letting you do whatever you need to do to kill them off safely without having to spend time to move away or stun them by other means. The stun done by Hawk is not a regular stun, in addition to making enemies disabled from moving / attacking, the stun by Hawk is permanent -- that is, once the enemies are stunned by Hawk (one by one since Hawk is not multi-target), no matter how you hit them (with Strafe, for example) they would still be forever in a stun state!** At least they are stunned until a few seconds after your Hawk could re-stun them again (if the Hawk summon is present, facing a single monster with Hawk ensures that the monster is permantely stunned, at least by means of re-stunning).
**One exception attack that removes the stun by Hawk is a bow swing or simply a PKB.
One careful note in using Hawk is that well, although it is uncontrollable, however, that dosen't mean you cannot move your character to manuver the Hawk's position. The most important thing for you to remember when using Hawk is that it always hits the monster that is closest to your character. It dosen't matter if other monsters are within range and which appears in any order, the monster cloest is gurranteed to be stunned first. When your character is pincered (surrounded by enemies in both left and right), moving toward the leftside more, for example, will make the Hawk stun the left enemy. If you do not move away from the monster at the left side, the Hawk will automatically and continually re-stun the monster on the left! Some people think that this is unfortunate because they see that re-stunning a monster seems redundant, where it may be more of a help if it attacked another mob. For me though, this isn't as bad as it seems. Playing with Hawk a while, you will come to experience that having the Hawk to attack random targets means having more monsters having a "lock on" status on your character. Yes the Hawk effectively makes monsters track on your character once they have been hit once. Having more monsters (ranged monsters in particular) to lock on your character probably will do more harm than not. Instead, you could take advantage of staying by one side and killing either the stunned monster or the other one further away. Killing them one by one is always the fastest way for Rangers/Snipers because of the domination in power of Strafe vs other skills. On the other hand, if you really want to stun the monster on another side, you can do it by manually moving your character towards the other side (in our example, moving toward the right side after the monster on the left has been stunned). In this way, some form of 'control' is available for you choose which monster to stun, which can be a good thing (it takes a bit of practice to get used to, you would find yourself doing things that normally you wouldn't do, such as walking towards/closer to a monster on purpose just to stun it). Recall that puppet takes all the monsters' with "lock-on" status away, in times when you happen to be attacked by many monsters at a time, this is when puppet comes into play.
Another thing that isn't as important but needs to mention is that the range of Hawk is relatively shorter than Strafe is, but it should be long enough to at least outrange or even with long range monsters.
Note that there is some delay between each of the Hawk's dives, but the attack speed of it should be good enough for the purpose it offers (stunning every target around you). Suppose that it takes 4 units of time of delay between Hawk attacks, the enemies are stunned in about 7 units of time. Get used to this so be ready when an enemy becomes un-stunned and take action ^^
All in all, Hawk is a very good skill to have. Stunning the monsters by hawk means lesser moving-away time, and lesser pots used (since alot of touch/projectiles in a 1v1 battle is completely avoided instantly). While a summoning rock is 5k each, comparing to a touch by a lv 93 monster, about 1.5k damage, and or its projectile attack which can go as high as 1.8k, utilizing Hawk isn't as expensive as it seems. For people who want to level more quickly, Hawk will save sometime here and there (it really makes your training time significantly faster). One note of advice from me though, however, is that you probably don't want to spend money on summoning rocks at least not until you are very rich to afford pots for several levels ahead.
Regarding about the amount of SP... Up to level 16, the % of stun increases dramatically (at level 16 is Hawk has a 90% stun rate) ~~ adding SP onwards will only up the % by 1 (up to lv 21) and then even more slowly only reaching 99% stun at level 29 and 30. A recommended level for Hawk is about level 21, which gives 95% stun. Level 23 96%, lv 25 97%, lv 27 98%, and lv 29 99%. There was a patch that made Hawk to have a duration timer sometime ago, before this Lv 1-30 Hawk always had a 180 second duration. Now that's changed to... 148 seconds at lv 16, 162 seconds at lv 21, and timer rises per SP until lv 30, which is 180 seconds or 3 minutes (the full timer). One more interesting thing that makes Hawk less practical at lower levels is, that the Hawk, once summoned, comes with a hit counter. Each time the Hawk attacks a monster, the counter is incremented. Every level of Hawk has a upper limit counter preset, at level 16 for example the Hawk will disappear after 52 hits, level 21 at 61 hits, and up to 70 hits at maxed level. The counter is less meaningful than the timer though, according to my experience. Usually you don't get to attack so many times due to the somewhat delay between its attacks. Depending on how many SPs you have leftover, Hawk is left there for you to play with. Level 16 gives 90% stun, if you want to get a head start in Hawk, this should be the minimum amount of SPs you should spend on it early. Anything below level 16 gives a not very good stun rate (below 90% isn't as reliable as it sounds). Personally, I would get Hawk to level 21 minimum, for the longer timer and a much more reliable stun rate although it costs 5 more SP... Remember even at maxed level (or lv 29) Hawk is still unperfect! (that is, not 100% stun ^^).
By the way, another reason why Hawk should not be maxed early is... well you should have puppet and some other skills and the like before it, and more often than not most of the monsters you fight shouldn't be much of a problem for you to kill rather quickly; Hawk is meant for monsters who you cannot kill quickly. You see more benefit of Hawk on level 9X+ monsters mainly and probably not lower level monsters. It can be fair to say that Hawk's practicality fades away when your Strafe is able to knockback the monster most of the time. When you can do that, Hawk probably should not be used at all (saving summoning stones) since you are able to kill them without really spending anything on pots and what not.
Rating: B+
10) What does Thrust do? What's the practicality of Thrust for archers?
Thrust is a passive ability that adds walking speed. As with all passive spells, the added bonus will be permanent on the character. Thrust starts out with +2 speed per SP up to level 10, where a total of +20 speed would be added.
As most archers know, the ability to walk faster will help one to escape more so easily, find a spot to snipe more easily, and simply just moving around in a map quicker. Speed is good to have indeed, but why do Archers dislike having Thrust then?
One of the reason that people tend to put Thrust in the least of priority is simply due to the limited SP given in 3rd Job. Unlike other jobs, Archers actually have a very fine set of skills with nothing in the "useless" category. Having to max all the skills will not have leftovers for Thrust at all.
The other reason comes from that although speed is nice to have, however, the speed bonus can be gained from the game's equipment themselves.
In jMS, there is a speed towel (lv 20 common class overall)
that gives 10 speed. Because of its cheap availability (sell for 30k each by the NPC) people tend to mass scroll this towel. Assuming this isn't jMS, and that such an overall with +speed dosen't exist... The following items give speed:
Lv 42 blue cape (+10 speed) from Quest.
Lv 42 skull helmet (+7 speed, +5 jump) from Quest
~Speed scroll for shoes (60% +2 speed, 10% +3) *not used.
10% DEX/jump scroll (+1 speed, +5 jump)
10% DEX for overall scroll (+1 speed)
Pet Speed scrolls (60% +2 speed, 10% +5)
Lv 70 Gold Hinkel +7-14 speed (avg 10)
Lv 80 Dark Arund +7-14 speed (avg 10) *rare.
Lv 80 Dark Sharit +7-14 speed (avg 10) *rare.
Lv 90 Metos +9-13 speed (avg 11)
Lv 90 Akiop-terisk +9-13 speed
Speed Candy +10 speed (sold in Ludibrium pot shop)
NOTE: The lv 70 crossbow has only one color and does not have any speed bonuses. This puts Rangers with an advantage of about 10 speed from their Gold Hinkels.
For starters, the game's maximum speed boost is capped at 140%, so a maximum of +40 and no more.
Assuming that you are a Ranger with a bow that adds speed, your pet equip has 5 slots, using a speed candy. That's potentially +10+10+10 = 30 speed buff from equipment. Taking this 30, and adding on the 10%s you have succeeded on your overall and shoes for jump, you should be well off into 32-34s. This analysis does not include the new speed cape and the skull helmet, which are relatively new to kMS/jMS.
Suppose you were to use the Skull Helmet (+7 speed), as well as the Lv 42 Cape (+10 speed). Depending on exactly how much speed you have, the +17 speed may very well be wasted (on our potential example above we have 32-34 speed boost already, adding 17 is easily over 140%!). Even taking out the Gold Hinkel (or lv 90 weapon), it is still very plausible to make 140% speed boost with bare minimum difficulty.
Although the addition of such equipment might not come about, but this teaches us a lesson: that Maple will be getting new items, part of them may very well include speed bonuses (which we have seen already).
Note that the rating for Thrust, essentially, degrades itself overtime due to new items that come with speed bonuses get released. Right now though, it seems clearly that Thrust should definately be put into the last bits of your priority in your 3rd job career.
I also forgot to mention the skill Haste. More and more people will want to train in parties (for benefits such as Holy Symbol, Meso Up, Hyperbody, etc) in high levels. This leads to a higher probability for archers to find thieves to party with.. because Haste itself gives +40 speed, any bonus in Thrust is automatically wasted. Some archers might even have regular thief training partners, which would further make Thrust rather obsolete.
The last but not least of reasons that people might not want Thrust is simply that there's a problem with the 140% speed itself: When climbing on smaller platforms, Haste tends to create big long jumps that often are either too far, or that you walk too fast and slip off on the edge. No matter how you got used to it, this will happen once in a while (especially in Ludibrium maps where such platforms exists not too rarely). Some people, incluidng myself, prefers 130% around for daily training.
There are still people who want to have Thrust though, despite how it isn't difficult to obtain the 140 speed bonus... either that 1) You have spare leftover SPs or 2) You feel that wearing a speed equipment is either too costly (such as Gold Hinkel bow) or that 3) it's simply better off with other equips, such as a DEX hat instead of the skull helmet Whatever the reason is, the bottomline here is that Thrust is a matter of choice on your equipment.
If you do plan to put on Thrust, absolutely make sure that you do not pass level 10. As described in the beginning, Thrust adds +2 passive speed per SP spent; adding additional SP beyond level 10 only yields +1 additoinal speed (rather wasteful). Something around level 5 in fact, should be more than enough for any archer (it's a permanent +10 speed bonus!).
Rating: C
11) Do archers ever play without Soul Arrow for the extra attack?
No. You should always be using Soul Arrow as an Archer. Strafe does consume quite a lot of arrows. Higher level monsters do have a lot of HP (which means more arrows). +2~4 attack arrows can be marginally helpful if at all. At least, Soul Arrow saves your time in repotting arrows (which = more enemies killed). Because of this, I recommend you do try to max Soul Arrow from 2nd job.
12) It seems that 3rd Job Archers have a great arsenal of skills, what's the general build people recommend?
First of all, I apologize for not writing this up for a long time. I don't know if people still read this guide since things have changed for a while. There's too many reasons why I did not finish this part of the FAQ, but one thing that kept me from writing this at all was that my own opinion was changing, and I lack the experience to give the general answer that most people deserve.
In fact, I recommend that you don't follow my advice. There isn't really a best build, but there are bad builds. It is my interest to help people so that they don't end up with such bad builds (in essence, screwing over the character), so this is a guide for preventing people from making regrettable routes or mistakes.
With that aside, here's what you have been waiting for:
3rd Job Total SP Available = 151 (level 70~120)
3rd Job Total SP from all skills = 20+20+20+30+30+30+30 = 180
Since you should not touch 2nd/1st job skills by the time you reached 3rd, you should have 180-151 = 29 points that cannot be filled by the time you become 120 (the starting level for 4th job, which, by the way, isn't coming out anytime soon). This means that you have 29 points to throw away.
Absolute minimum SP distribution for Ranger/Sniper: (in order of skill menu)
0 Thrust
20 Mortal Blow (MAX)
9 Puppet
0 FireShot / 21 IceShot
30 Arrow Rain (MAX)
21 Hawk / Eagle
30 Strafe (MAX)
Minimum SP required for Ranger: 20+9+30+21+30 = 110
Minimum SP required for Sniper: 20+9+21+30+21+30 = 131
(note: the difference comes from FireShot and IceShot between the two).
Most of the above should be common sense for most of you, but in case you forgotten, here's a review:
Thrust: 0~5
Most of you by now should realize that passive speed boost can be gained easiliy by equipment and the speed candy (from Ludibrium). Refer to "Thrust" of the FAQ. If you must, only put minimal points into Thrust.
Mortal Blow: 20 (MAX)
A special passive ability of archers. Overall a very helpful ultility for archers. There is no disadvantage to MB, you are always using it once in a while. There is no reason to forgo SP from this skill and allocating in something that is probably less helpful.
Puppet: 9, 12 or higher
I don't think much needed to be said here. :)
If you are unsure of the reasons why these numbers are chosen, please try to refer to previously answered questions in the FAQ. Still not sure, you could post here for help or PM me. I do try to make this a short read :)
Recalling that:
Minimum SP required for Ranger: 20+9+30+21+30 = 110
Minimum SP required for Sniper: 20+9+21+30+21+30 = 131
(note: the difference comes from FireShot and IceShot between the two).
According to the above, the Ranger will need (110-1)/3 = 37 levels (level 107) before he/she gets to the point where decision making becomes tough (the time for you to place your leftover SP). Snipers will need (131-1)/3 = 44 levels (level 114).
You should be able to plan your SP build up to these levels. For rangers wishing to use FireShot, you might want to put SP into FireShot more so early (probably around the time you hunt YnPs). But besides that, everything should be quite straight forward.
As for the ordering of SP, here are some pointers:
1) Max Strafe ASAP. This should be maxed at 80 or around.
2) Arrow Rain/Erruption should be maxed soon after.
3) If you don't know where to put your next SP, put in Mortal Blow. It's always helpful.
4) Puppet level 6 is needed for occasional boss/Lycan hunting. If you solo often and you find puppet to be helpful, you might consider putting more points into puppet (9 or 12). I recommend 9-12 Puppet at vikings, for example, the place where most of you should be hunting starting from 90~100. Definately by 100 and beyond.
What to do with remaining SP?
That's the hard part and it's all personal preference. Remember that you have 151 SP total by the end of 3rd job (level 120). This means that, if you are following my guidelines, as a Ranger you would have 151-110 = 41 SP to play with, and as a Sniper 151-131 = 20 SP.
At this point you should have a good enough idea about how everything works together. But if you need help, here are some hints:
-Put remaining SP to maxing Hawk/Eagle. You might just use it someday.
-Put remaining SP into Puppet. If you find that your puppet gets killed easily or you think you might need a longer timer.
-Put remaining SP into Thrust. Do this when you completely know what you are doing!! Always check your equipment for speed improvement ability! Remember to use 10% scrolls!! And don't forget about pets!
-If you are a Ranger, you might consider maxing FireShot afterall.
-If you are a Sniper, and you really know how everything works, and you feel there isn't need for Thrust/super high level Puppet, you might want to max IceShot just so you could do a bit more damage everytime you freeze the mobs.
-This list is endless, decide for yourself!
There you have it, our skill distribution for 3rd class archers.
Hope this was worth the read.
13) What are the key differences that outline between a Ranger and a Sniper?
The major difference lies between shooting speeds. Rangers do shoot noticably quicker than Snipers, this includes Strafe, Arrow Rain vs Erruption.
FireShot (a very limited skill) and IceShot. IceShot is a much more useful and better skill here.
That should be all the differences. Note that the level 90 Bow is solely a Jakum Drop where the Crossbow is a Bain drop. The level 80 bow however is extremely common thanks to it being a Viking drop.
14) Are archers limited to training spots? Where do the 3rd job archers go?
70~85s:
Zombies. Lycanthrope hunting if you get bored or can't find map. If you plan to hunt hectors instead (because you have some hate for zombies for some reason, or the economy is broken with hector drops, etc) then you can do hectors instead. Arrow Rain/Erruption comes in very handy here, so is Mortal Blow.
90s:
Partying. Yeti&Pepe is the best, but if you can't find a party, try vikings. Snipers who put everything into Strafe and IceShot may try to camp at GateKeepers in the late 80s and mid 90s for a fast EXP run, however it's very dangerous hunting there.
100~999:
Viking Party. Start getting used to this map, learn all the sniping spots, and make a lot of partying friends here. Various monsters with good EXP such as Bains, Majestic Vikings, and G Phantom Watches, you'll need a very high level Hawk before training in those areas. But luckily for you, vikings do better than all of them and Archers do a fine job at it. Vikings are best suited for a party of 5 hunting members + 1 priest.
According to people from MapleSEA, partying at the Aqua Dungeon is faster than VKPT of Ludi. I have yet to experience on this one but when they come out you can sure give them a try.
==>Bowman Guide List<==
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