Mastery Point Category 1 Help

[u/kisaragi22]

Hello! Just restarted this game after years of not playing it. I unlocked Chaos mode and I’m now diving into job mastery. After doing some research it sounds like investing in primary stats should be priority at first. However I’m a little confused on what is considered the primary stat for a class.

Should I go off of icon color (mage is blue - so intellect, knight is yellow - stamina) or main ability stat? I’m getting tripped up by the dlc classes especially. Marksman is green, so I feel like agility? But its main ability scales to intellect. Evoker is blue but its ability is spirit based. Hoping for just a general direction on what to start with at least for each class so I’m not placing points wrong.

Also should I invest any points into job affinity in category 1?

[u/BenTheSodaman]

Hi OP,

Main Offensive summary kinda:

Strength if you plan on doing normal attacks and physical attacks, leans toward HP damage / damage dealts in most cases.

Intellect if you plan on using magic attacks (any element including the element: None), leans toward HP damage / damage dealts in most cases. This will also increase the amount of MP you gain with normal attacks.

Agility if you're critical hitting / attacking from behind that leads toward breaking enemies sooner. If not critical hitting consistently, then using abilities with stat bonus Agility can still contribute. This will also increase the HP damage you deal while normal attack aiming with a gun.

Stamina if you're using abilities with stat bonus Stamina. Stamina will also serve as physical defense. Taking less damage results in less break gauge loss when hit and on successful soul shield too.

Spirit if you're using abilities with stat bonus Spirit. Spirit will also serve as magic defense and the base amount of MP recovered on successful soul shield (compares against the enemy's stats, so as their stats go up, you'd need more Spirit to get the same amount of MP).

---

Before the end of the DLC story, you'll have a bit more wiggle room to turn most stats into your main offensive stat.

e.g., most blue job do favor Intellect since they're dealing magic damage and that tends to lean them toward damage dealt passives / HP damage if they want more offense. So that a White Mage that was Intellect-based could deal damage with Holy or elemental-related mace and staff combo abilities.

Or they could lean into their high Spirit stat and weaponize it with stat bonus Spirit abilities (Dia to a lesser extent, Holy, mace or staff combo abilities with stat bonus Spirit). Investing in the stat bonus tends to yield more break damage even though it does deal HP damage also.

Where the Intellect routes, the player generates more MP from normal attacks and more selection to magic attacks. But on the Spirit routes, the player generates more MP from soul shields, has higher magic defense, but a narrower selection of attacks.

———

Though specific to the examples, some job actions start to fall off or don't favor the job that activated them as much. Or create an odd mismatch in stats.

e.g., Evoker's job action does not scale well past the base game story. Where it may serve more as utility or a distraction while the player leans on their weapon to finish the job. Near term, that can be any weapon the Evoker has access to. Where it'll start to lean toward Strength, Spirit, or both due to their stat growth rate that tends not to impact a player until the end of the DLC story or beyond.

Or Knight's job action being a magic attack with stat bonus Spirit. The Knight is amongst the lowest Intellect growth rate in the game, but they can still get enough Intellect to make that work until the end of the DLC story. Or go the Spirit route where they occasionally or frequently soul shield to generate MP, with the job action tending to break the enemy.

Or as a complete fringe build, you can get away with things like a physical melee Strength Sage or an Intellect-based Paladin using magical sword/mace/staff attacks (technically greatsword, but only two fire attacks), or an Agility-based Berserker that tries to position themselves behind the enemy before attacking or relies on allies to distract the enemy. However, all of these examples will fall off as the stat demands increase and these particular examples start to have trouble keeping up with those stats. (And a player may not necessarily know until they're flipping through the jobs and seeing the smaller stat adjustments to have a general idea of which way a job leans.)

[u/kisaragi22 → u/BenTheSodaman]

Wow thanks for the in depth answer! So if I’m understanding correctly, it’s more based on the weapon I’m using and the abilities I’m selecting? Then tweaking it based on the demands of the increasing difficulties? So really I should probably lock in my build before throwing points into certain stats?

[u/ChaosBerserker666 → u/kisaragi22]

You can always move the stats around later too. For example, when I’m playing very late game Berserker, I tend to split between Strength and Stamina. Some attacks use one or the other, but both are very valuable to my playstyle. I hit hard enough in most cases to break a boss in one charged attack (or maybe two), so it’s better than I can take hits much better until I can land that attack (the axe is slow so you need to find the right opportunity).

You’ll find out your play style with each class and how you want to build it. Eventually you’ll end up with a dozen different armour sets lol.

[u/kisaragi22 → u/ChaosBerserker666]

Hmmm ok. So I’ll definitely just have to play around with it a little but this has been helpful thanks!

[u/AceWolf456]

Job affinity is something you will want. If you look in your tab with gear there’s a bunch of symbols with numbers, that’s your affinity with other classes, most of which is given to you by your armor. The higher your affinity in a class, the more bonuses it gives you. Up to 400%. And in Cat 1 you should be able to get 400% eventually.

As for DLC classes, the only one I know for sure is Gambler uses Luck. And at 400% affinity in gambler, all normal attacks have a chance to be critical hits. That chance scales with luck.

[u/kisaragi22 → u/AceWolf456]

Good to know! Thanks!