Thread: Still Skill Confused

I asked this question before and I thought I understood the responses given but upon reading up on skill awakening and rereading the responses, I am still rather confused.

I understand what it takes to obtain skill awakening but a question I have of it is still unanswered (maybe because I wasn't clear on it) but when one achieves skill awakening, does the awakened skill override the old skill or does it work along side it?

For example, for Bashira her skill is triple shot and her awakened skill is quadra shot beta. Does quadra shot beta overrule triple shot (as in triple shot no longer exists) or can you use both at the same time (as in both skills are available for use)?

Overrides it. You will basically in the Bashira example have "Quadra Shot 5/5" instead of "Triple Shot 5/5."

You can change it back at any time for the same cost it took to get it.

Followed by that there ARE a FEW units who can use there AW SKILL only once PER battle...after that it changes to there unAW SKILL...
Eg: Mage armour Erica (the previous star trial)

Alright that clears it up. But that seems a bit limiting though understandable. Aren't there some cases where the unawakened skill is preferable to the awakened skill? I have noticed that some awakened skills take far longer to activate or are simply worse in a strategic and/or useful sense.

How would one decide whether a skill should awaken or not?

Originally Posted by JSmith12

Alright that clears it up. But that seems a bit limiting though understandable. Aren't there some cases where the unawakened skill is preferable to the awakened skill? I have noticed that some awakened skills take far longer to activate or are simply worse in a strategic and/or useful sense.

How would one decide whether a skill should awaken or not?

based on your own judgment of the skill. this requires aigis experience and some thinking about it, as well as how you use the unit. for example, black samurai hibari's SAW is not preferred due to having a long cooldown, since her normal skill is more or less sufficient. Kikyo (black shaman) is also usually kept at normal skill due to 1s toggle into healer instead of 5s initial time.

using the tenhou example of bashira, quadra shot may not be preferred due to x0.9 attack during skill. there's also the skill uptime (duration/total time before next use), where total time = duration + cooldown/reuse time

Ah okay then, thank you for the clarification.

And keeping with the Bashira example, it seems that that even with the x0.9 attack, when attacking with four arrows it's still stronger it seems than triple shot.
Thank you for clearing this up .

Bashira's Quad Shot β being better or not reeeeeally depends on the armor class of opponents she is shooting at. Remember, not only defense is a flat damage reduction, but if enemy's defense is higher than archer's attack, then there's a chance that archer's arrows will simply bounce away uselessly, dealing no damage.)

If you're planning ahead to skill AW, check the "Guide to All things Awakening" topic for a lot of helpful info.

Originally Posted by JSmith12

Ah okay then, thank you for the clarification.

And keeping with the Bashira example, it seems that that even with the x0.9 attack, when attacking with four arrows it's still stronger it seems than triple shot.
Thank you for clearing this up .

While her overall DPS will be higher, once an enemy reaches a certain threshold of armor, the S.AW will start dealing less damage than the basic skill, and a little bit higher armor than that the S.AW will start bouncing before the basic skill does. Lets take a maxed Bashira with Spica AW and AW Prince Buff (20%).

Your attack after passive buffs will be 752.424

Base skill will be 752 x3 = 2256

S.AW will be 677 x 4 = 2708.

The threshold where S.AW becomes equal to base skill is

752 x3 - 3d = 677 x 4 - 4d

at 452 defense, the S.AW and Skill Awakening will deal the same amount of damage, and any more defense than that and the base skill will start to deal more damage. All giant/cyclops fall under this, with the armored Cyclops topping out at 450 Defense. But the larger gilman sit between 500 and 600 Defense, and the base skill will be better for these.

Against air units (Where you have a 1.4 attack multiplier), it becomes

1053 x3 - 3d = 948 x4 - 4d

Defense level of 633 becomes the point where the normal skill overtakes the S.AW. The weapon equipped Flying Demon and the demonic flies are the only flying units I could find that exceed this threshold.

There are some units whose Skill and S.AW do entirely different things. Anya's transforms her from a Super Tank into a death dealing AoE DPS Goddess, and Shuka goes from a support skill into a personal steroid to improve her own direct combat capabilities.