Battle mage

[HeartBreak301]

Not really talking crap about them so much as stating the obvious fact that they're the worst melee class in the game. If you're going to make a melee FO you're much better off making a FOmarl or FOmar, hell even FOnewm is pretty ok since he can at least use an Excalibur. And not very many melee weapons that FOs can use are OP, Excalibur and Slicer of Fanatic are the only two that come to mind, and since they're FOs they're not even at an OP level since their ATP sucks compared to other classes that can use them as well.

If you want to make and play a melee FOnewearl, be my guest. I'm just stating that there are much better options for a melee FO.

[Genoa]

K well that clearly tells me you don't have a FOnewearl over 100+ that can use ATP weapons efficiently, or anything other than an Excalibur by the way you hype that overrated, berserk-infested saber.
I'm ATP capped and I still have around 1500+ MST and 186 ATA...so I can easily use any weapon available to FOnewearl.
You're still looking so heavily on the weapons.
Shifta/Zalure is basically win no matter how shit your ATP originally is.

By the way, FOmar/FOmarl ATA is pretty bad. 163 on FOmar and 170 on FOmarl.
FOnewearl at least gets 186. And yes, even 16-23 ATA makes a difference.
You probably still need good Hit % weapons regardless just because anything under 190+ in Ultimate end-game zones are rough evasion.

What is a seksi FOnewearl?
V101
V502
V801 // Cure/Shock <--- depends on the mob situation
Smartlink
Resta Merge (when grouped, otherwise you can use an Atk-tech Merge)

Your mag (generally invincibility-inducing mags, but if you care more about it's appearance, go for it) stats have to balance your material growth, but you'll want a good amount of Dex/Mind/Pow, more reliant on Dex most likely and Mind Mats.

Weapons:
Obviously you need your forcy stuff too. Weapons that boost technique abilities are the ONLY weapons worth wasting your small 30 item inventory.
If it doesn't increase technique dmg or support technique range... leave it in the bank.
ATP-based weapons are heavily dependent on Hit% and their special ability (and obviously if they actually pack any decent base ATP/ATA to begin with).

Vivienne is an exceptional Double Saber for single-target melee DMG. It can also steal TP back

Holy Ray is a great rifle, pretty easy to farm. Has a good paralyze chance. I've collected quite a few and have a 40% hit one, very accurate.

Last Swan // L&K38 Combat are lolololol OP
Last Swan is a handgun that fires like a Mechgun. So it has handgun animation speed and stance but fires three bullets per hit like mechgun, without the long Mechgun cooldown after 3rd shot.
L&K38 Combat... if you're on a specific private server, fires 5 per hit. Totaling at 15 hits a combo... <____> +25 grinder on that gun too. (extra +50 ATP)

IF you can't get those, of course Charge Vulcans 50%+ all the way.

Any of those fancy Parasol partisans are handy.

Bringer's Rifle and Slicer of Fanatic are obviously good weapons due to their Unreduced Demon special (cuts target HP to 1/4)

The largest issue faced with making a successful melee FOnewearl is acquiring the weapons AND getting hit%.
Leveling a character up and getting the appropriate mag/material stat ratio is not hard. FOnewearl ATP is exceptionally easy to cap, you just really only put effort into ATA and keeping good MST up.
Units, merges, and gear, like ANY class, is the hard part.

But a FOnewearl cannot get away with using shitty ATP-weapons. You'll have to spam away with Techs.
Personally, my main, HUcaseal, found the vast majority of my gear/materials/tech disks and I simply passed them onto my other characters and created super Forces.

ANYONE can melee given the right equipment.
FOmar is of the highest damage output but suffers from the lowest ATA in the game.

FOmarl has high dmg output but suffers from some atk animations being slightly... goofier? and some to be very sluggish and sloppy. Her accuracy isn't anything to write home about either.

FOnewm is actually really good because he still pushes up to 814 ATP and a semi-decent 180 ATA. And he's obviously the most powerful AoE tech-spamming Force on top of that.
He has the absolute lowest ATA growth (by leveling) so he needs a bigger push to hit his cap, causing other stats to be lower due to the excessive help towards ATA.

FOnewearl has only 583 ATP and a semi-decent ATA cap of 186.
The ATP is ridiculously easy to cap, you might even do it accidentally as you progress in level.
Her MST growth and cap is obviously very high, so you only need to push ATA and pour the rest into MST. You barely have to mess around with ATP.

To o.w.w.a.y. I phantom, yes, Battle-mages are very successful. Force is the most versatile class, given the potentially to smash shit, shoot shit, or blow shit up while fully supporting yourself or a team of others.

PSO is not a hard game in the least bit, at least not with the end-game gear selection available to everyone.
Some people are just making this sound way to difficult.

A Force is probably the most difficult to start off, usually easier to start as a Ranger or Hunter and hand stuff down to a new Force.

My overall point,
This game is so easy when you're geared up that even a FOnewearl can melee her ass to victory and make it look fun instead of a challenge.

Or you can make a cookie-cutter force and only spam techniques with the occasional use of a special weapon's ability and justify the reasons with "If you want to melee, make a hunter".

[HeartBreak301]

I'm playing a 179 FOnewearl right now.


And I don't even really know what to say in response to that post, it pretty much just fried my brain. So I guess I'll just say that I'll keep on using my Psycho Wand and blowing any melee FOnewearl out of the water when it comes to power comparisons.

Like I said, before, if you want to play a Melee FOnewearl, be my guest, I'm not going to stop you. I'm simply stating that a Melee FOnewearl is the WORST choice out of ALL characters for melee.

Also, if you really think the 30 S/Z gives that big of a damage boost, a RAcaseal with no buffs or Zalure will still be hitting harder with a Vivienne than a FOnewearl will.

Done with this thread now.

I guess I have one thing left to add, I read "K well that clearly tells me you don't have a FOnewearl over 100+ that can use ATP weapons efficiently" again and you're absolutely right. It's mainly because NO FOnewearl level 100+ can use ATP weapons efficiently.

[Genoa]

I'm playing a 179 FOnewearl right now.
And I don't even really know what to say in response to that post, it pretty much just fried my brain. So I guess I'll just say that I'll keep on using my Psycho Wand and blowing any melee FOnewearl out of the water when it comes to power comparisons.

Like I said, before, if you want to play a Melee FOnewearl, be my guest, I'm not going to stop you. I'm simply stating that a Melee FOnewearl is the WORST choice out of ALL characters for melee.

Also, if you really think the 30 S/Z gives that big of a damage boost, a RAcaseal with no buffs or Zalure will still be hitting harder with a Vivienne than a FOnewearl will.

Done with this thread now.

I guess I have one thing left to add, I read "K well that clearly tells me you don't have a FOnewearl over 100+ that can use ATP weapons efficiently" again and you're absolutely right. It's mainly because NO FOnewearl level 100+ can use ATP weapons efficiently.

179 and you can't vouch? Wow...
I mean I guess if you haven't done it you haven't done it...
But I'd think if you got all the way to 179 you'd have at least tried it once.
Oh well,
And oh...
RAcaseal doesn't hit harder unbuffed when FOnewearl is buffed and enemy is debuffed.
You can try that one yourself though

EDIT: also, it wasn't a comparison to Power for FOnewearl given ATP vs. Tech spam. That is an obvious answer.
If you didn't blow shit up faster with Psycho full MST vs. a FOnewearl using ATP-weapons then somethings wrong with your Rafoie button.
The point was the game is so easy even a FOnewearl can EASILY melee given the equipment and support techniques.
I've had harder tic-tac-toe matches

[HeartBreak301]

I haven't done it because I've played with people who have and it made my skin crawl. I tried to repress those memories but they haunt me to this day.

Ok, now I'm done because I'm going to sleep.

[Kyerea]

There's no such thing as an efficient or "decent" melee FOnewearl. In fact, FOneys are only good for two things: a.) making me a S/D sandwich and b.) being a FOrce.

My FOney also says hi Hex.



If you want to melee with a character, pick the HUcast and grab a Vjaya for obvious reasons.

[Genoa]

what a narrow-minded, stereotypical response. Way to only play easymode on a retardedly easy game. Hope you feel pro swinging your Vjaya around like 99% of Hucasts

[Kyerea]

A narrow-minded and stereotypical response on these forums regarding PSO:BB would involve posting incorrect or outright fallacies of information for characters, builds and tactics they know nothing about. For your information, most HUcast players don't care to use the 40-Hit Vjaya that can be acquired (for free mind you) in Gov't Quest 6-5 as a reward with a HU host. So 1.) I'm using a weapon there that can be acquired for free, 2.) Yes I have a high-stat HUcast with ubers, but the most powerful HU weapon in the game is still a weapon anyone can acquire for their HU and 3.) it shows that unless you are pulling off large, and I iterate, VERY LARGE numbers with a melee-oriented character. You cannot equal HUs in that regard, so stop pretending your melee FOney is useful. Or really any melee-FO for that matter.

In fact, badly equipped HUs are still worse in comparison to a badly equipped RA. In terms of dps, acquiring ubers for and ease of play/transition (HUs have some of the most expensive and specific gear in the game, not mentioning needing Hit on almost all of those ubers, spare the BKB/DC, for any of the HU classes).

Oh, and that picture was taken in Ultimate btw.

["En"]

Let's not kid ourselves. FOnewearl can melee like a HUcast can pretend to be a force with S-Red's Blades and a Dragon's Claw. Ironically, the ATP boost a HUcast gets from the Shifta supplied by S-Red's Blades isn't far off from what FOnewearl is going to get out of her own Lv30 Shifta. Shifta doesn't supply a flat value; it's percent-based. As such, a percentage of 1639 ATP is going to have a greater impact than a percentage of 583 ATP, regardless of what weapons FOnewearl might have in her arsenal. As Kyerea said, FOnewearls are better suited to making Shifta/Deband sandwiches. And trust me; the rest of the party loves her cooking. Why put that talent to waste?

Zalure may as well not be an argument, due to the existence of the S-Rank Zalure (Lv21) special.

I've always had deep respect for Battle Forces, but people need to accept the fact that they are, in fact, Forces. Not Hunters. They can successfully go the melee route if they so desired, but they will never (check: NEVER) be able to compete with what the Hunters and Rangers can do.

Possible? Yes. Efficient? No. I'd recommend Battle FOmar/FOmarl/FOnewm for those who want a change of pace. Each of them has their own advantages and disadvantages. Battle FOnewearl, on the other hand, is an "honour" reserved solely for the most asinine hipsters.

[Kyerea]

I concur, FOmar and FOmarl are quite possibly the only FO classes that could pull off a sub-par melee dps in single-player whether it is GC or BB PSO. Though I reiterate that last clause, being "sub-par". In no way is a "melee" FO used as a HU, a good player uses it to support the other players by attacking enemies out of the way of the general party's vicinity, if the FO in question has nothing else to do productivity-wise or is defending himself/herself.