Lily PvE guide

About This Guide

This guide will teach you a lot about things you need to know to play Lily effectively in PvE.

However, I won't be publishing a "Meta" skill build or a "Meta" skill combo build. That's because:

a) Some of the skills or extensions can be up to preference and it's impossible to objectively propose one skill build that's "Meta" and always right. If a skill or extension falls into this category, I've noted it down in the guide below.

b) Some of the skills or extensions will be "the best" in certain situations, and not so good in other situations. It's up to you to decide what will fit your gameplay better.

c) Building skill combos is influenced by many factors: what kind of dungeon/boss you're fighting, how fast can you kill enemies, how long the fights take without any downtime, etc. Therefore, you should always consider what kind of skill combo build will suit your current situation the best.

d) I don't like it when people share builds without understanding why certain skills or extensions were chosen. This guide is made to help you pick up your own build that you'll fully understand and be able to use to its near full potential.

Lily's Strengths

1. Highest Critical Rate of all classes. Lily's endgame weapons have a permanent boost of +5% Critical Rate. Lily's passive gives her +5% Critical Rate if her SG is over 50%. Lily can cast a Critical Rate buff that gives +15% Critical Rate for 20s.

2. Highest Critical Damage of all classes. Lily's passive gives her +1300 Critical Damage. Her awakening adds +300% of her base Critical Damage, which is equal to over +3300 Critical Damage at level 55 and over +3600 Critical Damage at level 60.

3. Good single-target damage against both large bosses like Primal, and smaller mobile bosses like those in Golden Citadel. Can cast skills that follow and damage bosses that move a lot.

4. Godly damage with Big Puppet AR Card (gives a buff for no-cooldown on all skills for 5 seconds) and Stella in party to provide Lily with SG buff.

5. Essential class to have in parties. Lily can buff herself and all party members with +15% Critical Rate for 20 seconds in a very wide area.

6. Ability to heal herself with one of her skills.

7. Ability to group up mobs together from a quite large area.

8. Decent ability to perform aerial attacks and restore SG in the air.

Lily's Weaknesses

1. Her ultimate skill is, arguably, the worst ultimate among all classes. Has a small range and the damage isn't as high as other classes.

2. Lily's skills all require a lot of SG to use. Without a Stella in party, she'll need to use aerial attacks to try to restore SG. If she's fighting against only a single target, she won't be able to recover SG in a quick way.

3. Average AoE/mobbing capabilities. She can gather mobs together but doesn't possess any exceptionally good skills for clearing large areas of scattered mobs.

4. Lily has to keep an eye on her SG bar if she wants to get the +5% Critical Rate passive. If her SG bar falls below 50%, she loses the benefit of +5% Critical Rate passive.

5. Relies on having a Stella in party to provide Lily with SG buff.

6. Relies on Big Puppet AR card to deal massive damage in dungeons.

Lily's Skills Analysis

I'll describe each of Lily's skills with as much details as possible. I'll also include information about Lily's advancement skills, which we'll get probably in the second half of 2018. Please note that all the skill names are based off of unofficial fan translations. I'll update the skill names with official translations once the game comes out.

Please be aware that at level 55 you'll have a total of 140 SP (Skill Points) to invest into skills, while after the level 60 update you'll be able to use up to 153 SP. To max out all the new skills that come with advancement patch, you'll need a total of 30 SP (26 SP if you decide to skip the new passive skill). This means that if you want to save up skill points for the advancement, you'll have to stop spending them at 123/140 SP (or 127/140 SP). It's up to you if you want to use all 140 SP right now, or use only 123 SP (or 127 SP) and save the rest for advancement skills. It's uncertain if we'll get a free skill reset when advancement comes.

Also, keep in mind that I won't be writing down every skills' Damage, SA Break, SG Cost, Cooldown values in this guide. First of all, you can easily view those values by hovering your mouse over the skill icons in the game. Second of all, the values for Damage and SA Break shown in the game are not fully accurate and cannot be fully trusted. Empirical damage tests can easily prove that those values can be slightly or significantly incorrect. And lastly, this guide is already lengthy enough without tables full of numbers. You should use this guide to learn about each skill's usage, strengths and weaknesses, then refer to skill tooltips in the game to learn about their Cooldown times and SG Costs.

Active skills

Evil Slash

Attacks enemies in a short range in front of Lily. Low reach, short animation time, pretty low damage. Normally I wouldn't recommend leveling up Evil Slash, but after Lily's advancement she will get an extension to this skill that makes it a pretty decent mobbing/utility skill, with increased range and damage.

Evil Slash Extension

Comes with Lily's advancement patch. Greatly increases range of this skill and increases its damage. A very decent skill to have for mobbing utility.

Spinning Devil

Attacks enemies in a straight line, followed by spinning slashes. Lily travels forwards and pushes enemies along with her when using this skill. The range of finishing spinning slashes is not good. The skill takes quite a lot of time to cast, and its damage is not that good. I find it difficult to use. I wouldn't recommend using this skill at all.

Scythe Cutter

Slashes enemies directly in front of Lily and makes them airborne. It's a quick skill with short range and small damage. It's a very optional skill to take. Only consider taking it if you really have nothing better to do with your skill points. Only really useful with the extension.

Scythe Cutter Extension

Adds the ability to charge this skill to level 2. If you fully charge the skill, its damage will multiply by x1.8 and make Lily jump into the air as well. It takes about a second to charge it. When in the air, you can use air attacks to restore SG. It's an alright skill, but you should only buy it if you don't have anything better to invest SP in.

Grim Countdown

Performs a single slash in a rather small area in front of Lily. This skill has decent damage and pretty short animation time. You can either use it as a DPS skill, or use it as a healing skill if you buy the extension. Please be aware that getting the extension will halve the damage of this skill. Overall a very decent skill, regardless of the way you want to use it.

Grim Countdown Extension

This extension halves the damage of the skill, but allows you to restore HP after hitting an enemy. Higher levels of this extension restore more HP. You can only restore HP from one mob that you hit. Even if you hit multiple mobs with the skill, you'll only recover HP from one of those mobs. It's entirely up to you if you want to use this extension. It's decent for healing yourself if your Stella in party cannot heal you, or if you're lazy to dodge attacks.

Fear Chain

Good skill for gathering mobs in a medium-sized area. You'll need to purchase the extension to take full advantage of the range increase of this skill. You can also use this skill on bosses, as it has very good SA Break. All in all, it's a good skill for mobbing and breaking bosses' armor, but only worth taking if you're planning on maxing out its extension as well.

Fear Chain Extension

Increases the range of this skill up to +4 meters. A good extension to take for increased mob gathering capabilities.

Death Grinder

Throws a scythe forwards like a boomerang and deals multiple hits. The mobs will be pushed along with the scythe's movement. Damage of this skill is not great, but its SA Break is decent. A boss has to be large for this skill to be useful for SA Breaking. You can use this skill to gather up some mobs in a straight line. The two extensions change the way this skill operates. Overall, I'd say this skill is not bad, but pretty optional to take.

Death Grinder Extension 1

Summons a Grim Reaper that additionally throws his own scythe at a slight delay compared to Lily's scythe. It allows you to gather up mobs from a slightly wider area. It's not a bad skill, but not spectacular either. The damage of the secondary scythe is not that great. Up to preference and optional.

Death Grinder Extension 2

Lily's scythe is thrown forwards, but it stops midway and creates an AoE that deals multiple hits over time. This skill is decent for dealing some damage to mobs that are already grouped up in front of you. It's also decent for dealing damage to bosses that don't move. Up to preference and optional.

Death Scythe

Deals small damage in a small circular area around Lily. Has decent SA Break. Player can finish this skill by pressing left click or right click. Left click does a horizontal slash in a small area in front of Lily that pushes enemies away. Right click does a vertical slash in a small area in front of Lily that knocks enemies up into the air. This skill used to be quite weak and very optional before advancement. After advancement, it received an extension that made it more useful.

Death Scythe Extension

After Lily's advancement, you can buy an extension to this skill that greatly increases its damage and range of both left and right clicks. A very decent skill to have.

Cruel Slash

Lily becomes immobile and can perform multiple slashes by rapidly clicking left mouse button. She can perform a finishing strike by pressing the right mouse button. The finishing strike is automatically performed once the timer for this skill runs out, too. The range of this skill is small. and the damage is only decent if you buy the first extension that gives you a big penetration bonus.

Cruel Slash Extension 1

This extension gives you up to +70% Penetration when using this skill. It's a massive damage increase, especially if you already have about 30-55% Penetration from your gear. Penetration in this game scales exponentially, meaning the higher you go with Penetration, the more damage increase you will get with each additional penetration point. A great skill to use if you can take advantage of how Penetration scales.

You can take advantage of this Penetration buff to increase damage of your Death Tornado as well. Cast your Death Tornado first, then quickly activate this skill. While you're still using Cruel Slash, all hits of your tornado will also have the Penetration bonus. You can also increase damage of your AR Cards that deal damage over time, like Glutton Army or Deus Ex Machina.

Cruel Slash Extension 2

Increases Critical Rate up to +10% when using this skill. This extension is very weak compared to the previous extension, don't buy it. Especially since Lily already has a lot of other bonuses that give her Critical Rate.

Grim Reaper

You can activate this skill after jumping and pressing 1 in the air. It attacks enemies in a short area in front of Lily and knocks them up. The damage of this skill is decent and its animation is short. After using this skill, you can follow it up with left/right clicks to restore SG in the air. An essential skill to have for Lily players.

Force Region

Lily's most important buff skill. It gives up to +15% Critical Rate for 20 seconds to Lily and everyone in the party. The range of this skill is very wide. You'll almost always hit everyone in the party with this skill. This is the reason why a Lily is always welcome in a party.

Death Tornado

Lily's most important DPS skill. Its cast time is very short, and it deals damage over time in a medium area. You should be quite close to your targets before casting it. This skill can be spammed with Big Puppet AR Card. You can summon multiple tornadoes during the 5 second Release buff (no cooldown) from Big Puppet's golden ball. You save a little bit of time if you quickly dodge inbetween casting tornadoes, as it cancels the animation while still spawning a tornado.

You can increase damage of this skill by using Cruel Slash (with Penetration extension) right after casting the tornado. Every hit of tornado will have the Penetration bonus while you're using Cruel Slash skill.

Death Tornado Extension 1

This extension makes the tornado follow its target while dealing damage. It's a great extension and very versatile, as it's good for both large bosses, as well as small bosses that move a lot. Definitely an extension you should take.

Death Tornado Extension 2

This extension makes the tornado travel forwards in a zig-zag pattern. It theoretically does more damage to very large bosses like Primal, but it's not very useful against smaller bosses as it can deliver all hits only against very large targets. The first extension is more versatile to use.

Evil Trinity

Lily attacks enemies in a triangular area to the front. The area widens the further it travels away from Lily. This skill deals multiple hits and pushes back enemies. The damage is very good, but you must be close to your enemies if you want to land all the hits. It might be difficult to land all hits against small bosses, but it works great against bigger bosses and groups of mobs.

Death Guillotine

Lily's ultimate skill. While it deals good damage, it has many problems. The range of this skill is very low. It drags enemies in front of lily into the range, but doesn't drag them if they're too close, too far to the sides or behind Lily. This makes it a bad skill to use for clearing mobs, unless they're already concentrated in a small area. It also has the problem where it can sometimes push some mobs away from its attack range. For bosses it's decent, but you'll have to position yourself well to hit the boss. If a boss likes to move, it might walk away from your attack range, as it takes a few seconds before the skill does its damage. Other classes have better ultimate skills than Lily.

Bloody Blossom

This skill is only available after advancement. It's a second aerial skill for Lily. Its attack range and damage are higher than Lily's first jump skill. You can activate this skill by pressing 2 in the air. The animation time is quite short. This skill restores SG if you can hit multiple enemies at once. A great skill that you should definitely use as often as you can.

Fury Scythe

This skill is only available after advancement. It puts Lily in a special stance. You can move forwards slightly while performing slashing attacks if you left click. You can travel much longer distances quickly by pressing right click. You can fully rotate your camera and change the direction in which Lily is travelling while using this skill. The damage is very decent and you should definitely invest points into this skill.

Passive Skills

Basic Attack Mastery

Learned automatically. The most important bonus from this skill is improved SG recovery from performing basic attacks. Lily recovers the most SG when attacking with [left click x3] combo in the air, or when attacking with [left click x3, right click x3] combo on the ground. For best results, attack as many mobs as possible with those combos. You'll need to upgrade this skill to level 4 to unlock the last third hit in the aerial combo, and to level 5 to unlock the [left click x3, right click x3] combo. The rest of the combos are not very useful. All in all, a good skill to buy if you're having problems with SG recovery. If you play in a party with Stella all the time, then there's less importance in leveling up this skill, as you'll be recovering SG thanks to Stella's SG buff.

Special Ability Mastery

Learned automatically. This skill has different effects depending if you use it on the ground or in the air. On the ground, Lily will dash forwards and deal small damage during the dash. You can dash over a longer distance if you hold down the right click button for longer. You won't restore much SG when using this skill on the ground. However, when used in the air, Lily will perform two circular slashes that deal pretty decent damage and restore a lot of SG. This skill is definitely worth maxing out. You can chain it with [left click x3] combo in the air, and with Lily's two aerial skills.

Emergency Dodge

Learned automatically. You can dodge on the ground with Shift button by using 20 Stamina points. You can also perform an air dash if you press Shift in the air. You are invincible while dodging on the ground, but not in the air. This skill cannot be upgraded at all.

Rising Roll

Learned automatically. If you're knocked down to the ground, you can press Shift to roll back onto your feet by using 25 Stamina. You're invincible while rolling. By increasing this skill's level to 2, your Stamina cost goes down to 15. If you max out this skill, your roll will be quicker, but it also means your invincibility will be shorter as well. I personally either leave this skill at level 1, or only invest in getting it to level 2.

Dash

Learned automatically. You can upgrade this skill to dash even faster. Always upgrade this skill. Double tap a direction button (W, S, A, D) and hold it to dash. In game options, you can set it up in 2 ways: one of them will make you dodge first after double tapping a direction button, and after that dodge you will start dashing; the second option will let you go straight into dashing after double tapping a direction button. I recommend to use the option that puts you into dashing straight away, so you don't waste Stamina when you just want to dash.

Rising Attack

Learned automatically. If you're knocked down, you can left click to rise up to your feet while dealing small damage and using 30 Stamina. You can only use this skill once every 15 seconds. You are invincible for 1 second while using this skill. At level 2, this skill only uses 20 Stamina. At level 3, this skill gives you 3 seconds of invincibility. Personally I like to have this skill at level 3, as it's useful in Primal to make sure you don't get knocked up or knocked down if you're trying to get a golden ball's no-cooldown buff. This skill is up for preference.

Dash Attack

Learned automatically. Left click while dashing to perform a front flip that slashes enemies and pushes them away. I don't like using this skill as it's hard to aim, the damage is low, the animation time is quite long, and it pushes away enemies which makes it more difficult to gather them up to use AoE skills.

Special Dodge

This skill lets you use a special dodge while you're being hit by and enemy and normally you wouldn't be able to dodge. This includes situations where you are stumbling from an enemy's attack or when you're knocked up into the air. This skill is very useful in Primal if small tentacles knock you up into the air. You can dodge out of it and quickly get back on your feet. This allows you to avoid taking increased damage while you're in the air. The cooldown for this skill is 60 seconds at level 1, 50 seconds at level 2 and 40 seconds at level 3. It takes 40 Stamina to use this skill. You must be careful not to use this skill at the wrong time, or it'll be on cooldown when you really need it, plus you'll waste 40 Stamina. I recommend getting this skill to at least level 1. Higher levels are up to preference, depending on how many SP you're willing to invest into this skill.

Special Dash Attack

You can activate this skill by right clicking during a dash. Lily performs a quick slash for decent damage. The reach of this skill isn't that great. It's up to you if you want to invest in this skill or not.

Stamina Mastery

Improves the base Stamina regen ability. Normally, you can recover 5 Stamina every second. Each level of this skill gives you additional 0.5 Stamina recovery every second. I usually only recommend getting this skill up to level 2, as the SP cost for further levels is just too high and not worth it. If you really want better Stamina regen, then you should use Megiddo Maker Mk2 AR Card.

Intensifying Madness

This passive skill increases your Critical Damage up to +1300. You should always max this skill.

Rampaging Madness

This passive comes with Lily's advancement. It's not a super good passive, but might be worth taking if you find good ways of implementing it into your playstyle. This passive activates when your HP falls below 50%. It will decrease your SG Consumption, increase Critical Damage and Penetration for 10 seconds. This passive has a 60 seconds cooldown time. The cooldown time will reset if you activate Big Puppet's gold ball no-cooldown buff. A good way to force yourself to be low HP is to take off your gear that increases your HP, so your maximum HP falls down to around 20-25k, then equip your gear back. Your HP should be now below 50% and you'll activate the passive. Be careful not to pick up any healing from Stella though. Try to dodge her heals if you can. This decision whether this passive is worth taking or not is up to you.

Crazy Scythe

This passive gives Lily +5% Critical Rate and +5% Attack if her SG is above 50%. You can see the halfway point of her SG bar by looking at the dot in the middle of her SG bar. It's a decent passive, but you'll need a Stella in your party to constantly keep your SG above the halfway point. Also, the +5% Attack increase only applies to your base Attack stat, so it's pretty much useless.

Erosion/Awakening/Awakening Special Attack

When using Erosion, you get +150% Critical Rate, +20% Movement Speed and Super Armor for 30 seconds. When using Awakening Skill, you get +300% Critical Rate, +20% Movement Speed and Super Armor for 60 seconds. The Critical Damage increase applies to your base Critical Damage, but it's still very substantial and noticable. Lily has the best Erosion/Awakening skills from all classes. After advancement, press the Awakening button again while Awakened to perform an AoE special attack that does good damage in a pretty large area.

Tips on Playing Lily

1. Always pay attention to your SG. Try to keep your SG above half to receive a +5% Critical Rate buff.

2. If you're running low on SG, gather up mobs together and use aerial slashes with left/right click attacks in the air. You can also use [left click x3, right click x3] combo on the ground.

3. Always give your party members the +15% Critical Rate buff if you can.

4. Party up with Stella to get her SG buff. With SG buff, you'll be able to concentrate on dealing damage more.

5. When deciding on skill order in your skill combos, always keep in mind that you get the best bonuses when using 3-step bonus. If you put your highest damaging skills in the last 3rd vertical slot of your combos, you'll be able to utilize 3-step bonus to increase those skills' damage or decrease their cooldown by a significant amount. But keep in mind, sometimes you might want to put some of those skills in the first, lowest slot of your skill combo. That's because it allows you to use that skill instantly, instead of being forced to use one or two skills before it. The decision should be based on your playstyle, on your experience with each skill and on the situation you're dealing with. Sometimes it's worth to put a certain skill in the last vertical slot to utilize 3-step bonus for it, and also put it in a different skill column in the first slot to be able to use it instantly if a situation requires it.

6. If you want to activate 3-step bonus for a skill quickly, you can put that skill in the 3rd slot at the top, then put another skill on both the middle and bottom slot. For example, if you put Evil Slash skill in both the middle and bottom slot of a skill combo, then put Evil Trinity in the top slot, you'll be able to use Evil Slash, then instantly jump to Evil Trinity and activate 3-step bonus for Evil Trinity. This effectively skips having to use a second skill in a combo and allows you to quickly activate 3-step bonus for the skill in the last slot.

7. Put skills with low cooldown, low animation time and/or low damage in the first or second (or both) slots in skill combos. That's because you wouldn't gain much benefits for those skills if you activated a 3-step bonus for them. Also, since their cooldown is low, they should be in the bottom slots so that you can use them often to activate 3-step bonus for skills placed in the last slot of skill combos.

8. Dedicate one column of your skill bar for Death Tornado skill. Put that skill in all 3 vertical slots of one skill column. This is because you want to be able to spam Death Tornado over and over with Big Puppet AR Card's no-cooldown buff from breaking a gold ball. Alternatively, you can only put Death Tornado in one of the vertical slots, and leave the rest 2 slots empty. This will have the same effect as filling up all 3 vertical slots with Death Tornado.

9. Some of Lily's skills make her vulnerable to enemy attacks. Always be mindful of that and pick a good time to use those skills without putting yourself at a risk.

10. In your gear, try to stack up as much Critical Damage, Critical Rate and Penetration as you can. Lily has the highest Critical Rate of all classes, so you can take advantage of it by stacking a lot of Critical Damage. Having even more Critical Rate is always good as well. Stacking Penetration is good if you're planning to use Cruel Slash skill, as its Penetration passive along with your high Penetration stat will make that skill deal very high damage. Having at least 120% Attack Speed helps as well, as you'll be able to throw one more Death Tornado during Big Puppet's no-cooldown buff.

Quote from tike36

now all i need to find is where to get big puppet AR

Small chance to get it from blue/red AR Cubes. You get those from daily attendance, you can buy them in S-Coin NPC in every town (you farm S-Coin by doing repeatable quests, daily missions, events, some side quests, etc.), and you can also buy them in cash shop if you want it immediately and don't want to spend weeks/months trying to get it the f2p way.

Quote from Aimi

Wait, regarding those cards. If you obtain one you can have it forever? or is it a one time use?

It's forever. More info about Big Puppet is in AR Cards guide. It's a necessary card to have if you want to make the most damage in PvE, as you can spam your strongest skills for 5 seconds with no cooldown (you must have Stella in party to give SG Buff though, unless you're Haru who can buff herself with SG regen).