[Shi Assoc. East Section 3] Faust

The Archer class really is made up of Archers. Shi Faust is the first-ever Shi ID released after launch, with a mix of Poise and Bleed. Her gimmick is to use a Defensive Skill to charge up her bow and unleash it to deal damage. An in-depth explanation for this will be given later on.

To start her Passive, she does the following:

• If she is in the “Ready to Loose” state, it will convert any base attack skill into Skill 3-2. Keep in mind that any Skill converted from this will gain both power and damage boost based on Skill level. “Ready to Loose” status just makes it so that Shi Faust is unable to be staggered through normal means and cannot trigger any form of Assist Attack. This status will also be removed if an E.G.O Skill was equipped.

• However, if she has 4 “Target Aim” while Skill 3 is neither on the dashboard nor is the upcoming skill, the Defensive Skill will be counted as Skill 3, which will then further turn into Skill 3-2. “Target Aim” as a status does nothing and is only used as a counter for how many turns she has used a Defensive Skill. 

Her normal Passive, which requires 3 Lust owned, gives Poise Count but is unfortunately capped at 3 times PER ENCOUNTER, which resets when she goes to 3 Arrow. Basically crippling her own Poise generation if she doesn’t use Skill 3-2 often, making her rely on others. Furthermore, she gains 2 Slash Dmg Up if she uses Skill 3-2 with 2+ “Target Aim”. 

Now we can finally delve into her skills:

• Skill 1 - Cleave - Base roll 12 - Max roll 14 - A lackluster Skill 1 for a Season 6 standard. It is better to charge her bow instead of using this skill if you have multiple of them on the dashboard, as it does more damage in the long run and is better for your resource management.

• Skill 2 - Positioning Maneuver - Base roll 16 - Clash 20 - A pretty lackluster Skill 2 for a Season 6 standard.

• Skill 3 - Glimmering Bow - Base roll 16 - Max roll 24 - A fairly average skill 3 alternative if you are not playing around her gimmick, or if she runs out of arrows.

• Skill 3-2 - Bow’s Glimmer - Base roll 15 - Max roll 36 - The skill her entire kit revolves around. Unfortunately, it is only slightly better compared to playing her normally without using Defensive Skill for 4 turns in a row. It is generally recommended to use this skill at 2+ “Target Aim” to gain the benefit of 2 Slash Damage Up. Furthermore, the target hit with this skill gains the “Lodged Arrow” status, which inflicts Bleed pot, Defense Level Down by the stack, and 1 Fragile at 2 stacks. The arrow is also returned upon removal of the status. If this skill scores a kill, she gains a +2 to Offense Level, 1 Final Power next turn and in case of a Crit Kill, she gains Poise Count additionally.

• Defensive Skill - Guard - Unfold Bowblade - Max Roll 18 - Her charge-up skill, which unfortunately is just a normal guard, meaning she wouldn’t be able to gain SP by clashing with this skill while charging, further increasing the time between first turn and first shot if you want to reliably do damage. And if that wasn’t enough, she would be losing Poise Count EACH TURN she uses a Defensive Skill, which further hammers her lack of Poise Generation. To compensate, however, she gains a Shield which becomes smaller for each stack of “Target Aim”. Do note that using any E.G.O skill will straight up remove all her stacks.

To summarize, you can either play her normally, launching a non-maxed Skill 3-2 every so often to benefit from debuffs, Passive’s Poise Count reset, and Slash Damage Up or you can go all in with Skill 3-2. Although the former may need some help with Poise Generation, the latter requires your SP support and not using her own E.G.O. skills for that. 

Notable E.G.O Synergy

• [Thoracalgia] Faust - Can help with Poise generation