Kasarr's Dark Dragon Build, Skill, and Stat Guide *ver 1.3*

If you've found this trough the MT wiki or want to reply (where it's still UPDATED), click this link. ~Lost

Ok, so it seems that lately everytime I am logging on, either someone within this great guild or someone in my party is asking me how I built my Dragon, so I have decided that (rather than explain it over and over) I will simply write out my entire build, stats and skill progression as I have found to be both fun and powerful. I hope you like it and if you don't, just at least look at the screenies of me and my awesome hawtness!

This is going to be divided in to 4 (?) topics, each with its own post because it would just be ridiculous to put all that much in one post! Becasue I am writing a very in-depth guide, it may take a few days, WEEKS so please don't ask where the rest is, I will announce on the News and in-game when I complete it. If you have any questions or want to post tips, feel free to! but I would greatly appreciate it if you could wait to post until the entire guide is up. All comments greatly appreciated! ^o^

DISCLAIMER:
I am not to be held responsible, under any circumstances, as to anyone's results, desired or undesired, that are derived from using, referencing, or quoting this guide.

Basically, do not blame me if you think your dragon sucks, becuase there's nothing crappier than getting random PM's telling me "ur guide sux, its to hard i cant make dragon gud."
If you have an issue or complaint, either leave a post here, contact me in game, email me or IM me, anmd use "Dragon Guide" in the title/friend request/whisper. Here's all my contact info:

In-Game-Name: Kasarr (I play Fantasia, Dream Island)

Email: fireball3332000@yahoo.com

Xfire & msn: wildekarrde



Alright, there's the intro, and here goes nothing!

**edit: Jul 17, '08**
Due to new skills coming out and old ones becoming better or worse, the skill progression has been rearranged, and it no longer represents Kasarr's original skill progression. Kasarr does indeed have all the skills at the levels stated, but he got them in a different order, cuz he's a big n00b like that I only re-arranged things due to criticizm and Dark Commando coming out. All changes made have been made to improve the power of anyone following the guide

Topic #1: Stats

The most important stat for either of the magic types is always and always will be Magic Ability, also known as MA. MA is the important factor within all damage-dealing spells because it directly controls how much damage you can do. The most powerful of Dragons and Sheeps are those who invest their 4 Bonus Stat Piontsinto MA and MA only. Although other stats such as LK (discussed below), HP, MP and DP may seem useful, but consider that for every point you take away from MA, that's a lot of damage you can not do anymore. Remeber that your base MA will increase every other level as long as you invest every single stat point into it. I know that it is slow-progressing, but spending points in other stats makes it even slower! Another thing to remember about MA is that you can get a HUGE amount from good equips, especailly from ultimate weapons and even more from Myshop items and sets. MA should always be what you look for in a weapon, which makes your best choices for weapond to be Rods, Canes and Staffs. You can also get MA bonuses from hats, accesories and pets.
Here is an example of how much more damage high MA equips can give you:



The second most important stat for Dragons (Not Sheeps though) is Luck, also known as LK. This stat is important because it controls the accuracy of the magical attacks Mana Arrow, Arrow Rush, Hellfire, and Dark Lance. If your LK is low, all of your spells will miss A LOT! LK also controls useful things like your Critical Hit Ratio and your abilty to compound items (see Tutorial on Compounding). The best way to have a high LK is too get it from your Equips either by buying items with high LK or by compounding it into them. Sadly, there are no skills for Magic-types that give increases to LK (Unless you have the Anniversary Skill).
Here are some examples of why it is important to have a high LK:


The other Magic-Based, important stat is Mana Points, aka MP. Its how much mana you have, and because casting any spell costs a certain amount of mana based on the spell type and level. Its ridiculous to ever invest in this stat because no matter how much mana you have, a level 10 Arrow Rush will ALWAYS cost 213 MP, whether you only have 1,000MP or 10,000MP. You can get bonus from most magic items, especially Myshop items.

Of course, the absolutley necsessary stat for ANY type is Heath Points. I'll be talking more on this under the Build section, so basically all you need to know for now is that you should get it from equips by comping it into them. Shields are the most common HP comp'd items, but I personally have my Classic Cane give me +2044 HP.

The 2 Defense stats are important, but not ebough to rule out the needs for MA and LK. You get a high base MD anyway, and you have Cure for any injuries. DP and MD are nice, but rarely important since you should be OHKO'ing everything you are fighting, at higher levels at least.

WT is also important, but not enough to be worth investing in, espcailly with the 1432 build (see next section). Depending on how you like to play and wether you care to loot every single thing, you may want to carry a pet like Blue Penguin if you frequetnly get overWT. The other Sense stat, DA, is used for drilling and certain Fox/Lion skills, and is unimportant for investing in. If you do not have a char that can drill, you might consider havinga DA comp'd set.

HV is not important for LK-based hitters, becuase the evasion added by a high LK will outweigh the envasion of a high-HV char.

DX, AP and AC are used for melee attacks and control attack speed, melee damage and accuracy, respectively. As this guide is for pure casters, they do not come into play AT ALL.

Topic #2: Build Graph

Ok, so now that we've covered the important stats that WE control (e.i. "Bonus Stat Points"), its time to move on to the stats that the game does automatically. For those of you who don't know, I'm about to give a quick explanation of how builds work.

Your Build Graph is the rectangle thing in your Myview under the Basic Info tab. It should look something like the picture below, but yours may be distributed differently.


As you can see, the stats go in order like this: 1 Attack, 4 Magic, 3 Sense and 2 Charm, and that is called a "1432" build. My lion is 3 Power, 1 Magic, 4 Sense and 2 Charm, aka "3142." Hopefully, that makes sense now, it took me until like level 50 to understand what people were talking about when they asked if i was a 1432 Dragon.

Ok, so here is how your Stats and your Build Graph are connected. Say you have 4 Points in Magic on your Build, that means that every time your base level increases, all of the stats under the Magic build will receive 4 Bonus Stat Points. This also applies for 1's, 2's, and 3's in a Build Attribute. In case you are unaware, here's how each Build Attribute controls each Stat:
Attack = AP, AC, DP
Magic = MA, MP, MD
Sense = DA, LK, WT
Charm = HP, DX, HV

Now that we've explained how a build graph works, its time to move onto what build is best for a Dark Dragon. If you read the above portion about Stats, you already know that MA and LK are the most important Stats, but HP is also very important. Obviously, you will have a 4 in Magic, the game won't let you do it any other way, so the hard part is where to put the other Build Points. I say 1432, which is the standard build, because it gives you enough Sense to have a moderate base LK, enough to where you don't have to spend every comound slot of your EQ's on LK. Obviously, we won't be caring what our Attack is, so leave that at a 1. This leave us with a 2 in Charm, which is just enought to get us a survivable amount of HP, but not enough to have any extra. If you don't like the lower HP, rember that almost every shield can be compounded for HP.

1432 provides enough defensive stats and and offensive balance that I find perfect for me. If you don't like dying, but don't mind missing your attacks, conider going 1423, possiblythe extreme 1414. If you feel lucky and plan on dying a lot, 1441 is a fun build, with the increased LK you score more crits and get hit a little less, but your HP and DP are sacrificed. This guide will focus on the 1432 build, becuase it is a nice balance for beginning players an also its based off of Kasarr, who is 1432.

Topic #3: Skills & Abilities

He-he-he...Now for the fun part!

Obviously, this will be the longest section, seeing how it is both the most important and the most fun. Contained here will be a complete skill explanition, progression and possibly some pictures of how awesome certain skills can be. It will be divided into 2 subsections, one for Shaman skills and another for Magcian skills. 3rd Job skills won't be covered until i can advance and get them myself, and there aren't many to talk about anyway.

They will be listed in the order they should be gotten before the individual sections, with decriptions provided for each skill following.

Part 1: Skill Progression

If you want to gain the best skills as EARLY (very big advantage) as possible, you MUST get them to each level specified, in this order!

~All 1st Job skills are WHITE
~All 2nd job Skills are RED
~All3rd Job Skills are PURPLE

Mana Arrow, Lv 5

<Save TM Points Here>

Invincible Casting, Passive Skill

Mana Arrow, Master Level

Cure, Lv 10

Bottle of Mana, Lv 1

<Save TM Points Here>

Mist of Mana, Lv 2

<Save TM Points Here>

Arrow Rush, Master Level

Mist of Mana, Master Level

Dark Pact, Aquisition

Hellfire, Master Level

Wicked Flame, Lv 6

<Save TM Points Here>

Dark Lance, Master Level

Wicked Flame, Lv 9

Mana Storm, Lv 10

Gravity Crush, Master Level

Wicked Flame, Master Level

Mana Shield, Lv 10

Dark Barrier, Master Level

Scythe, Lv 10

Rust, Lv 10

Fear, Lv 1

Dark Commando, Master Level

Fear, Master Level

Scythe Master Level

Hinder Snare, Aquisition

Dark Distractor, Master Level

Staff of Agony, Master Level

Part 2: Skill Descriptions

First off, there's a few terms the game uses when decribing skills, and they will be used in this guide, so short definitions have been included below.

• Active Skill: Skill used by either clicking the skill or "preparing" by setting it in your QuickBar, and then clicking the target. They come in 4 varieties, Single Target, Single Target winth splash, Targeted Area of Effect (AoE) and centered AoE. A single target spell turns your mouse pointer to this {image coming soon}, which you simply move to a monster and click it to begin casting, Single target with splash damage works the same way, except *sometimes* other monsters near the target monster can be damaged as well. A Targeted AoE spell turns the pointer into a large, white circle, like this {image coming soon} which you move over any monsters and all the monsters inside the cast zone get damaged. A Centered AoE works just like a Targeted AoE, except you cannot choose where, it simply damages in a circle surrounding you (you won't be damaged by your own skill, lol).
  
  
• Skill Aquisition: These are skills that add special, permanent effects to your character. All oyu have to do is have the TM pts and use the skill card and you have the skill forever. They are often used as Pre-requisites for other skills (ie: Dark Pact, & Element Seals)
  
  
• Passive Skill: Much like Aquisitions, these simply add effects and are learned in the same manner, the big difference is that rather than adding effects to your character, they add special effects to tother skills. Usually they are definatley worth getting becuase they can take a regular skill and make it much better by adding stun effects, Damage over Time (DoT) or just plain adding damage.

Ok, now for skill explanations/definitions, this is gonna be long >.<

Mana Arrow- The basic magical attack and you main weapon for most of the game. Its a ranged attack with moderate-high damage at master level. Get used to hitting with it, running, running back, hit again.

Invincible Casting- Possibly the most important skill for mages, its a Skill Aquiistion that makes you casting uninterruptable. During those forst few levels before this skill, you are gonna hate it when you are casting MAna Arrow and some stupid Monkey hits you and you haave to start casting AGAIN.

Kay, as everyone can see, I've been working on my guide lately, foud out that in my Auto class I can get past the stupid school block and screw around on the forums =P

Things Recently Changed:

1: Changed the BUILD Section a bit to explain more about other builds and their advantages/disadavantages.

2: Changed the STATS section to explain HV, DA, WT and power type skills. I was being too restrictive and talking crap about useful stats, rofl

3: Changed the SKILLS section for the progression invovling mastering Mist before AR, now its get Mist lv 2, then save for AR. Found out using only regular Mana Arrow (even if its really buffed by Mist) is hard and slow leveling for TM lvls 40 to 50.

3: Changed the SKILLS Section, adding in Descriptions for each skill, still a work in progress. Also split it into 2 parts, one for progression, the other for descriptions.

4: Changed the TITLE to Ver 1.3 due to all the editing as of late =P


btw guys, feel free to comment under this post, Especially guests, I know a lot of folks have been reading my guide from the Wiki Link. That's how Dark came into the guild ^_^

I have to give u props on ur guide Kev
To anyone using this guide he has a very good outlook on the build and is very helpful =) so mad props to u my friend.

Yeah i agree lol. Nice guide.

lol, the biggest help for me was SleppyNi, an old guild admin of long, long ago. He helped me before i was even 2nd job, back when GB was still around *sniff i love you Nora*, he told me everyhting I needed to know about mages, about stats and LK vs MA, a proper skill progression, everything. Basically this is his build, taken and modified by me (he quit long before 3rd jobs, you can find himin the ranking,still a lv 203 2bd job dragon)

Re-edited, by request of Lyrz, to include new skill, dark commando. Bumped cuz i felt like it.

PLease don't delete this, its the only copy (other than the notepad copy on my desktop) becuase the oficail eTO forum one got deleted for being old and the mytrickster forum ones were removed when MT died.

btw, it is still linked to the mytrickster wiki, sadly its the only non-mytrickster created guide, so its the only one that has survived (and its getting lots and lots of hits for that).

thanks~
Kevin

You forget that all good guides got saved and are on MOG now.
Not to mention the MT wiki won't be updated much longer, I think.

1. People still look at the wiki, its the firsth thing that pops up ona Google Search.

2. Due to the fact that the wiki can't be updated, the links to the guides lead to the old MT guides, not to the "relocated" MOG guides.

3. Wiki hasnt been updated in weeks, due to MT shutting down

Could you make a training section?

Kai, whoever you are, he can't edit anything here anymore because his account was deleted. You know, since he left the guild and these are GUILD forums.
Ask that again on the MOG forums; check the link I edited in at the top.

Thread locked cause it's annoying to have random people reply where it's useless.