Characters / Phantasy Star Online 2 New Genesis Classes

A list of characters in Phantasy Star Online 2: New Genesis referring to the playable classes of the game. To return to the main character index, click here.

Main Page | ARKS | DOLLS | Starless | Classes

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Hunter

Hunters are the vanguards of ARKS, standing on the frontlines to draw away enemy attacks and cut a path for their allies.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Blademaster, focusing on heavy, charged attacks. They can also play as the Tank, having a plethora of skills that increase survivability, as well as "War Cry" to ensure all the mobs come to them and barely make a dent in the Hunter.
• BFS: The average Hunter's sword is as long if not longer than the user is tall. The Limit Break also transforms the sword into a much bigger sword to strike the enemies.
• Charged Attack: Hunter's speciality, carried over from the base PSO2. Sword deserves special mentions for having "Over Charge" (charging PA a bit longer to third level) and "Charge Avenger" (automatic Counter-Attack after charging PA for certain duration).
• Combo: Hunters are able to take skills that allow them to skip parts of their Normal Attack chain to get to the more damaging final hit by comboing two different or two of the same Photon Arts with the requisite skills.
• Limit Break:
  • Sword: Turns their weapon into a BFS and cleaves the enemy with two swings of their sword.
  • Wire Lances: Zips in light speed to create a web of wires, cutting up foes that are caught within.
  • Partisan: Slashes the enemy with several swipes of their weapon before running them through with a powerful lunging charge.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: Players familiar with Hunter in the original PSO2 will be tempted to charge their Photon Arts to tank enemy attacks thanks to the Charged Parry skill. Unfortunately for them, its effects have been inverted in New Genesis, as attacks are only blocked when a Photon Art is released rather than when it's charged.
• Grappling-Hook Pistol: The Wire Lance's weapon action allows the user to wrap the lances around a target and pull themselves closer to dropkick them.
• Heroes Prefer Swords: The default Hunter weapon is a Sword, and the player is assumed to be a sword-wielding Hunter in story cutscenes.
• Marked to Die: Volkraptor makes a return as a Partisan-wielding Hunter's signature attack. It fires a lance of energy that embeds itself in the target. The Hunter is then given a short time window to deal as much damage to the marked part of the target to repeat a portion of that damage on the target when the mark is triggered.
• Mighty Glacier: Sword has the highest attack stats, but moves relatively slower even compared to other Hunter weapons. While Wired Lance grants better mobility, and Partisan grants rapid attacks, Sword's Photon Arts revolve around landing few but powerful hits. Notably, the skill "Over Charge" and "Charge Avenger" are exclusive to Sword, incentivize players to charge PA longer for more powerful attacks, resulting in massive damage in exchange for slower playstyle.
• Spin Attack: With the requisite skill, Wired Lances are able to use their weapon action to spin their lances around them to damage and stagger all nearby enemies.
• Weapon Specialization: Hunters have exclusive access to Partisans, spear-like weapons that can also take the shape of a poleaxe. Partisans specialize in the use of Combos for huge burst damage in conjunction with the Hunter's Volkraptor, which marks a target to take a percentage of the damage a Hunter deals to it over the next few seconds.
• Whip Sword: Wire Lances return in this game. Compared to the original PSO2 which emphasized the use of wires for grappling maneuvers, New Genesis emphasizes the "sword" part, swinging the lances in a frenzy to slash enemies with a wider range than other melee weapons. In addition, a Wire Lance's weapon action allows players to wrap them around an enemy to prepare a Diving Kick as a gap closer and a source of burst damage.

Fighter

Fighters are swift, hard-hitting close-range specialists who trade defense for offense, assailing their opponents with flurries of attacks.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Scrapper, carrying over from their original incarnation. Speedy, close-ranged combat is where Fighters thrive, and what little defense they have is mitigated by their quick movements that keeps them from getting touched.
• Combo: Fighters possess skip art skills similar to Etoile in the previous game. By chaining two of the same or two different Photon Art together, they can skip parts of their Normal Attack chain to get to the more damaging final hit.
• Double Weapon: Double Sabers are double-bladed weapons that are used for a variety of spinning attacks an to generate cyclone Razor Wind.
• Dual Wield: Fighters are able to use Twin Daggers for rapid-slashing attacks while staying airborne. They can also parry away attacks all around them with their weapon action.
• Glass Cannon: Fighter's playstyle incentivizes keeping Overload on as much as possible, boosting the damage they deal in exchange for taking more themselves. Getting good at dodging or timing the defensive weapon actions for Knuckles and Double Sabers is highly encouraged.
• "Just Frame" Bonus: Acceleration Drive, which is unique to Twin Daggers. After performing a Photon Art, the user will flash white-purple, allowing them to dash in and continue engaging the enemy when a normal attack is done in that small window.
• Kick Them While They Are Down: While everyone can do this, Fighters have the upper-hand in this regard due to their "Defeat Advantage" and "Defeat PP Recovery" skills. The former gives them a damage bonus on downed enemies, while the latter boosts PP recovery. Coupled with a Bouncer for faster Downs, this gives them immense burst damage potential.
• Limit Break:
  • Knuckles: Winds up for a single, supercharged Megaton Punch.
  • Twin Daggers: A lightning-fast flurry of slashes that cuts through the foe.
  • Double Saber: An elegant dance of blades slice and dice before slashing down to finish the job.
• Power Fist: Knuckles are these, enhancing a Fighter's punches to pound away at DOLLS.
• Power Up Letdown:
  • You can buy the Spiral Drive Skill on the Skill Tree for one Skill Point, which allows you to expend the Kamaitachi you've built up from dealing hits to produce what is effectively Étoile's Double Saber explosion attack, rushing forward to deal two big hits in a small area of effect in front of you. The problem with this Skill is that it shares its resource cost with Deadly Archer, which is slower but hits much harder and has total invulnerability, meaning there is often very little reason to use Spiral Drive except against groups of weak mobs. The fact that Spiral Drive activates by holding normal attack means that buying this Skill also stops you from just holding normal to fight, since you might accidentally waste your Kamaitachi.
  • Overload / Limit Break, for what it's worth, is pretty lackluster overall. While it no longer decreases maximum HP, it only grants a 20% damage boost and it only lasts for 30 seconds with a three minute cooldown. It can be used to pick up some free burst during a Down or a Break, but the effect is not very noticeable overall and it takes so long to come off cooldown that you generally only get it twice in one Urgent, and that's if you don't blow it at the wrong time or get yourself killed and activate your Last Chance Hit Point.
• Razor Wind: Double Sabers are able to produce slashing whirlwinds around themselves and their targets to deal damage.
• Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: Thousand Blows opens with a flurry of punches before finishing with an uppercut.
• Reduced Mana Cost: Knuckle Arts Combo PP Save reduces PP consumption as you use P As back-to-back. Using a basic attack or weapon action will reset the bonus.

Ranger

Rangers are mid-range combatants who specialize in picking off their foes from a distance with their rapid-fire Assault Rifles or their heavy-duty Launchers.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Archer, at least in concept. Their damage isn't extraordinary, but they're able to provide covering fire and utility with Blight Rounds. They're also able to prevent and shrug off status conditions quicker, especially with the absence of the status-curing Anti technique.
• BFG: Though considerably smaller than they were in the original PSO2, launchers are still Chainsaw Grip BFGs that Rangers can tote around to blast away their foes.
• Boring, but Practical: Assault Rifles are this. Their normal attack just has you firing a stream of bullets into a target. It's pretty monotonous, but it's accurate, deals decent damage, and can be held indefinitely since it doesn't cost anything to fire. It also happens to be the least situational attack that Rifle has, since almost all the PAs are specialized for specific situations.
  • Blight Rounds, the main Ranger skill, fires a projectile that creates a weak point on an enemy, increasing the amount of damage dealt. It's not at all flashy, but you'd be hard-pressed to find a party who doesn't want a Ranger to help them take down a boss.
  • Blaze Shot used to be Awesome, but Impractical due to being woefully accurate until an update turned it into this trope. Now, it behaves like a faster normal attack, with the added benefit of extra mobility, allowing for quick repositioning and sustained damage.
• Charged Attack: Rangers are able to charge a Rifle or Launcher's normal attack to deal a more damaging AOE explosion.
• Death from Above: Launchers are able to fire a mortar shell that comes down on an area before exploding repeatedly for high damage.
• Gun Fu: To a lesser extent than Gunners, but Rifles and Launchers both have a Photon Art that allows them to slide along the ground while spraying their foes with projectiles. However, the Rifle PA, Blaze Shot, is rather inaccurate beyond close range, making it far more useful as a quick repositioning tool than as an offensive one.
• Homing Projectile: Multiple Launch, a Launcher Photon Art, fires several homing projectiles followed by a single blast, with it's main gimmick that said projectiles go through enemies, preventing a smaller enemy from taking the shot from the Ranger's target.
• Limit Break:
  • Assault Rifle: Commands a Kill Sat to lock-on and blast the enemy with a storm of lasers from above.
  • Launcher: Loads up a single gravity shot that implodes on impact.
• Marked to Die: Blight Rounds creates a weak point on the target, increasing all damage dealt to the marked area.
• More Dakka: The Blaze Shot Photon art allows players to quickly glide while firing in full-auto, draining PP in the process. While the description stresses how it's more of a retreating technique to quickly run away from enemies, it can also be used as a damage burst against stunned or not too mobile enemies.
• Not the Intended Use: Blight Rounds leave markers visible to everyone on the map in order to make it easier for players to know where to aim during a battle. However, aid marker also appears on non-combat targets, such as Containers or resource nodes, allowing benevolent players to tag spots where to farm for their fellow Meteorn.
• Sticky Bomb: The Launcher weapon action throws a sticky bomb that detonates after a certain period of time for a large burst of PP recovery, offset by a hefty 30 second cooldown even with the requisite skill.
• Throw Down the Bomblet: The Assault Rifle weapon action is a 3-round burst followed by the Ranger either throwing a grenade exploding on impact, if the players inputs a direction during the execution, or setting up a proximity mine without directional input.
• Wave-Motion Gun: Fear Eraser, a Launcher Photon Art, is a man-sized version of this. It's capable of enormous damage output but it also eats through your PP like nobody's business.

Gunner

Gunners are close-ranged gunslingers who dance around the fight with acrobatics while using their Twin Machine Guns to pelt their foes with bullets in preparation for massive burst damage.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Archer, with a mix of Scrapper. Death of a Thousand Cuts is what their guns are built for, and they're also about utilizing their acrobatics to get in, get out, and keep a rain of bullets going all the while.
• Charged Attack: The crux of Gunner's damage kit is their Chain Trigger, which is activated and unleashed with a charged PA, and is charged up with normal attacks and un-charged P As. As opposed to how it works in base PSO2, it's not relegated to one target as it can be charged with while attacking any enemies and thus makes their Photon Art Aimless Rain useful for charging it while fighting mobs of enemies, and can make that art very effective in taking out those mobs.
• Close-Range Combatant: Although they use guns, Gunners do their best work up-close-and-personal and in the thick of enemy mobs, dodging attacks at the last second with Stylish Roll and shooting back to prepare Chain Trigger for huge burst damage. Their gunfire also hits harder at close range (indicated by an orange targeting reticle instead of white)
• Crutch Character: Like the melee-oriented classes, Gunners do not descend while performing normal attacks and most PAs in the air with their TMGs; they only do so ''after' the attack has completed. Beginners or newcomers to the NGS will quickly realize this allows the Gunner to kill most early-game enemies without taking any hits by simply holding the attack button down to rain More Dakka from above while staying airborne and out of their attack range, especially if they have teammates or NPCs present to distract the enemies from targeting the Gunner. As the game progresses monsters will start having much increased reach along with access to attacks and projectiles that can strike both ground and air (sometimes concurrently as well) or lock on against aerial combatants, completely negating this early-game advantage.
• Glass Cannon: Gunners have unsurpassed burst damage with a perfectly setup Chain Trigger, but their nature as Close Range Combatants and their lower health and defenses means that mastering sidestepping and Stylish Roll is essential to staying in the fight.
• Guns Akimbo: Favors Twin Machine Guns. While they can use Assault Rifles, most of a Gunner's skills are Twin Machine Gun-exclusive, encouraging them to stick to TMGs
• Gun Fu: Gunners make extensive use of flips and jumps to dodge attacks while continuing to shoot at enemies.
• Limit Break: The Twin Machine Gun Photon Blast utilizes Improbable Aiming Skills to make their gunfire ricochet everywhere before the final shot explodes on impact.

Force

Forces are long-range attackers whose Techniques let them control photons to burn, freeze, and shock their foes with the power of the elements.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Nuker, blowing up mobs of enemies with their techniques and exploiting of elemental weaknesses to their advantage.
• Attack Drone: The Talis Weapon Action deploys a card on the spot, shooting at wherever the user is facing.
• Combat Medic: While the Resta technique is absent from New Genesis, Forces can support their party with the skill Resta Field Force, which generates an area that heals allies that step into it whenever they use a Restasigne.
• Counter-Attack: Elemental Bullet is essentially the Phantom's Dodge Counter Shot in Force form. A successful parry stores up a bullet that can be fired on the next technique cast. The bullet's element is based on what technique is cast.
• Fire, Ice, Lightning: Forces have access to the Foie, Barta, and Zonde.
• Limit Break:
  • Rod: The user combines the elements to form a powerful laser.
  • Talis: Deals several cards to shoot down a gigantic beam from the sky.
• Squishy Wizard: Forces are able to unleash all sorts of mayhem with their Techs, but you'd better stay on your toes and know when to block unless you want to eat dirt. On the plus side, you can move while casting now, and Rod can block attacks which regenerates PP.
• Stance System: The Talis Photon Arts change the behavior in which techniques are cast. Convergence Shot lays talises in a front-facing formation, casting techniques in a concentrated form, while Spread Shot spreads talises in a two-part attack. The first half makes techniques shoot in a tri-shot spread, while the second half turns it into a six-direction spray.
• Super Mode: Photon Flare is an active skill that boosts the Force's attack power while in use. With the right skills, it can also sacrifice a bit of damage for drastically reduced charging time on Techniques and refund all the PP spent during Photon Flare once it finishes.

Techter

Techters are Tech specialists who are able to pelt enemies from afar as well as get in close for a good whack from their Wands, as well as support their allies' offense and defense.

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• An Adventurer Is You: A magic-infused Blademaster, in part of having Photon Arts for their wand, augmented with elemental power. They also carry over Buffer, being the sole users of "Shifta/Deband", and Healer, with the potential for boosted healing power with "Resta Field Techter".
• Carry a Big Stick: Wands, just like the original game, take the form of maces to smash foes with blunt force.
• Charged Attack: Heavy Hammer makes a return in this game as a Wand Photon Art. While the damage isn't quite as apocalyptic as before, the full charge time has been slashed in half, making it much more practical overall.
• Combat Medic: Like Forces, Techters can learn a skill that creates a healing field for allies when they use a Restasigne. Their version of the ability, Resta Field Techter, additionally increases the healing potency of their Restasignes, giving them a leg up on the Force in this role.
• Cool Sword: If the wand isn't a blunt weapon of any sort, its usually in the form of a one-handed sword. This can also apply to certain weapon camos.
• Counter-Attack: Lifted wholesale from Étoile Wands to create this version of Wand Lovers. Not only does it protect the user from knockback, it grants parry frames on normal attacks, allowing a Techter to clash their weapon against an enemy attack to deflect and strike back.
• Death Dealer: Techters share the ability to wield Talises with Forces, utilizing them to modify their Techniques for greater effectiveness.
• Fire, Ice, Lightning: Just like Forces, they can use Foie, Barta, and Zonde.
• Limit Break: The Wand Photon Blast makes the Techter rush in with a powered-up wand and wails on their target with it, finishing it with a heavy slam of their weapon.
• Magic Knight: Moreso than their original counterpart. Techters still share their technique abilities with Forces, but come with a slew of combat skills not unlike the melee classes. They come with two wand Photon Arts to bring on the pain in close-combat, and can control their elemental weapon damage on command. To top off their combat abilities, they can parry via their Weapon Action. The one thing they have to watch out for is their squishier defenses.
• Spell Blade: Wand Element Change allows the Techter to imbue an element to their weapon via casting a charged technique of their choosing.
• Status Buff: Shifta and Deband are now a Techter-exclusive skill in New Genesis, making them the only class able to directly buff their allies' attack and defense.
• Support Party Member: Downplayed. Techters have exclusive access to Shifta and Deband in New Genesis, allowing them to buff their entire party's offense and defense. But they're also able to keep up with the other classes in damage and are actively encouraged to get into the thick of things.

Braver

Bravers are hybrid combat units that utilize swiftness to engage in close combat with a katana, or shoot from afar with a photon bow.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Jack of All Trades, being a Katana and Bow-wielding combatant with versatile but middling damage. "Special Ability Optimization" can make it so both Melee and Ranged-specific buffs benefit both stats, making them true hybrid fighters.
• Bow and Sword in Accord: The Braver's fighting style of choice, giving them versatility in battle.
• Counter-Attack: "Katana Guard Counter", which works just like Counter Edge; guard before you get hit, then you strike back with your katana. "Katana Guard Counter Advance" adds in a Sword Beam alongside it. If you're feeling daring, "Fearless Attitude" is another way to counter, by not attacking just before an attack connects, then retaliating with your own.
• Iaijutsu Practitioner: The fighting style is this, just like in the original game's Braver and with a touch of Phantom.
• Limit Break:
  • Katana: A quick draw of the blade becomes a thousand cuts before finishing with a single, gigantic stroke.
  • Bow: The Braver nocks a super-charged arrow, and lets it fly for a potential One-Hit Polykill.
• No "Arc" in "Archery": Played completely straight in contrast to the original; arrows always fly straight and true, regular or not.
• Reduced Mana Cost: Bow Arts Combo PP Save reduces PP consumption as you use PAs back-to-back. Using a basic attack or weapon action will reset the bonus.
• Super Mode: "Braver Combat", which lowers PP consumption and boosts PP regeneration for the duration. Unique to this skill is the ability to manually end the skill for a finisher, much like the Scion classes' "Time" skills. Additionally, the skill's timers can be reduced down to a 15s active time and 60s cooldown, trading off some of that PP cost reduction uptime for more finishers.
• Trick Arrow: The bow's specialty, ranging from homing arrows, to explosive arrows, to arrows that hide in another dimension.

Bouncer

Bouncers are high-flying combatants that confound their enemies with their mobility, wielding soaring blades or jet boots.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Scrapper, with Debuffer on the side in contrast to their original incarnation. They still retain their swift, high-flying style as before, but traded their buffing power for the ability to make enemies more susceptible to being knocked down, and inflict Jellen to soften their blows.
• Armed Legs: Jet boots are less like literal boots and moreso bladed attachments to your footwear.
• Awesome, but Impractical: "Jet Intensity" is practically Jetsweep Kick's successor, having an axe kick that'd make its ancestor proud. However, Jet Intensity has not nearly as easy setup, requiring a few seconds of your time to get it going; a few seconds too long in the heat of battle to make it spammable. It's still worth it to get one in when you can, but the risk is high.
• Blade Spam: Soaring blades come packed with photon blades, letting them riddle their targets with stab wounds from afar.
• Flash Step: Jet Boots have three conditional gap closer skills that blink them in striking range when used. Should a Jet Boots Bouncer have to back off for whatever reason, they won't stay out of striking range for long.
  • "Thrust Drive" allows JB users to blink-kick an opponent after casting a technique. Ideal for getting back in range after venting tech stacks.
  • "Jet Boots Bounce Counter" allows JB users to kick a condensed photon wave at the target after successfully dodging an attack; performing a normal attack afterwards results in a blink-kick.
  • "Boots Arts Skip Beat" lets JB users jump in with an overhead kick after performing two different Photon Arts back-to-back, and replenishes a good amount of PP on the kick; the follow-up is the fourth attack in the basic attack chain, which has some lengthy evasion frames, making this a safe follow-up whenever Jetsweep Jolt is on cooldown.
• Gathering Steam: How "Jet Intensity" works. It starts out slow, but as the user continues attacking, it gradually builds up speed in power before unleashing an axe kick that inflicts a ludicrous amount of damage. Given how much time is required, it's not recommended to attempt this in any other situation other than openings from downing enemies.
• Limit Break:
  • Soaring blades summon a wave of photon blades before combining their swords into a BFS to cleave their foes down.
  • Jet boots whips up a ball of elemental energy, then kicks the slow-moving projectile to mow down whatever gets caught in its trail.
  • Jet boots also has a mini version known as "Jetsweep Jolt", named after their famous power kick in the original game. While not nearly as destructive in power, it doesn't have the painfully long windup time, nor the need to dispel the boots' active element. With the addition of Jetsweet Jolt Rapid Boost, PP Save, and Short Cooldown, Bouncers gain extra boons for using it, and have a means to do it again sooner.
• Magic Knight: As it was in the original game, the Bouncer retains the ability to cast techniques, even sharing Barta Blot and Zonde-Clad from the two Technique-based classes. The catch is that the technique-casting capabilities are limited to the jet boots. The Melee-Tech disparity can be evened out by taking "Special Ability Optimization", allowing the Bouncer to be a hybrid fighter.
• Rapid-Fire Fisticuffs: Their "Jet Intensity" skill for Jet Boots turns holding down the normal attack button into this, kicking the enemy while slowly picking up speed until it ends in one VERY powerful final hit.
• Reduced Mana Cost: Jetsweep Jolt PP Save reduces all PP consumption slightly after performing Jetsweep Jolt, which lasts until its cooldown ends.
• Spell Blade: Spell boot, rather. Unlike how Techter handles theirs, jet boots can imbue elements into their weapons with just a short charge. Even more unlike them, elementally-charged boot Photon Arts count as uncharged techniques when gaining stacks for skills such as Barta Blot and Zonde-Clad. This allows them to utilize those abilities without needing to touch their respective techniques other than to imbue the boots' element or set off their stacks.
• Spin Attack: Soaring blades' Photon Arts have copious amounts of spinning involved, which may or may not have anything to do with their Étoile background.
• Sword Beam: Er, jet boots beam, in this case. "Fierce Wave" is a lingering shockwave of photon energy, which can be charged to add an additional, bigger one.
• Theme Naming: Soaring blades once again have bird-themed Photon Arts. This time, it's "Destructive Stork", "Rampaging Harrier", and "Roaring Pheasant". Jet Boots, meanwhile, are wind-themed with "Spinning Gust", "Violent Gale", and "Fierce Wave".

Waker

A unique class that calls upon the aid of powerful photonic entities known as Familiars to battle. Armed with Harmonizers to control their Familiars, Wakers utilize their distinct abilities to fight at all ranges and battle with explosive power.

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• An Adventurer Is You: The Summoner, in truer fashion compared to their ancestor. Instead of fighting side-by-side Beastmaster-style, they call their summons as part of their Arts, making the Waker themselves more physically involved.
• Action Bomb: Marmelo, the successor to Marron and Melon. This time it is relegated specifically to the Waker's Weapon Action button.
• Actionized Sequel: Compared to Summoners, Wakers have less to worry about in the gear department, as Familiars don't need to be raised or fed like Pets did. Familiars are now also summoned on command rather than being pseudo-independent from the player, removing a lot of the clunkiness of Pets, and Wakers themselves now actively participate in combat due to Harmonizers now having their own attacks and abilities.
• Attack Drone: With the Familiar Assist skill, a tiny drone based on your Familiar will appear after activating Treble Clef Ignition. These Familiar drones will periodically shoot bullets at enemies, dealing additional damage. Damage inflicted by Familiar Assist additionally builds Familiar Focus for that Familiar.
• Breath Weapon: Fredran specializes in these. Fredran Breath evokes Redran Laser as it fires bullets from its mouth at foes; holding down the PA button will allow it to lock on to multiple foes and fire bullets all at once. Fredran Riding also allows it to perform a single-target variation if tapped.
• Bulletproof Human Shield: Marmelo defends the Waker by using its body as a guarding mechanic. With the Hot Marmelo Parry Skill, Marmelo will even automatically defend the user from almost all attacks for a limited time, even if the user is in the middle of an attack.
• Call-Back: When Old Friends Rescue activates, images of Wanda, Sally, and Trim, the three starting Summoner Pets, surround the player to defend them.
• Combination Attack:
  • By having at least one stock each of Familiar Focus for both Fredran and Wolfa, the Waker can use a skill called Familiar Union, which will expend one of each Focus Gauge to trigger a powerful attack where the two Familiars team up to strike down foes. By learning the Familiar Unison Marmelo Plus skill, having at least one stock of Marmelo Focus when the attack is used will spend a stock of Marmelo Focus and cue Marmelo to join in with an uppercut attack, boosting Familiar Union's damage.
  • The Waker's Photon Blast involves all three Familiars teaming up to attack; Fredran and Wolfa appear and fire laser beams at enemies, then Marmelo appears and summons a squad of illusory Summoner Pets to overwhelm foes.
• Counter-Attack: In addition to a traditional counter, Waker possesses a unique counter mechanic called Marmelo Strike, which functions identically to Marron Strike and Melon Strike from PSO2. By blocking attacks with Marmelo, Marmelo's charge meter will increase by up to two stages. Holding and releasing the Weapon Action button will trigger the Waker to throw Marmelo, dealing massive damage. The higher the charge level, the more damage Marmelo Strike inflicts.
• Damage-Increasing Debuff: Much like Summoner's Mark, Treble Clef Mark increases the damage a marked enemy takes from your Harmonizer PAs.
• Difficult, but Awesome: Waker's gameplay evokes this in much the same way Summoner's did. It is uniquely the only class in the game whose combat revolves almost entirely around resource management, as its biggest burst damage requires Familiar Focus and Marmelo charge stacks. Juggling building Familiar Focus by both actively using Familiar PAs and popping Treble Clef Marking for Familiar Assist to build Focus for your non-active Familiar becomes a rather strenuous exercise in battle awareness, and Marmelo can be rather finicky at times and requires multiple hits to charge up. That said, this is rewarded by Waker having possibly the biggest burst damage in the entire game, with both Familiar Unison and full charge Marmelo Strike having staggering power notations and coming out near-instantly.
• Edible Theme Naming: The Familiar that Waker uses for their Weapon Action is named Marmelo, a Portugese word for a quince, fitting in with Summoner's Marron (Japanese for "chestnut") and Melon Pets. It also happens to be a portmanteau of the words "Marron" and "Melon", reflecting it being their successor.
• Good Old Fisticuffs: Wolfa is the close-ranged attacker of the Waker's Familiar trio, who fights almost exclusively by using its fists to punch really hard and get up close and personal with foes.
• Heal Thyself: Wakers have access to Old Friends Rescue, a Mythology Gag to Summoner's Dear Master skill, which gives them a chance to automatically recover HP if they take more than a certain percentage of their max health in damage in a single hit.
• Limit Break: For their Photon Blast, the Waker calls Wolfen and Fredran to shoot laser beams at foes in front of them. Marmelo then appears and summons a wave of illusory Summoner Pets to deal multiple hits of heavy damage.
• Magic Knight: Averted this time, unlike Summoner. Harmonizers, despite being classified as a Technique weapon, do not have access to Techniques, likely to address the fact that Summoner had virtually no business using them except for utility and buffs.
• Magic Music: Waker inherits the music theming that was present with the Summoner class. In addition to using a baton for a weapon, their unique Marked to Die mechanic is called the Treble Clef Mark, and the class's icon has been changed from a generic beast to an eighth-note.
• Marked to Die: One of the class's unique mechanics is Treble Clef Marking, a marker mechanic very similar to that of Phantom Marker with elements of Summoner's Mark. By attacking foes with your Familiars repeatedly, a Treble Clef Mark will appear on them, which increases the damage they take from your Harmonizer PAs. With the Treble Clef Ignition skill, holding down the normal attack button allows the Waker to detonate active Treble Clef Marks, inflicting additional damage and restoring a large chunk of PP.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter: Distinct for actually gaining a mechanic that other classes lost in the transition to NGS: a Focus Gauge. Attacking with your Familiars builds Familiar Focus, which can be expended to perform a Limit Break when both Fredran and Wolfa have at least 1 Stock of Familiar Focus.
• Power Up Mount: Fredran Riding allows the Waker to jump onto Fredran and fly around on it. You can ram into foes to deal damage, and releasing the PA button will cause the Waker to dismount while shooting Fredran forward, dealing an explosive blast on impact.
• Reduced Mana Cost: Call Again PP Save reduces PP consumption for Familiar PAs if both Fredran and Wolfa have 0 Familiar Focus Stock.
• Regenerating Health: Wakers can learn Resta Effect Continuance, which decreases the HP immediately healed by a Restasigne in exchange for healing in bursts over a short period of time after using a Restasigne.
• Stone Wall: Waker has many skills designed to make them hard to kill, evoking Summoner's Mighty Glacier attributes from the original game. They can automatically heal with Old Friends Rescue, gain Damage Reduction and boosted healing from Welfare Management when below a certain percentage of their max HP, turn Restasignes into Regenerating Health with Resta Effect Continuance, and gain a chance to not consume a Restasigne or Reversersigne with Lucky Sign. They also have access to Hot Marmelo Parry, an Active Skill that can be used during any action and causes Marmelo to automatically block the next attack that would hit you.

Slayer

Slayers are speedy combatants that marry melee and ranged combat with Gunblades, a multi-form weapon that can switch between a handgun and a short sword on command.

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• An Adventurer Is You: What happens when the Jack of All Trades has a gun and a sword merged into one and can fly at their foes like a whirling buzzsaw of death. They lean more towards the Scrapper with hints of the Archer, but most especially have several Area-of-Effect options.
• Attack! Attack! Attack!: A Slayer's moveset is so filled with a constant barrage of shots, slashes and explosions that a skilled Gunblade wielder will be like a proverbial wrecking ball of destruction. Their Focus Gauge effectively requires this strategy to keep it from emptying out, and even their counter is not a guard or dodge, but a blade swing, encouraging you to smack the foe with your parry.
• Critical Hit Class: Slayer boasts skills that boost their critical hit rate, as well as a skill that accelerates PP generation on critical hit. Though since crits in this game boil down to hitting the high end of damage range, it means Slayers will churn out consistently high damage with little to no variance.
• Damn You, Muscle Memory!: Luster veterans from the original game may be tripped up by the fact Gunblades are classified as a ranged weapon, not melee. The default combo are gunfire shots, and the Weapon Action is the melee combo they're expecting to see. As such, flailing around suspended in the air trying to do a basic combo can and will happen, and would eventually lead to faceplanting once you get slapped out of the sky.
• Difficult, but Awesome:
  • The class has a number of features that require mixing the Weapon Action, Normal Attack, and Photon Arts commands with directional inputs (called Move Arts) and each other to truly get the most from it, but it lives up to its name if you can pull it off.
  • Flowing Sirius in its Stay Art locks the player in position for a series of attacks chained together. If you perform the PA twice in a row, it continues the combo further for the single highest amount of damage your regular attacks can do, and gains Unleashed Rage and Gunblade Focus meter very rapidly for a single-target focus. However, while you can Weapon Action cancel out of most of the attack, it only does its strongest bouts of damage with the finishing blows of each half, meaning you have to either only use the move on downed foes, or play it very riskily to get the most out of the PA. Against overly mobile foes, it's functionally useless until they slow down.
• Fragile Speedster: For all their Glass Cannon issues below, a major factor of the Slayer is that they are damn fast. Shifting Spica's Move Art can immediately get them in an enemy's face, as can using a Weapon Action after a charged Normal, and most of their Move Arts allow them to shift position during a combo, as does their Weapon Action. Half of your game plan consists of mauling foes and getting in their face before backing out as necessary — or countering into their attacks to keep up a hectic assault without pause for the more skilled and daring. This makes them readily more mobile than every other class generally relying on the Photon Dash with only a handful of distance control options strewn about.
• Glass Cannon: Slayer's main disadvantage. Although it has nigh-unstoppable offense, it possesses the lowest HP stat in the game, even lower than Technique classes. Mastery is required to not only keep up an assault but also to avoid getting grazed by an enemy's attack and getting immediately squashed into a flat pancake.
• Jack of All Trades: As a Melee-Ranged hybrid, the Slayer can do basically everything you can think of or need, all wrapped onto a single weapon in the Gunblade. While individual attacks may not initially seem high, as the ranged options don't do as much damage as the strongest Ranger moves nor reach as far, and the melee won't be hitting as hard as something like a Katana Braver, the sheer speed of all their attacks accumulating accelerates their DPS to high levels and makes up for it all in the right hands.
• Limit Break:
  • Slayers can use Unleashed Rage, a special attack that builds up by hitting with Slayer PAs and allows the player to rapidly approach a target and deal a ravaging strike.
  • For their weapon proper, the gunblade wielder summons a dimensional field to surround their target before charging in to unleash a flurry of slashes, before finishing the job with a storm of homing bullets that shatters open their field.
• Mechanically Unusual Fighter:
  • It gains a Focus Gauge much like Waker, but even beyond that the Slayer is the only class with directional inputs changing their Photon Arts, a necessity for only wielding one weapon versus everyone else's two (besides, again, the Waker). It also reintroduces an idea of the Just Attack style system thanks to "Relentless Blade" requiring an attack input during Photon Arts for extra hits, or the "Slug Shot" being a timed extra attack after a Photon Art finishes. Their Focus Gauge rapidly depletes if you're not attacking, requiring aggressive play to keep the benefits up, and perhaps the strangest of all, the "Waving Rigel" PA with no direction actually draws enemies in towards you, making for the first actual form of mob crowd control in the game if you set it up right.
  • The Gunblade's Weapon Action possesses several unique properties that sets it apart from other weapons. Pressing it allows you to perform slash attacks with the Gunblade, giving you a second set of normal attacks that hit harder and faster than the handgun normals at the expense of range. Much like the weapon's PAs, its properties change based on whether or not you're holding a directional input. Pressing it while standing still performs a stationary slash that guards against attacks and can be chained up to three times in a row for a slash combo. Pressing it with a direction performs a spin slash that also lets you evade attacks. This also makes it the only weapon whose Weapon Action can serve as both a block and an evade simultaneously.
  • Despite being classified as a Ranged Class, the Slayer's Gunblade suffers none of the same damage penalties that the Ranger, Gunner and Bow Braver do; while their normal shots aren't efficient enough on their own, their Weapon Action's offensive nature alone is on par with a Gunner going all out in DPS, a Charged Normal is on par with Launcher damage, and their PA combos rack up a damage count comparable to melee classes when used correctly.
• Some Dexterity Required: The Slayer can all but attack non-stop if they have the PP for it, but actually maximizing their efficiency could turn your fingers into a proverbial pretzel. Not only do you have to get the reflexes for whether to use a Move Art or not when inputting a Photon Art, but "Relentless Blade" helps generate PP and deal extra damage per PA, meaning you have to constantly input multitudes of button combinations back and forth across your keyboard/mouse/controller.
• Super Mode: "Gunblade Focus Overdrive" functions similarly to "Braver Combat", albeit having a cooldown and a requirement for a maxed Focus Gauge; activating it not only prevents the gauge from declining but also grants access to a special finisher when used again. Unlike "Braver Combat", however, you cannot shorten it or its cooldown to make it faster to use again, given the sheer power of its finisher being almost on par with a Photon Blast.
• Theme Naming: The Slayer's Photon Arts are "Shifting Spica, "Flowing Sirius", "Reaping Regulus" and "Waving Rigel", named after the brightest stars in the sky.