Freelancer Draft Builds

Build 2: The Saboteur

Unlike the Sword Saint, this build seeks to explore the limits of the Freelancer's versatility from a mechanical starting point. What's an archer who doesn't use ranged weapons like? Combining it with two other Claw users, the Monk and the Artist, the goal is to create a multilayered, versatile fighter who disables enemies with precise, pinpoint strikes and dazzling movements.

Level 8: Charge, Jutsu (Katon/Doton), Artistic Niche (Any, but we'll go with Dance) [DN: We start with a lot of varied abilities. Katon/Doton are the preferrable Jutsus because Dance duplicates the others from the get-go. Regardless of choice, however, they're the primary means of offense early on, as they do better damage than any of the weapons available to this mixture, and can also inflict status effects. The Witch Hunt dance effectively obsoletes Mindblow, which is nice, and Toxic Dance grants a tasty Poison effect, albeit at high difficulty. Charge is kind of the dud here - the damage is mediocre even compared to Katon, and it's a pretty slow action too. It could easily be swapped for a higher HP multiplier with no real loss. Better things will be coming soon, though.]

Level 15: Vitals Aim [DN: The Archer class is honestly pretty dreadful before Vitals Aim. Afterward, it Means Business (TM). This is the bread and butter damaging ability most others are compared to - it doesn't do the most damage, but it's like mailman and always, always delivers the mail. If no other options are apparent, Vitals Aim is almost never a bad choice.]

Level 23: Vengeful Spirits/Eclectic Performer [DN: Both options have their good points. Vengeful Spirits turns Doton and Katon into awesome mezzing tools, whereas Eclectic Performer provides two high-powered damage options and a way to regain HP. The difficulties are so high they're not reliable, though - there's a serious chance of wasting your action. It's kind of odd how aggressively tuned Artist difficulties are - 30% success chance on most effects is pretty nasty. But neither's a bad choice, regardless. Reliable power vs versatile unreliable options, which one's better?]

Level 30: Marked Quarry [DN: No contest. Marked Quarry makes all those difficult Dancer moves likely to land, and makes landing the Monk jutsu effect trivial. It sucks to be unable to get the next dance tier, but it's very much for a good cause!]

Level 37: Suplex/Fame [DN: Here comes the moneyyyyyyy! Suplex makes basic attacks into extremely accurate debuffs. They may not last long, but any actions burnt on confusion are a big win - Confusing a major enemy can effectively buy a respite round! Fame provides a fatal-type debuff in Stone, a ghetto Mighty Strike in Sword Dance, and perennial favorite Slow, all at an affordable 40 difficulty increase now that Marked Quarry is online. Really, anything's a win here. Very, very solid level.]

Level 44: Colossus Slayer [DN: Monk abilities at this level are pretty bad, and Level 4 Dances are a weak spot - Virus is a neat debuff, but whether it'll be necessary is highly debatable, Level 3 already provided a Fatal-type attack, and Deadly Duet just folds two actions you have access to into one. Empowering Vitals Aim makes it an even crazier damage inflictor, which is very good because it's slowly lost its luster. This brings it up to par.

Level 51: Free Space [DN: The build is mostly complete at this point, so anything is reasonable. Grab a second Jutsu for more nice debuffs? Get Arm Aim to Disable? Grab a random spell group? Acquire Hater to expand the toolset? Anything goes.]

Level 58: Free Space [DN: See above! The world's your oyster]

Level 65: Stardom [DN: Phantom Rush is stylistically awesome, but the one-two punch of Dirty Dancing into Fatal Flamenco is impossible to argue with. Nameless Dance on top is icing on the cake.]

Subjob: Rune Knight [DN: Nothing really says 'sabotage' like canceling enemy spells and buffs. Dervish is also a good option for a more damage-oriented character, allowing easy Suplex infliction and more jutsu crits, for example.]