RWBY GRIM ECLIPSE CHARACTER GUIDE

This guide focuses on character and general abilities and playstyles that work for each character.

Introduction

In this guide I will be outlining all abilites for each character and my opinions on each. I will also be highlighting mechanics and playstyles that go along with the individual abilities and the character as a whole. I will also be outlining different builds for each character and how to best play these builds and how effective each build is.

General Abilities

General abilities are a key component to every characters success and should almost always be a part of your build. Each ability can be good in the right circumstance and with the right character and playstyle.

Survivor (Requirement Level 5): This allows you to take additional damage after your aura is depleted. It can be crucial on characters that benefit from depleting there aura in the case of Ren and Yang. It is also just an all around good ability for survivability and can be taken on any character if you need additional defense.

Aura Regeneration: This ability causes your aura to regenerate around twice as fast (about 3 seconds as opposed to 6) it also refills quicker once it starts regenerating (also twice as fast).
This is in my opinion the most versatile defensive ability. While it doesn't allow you to survive anymore hits like the two other defensive abilities. It does allow you to continue fighting much quicker and requires much less dodging and kiting. This ability has significant offensive implications as it causes you to worry less about kiting and thus you can spend more time dealing damage. This ability is by no means a requirement however. Much like Survivor it is also very good on Ren and Yang.

Improved Ultimate 1: Gives you a second charge of your ultimate. This will start you with the additional ultimate at the beginning of the level as well as any wipe as well as when you are revived. This is just a very solid ability and is good on most characters especially those with very good ultimates such as Ruby and Yang. It is however not good on Ren as his ult is not very good in most cases.

Improved Ultimate 2 (Requirement 300 Ultimate kills) (Requires Improved Ultimate 1): Adds a third charge to your ultimate. It is especially good to get this on Yang due to her ability to her character ability which allows you to refill all charges of your ultimate upon depleting your aura.

Increased Aura (Requirement 2000 Kills): Doubles your aura pool. This is another fairly solid defensive ability that allows you to take a few additional hits. This additional aura does require double the time refill once it starts regenerating and thus it is a fairly good idea to get Aura Regeneration alongside this. This ability is pretty bad on Yang and much less effective and almost useless in some cases with Ren.

Medic (Requirement revive teammates 5 times): This halves the time required to revive allies and is very good if you have teammates dying a fair amount. It is better at later stages as they tend to require you to stay on the move more which makes the short time stood still very good and cause more deaths than earlier stages. It is of course useless in singleplayer.

Heavy Synergy (Requirement 300 heavy attack kills): Increases the chance of creating a team attack opportunity when using a heavy attack. This is pretty good most characters and is just a pretty good ability on all characters however there will be other abilities that need to come before this.
It is good if you are the one setting up team attacks however if you are primarily using ultimate, ranged attacks, or executing team attacks it is not useful.

Ruby Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL): The last will send you into the allowing you to continue attacking with your aerial attacks. Not as good as really any of the heavy attack combos.

Light, Heavy (LH): Does the same damage as both aerial heavy attack and uncharged heavy attack which is not quite enough to kill a creep.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH): Does a fair amount more damage and reaches farther in front of Ruby but in less of a cone

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): A very slow last attack that will do very high damage to enemies in a very large radius in front of Ruby upon pulling her scythe out of the ground. Easily her best combo. Though LLH is much quicker and can keep up and even do slightly more on single targets. Also her best way to build ultimate as it hits multiple times during the heavy attack and hits many enemies.

Heavy Attacks

Uncharged Heavy: Short range and standard uncharged heavy damage equal to heavy aerial or LH combo.

Charged Heavy: Fairly standard Heavy Attack, slow but very powerful good mostly for capitalizing on stunned enemies.

Aerial Attacks

Light Aerial: Ruby can do up to four light attacks while in the air which are very similar slashes to her first 2 grounded light attacks.
Heavy Aerial: Her heavy attack which can be done on any one of the four hits and does much more damage than the light attacks equal to a uncharged heavy attack or LH combo though with a greater range it will hit.

Ultimate

Crescendo (starting ability): Ruby spins Crescent Rose around her, knocking back enemies. Small range and mediocre damage. It however like most Ultimates get much better with the first upgrade.

Improved Crescendo (2 points): Ruby spins three times and the range is greatly increased. This is a must no matter how you are planning on playing Ruby as even with just this upgrade becomes one of the best Ultimates in the game.

Crescendo Forte (2 points) (Requirement Improved Crescendo): Crescendo's final hit knocks enemies back and deals increased damage. Very good upgrade does exactly as it states it causes the ultimate to do around two thirds more damage compared to the first upgrade and knocks enemies back slightly farther. Better in most cases than its counterpart.

Crescendo Finale (2 points) (Requirement 300 Ultimate Kills with Ruby) (Requires Improved Crescendo): Pulls enemies closer to Ruby with each hit. This keeps enemies together and slightly increases damage which is especially good if you need to use a second ultimate or just to make hitting more enemies with other attacks easier. It also makes kiting easier as the surviving enemies won't be spread out. I recommend getting this for stages with androids as it makes it so you can kill a group of them with two Ultimates back to back.

Team Attack

Reap (Starting Ability): Ruby Teleports to her target and spirals downward smashing into the ground. This is pretty good on its own and generates ultimate quickly.

Improved Reap (1 point): Reap's damage is greatly increased and nearby enemies are also affected. A very good upgrade and worthwhile if you are team attacking even a little bit.

Grimm Reaper (Requirement 100 Team Attack kills) (2 points): Does more damage to surrounding enemies and knocks them back farther. Not very good or necessary unless you are primarily team attacking.

Ranged

Dust Blast: Ruby fires a bullet made of dust dealing damage to all in a small radius around the target. Ok for a starting ranged attack.

Electric Blast (1 point): Uses electric dust which chains between up to 4 enemies stunning them. Pretty good attack especially for kiting.

Ice Blast (Requirement 200 Dust Blast Kills) (1 point): Uses ice dust freezing enemies hit by the explosion. Decent for kiting and just controlling the enemies. However, it will generally hit less than the electric blast which does essentially the same thing.

Fire Blast (Requirement 400 Dust Blast Kills) (Requires Ice Blast or Electric Blast) (2 points): Uses fire dust dealing much higher damage to the target. Does not do aoe. Much worse than either of the previous upgrades. Don't get this it's a waste of 2 points.

Special Abilities

Team Player (Requirement 300 Counters with Ruby) (1 point): Increases the chance of creating a Team Attack Opportunity when countering. Ok for a counter ability but definitely not worth it.

Hyperballistic (Requirement level 10 with Ruby) (2 points): Reduces the hit streak needed to gain additional ultra. Good for building your ultimate charges quickly especially when using LLLH.

Ruby Builds and Playstyles

Ruby is very much an Ultimate focuses character as she has easily one of the best Ultimates in the game. As such it is generally best to build her with that in mind.

Ultimate focused build

• Improved Crescendo (2)
  
• Crescendo Finale (2) or Crescendo Forte (2) Depending on your preference.
  
• Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  
• Improved Ultimate 2 (1)
  
• Hyperballistic (2)

The last 2 points are largely personal preference.
I typically will either go defensive and get:

• Aura Regeneration (2)

Or I will round out my offensive build with:

• Improved Reap (1)
  
• Electric Blast (1)

Pretty much anything can be used for those last two points so I recommend trying a few combinations and figure out which you prefer.

With this build you will want to kite the enemies into a group if possible and use LLLH to build up your ultimate quickly and while they are grouped together use your ultimate to quickly kill most enemies.
You will have to be careful when going for your LLLH combo as it can be fairly easy to be hit out of it, so you may want to do the light attacks before the enemies reach you and then hit them with just the heavy attack which is the most important part as it generates almost all the ultimate and does almost all the damage.
You should do team attacks when you can as they build ultimate very fast and also do a good amount of damage with almost no danger as long as your roll or air dash or go into another invulnerable attack like Ultimate or Team Attack as soon as you come out of it.

While I strongly believe the best build for Ruby is an ultimate focused build you can try going a team attack focused build however with Ruby this build is much less effective than it can be with other characters.

Team Attack Focused Build

I still recommend getting Improved Crescendo at the very least as it turns your ultimate from around as good as LLLH to one of the best Ultimates in the game.

• Improved Crescendo (2)
  
• Improved Reap (1)
  
• Grimm Reaper (2)
  
• Heavy Synergy (1)

That is really all that is need for a more focused team attack build so you can use the last 4 points to either focus on your ultimate with things like:

• Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  
• Improved Ultimate 2 (1)
  
• Crescendo Forte (2)
  
• Crescendo Finale (2)
  
• Hyperballistic (2)

Or you can go a more utility and defensive route with things like:

• Electric Blast (1)
  
• Ice Blast (1)
  
• Survivor (1)
  
• Aura Regeneration (2)
  
• Increased Aura (1)
  
• Medic (1)

With this build you should focus on creating and taking advantage of team attacks.
You don't really have a great way of creating team attacks which is why Ruby isn't a very good character to go for a Team Attack Build. Your best options are LLLH and aerial heavy. Heavy and LLH aren't too bad either. Your best option is your ultimate really which creates a lot but also does a high amount of damage itself so you can't often take advantage of them. While your ability to create team attack opportunities isn't great your Team Attack is quite strong.
While playing this build try to create Team Attacks even if you take damage then use either your Team Attacks if solo or your Ultimate to buy time for your aura to regenerate.

Ruby is a very strong character with one the best Ultimates and has a good ability to build her Ultimate quickly.
She can be tricky at times as her combos can be slow and easily interrupted however once you are able to get used to timing when you start the combo you will have one of the best combos in the game which builds very quickly into one of the best Ultimates in the game.

Weiss Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL) Fast but weak.

Light, Heavy (LH) Very quick and powerful single target attack that is enough to take out a creep.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH) Freezes all enemies in a fairly large radius. Deals less damage than it takes to kill a Creep. Great for crowd control but not very efficient for damage.

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH) Creates a line of ice spikes. All around pretty useless does very little damage even if you hit all of the spikes which is hard to do because it pushes them away from it as it goes.

Heavy Attacks

Uncharged Heavy: Does almost enough to kill a Creep same damage as aerial heavy but generally hits less targets.

Charged Heavy: Not a very large area of damage behind the glyph but it is possible to hit multiple targets although not as easily as some other characters' heavy attacks.

Aerial Attacks

Light Aerial: Weiss can do up to five light attacks which come out very quickly but do standard light attack damage.

Heavy Aerial: On any the five hits Weiss, can do a heavy attack instead which causes her to create a glyph which she jumps backwards off of hitting targets behind the glyph in a cone towards the ground. Deals standard Aerial Heavy Damage.

Ultimate

Nova (Starting Ability): Weiss releases a burst of energy damaging nearby foes. Slight delay after using it, small range, and ok damage for an unupgraded ultimate.

Improved Nova (2 points): Nova's damage and radius is increased and it now stuns all enemies hit. This is a huge improvement and definitely worth getting. While not as good as some Ults like Ruby, Yang, Pyrrha it is still a very good ultimate.

Novacaine (Requirement 300 Kills with Nova) (2 points): Freeze all enemies hit by your ultimate. While neat and it fits into Weiss's whole gimmick of freezing everything. It seems to be strictly worse than just Improved Nova.

Team Attack

Frostbite (Starting Ability): Weiss leaps into the air and plunges Myrtenaster into the ground. It is fairly slow for a Team Attack but it still just a solid Team Attack.

Improved Frostbite (1 point): Frostbite now damages all enemies in a small radius around her impact.

Hypothermia (Requirement 100 Frostbite Kills) (2 points): Increased damage and freezes all enemies hit.

Ranged

Barrage (Starting Ability): Weiss shoots 3 beams at her target. Decent baseline ranged attack.

Improved Barrage (1 point): Weiss unleashes a storm of dust-enhanced projectiles. This is easily the best single target ranged attack in the game it makes picking off individual targets very easy however isn't much good for kiting large groups of enemies. Still an amazing ability though.

Frost Bolt (Requirement 200 Barrage Kills) (2 points) : Shoots and icicle in a straight line that freezes everything it hits.

Special Abilities

Counter Mastery (300 Counters as Weiss) (1 point): Freezes countered enemies. Again, kinda cool how it feeds into her whole freezing theme but not very good or practical as having them stunned is often as good if not better than having them frozen.

Super Schnee (Requirement Level 10 as Weiss) (2 points): Increased bonus ultra when receiving the combo bonus.

Weiss Builds and Playstyles

Weiss Builds

Weiss has a lot of builds you can go as a lot of her most powerful attacks don't cost much leaving you a lot of room to go for other abilities.

One build that you can do is to avoid all of her freezing abilities which is the highest damage build but the freeze effects make it a lot easier to remain safe.

Non-Freeze Focused Build

• Improved Nova (2)
  
• Improved Barrage (1)
  
• Improved Frostbite (1)
  
• Hypothermia (2)
  
• Super Schnee (2)

For the last 2 points, you can either go ultimate based:

• Improved Ultimate (1)
  
• Improved Ultimate (1)

Go defense based (though you shouldn't need it as you are a primarily ranged character):

• Aura Regeneration (2)
  
• Survivor (1)
  
• Increased Aura (1)

Or go Utility based:

• Heavy Synergy (1)
  
• Medic (1)

With this build you want to primarily use your ranged attack to do damage and build your ultimate which it does very efficiently. You can use your LLH combo to freeze large groups and then use heavy attack or your Ultimate to finish them off.

This build while in my eyes is definitely the best build may not be the most fun.

You can also build Weiss to keep enemies frozen and chip away with heavy attacks

Freezing Build

• Improved Nova (2)
  
• Novacaine (2)
  
• Improved Frostbite (1)
  
• Hypothermia (2)
  
• Improved Barrage (1)
  
• Frost Bolt (2)

This build allows you a plethora of ways to freeze enemies however it has very low damage in comparison to the other build and less flexibility in the build.
This build is fairly straight forward but clunky as you try to keep enemies frozen but can only refreeze once they become unfrozen unlike stunned enemies where you can hit them with another stunning attack to reset the timer.

Blake Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL): Her fourth launches her into the air allowing for a continued combo though doing a heavy attack prior to that is still almost always better.

Light, Heavy (LH): Does a slash with her and her clone pretty standard LH combo does the same damage as aerial heavy and uncharged heavy.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH): A very solid and quick dash trough and back through her target has decent aoe in the path.

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): Creates a shadow clone then jumps back before it explode dealing a decent amount of damage though it is fairly slow and generally LLH is better.

Aerial Attacks

Light Aerial: Blake can do up to 5 at a moderate pace.

Heavy Aerial: Blake can do a heavy attack during any of these five attacks causing her to spin down dealing about the same damage as Uncharged Heavy and LH combo.

Heavy Attacks

Uncharged Heavy: is light most a mediocre attack that is pretty quick and very comparable to aerial heavy.

Charged Heavy: Causes her and her clone to dash for a decent distance and deal a pretty standard amount of damage for a heavy attack.

Ultimate

Dust Clone (Starting Ability): One of the worst starting Ultimates as it is very small and very weak.

Earth Clone (2 points): While much better than Dust Clone it is still a very weak ultimate as it has a delay and low damage and mediocre range the only good thing about it is it stuns all enemies but Blake doesn't really need that due to her Stun Blades.

Frost Clone (Requirement 200 Dust Clone Kills) (2 points): Worse than Earth Clone due to freezing being generally worse than stunning.

Fire Clone (Requirement 400 Dust Clone Kills) (Requirement Frost or Earth Clone) (2 points)

Team Attack

Shadow Strike (Starting Ability): Good starting Team Attack.

Improved Shadow Strike (1 point): A very good upgrade making her team attack one of the best in the game.

Shadow Blitz (Requirement 100 Shadow Strike Kills): Another good upgrade but in some cases, is overkill and thus is not as good as the first upgrade that and the additional point investment.

Ranged

Blade Beam (Starting Ability): Mediocre base ranged attack.

Stun Blades (1 point): Stuns all targets in a straight line with a very good width it is easily the best ranged attack in the game. And one of the best attacks in the game if not the best. It also charges Ultimate insanely fast.

Blade Salvo (200 Blade Beam Kills) (2 points): Does more damage but hits way less people and doesn't charge as fast or stun while a pretty good ranged attack it is way outclassed by stun blades.

Special Abilities

Frenzy (Requirement Counter 300 enemies) (1 point): Increased damage from countering. Completely useless as countering is done for the mobility and stun and chance at creating a team attack not the damage.

Fortunate Faunus (Requirement Level 10 as Blake) (2 points): Allows twice the time in between attacks for your combo counter and you can take 1 hit without resetting it. Very good ability however not that useful for Blake who can already charge her bad Ultimate very fast with Stun Blades.

Blake Builds and Playstyles

Blake is a pretty low damage character however she is by far the best kiting character due to her Stun Blades. This allows her to either continue to safely chip down enemies with continuing to ranged attack or use your ultimate or heavy attack to take out the stunned enemies before retreating and stunning them again.

Blake really only requires her Stun Blades to be a good Character though there are many other good options you can go alongside them.

Kiting Build

• Stun Blades (1)
  
• Dust Clone (2)
  
• Improved Shadow Strike (1)

These are really the only required abilities which leaves you with 6 points to play with.
I recommend taking these however any combination of skills is fine:

• Shadow Blitz (2)
  
• Improved Aura 1 (1)
  
• Improved Aura 2 (1)
  
• Fire Clone (2)

Despite her weak Ultimate it is still good to get multiple charges because of how quickly you charge them up due to stun blades.

With this build and really and build of Blake you should use your ranged attack as your primary attack and use them to set up for your stronger attacks.
It is good to use your ultimate to create Team Attack Opportunities and in solo take advantage of them with your very strong Team Attack.

Yang Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL): Looks like 5 attacks but is only four inputs still just a weak attack like almost all light attack combos.

Light, Heavy (LH): Pretty standard LH Combo not quite enough to take down a Creep same damage as Uncharged Heavy and Aerial Heavy

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH); Kind of tricky to use as you have to be very close to the enemies in order to get them caught in the uppercut but it does a very good amount of damage and is your best tool to generate Ultimate.

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): A very different area that this attack covers compared to LLH which is a small circle LLLH is a line behind your punch deals slightly more damage than LLH is about as fast and is better for single targets but LLH will generally be better as you want to generate ultimate with Yang as she has the best Ultimate in the game alongside Ruby.

Heavy Attack

Uncharged Heavy: Decent speed very small area effected and damage is standard for uncharged heavy attacks.

Charged Heavy: Good damage but very small area of effect.

Aerial Attacks

Light Aerial: Yang can do up to 4 light attacks before returning to the ground standard damage for Light Aerials like all of them not useful.

Heavy Aerial: Ok for what it is good at setting up team attacks which makes it better than most and does standard damage.

Ultimate

Quake (Starting Ability): Pretty standard base ultimate comes out pretty quick and does good damage for a base ultimate.

Improved Quake (2 points): Becomes a pretty good ultimate with slightly smaller range than most but good damage and quick.

Super Quake (Requirement 300 Quake Kills) (Requirement Improved Quake) (2 points): Makes Yangs Ultimate into one of the best ultimates in the game able to one shot Beowolves.

Aftershock (Requirement Improved Quake) (2 points): Very cool and unique ability it is unfortunately just outclassed by Super Quake.

Team Attack

Blast Wave (Starting Ability): Fairly standard dashing Team Attack has decent speed to it.

Improved Blast Wave (1 point): Now hits enemies behind the target though for significantly less damage it does however knock them back which can be useful for protecting yourself after the Team Attack is done.

Earth Wave (Requirement 100 Blast Wave Kills) (Requirement Improved Blast Wave) (2 points):
Has a greater area of effect and higher damage to those affected by the aoe.

Ranged

Missile Barrage (Starting Ability): Pretty bad due to the first 2 attacks being essentially melee attacks.

Concussion Missiles (1 point): Does a little bit more and stuns the target(s) hit but is still not very good.

Missile Salvo (Requirement 200 Missile Barrage Kills) (Requirement Concussion Missiles) (2 points): Very good single target ranged attack capable of 1-shotting Beowolves. While stronger in damage than Weiss's it is very slow compared to Weiss's and needs 3 points invested as opposed to 1. It also doesn't particularly mesh with her playstyle which kind of forces you to specifically build around this hindering her best ability her Ultimate.

Special Abilities

Brawler (Requirement 300 Counters as Yang) (1point): Stuns enemies for longer which is nice but as it only affects one target and Yang wants to keep targets together for her Ultimate it is usually a hindrance to counter and should only be used to get out of sticky situations and as such makes this ability worthless.

Second Wind (Requires Level 10 as Yang) (2 points): My favorite of the level 10 abilities as it allows for a different very strong and risky playstyle that is very true to how Yang is in the show.
This is an incredibly key part of her kit as it allows for instant generation of up to 3 Ultimates and really solidifies her as one of if not the best ultimate focused characters.

Yang Builds and Playstyles

Yang is a very in your face character who similar to the shows relies on and uses her semblance which causes her to enrage when her aura is low this is replicated through her level 10 ability which creates her unique and very strong playstyle that requires you to use you aura as a resource.
Because of this the defensive abilities become very strong as you will consistently be out of aura and thus wanting to regenerate quickly and survive more hits after it's depleted.

The first and in my opinion best build for Yang is the Ultimate focused build that uses Second Wind to quickly generate 3 charges of ultimate.

Second Wind Ultimate Build

• Improved Quake (2)
  
• Super Quake (2)
  
• Second Wind (2)

These are the most important abilities for the build but the last 4 points are also incredibly crucial and can be used on 4 different abilities primarily which unfortunately cost 5 in total so you cannot get all 4.

• Survivor (1)
  
• Aura Regeneration (2)
  
• Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  
• Improved Ultimate 2 (1)

These 4 are all incredibly good and crucial for the playstyle so it is very hard to figure out and choose which to not take.
The Improved Ultimates take Second Wind from not worth it to incredibly strong.
Survivor allows for an easier time of getting to 0 aura whilst not dying.
And Aura Regeneration makes it so that you can get back to full health faster.

In general I would recommend not taking Aura Regeneration but I highly recommend testing all options.
This leaves you with 1 point left over which you can use for one of 3 things.

• Improved Blast Wave (1) While not great it does make your Team Attack, which you don't use all that often, stronger. It does make the Aerial Heavy attack better as it creates a good amount of team attacks. This causes you to sometimes want to use Aerial Heavy instead of LLH or LLLH as it is much quicker and still does a decent amount of damage with the Team Attacks created. This is of course for solo in multiplayer this is useful if there are a lot of Team Attacks being set up.
  
• Medic (1) Very straight forward if teammates are dying then this is a very good option if not don't take it.
  
• Heavy Synergy (1) This is similar to Improved Blast Wave in singleplayer as it promotes the use of team attacks more, however; it is very different in multiplayer as it allows you to set up more Team Attacks.
  
  This playstyle while I believe to be the by far the best and most fun is not by any means the only viable build and playstyle for Yang.
  The other builds will typically either not take Second wind all together or not rely on it and thus not take the defensive abilities allowing for a greater variety of offensive and utility based options.
  There are a few variants of these builds however they all still rely heavily on her Ultimate.
  
  

  Ranged Ultimate Build

  • Improved Quake (2)
    
  • Super Quake (2)
    
  • Concussion Missiles (1)
    
  • Missile Salvo (2)
    
  • Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  The last 2 points are preference based between two options primarily I recommend getting
  • Second Wind (2)
    
  • Improved Ultimate 2 (1)
  If you do go for the 3rd Ultimate slot, then the last point is pretty much exactly the same choice as the previous build but you can also go for Survivor or Increased Aura if you really need the defense if so i recommend Survivor over Increased Aura.
  
  You can also go a team attack variant in which case you will want to switch out the Ranged abilities for the Team Attack ones and as the last point (if in single player) Heavy Synergy.
  • Improved Quake (2)
    
  • Super Quake (2)
    
  • Improved Blast Wave (1)
    
  • Earth Wave (2)
    
  • Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
    
  • Improved Ultimate 2 (1)
  The last point as stated previously if in single player should be used on
  • Heavy Synergy (1)
  If not again it is personal preference and you could even swap out
  • Improved Ultimate 2
    For
    
  • Second Wind
  Yang is a very fun and all in character whose damage capability is probably the highest in the game at the very least in short bursts once her aura is depleted.

Juane Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL): Like all characters is not worth doing.

Light, Heavy (LH): Standard LH combo not really worth doing.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH): Does mediocre damage but has a good area of effect around him and it is ok at generating ultimate when hitting multiple enemies but is not his best option.

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): A pretty good single target attack that is fairly quick and generates a large amount of Ultimate.

Uncharged Heavy: Never use this it does almost no damage about equal to a single light attack.

Aerial Attacks

Light Aerial: He can do up to three attacks before returning to the ground.

Heavy Aerial: One of his best attacks as it is very safe and comes out quickly and has a good radius of damage around him.

Ranged

Charge: He charges towards his target or in the direction he is facing if there isn't a target. He deals damage to the enemy based on how far he has traveled. The damage even at max is equal to the of his heavy aerial which is easier, quicker, and hits multiple targets. This is only for maneuvering in fights.

Ultimate

Natural Leader (Starting Ability): This is a very good albeit very different Ultimate. The damage boost is obviously amazing but the knock back is also ok as it creates a good amount of Team Attacks which are crucial for Juane to create.

Deadly Leader (2 points): Doubles the damage boost from 50% to 100%. This is by far the best Ultimate upgrade for Jaune.

Nimble Leader (2 Points): Increases movement speed on top of the 50% damage buff.

Invigorating Leader (Requirement Have Teammates kill 300 enemies while buffed by your Ultimate.) (points 2): Adds a healing component to it as well as the 50% damage boost

Team Attack

Dash and Slash (Starting Ability): Pretty good Team attack moderate speed good damage and very good ultimate generation.

Improved Dash and Slash (1 point): Increases the number of strikes and damages nearby enemies. This is very good as it not only increases damage but also significantly increases Ultimate generation.

Final Dash and Slash (Requirement 100 Dash and Slash Kills) (2 points): Adds even more slashes this is also very good as it continues to increase damage and generate more ultimate.

Heavy

Team Jaune (Starting Ability): Deals damage in a wide area around him and causes a team attack on his target if they are weakened. This is his best attack as it has good damage average for a smash attack but has a much better area of effect than any other heavy attack other than Ren's which is comparable.

Improved Team Jaune (1 point): Creates Team Attacks on all weakened enemies hit by it.
This is a must as Jaune is all about creating and using Team Attacks.

Ultimate Team Jaune (Requirement Kill 200 enemies as Jaune) (1 point): Jaune can finish his own Team Attacks.This is obviously useless in singleplayer as you can already do that. In multiplayer though this ability is usually very good as you both create a lot of Team Attack Opportunities and want to use a lot of them. The only time it's not great is if your teammates are very actively executing Team Attacks in which case it is better to let them use the ones you set up.

Special Abilities

Best Teammate Ever (Requirement 500 kills as Jaune) (1 point): Doubles the duration of the buff from his Ultimate. This is a must as it allows you with the right build and execution to keep his ultimate up nearly 100% of the time. And even without keeping it up all the time it is still just amazing to double the duration.

Team Synergy (Requirement Level 10 as Jaune) (2 points): Charges your Ultimate whenever a teammate uses one of your Team Attack setups. This is a big part of Jaune's kit as it allows him to continue to generate both attacks which is his best way to deal damage and also generate ultimate at the same time.

Jaune Builds and Playstyles

Jaune is by far the most team oriented character and unlike most characters who stay at about the same power level between singleplayer and multiplayer, Jaune is much better in multiplayer due to his Team Attack setups (especially since he generates ultimate from teammates using them) and his ultimate which is obviously much better being on multiple teammates rather than just himself.

Juane's playstyle is pretty slow and his attacks are fairly weak as such you should focus less on killing your enemies with just heavy attacks and combos and instead go for Team Attacks and once you have your ultimate active use your Heavy or Aerial Heavy to quickly dispatch enemies.
Jaune typically wants to use ultimate quickly so that he can consistently keep damage boosted and as such does not really need more than the one charge of Ultimate.

Jaune has a few minor variations to his build but really only has two paths he can go one for multiplayer and one for singlepayer.

Multiplayer Build

• Deadly Leader (2)
  
• Improved Team Jaune (1)
  
• Best Teammate Ever (1)
  
• Heavy Synergy (1)
  
• Jaune Fire (2)
  
• Improved Dash and Slash (1)

With your last 2 points, I recommend going either:

• Final Dash and Slash (2) (If your Teammates are setting up Team Attacks.)

OR

• Ultimate Team Jaune (1)
  And
  
• Medic (1)
  OR
  
• Survivor (1)

Singleplayer Build

• Deadly Leader (2)
  
• Improved Dash and Slash (1)
  
• Final Dash and Slash (2)
  
• Improved Team Jaune (1)
  
• Best Teammate Ever (1)
  
• Heavy Synergy (1)

With the last two points I recomend going defensive

• Aura Regeneration (2)
  
• Survivor (1)
  
• Increased Aura (1)
  
  Jaune while fairly weak on his own is one of if not the best character for multiplayer due to his incredible supportive abilities and gameplay.

Nora Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL): Nora has the strongest of the light combos though hers is much slower than others.

Light, Heavy (LH): Not very good slow and weak does however stun targets.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH): Solid combo though not a whole lot of aoe much faster but generally worse than LLLH.

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): Very slow but extremely powerful attack capable of killing a Beowolf. This is good for single target but for aoe it will generally push away other targets as you follow your one target.

Aerial Combos

Light Aerial: Unlike all others is an aoe attack which does not move her forward she can do three and is probably the best Light Aerial but you should still always do your Heavy Aerial.

Heavy Aerial: Very good attack very good damage but good aoe and good Team Attack opportunity creation.

Heavy

Uncharged Heavy: Like most quick and moderate damage equal to her Aerial Heavy.

Charge Heavy: While good for taking out individual targets primarily frozen and stunned targets it has almost no aoe.

Ultimate

Charged Up (Starting Abilities): Slow but strong Ultimate great range and damage for a starting Ultimate.

Fully Charged (2 points): Good increase in damage and range.

Super Charged (Requirement 300 Charged Up Kills) (2 points): Good increase in damage due to the additional damage from the chain lightning.

Team Attack

Electro Blast (Starting Ability): Very good and in my opinion probably the best team attack due to the fact that you don't move to the target allowing you to keep fighting your enemies. It is also quick and has great damage.

Improved Electro Blast (2 points): A very good upgrade as the chain lightning does full damage to all enemies hit up to 4 additional targets.

Super Electro Blast (Requirement 100 Electro Blast Kills) (2 points): Good upgrade as it increased the area in which the lightning can chain to additional targets and hits more targets. Can be overkill sometimes as there may only be a few enemies around but is incredible when enemies are grouped up.

Ranged

Love Launcher (Starting Ability): Very fun ability and is pretty good both at being disruptive and dealing a good amount of damage especially when hitting targets with most or all of the grenades. Better at close range as you can almost always hit all of your grenades dealing a pretty good amount of damage. It is also very good for building Ultimate and if all grenades hit will trigger Power Surge which makes it the quickest way to trigger Power Surge.

Improved Love Launcher (1 point): Just a good damage increase (about double) and is a must if you plan on using you ranged attack at all.

Love Mines (Requirement Improved Love Launcher) (1 point): Very cool upgrade and can be taken as missed grenades can still damage enemies if they quickly walk over them. Can be taken but not a necessity.

Love Shock (Requirement Improved Love Launcher) (Requirement 200 Love Launcher Kills) (1 point): Increases the potency of it at short range significantly and allows for much faster Ultimate generation as well as just good additional aoe. I recommend taking this.

Special Abilities

Power Surge (Requirement 750 kills as Nora): An incredible ability with a huge potential that benefits from being able to consistantly land consecutive hits to keep the damage boost up. Two ways to trigger it with all hits of Love Launcher or with most hits of LLLH Combo.

Lightning Chain (Requirement Level 10 as Nora) (2 points): Not a very impressive ability as it does not trigger on Heavy Attacks. As well as the fact that the damage is pretty low and it does not deal additional damage to the primary target makes it very weak and generally not worth getting.

Nora Builds and Playstyles

Nora is a very slow and powerful character. She has quite a few different strong abilities and attacks though they don't always work together too well which makes a few different builds.

Nora can choose to focus on her ranged attacks which do not create Team Attack opportunities but do generate Ultimate fast. She can also use her LLLH combo to build Ultimate instead which leaves more points for Team Attacks and can also use her Aerial Heavy attack to create Team Attack opportunities and do a good amount of damage especially with her damage boost.

She has two main ways two build her as they dictate whether you use your Ranged Attacks or your LLLH Combo to activate Power Surge as well as what attacks you use once it is active. They both are very good options and thus create two fairly equally viable builds.

Ranged Build

• Fully Charged (2)
  
• Improved Electro Blast (1)
  
• Improved Love Launcher (1)
  
• Love Shock (1)
  
• Power Surge (2) [/list0
  With the remaining 3 points I recommend taking either:
  • Super Charged (2)
    
  • Super Electro Blast (2)
  And really any of the remaining one cost abilities.
  If you take Super Charged I would recommend:
  • Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  If you take Super Electro Blast (And are in singleplayer) then I recommend:
  • Heavy Synergy (1)
  
  This build focuses on using your ranged attacks primarily at short range but also at long range.
  When using your ranged attack at short range you will both deal a good amount of damage both single target and aoe and very importantly activate Power Surge. Once active you can either continue to use your Ranged Attacks or your Heavy Aerial (In my opinion the better option).
  Make sure to keep attacking to keep Power Surge active the best way to do this if you need to kite is by attacking only once every few seconds with your Ranged Attack this will continue to keep it active until you are able to start attacking again. Your Ranged Attacks will also build your Ultimate very quickly.
  
  

  Combo Build

  • Fully Charged (2)
    
  • Super Charged (2)
    
  • Improved Electro Blast (1)
    
  • Power Surge (2)
  
  The last 3 points can be used on pretty much anything but I would recommend:
  Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  Improved Ultimate 2 (1)
  Heavy Synergy (1)

Pyrrha Abilities

Combos

Pyrrha has an ability that creates additional combos adding 3 light attacks and 1 heavy during those 3.

Light, Light, Light, Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLLLLL): Stronger than most strings but still Light Attacks should only ever be used to build up to Heavy Attacks.

Light, Heavy (LH): Standard fairly weak combo though Pyrrha's does put you up in the air allowing you to combo of it.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH): Her best single target other than the upgraded Heavy. It is very good at building Ultimate.

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): A little less damage and Ultimate build than LLH though this has a decent aoe range around Pyrrha allowing for still mediocre damage but better Ultimate building in groups.

Light, Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLLH): Very good single target damage capable of singling out a Beowolf, though it does take a decent amount of time to get to.

Light, Light, Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLLLH): Same as LLLLH but slower and therefore worse.

Light, Light, Light, Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLLLLH): Same as LLLLH but slower and therefore worse.

Ranged: Higher single hit damage than all other but no third attack making it much weaker than everyone else's.

Heavy

Uncharged Heavy: About half the damage of most uncharged heavy making it unusable.

Charged Heavy: Like most heavy attacks in damage and Team Attack spawning though it has a pretty bad area of effect.

Abilities

Ultimate

Pyrrhoutte (Starting Ability): Easily the best starting Ultimate and on par or better than some fully upgraded Ultimates like Blake's.

Improved Pyrrhoute (2 points): Good upgrade on par with all Ultimates but Ruby and Yang though it is much better at killing Ursa, Mutant and Alpha Beowolves as it can hit them multiple times dealing full damage each time.

Final Pyrrhoute (Requirement 300 Pyrrhoute Kills) (Requirement Improved Pyrrhoute) (2 points): This is just not worth it as it does not increase the damage at all or enough to justify the 2 points and gets rid of the multiple hits on large enemies.

Team Attack

Spear Toss (Starting Ability): Decent for a Team Attack but nothing special really.

Improved Spear Toss (1 point): Pretty good upgrade adds moderate damage to those in a decently long line back towards where she jumped from.

Brutal Spear Toss (Requirement 100 Spear Toss Kills) (Requirement Improved Spear Toss)
(2 points): Increases the main target damage a decent amount and doubles the aoe damage. Pretty good if you are going for Team Attacks.

Combos

Combo (Starting Ability): As outlined before.

Improved Combo (1 point): Adds three additional light attacks.

Improved Heavy (Requirement X Kills) (Requirement Improved Combo) (1 point): Very strong primarily single target Heavy Combo, though fairly unreliable to get all of the damage from it.

Special Abilities

Ricochet (Requirement 300 Counters with Pyrrha) (1 point): Very good ability easily the best and only worthwhile counter ability in the game. It is very good for kiting and disruption especially when paired with her Level 10 ability.

Long Distance Toss (Requirement Level 10) (2 points): Doubles the range in which you can use Counter and Team Attacks. Very good if using both Team Attack and Counter. It is still good if only using one.

Pyrrha Builds and Playstyles

Pyrrha is in many ways a very standard character that makes use of all mechanics fairly evenly and unlike most characters does not focus on any one style of play. Though she does have a very strong Ultimate which should be consistently used.

One build you can go with her is focused on Counter and Team Attack.

Team Attack/Counter Build

• Improved Pyrrhoute (2)
  
• Improved Spear Toss (1)
  
• Brutal Spear Toss (2)
  
• Ricochet (1)
  
• Long Distance Toss (2)

With your remaining 2 points, you can go one of 2 routes rounding out offense with heavy combo, or defense/utility.

Offense

• Upgraded Combo (1)
  
• Upgraded Heavy (1)

Defense

• Survivor (1)
  
• Increased Aura (1)
  
• Aura Regeneration (2)

Utility

• Improved Ultimate 1 (1)
  
• Improved Ultimate 2 (1)
  
• Medic (1)
  
• Heavy Synergy (1)
  
  Of all those options I most recommend getting both Improved Ultimates due to your very strong Ultimate.
  
  With this build you want to use your Ultimate whenever you can and Counter often you should also try to take advantage of team attack opportunities often which is made easier by the increased range. This build and Pyrrha in general has a much more varied playstyle than really any other character. This however does mean that at times she may feel like she is lacking in a bit of power but the large variety of tools she has allows her to play much more freely than most other characters who rely almost entirely on one Combo or Ranged Attack and there Ultimate or Team Attack.
  
  Another build you can go is a Combo focused build.
  
  

  Combo Build

  • Improved Pyrrhoute (2)
    
  • Upgraded Combo (1)
    
  • Upgraded Heavy (1)
    
    This is all that is truly needed for this build but much like the other build you can add in a few other offensive options though with this you also have more defensive and utility options available.

Ren Abilities

Combos

Light, Light, Light, Light (LLLL): Pretty standard useless combo.

Light, Heavy (LH): Low damage but quick and does aoe and puts you in the air.

Light, Light, Heavy (LLH): Decent damage and Ultimate charge but it is pretty slow generally worse than LLLH

Light, Light, Light, Heavy (LLLH): Good damage and aoe somewhat similar to Ruby's LLLH combo. It is also somewhat slow.

Abilities

Ultimate

Warp Strike (Starting Ability): Easily the worst Ult in the game. It should only be used for buying time for aura regeneration. This fact that it lasts a while allows you to make better use of your Empower Heavy Attacks, if you choose to go for that build.

Improved Warp Strike (2 points): Doubles the amount of hits doubling your time spent in the Ult which allows you the full 6 seconds it takes to regenerate your aura. However, Aura Regeneration also allows you to regenerate your aura during the non-upgraded Warp Strike. They both cost the same and Aura Regeneration is just much better as it is both quicker and very useful without the Ultimate and is really a must for going with Heavy Attacks. This makes this ability pretty much never worth taking.

Furious Warp Strike (Requirement 300 Warp Strike Kills) (Requirement Improved Warp Strike) (2 points): Increases the range which is completely uneccessary. Never worth taking.

Team Attack

Cyclone (Starting Ability): Pretty solid it does do a good amount of damage.

Improved Cyclone (1 point): This is very good as it significantly increases damage and adds a decent amount of aoe damage. It does however extend the duration of the Team Attack which is better for Ren than really every other character as it is another way to delay allowing your aura to regenerate.

Devastating Cyclone (Requirement 100 Cyclone Kills) (Requirement Improved Cyclone) (2 points): Slightly increases damage almost always not worth the 2 points.

Heavy

Charge (Starting Ability): A very standard strong Heavy Attack.

Aura Charge (1 point): Costs 25% Aura to add an ok amount of damage in a large circle around him (the size is comparable to most Ultimates). Ok ability but mostly just necessary for the later upgrades.

Improved Aura Charge (Requirement Aura Charge) (1 point): Still takes 25% Aura and adds a stun to all affected which is very good. However, this is mostly useful for getting the Heavy kills required for the last upgrade.

Draining Aura Charge (Requirement 300 Charge Kills) (Requirement Aura Charge): Takes 50% Aura now but drastically improves the damage stuns and grants invulnerability while charging and attacking. The invulnerability is what makes this ability so strong as the invulnerability makes it very similar to an ultimate but costs Aura instead of Ultimate Charge. The of only the circle is comparable to a fairly average Ultimate but the damage dealt to the target(s) affected by the Heavy Attack itself take around double damage making it an incredibly high damage move. It is great for both large groups of enemies due to aoe effect and incredible for high health enemies as it deals the most damage of any singular attack when hitting with the Heavy Attack as well as the aoe of course. It is somewhat high risk as you are significantly weakening your Aura but after using it twice or even sometimes once you will have your Ultimate to allow you to regenerate back to full Aura.

Special Abilities

Extra Ammo (Requirement 300 Ranged Kills) (1 point) : Doubles the amount of bullets fired which makes your ranged both due more damage and more likely to hit. Though it is still generally not worth taking as using ranged is generally just less effective than Combos or Heavy (Empowered or not).

Heavy Hands (Requirement Level 10 as Ren) (2 points): Allows Ren to use his own Team Attacks which can be useful as it is both a good source of damage and allows him and additional way to buy time to regenerate Aura. Obviously useless in singleplayer.

Ren Builds and Playstyles

Ren is an incredibly high risk high reward character as he relies on uses his Aura to strengthen attacks. He has in my opinion the most unique playstyle as he relies on using his aura to deal massive damage with his Heavy Attacks, then buying time for his Aura to regenerate ideally through Team Attacks or using his Ultimate which really is only useful for this.

Ren really only has one build you can go which is his Heavy Attack build.

Heavy Attack Build

• Improved Cyclone (1)
  
• Aura Charge (1)
  
• Draining Aura Charge (2)
  
• Aura Regeneration (2)
  
• Survivor (1)

Your last 3 points differ depending on whether you are in singleplayer or multiplayer.
Multiplayer:

• Heavy Hands (2)
  
• Heavy Synergy (1)
  Or
  
• Medic (1)

Singleplayer

• Heavy Synergy (1)
  
• Devastating Cyclone (2)

Abiltity and Playstyle Overview

Playstyles differ from character to character as well as player to player and thus suggest that everyone try every character and different builds to find what you most enjoy.
All characters have strengths and weaknesses and are very different in playstyles however; no character is strickly weaker than any other.
Depending on your personal playstyle you may want to go more offensive or defensive or utility based builds.
In general I recommend figuring out what playstyle you most enjoy playing and trying out every character.

[Wind~Watcher]

You really prefer offensive builds I see, particularly ult focused ones. I tend more towards tanky, basic attack focused builds.