10. “Machine Gun Mage” Build
True to its name, this build is designed to turn your mage into a machine gun, hurling a flurry of projectiles at enemies before they can get close enough to hurt you. It takes a bit of playing in the Chaos Trials for the build to reach its fullest potential, as it requires extra relics and arcana you can only get throughout the trials. However, the pay-off proves itself to be certainly worth the risk. If you feel like experiencing the power fantasy that comes with being nigh-invincible, then this build offers just that.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Venture
Arcana:
- Basic: Bolt Rail
- Dash: Any
- Standard: Magnetic Follow-Up
- Ultimate: Any
- Extra 1: Fuelled Berserk
- Extra 2: Evading Zephyr
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Evening Gloves
- Cursed: Silver Spinning Top
- Cursed: Double Trouble
Advantages:
- The combo that Bolt Rail and Magnetic Follow-Up provide guarantees that you don’t even have to get in an enemy’s range to hurt them. Simply activate Magnetic-Follow Up and attack in their direction. The rocks will knock them back and any enemies that get close enough will fall into Bolt Rail’s effective range.
- The Silver Spinning Top increases the activation speed of all your arcana, and Fuelled Berserk increases the attack speed of your basic arcana while activated. This affects the effectiveness of Magnetic Follow-Up, turning you into a true “Machine Gun Mage.”
9. Self-Healing Build
A build for those who have a hard time lasting in the Chaos Trials. Healing is difficult to come by in the game, the most common resource being the merchant’s health pot. You may find yourself constantly weighing between health or an extra relic or arcana you’ve been wanting. This build serves to take care of that dilemma for you, giving a constant, renewable source of healing; yourself!
Loadout:
- Cloak: Awe
Arcana:
- Basic: Spark Contact
- Dash: Circuit Line (Optional)
- Standard: Lightning Aspect
- Ultimate: Shock Assault
- Extra 1: Any
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Vampire’s Eyeglasses
Advantages:
- This build is designed to land as many critical hits as possible. Lightning Arcana’s attack speeds and quick bursts mean that they tend to land crits more often than other elements. Combined with “Awe,” which increases critical hit chance and damage, as well as Vampire’s Eyeglasses, which provides healing bonuses on critical hit, will ensure that you have a supply of health throughout the Chaos Trials.
8. Rules of Contingency
As the video states, this is a build for “getting it done and getting it done quickly.” It capitalizes on a high-risk, high-reward playstyle. The relic the build is named after makes all attacks deal 99 damage, both yours and the enemy’s. Your arcana is built to deal as much damage while minimizing your own exposure to attacks, but you’ll still find yourself taking risks and ending up in tight spots, with 99 damage on the line! It makes for thrilling and exhilarating gameplay.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Spirit
Arcana:
- Basic: Volt Disc
- Dash: Wave Front
- Standard: Whirling Wind Agent
- Ultimate: Homing Flares
- Extra 1: Any
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Any
- Cursed: Rules of Contingency
Advantages:
- Your starter arcana are composed of ranged or protective spells, mitigating the risk provided by the Rules of Contingency. The “Spirit” cloak also increases healing rate, which can help you try and make up for any damage taken.
7. Critical Drill Build
This build is designed to make full use of the Tectonic Drill arcana, maximizing its damage output and critical hit chance. With its ability to pierce through enemy projectiles, the Tectonic Drill is a powerful and versatile asset to your mage. The rest of the build is also designed around following up on this powerful attack.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Awe
Arcana:
- Basic: Earth Knuckles
- Dash: Tunneling Drive
- Standard: Tectonic Drill
- Ultimate: Terra Ring
- Extra 1: Any
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Dark Katana
Advantages:
- “Tectonic Drill” is considered a melee arcana, making it privy to the Dark Katana’s perk, tripling the critical hit chance of all melee arcana. This, combined with “Awe”’s perk of increasing critical hit chance and damage, makes for a powerful centerpiece for your build. Terra Ring (especially its ultimate) and Earth Knuckles act as powerful follow-ups as well.
6. “Immortal Mage” Build
This combines elements of the “Self-Healing” build with an aggressive arcana set, designed to get up close and personal with the enemy while surrounding yourself with protective spells. This not only ensures that you’re able to heal yourself throughout the Chaos Trials, but you also have a good mix of protective and offensive spells in combat, making you a versatile and lethal mage.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Awe
Arcana:
- Basic: Chaos Reaper (Optional)
- Dash: Ignition Rush
- Standard: Cardice Prime
- Ultimate: Tearing Whirlwind
- Extra 1: Any
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Vampire’s Eyeglasses
Advantages:
- Tearing Whirlwind sucks enemies in towards you and the effective range of Cardice Prime and Ignition Rush. Activate these alongside your basic arcana, and you’ll be protected by a circle of ice spikes and a circle of flames. Once you get used to the flow of this build, you’ll be dealing damage while well-protected.
- “Awe” and Vampire’s Eyeglasses work together to make you a self-sufficient healer. Vampire’s Eyeglasses gives you a small healing bonus for every critical hit. “Awe” increases critical hit and damage. And the rest is history.
5. Full Fire Build
A build fully composed of fire arcana, for those whose favorite element is fire. Fierce and decisive, this build is designed to deal as much damage as possible, as fast as possible! All the arcana are designed to chain into one another in a combo of attacks, quickly building up signature charge and paving the way for finishing with a devastating ultimate attack. If you’ve ever wanted to experience the feeling of dealing high, violent bursts of damage, this build may just give you that.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Fury
Arcana:
- Basic: Flame Cross
- Dash: Ignition Rush (Optional)
- Standard: Exploding Fireball
- Ultimate: Homing Flares
- Extra 1: Any flame arcana
- Extra 2: Any flame arcana
- Reserve: Any flame arcana
Relics:
- Starter: Neve’s Ruby
Advantages:
- This build is composed of long-range attacks, allowing you to keep a safe distance while dealing good bursts of damage to enemies. However, Homing Flares and Exploding Fireball are also particularly lethal in close-quarters; they deal knockback and have respectable AoE, making this build versatile and suited to most situations you’ll encounter in the Chaos Trials.
- Equipping seven flame arcana will make all enemies burn at a single hit, stacking to your already hard-hitting arcana.
4. Full Lightning Build
While working with a different element, this build works the same way the Full Fire Build does; chaining your set of spells to build up signature charge and finish with a powerful ultimate attack. Though, while the fire build focuses on dealing high bursts of damage, this build focuses on sustaining quick chains and combinations of attacks; an energetic and persistent playstyle, much like how lightning is (at least in the game’s lore).
Loadout:
- Cloak: Awe
Arcana:
- Basic: Volt Disc
- Dash: Thunder Line
- Standard: Arc Sphere
- Ultimate: Deferred Dynamo
- Extra 1: Any lightning arcana
- Extra 2: Any lightning arcana
- Reserve: Any lightning arcana
Relics:
- Starter: Neve’s Citrine
Advantages:
- In the right circumstances, chaining your attacks will build up signature quite quickly, allowing you to deal massive amounts of damage with Deferred Dynamo’s ultimate attack.
- This build’s lethality only stacks when you find three extra lightning arcana. Neve’s Citrine increases critical hit chance by 20% when you equip seven lightning arcana. This, paired with “Awe,” which increases critical hit chance and damage, will make your already quick lightning arcana hit hard.
3. Full Earth Build
Earth is strong and resilient, and if you’re a fan of being headstrong, standing your ground, and grinding through your enemies, this build is tailored for you. Majority of your arcana in this build is centered around melee, so you’ll be exchanging blows often as you deal hard, powerful attacks.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Grit
Arcana:
- Basic: Stone Shot
- Dash: Tunneling Drive
- Standard: Tectonic Drill
- Ultimate: Rock n’ Roll
- Extra 1: Any
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Thesis on Defense
Advantages:
- Tectonic Drill and Rock n’ Roll are very solid crowd control arcana. They can hit and knock back large amounts of enemies, keeping them stunned and leaving them to follow-up attacks. Herd enemies into a group by kiting them to get the most out of these two arcana!
- Thesis Defense and Grit serve to make you tanky by providing bonuses to armor and healing. Something that you’ll need when herding enemies and fighting bosses, especially earth-type enemies.
2. Full Wind Build
Wind is flexible and versatile, and with this build, you’ll always be deciding the terms of the fight. This build is designed to pull enemies into your area of influence, where they’ll suffer debuffs to their movement, and suffer increased damage from air arcana. This gives you control over most combat situations, and you can use your different arcana to keep them in your area of effect.
Loadout:
- Cloak: Awe
Arcana:
- Basic: Wind Slash
- Dash: Gust Burst
- Standard: Ward of Winds
- Ultimate: Cyclone Boomerang
- Extra 1: Any
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Rudra’s Pinwheel
Advantages:
- Ward of Winds slows down enemies and leaves them more vulnerable to air damage, as long as they’re within its AoE. This damage bonus stacks with Rudra’s Pinwheel, which increases the damage of all air arcana you have. You can use Cyclone Boomerang and Gust Burst to pull enemies towards you, use Ward of Winds, and wreak havoc!
- “Awe” increases your damage output by giving bonuses to critical hit chance and damage, further adding to your damage output.
1. “Whirlwind” Build
This build is designed similarly to the “Immortal Mage” build, but instead of being built around longevity, this build tries to shorten arcana cooldown as much as possible to make full use of its Tearing Whirlwind and Volt Pinball combo, sucking enemies into Volt Pinball’s range and spreading damage around your enemies.
Loadout
- Cloak: Venture or Tempo
Arcana:
- Basic: Any
- Dash: Any
- Standard: Tearing Whirlwind
- Ultimate: Volt Pinball
- Extra 1: Blazing Lariat (Optional)
- Extra 2: Any
- Reserve: Any
Relics:
- Starter: Tozy’s Pocket Watch
- Cursed: Double Toil
- Cursed: Double Trouble (Optional)
Advantages:
- Tearing Whirlwind and Volt Pinball make up a potent combo, activate Volt Pinball and use Tearing Whirlwind to suck enemies into its effective range. This ensures that you’re constantly spreading damage onto as many enemies as possible within a room.
- Tozy’s Pocket Watch and Venture build onto this combo by reducing the cooldown of your arcana, as well as giving you a damage bonus. The cursed relics “Double Toil” and “Double Trouble” serve to stack onto this benefit further, albeit at the cost of receiving double damage for each cursed relic.
