This guide is subjective. This is based on my experience and the experience of some other players online. You might prefer some skills over the ones I’ll suggest.
Some builds are better for going against a boss whereas others are more ideal for clearing a room full of enemies. Try the stuff out in this guide and ultimately go with what works best for you.
Feel free to suggest some other Archero builds in the comments section, too, if you think yours will help other players.
RNG comes into play when choosing skills. Use the builds in this guide as a best case scenario and adapt if need be when you’re stuck with consistently lower rated skills than the ones suggested here. You can always have better luck on the next run.
Play to Your (Weapon’s) Strengths
One of the biggest considerations when choosing your skills is what weapon you’re using. Some weapons will already come with skills equipped, like the Scythe and the Tornado (pictured above).
The Scythe has a built-in headshot ability that will have a 50% chance to insta-kill enemies with 30% health or lower. This means you don’t need to pick up the headshot skill.
The Tornado pierces through enemies and will come back to you, so you don’t have to get piercing shot.
Something else to consider when using the Tornado is the skill Bouncy Wall. This skill complicates the placement of your returning Tornado – if you have a hard time tracking your Tornado and utilizing the come back attack, you probably shouldn’t take Bouncy Wall and make it even harder on yourself.
The Best Skills to Take
These are the best skills in Archero and will definitely take you farthest on your runs. Most of the best skills in the game do things like add extra projectiles to your attack, give you bonus damage or crit, or greatly increase your survivability in some way.
+1 Arrows for diagonal, side, and rear will add a solid amount of damage to your attacks. They also sort of flesh out a bit of defense for your character as they are going to be covering more area while you’re running around.
If you have a +1 Side Arrows and you can track your placement well enough, you can take care of multiple enemies at once.
If you have Diagonal Arrows, you can get super close to a boss and deal extra damage by hitting them with the bonus arrows.
These skills are invaluable and should almost always be taken.
Bonuses to your base damage and attack speed (AS) are always solid choices, too. Quickest way to kill more enemies? Deal more damage. Some players rate crit bonuses a little lower, but I think they’re worth keeping in the same category as base damage and AS boosts.
As said before, this will come down to what kind of weapon you have, but skills like Ricochet, Piercing Shot, and Bouncy Wall are all worth taking if you don’t use a Tornado. These will add more ways for you to damage multiple enemies and clear floors faster.
Survivability skills like the Invincibility Star, Bloodthirst, and Rage are usually worth getting, but I would prioritize some of the other skills over them.
Some players swear by the Invincibility Star. It has 2 seconds of uptime every 10 seconds – some players have gotten so good at timing it that they can utilize the invincibility upon first entering a room to make at least one kill in the room before it fades out. Give it a shot and see if it works for you.
After-boss Purchases
Finally for this set of skills are those you get by buying them from the Devil merchant after bosses. This Devil merchant appears randomly, but is guaranteed to show up if you take a boss out without getting hit once.
This NPC will sell you certain skills in exchange for 20% of your HP bar.
Some skills like the extra life are worth it. Others are only worth it if you can utilize them effectively - like the walking through walls and walking through water skills. If you utilize them, go for it. If not, keep the health boost.
Skills to Consider
These are the skills that you will likely want to take, but just need to consider a few things before doing so.
I bet you were surprised to see that I didn’t add Front Arrow or Multishot to the category above. Those skills will actually slightly reduce your individual shot damage, so they should only be taken if you can deal with that slight loss.
Other skills in this category include Headshot and HP Boost.
You already have Headshot unlocked if you’re using a Scythe, but I’m not sure if stacking them adds any benefits. You can certainly try, though.
HP Boost is usually good, but the skills in the category above this are usually better choices all things considered.
You should also consider whether or not to take any of the skills that add an elemental damage to your attack. Fire Strike, Frost Strike, Bolt Strike, etc. are good boosts to your damage at first, but they don’t scale all that well with your damage and you may be better going with a more consistently rounded choice in the later stages of a run.
Lastly for this category are skills that affect your spirit/pet. I usually don’t pick these skills, but some players think they’re consistently a more solid choice than the situational/filler skills listed next. I prefer using skills that enhance my character specifically, but you can feel free to use skills like Spirit-Multishot if you think you’ll have success with them.
Situational and Filler Skills
These are the skills you shouldn’t take unless you absolutely have to or if you have a particular idea in mind.
Any of the sword or circle skills go into this category – they do provide some sort of buffer between you and melee enemies, but they don’t add to your DPS or provide function in ways that other skills do. They might be more useful if you are lacking a weapon with knockback like the Scythe or Bow.
More Archero skills that fall into this category are any of the ones that explode your enemies on their death like Death Bomb as well as Strong Heart, Smart, and Holy Touch.
Strong Heart isn’t as useful as other skills, Smart takes up a slot that a better skill could take, and Holy Touch just kind of sucks compared to something like attack speed up.
That wraps up this Archero guide! Hopefully I’ve given you more to consider when figuring out how to suit yourself up best for a competent and useful skill loadout. More guides are on the way, so keep your eyes peeled here at GameSkinny for more Archero content!
