A question about stat up skills.

[pinkmetal]

I have been reading about how the stat up skills in the trees are garbage
but I can't find any reasons why. 10 points in any one of them is +50 more to any given stat which seems good to me, can anyone explain this to me please? I want
to get my build correct the first time for a GU/RA, thanks in advance.

Also if anyone could post some great GU/RA builds that would be great :)
Also ALSO ...I'm not sure how the TM Gear skill for gunners work so I may be over looking that.

[gigawuts]

They're not garbage in and of themselves. They're not even really garbage.

That said, you only have so many points to spend. Multiplier skills, like tech charge advance, JA bonus, and weak hit advance all offer better gains for the same SP investments. 10 points for 50 ATK isn't going to do nearly as much for you as 10 points for 25% more headshot damage, for instance.

ATK skills are mainly to help you equip gear, and your mag can normally cover that requirement. I'd only invest in ATK skills if you don't have a mag for a certain class.

[pinkmetal]

That's understandable and this is what i have for my Ranger build

http://ryuhiroshi.ry.funpic.de/pso2/skillcalc.html?03I2bdIkbdIkbdIkbdIkbdIkbdIk0lbIn00 0000ib00000ibJdGFfGHcA0000ib0000Ib00000ib00000f

which utilizes the multipliers minus Sniping do to gunners always moving and usually in the air. Do you think that is alright for Rangers? I suppose its my lack of understanding of the gunner tree thats getting me?

[UnLucky]

Gunner can get the Standing Snipe bonus on some of their attacks, and apparently you can even get it in the air if you start a PA before you start falling after a previous attack.

But if you'd prefer the R-Atk ups, you could even take Stun Grenade if you remove two points from R-Def Up.

[Xaeris]

Unless you need those R-Atk Ups to meet equipment requirements, those points would be better spent in the Standing Snipes. You might think they wouldn't work with machineguns, going from the name, but used in midair, you'll get the bonus so long as you follow your arts quickly enough to avoid falling and canceling the bonus.

And since you asked about the Gear: it has three stages. At Stage 1, your damage is 105% of normal. At Stage 2, your damage is 110% of normal. At Stage 3, your damage is 130% of normal. Needless to say, you want to be at Stage 3 (a maxed out gauge) as much as possible. Taking nearly any kind of damage (exceptions being from burn and poison, as well as environmental damage like lava) will make you lose at least one stage of gear. So, avoiding damage is an important part of dealing damage as a Gunner.

[SociableTyrannosaur]

Just backing up what's been said; I get standing snipe bonuses all the time as a gunner. No reason not to get it.

Also - more food for thought:

GS and Launcher benefit form standing snipe too and you're really doing your team a disservice by not having some sort of AoE option. I have a friend who plays Gu/Ra a lot but doesn't have anything for AoE attacks. He really doesn't bring much to the table for AQs outside of boss fights as a result. Standing Snipe with Additional Bullet in the air can result in some pretty ridiculous numbers and Cluster Bullet/Divine Launcher see nice bonuses too.

As a Gu/Ra you will still be relegated to WB bot from time to time. Standing Snipe will help quite a bit here.

There are no good all class TMGs right now so when you play Ra/Gu to level up you'll either be using Lambda Aresvis for god awful damage or your main damage will be coming from your Rifle, Launcher and/or Gun Slash, all of which benefit from Standing Snipe.

[pinkmetal]

Alright thank you everyone I didn't understand the importance of standing snipe and for the explanation of TM Gear, you've all been a great help :)

[Xaeris]

Sure. To provide a bit more information about the gear, you build it up by shooting. Different attacks charge up the gear at different rates. The first step of the normal attack, for example, doesn't generate gear at all, but the second and third create a (relatively) substantial amount. Elder Rebellion, as much as we love it for damage, only generates gear on the last two bursts; in a single target situation (i.e, most of what you're using TMGs for), it'll take a while to fill the gauge on its own. To get around this, you can use Infinite Fire, which charges the gear pretty fast, or you can spam the regular attack until you've got what you need. Some of the other arts generate decent gear, but eh, not really worth the trouble.

[Zorafim]

The reason it's said that +stat is garbage is because of maths. Let me give you an example.

Say you have 1000 attack power. If you get +50 atk, you'll now have 1050 attack power, a 5% boost. If you get three +50 atk skills, that's 1150, a 15% boost. I pick 1000 attack power because you'll actually reach it pretty easily.
If you get JA boost capped, that's 10% extra damage almost every hit. Two of them is 21% boost, and three is a 33% boost. The more multipliers you get, the bigger the boost gets. Even if the boost was 5% like the atk boost is, you'll still do slightly more damage (15.7% instead of 15% more).

In short, it's better to multiply your number than to add things to it. That being said, if you run with a pure/pure job setup, I suggest capping one atk and one dfp skill just to help equip new items. Since your stats might start out low (say, 200? It's been a while since I've been low level), +50 is actually a pretty decent amount. The damage might be more noticeable than a multiplier bonus, and the ability to equip new items at low levels is pretty nice.

Just my thousand meseta (or however the saying goes).

[Anatha]

The best advice a person can give you is "You don't have to spend every point you get".

That's a recipe for disaster. Get the essentials, and then just let it be. If they add something in the skill tree, or alter them in some way, you'll be able to adapt.

If you spend all your left over points, you're kinda screwed.

Must haves: http://ryuhiroshi.ry.funpic.de/pso2/skillcalc.html?03I2bdIkbdIkbdIkbdIkbdIkbdIk0lbIn00 0000ib00000ibJdJ29k0009beDI2cFbnIq000Ib00000ib0000 0f
On ranger, you can simply spend no more points and be set.
For Gunner, those are the things you just can't go without, if you're going gunner you will have that build as your base.
Where you go from there is well handled in the other Gunner topics.

As for equipment requirements, you won't need to waste points in stat up skills, that is what your MAG is for. Raise it correctly, and you'll have no problems at all.

[Zorafim]

Why the one point in chain finish? All that does is increase your damage during a chain by 1%, right?

[pinkmetal]

Alright, that's a lot of great information thanks a lot again. I just started up again and didn't know where to start.

[SociableTyrannosaur]

Why the one point in chain finish? All that does is increase your damage during a chain by 1%, right?

Yeah it's definitely one of those all or nothing Skills. It doesn't even begin to get good til 5 points in. It gets a nice 10 point boost at 9/10 though. In fact this skill you could stop at 9 if you wanted to since 10/10 is only 5% more. But certainly 1 point is just a waste.