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Class Comparison

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Revision as of 10:48, 27 September 2011 by Ariastorys (talk | contribs)
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Class Comparison Table

These are GENERAL notes for the classes. Some Sub-Classes' characteristics run counter to the generalities of their class. There are melee styles with AoE skills, there are magic users with melee attacks, etc. Generally every class/sub-class have some version of every skill type and attack style, which (depending on general effectiveness, enemy combatant, or player style) may or may not be used in any given situation.

See Sub Class Comparison for more details.

  • Orientation
    • Melee means uses weapons
    • Magic means uses MP
    • Range means use of long-range attacks.
Name Orientation Play Style Range Defense Speed Notes Popularity
Slayer Melee Balanced melee class Medium Good Fast Easy to use, difficult to master. Its the basic class that specializes on many weaponds. Has a difficult time starting out due to lack of skills, but becomes very proficient at PvE and PvP. Skills are straightforward and highly accessible. Skills tend to have the dark/shadow elemental attribute. Very common
Fighter Melee High speed movement with powerful melee skills Short Good Fastest Harder than the Slayer due to shorter reach and lack of variety in skills, but very satisfying damage. Has a difficult time starting out until the first grab skill is learned. Skills tend to have the light elemental attribute. Common
Gunner (M&F) Ranged Versatile ranged attacker Long Average Fast Very easy to use. Has an extremely easy start by keeping enemies away with ranged attacks but later on many enemies have counters vs ranger attacks such as super armor or defensive auras. Excels in a keep-away game, and can harass effectively with low risk. Can temporarily enchant bullets with an element, use granades, explosive robots and heavy subweaponry such as Gatling guns and flamethrowers. ther'es a few gender diferences while executing some skills. Very common
Mage Melee/Magic Tricky melee attacks backed by magic skills Medium/Long Poor Average Low HP and defense makes the Mage the most difficult to play and start out with. As more skills become accessible, the Mage's damage output and survivability will start to increase rapidly. Uncommon
Priest Melee Slow moving tank with the strongest attack power Short/Medium Great Slow Easy to use, difficult to avoid getting damaged. Has an average difficulty starting out. Despite the name of Priest, this is not the traditional healer class. While the Priest can heal, it isn't very effective and has heavy limitations. Instead, the Priest excels in melee combat. Skills tend to grant super armor, protecting the Priest from interruptions. This makes melee combat extremely one-sided; the Priest must spend most of his time chasing players in PvP. Common
Thief Melee/magic fast movement and fast atack speed maxed out with critical hits Short/Medium Average Fastest Similar dificulty than a fighter but combos tend to be aerial, careless play can lead to instant dead, while this class is a traditional thief class some skills can be magic sided long ranged and somewhat defensive critical damage can be very high and its natural speed makes Thiefs both deadly and tricky on PvP. Common

Subclass Comparison Table

  • Range- usual range of attacks
    • Short- Shortest range
    • Medium- Can be roughly two to three body lengths away
    • Long- Farthest range
  • Source- source of damage, usually referring to the most often used attack
    • Physical- uses weapons to attack; deals physical damage
    • Magical- uses magic skills to attack; deals magical damage
    • Hybrid- uses both weapons and magic skills to attack
  • Skill type- the type of skills the subclass specializes in
    • Power- powerful offensive skills
    • Speed- fast/combo/cancellable skills
    • Buff- skills to either improve the character or to weaken the opponent.
    • Nuke- high powered ranged attacks
    • Summoner- Summons allies to aid directly in contributing attacks
  • Difficulty- Minimum level of initial skill required to play the character
    • Easy- Anyone with any level of experience can play this character to good effect
    • Average- Some experience with gaming would be helpful, some learning curve
    • Hard- Should have some experience with gaming and 2D scrollers, there will be a learning curve
Name Class Range Source Skill type Difficulty Notes
Blade Master Slayer Medium Physical Speed Easy The Blade Master expands on the basic skills and can now cancel attacks into them, allowing the Blade Master to improvise combos fluidly and easily. In PvE, the Blade Master enjoys easy infinite combo setups (while MP lasts). In PvP, they have well-rounded abilities and are able to quickly take down a player with their sheer DPS from proper combos. The Blade Master is the undisputed glass cannon of the Slayer subclasses.
Soul Bender Slayer Medium/Long Hybrid Buff Hard The Soul Bender wears cloth armor, so he takes more damage when attacked. However, he can easily mitigate it with Afterimage of Keiga and carefully trap his opponent with well placed spirits to inflict status ailments. With tools such as Ghost Step to safely avoid all damage and get the first strike, the Soul Bender specializes in a powerful keep-away to overcome his opponent.
Berserker Slayer Medium Physical Buff Average The Berserker uses his own HP to activate skills instead of MP, but gains incredible survivability in exchange. At low HP, he becomes more difficult to finish off thanks to increasing parameters and the ability to heal himself. The Berserker has gained the nickname "cockroach" by the Korean DnF community.
Asura Slayer Medium/Long Magical Nuke Average The magic-user of the Slayers and the slowest of the four. The Asura has the highest physical defense due to Plate Armor Mastery, and uses primarily ranged projectiles. His skills have high burst damage, making the Asura great for crowd control and boss killing, but the slow movement speed gives him a difficult time catching other players in PvP. The Asura is recommended for players who enjoy zoning with projectiles and creating fireball traps.
Nen Master Fighter Medium/Long Magical Buff Easy The magic user of the Fighters. She can harass effectively with projectiles, and learns many defensive skills to avoid damage. Most notably, Floating Nen Flowers allows an awakened Nen Master to passively nullify any attack once, after which it reactivates when a set period of time has passed by. The Nen Master sacrifices offensive power for powerful defense and escape tools to play an effective keep-away game, and can handle her own in close combat with her buffs.
Striker Fighter Short Physical Power Average The fastest movement speed combined with the highest burst damage in the game. Strikers aim to land a powerful combo string rather than individual hits, though trading hits is still advantageous for the Striker. Landing a combo is usually achieved by using a temporary Super Armor buff to help close in on an opponent. While the short reach makes it difficult to land a combo, the Striker's naturally high movement speed helps to compensate for it. The Striker is a great choice for players favoring "bulldog" or "rush down" tactics (the best defense is the best offense mindset) as they are able to chase enemies unchecked whenever the Super Armor buff is active.
Brawler Fighter Medium Physical Buff Average Specializes in afflicting status conditions (such as bleeding, poison, stun, and immobility) on opponents. The Brawler has a lot of tools to deal with a variety of situations. Most notably, they can mount downed opponents for extra attacks. In addition, Brawlers deal increasing bonus damage as opponents are also afflicted with increasing amounts of status conditions. They have one of the best tools in the game in the form of Heaven's Net, which allows them to pull and immobilize enemies from across the screen for a free combo. Players who like utility will also enjoy the Brawler's harassing ability.
Grappler Fighter Short Physical Power Hard Specializes in grabs/throws and can even grab ungrabbable enemies. The Grappler can chain throws together to create a combo, and is very dangerous in "okizeme" (the downed opponent cannot stand up safely). The Grappler enjoys immense popularity in the Korean DnF community as the glass cannon of the Fighter subclasses.
Ranger Gunner Any Range Physical Speed Easy Can fight at any range, and is especially dangerous at melee range. The Ranger specializes in juggling opponents in the air. The difficulty listed is rather deceptive. While the Ranger class itself is easy to play, dealing damage is very difficult. If one is adept at juggling, one can bring out the Ranger's strength to deal massive amounts of damage in a single juggle. However, if one cannot perform juggles, one will find the damage output to be decisively behind other Gunner classes.
Launcher Gunner Long Physical Nuke Easy The Launcher is a huge threat even from off-screen. His skills are mostly nukes, and can quickly dispatch an opponent with successful hits. While skill usage is very MP intensive, it can also deal generous amounts of damage when chained together in a single combo.
Mechanic Gunner Long Magical Summoner Average The Mechanic is different from the Summoner and the Necromancer in that his summons make a bee-line towards enemies and can fill the screen with projectiles, effectively giving the Mechanic the title of "the PvP Summoner". Despite that title, the Mechanic excels in PvE as well (particularly the Female Mechanic since she can rotate between G1-Corona and G2-Rolling Thunder indefinitely). Since Mechanics wear Cloth Armor, they play keep-away exclusively and put pressure on opponents from afar.
Spitfire Gunner Middle/Long Hybrid Nuke/Buff Easy The Spitfire is very easy to play, and is known as a "cheesy" class in that knockdowns allow him to fire a salvo of enchanted bullets for extremely high damage. He can zone effectively with grenades, possesses a great Z-axis attack with Crossmore, and can lay mines to stay in control of the field so it a class prepared for almost all situations and types of enemies.
Elementalist Mage Long Magical Nuke Hard The Elementalist is a powerful nuking class and is the bane of all Exorcists in PvP. She can play an effective keep-away game with her spells, and flood the field with projectiles. In PvE, the Elementalist can quickly destroy large packs of monsters with AoE nukes. With careful spell placement, the player can put immense pressure on both players and monsters while remaining safe but like any mage a slight error on being caught by an enemy and specially a group of enemies can lead to instant dead.
Summoner Mage Long Magical Summoner Easy The Summoner suffers from poor minion AI, but still enjoys flooding the screen with her minions. In PvE, she is able to solo while avoiding all damage, but she solos very slowly due to how attacking with summons work (target must be set using a skill). As a result, most players recommend going Mechanic for any sort of summon play usefull for both PvP and PvE alike. Still, there are Summoners who enjoy mild success in PvP since they have different minion attack patterns that players are unable to deal with. Interestingly, Summoners can lag out some party members when they create enough summons (like Necromancers in Diablo 2)!
Witch Mage Medium Hybrid Speed Average/Hard Several skills are based on chance, with a possibility of failure, success, and sleeper success. A witch relies on luck. Uses weapon buffs and close-range attacks to perform damaging juggle combos, while using AoE skills to trap enemies. They are able to air-dash and air combos due to unique movement skills related to the broom, making them the most mobile of the Mage subclasses and with the capability of max out Ancient Library and the access to Befriend Florae mana recovery enchances to party members and inteligence to a selected party member.
Battle Mage Mage Medium Hybrid Speed Hard The top tier PvP class in Korea, the Battle Mage enjoys unrivaled attack and movement speed (via Chaser buff) at high levels of play. They specialize in combos much like the Ranger, but are not limited to just air juggling. They use Chasers, which are generated automatically upon landing skills and are manually launched at enemies to inflict AoE damage, stun effects, negative attributes, and most importantly, to continue combos. The Battle Mage is equipped with strong survivability as well with maxed Mana Shield. Players who are adept at combos and juggling will find the Battle Mage to be very rewarding.
Crusader Priest Short Magical Buff Easy The support class of DFO, with skills that heal, protect, and buff. Offensive melee attacks tend to be short ranged. Careful skill allocation is needed due to multiple available builds, and healing skills can be cast only a certain number of times in dungeons. Depending on the number of party members, MP usage can be light to very heavy. This is also the most uncommon class played due to its niche role. PvP Crusaders can be found online, but are a rarity due to the bigger advantages of PvPing as other classes.
Monk Priest Short Physical Speed Average Will Driver allows the Monk to plant his weapon in the ground to use a special boxing style move set, sacrificing staying power for incredible speed and powerful burst damage. The Monk uses high speed dashing and dodging followed by a combo to take down enemies. Fast reflexes and quick thinking is essential to mastering this class. The Monk is recommended for players excelling in "footsies" (dancing in and out of opponent's attack range) as they are able to punish whiffs (missed attacks) with deadly precision.
Exorcist Priest Short/Medium Hybrid Power Average One of the most versatile subclasses in the game, both skill types (physical and magical) are well represented with either high damage potential or utility. Very careful skill planning is necessary as there are many build options, such as physical-based (focus on raw damage) or magical-based (focus on AoE and zoning), or hybrid (focus on PvP utility). Physical exorcists are famous for being able to kill other players in a single combo (though at great expense since they are unable to deal with keep-away play styles). They also tend to spend the entire match trying to catch the other player. It is notable that Physical Exorcists almost never win against Elementalists, while hybrid builds allow the Exorcist a chance to trap them with spells of his own.
Silver Moon Thief Short/Medium Physical Power/Speed Average/Hard One of the most faster damage dealer subclasses in the game, leather armor mastery and weaponds bonuses fully enhances the efects of critical hits for extremelly high damage output, skills are both aerial and very movile. Very careful skill planning is necessary as there are many skills and Sp's can be tight, and is important to improvise correctly the conection of combos successfully, in PvP they're Glass Cannons mainly because be caught by a Silvermoon can be deadly but leather armor makes them fragile to attacks It is notable that its movility is very helpfull on both PvP and PvE.
Necromancer Thief Medium/long Magic Summon/Buff/Nuke Average/Easy Magic user of the Thiefs, This class is aided just by a few summons like Nicholas Rapport that can take orders from the necromancer summon zombies and drain healt from enemies and Vallacre the Slaughterer that works as a possesion more than a summon with its own ai like Nicholas. while its gameplay tends to be tactical in both PvP and PvE compared to the Mechanic some nuke attacks and skills are made to trap enemies on DOT (damage overtime) skills with dark element magic while the Mechanic uses neutral magic, Once the Necromancer summons Vallacre the Slaughterer the maps can be cleanned easily in PvE and attack range expand to be medium to long, Bone Shield and light armor mastery enhances surviability and some skills can add curse and lower darkness resistance for extra damage, can be a good class with carefull skill placement because skills can be used directly from the character or throught Nicholas or Vallacre.