Description¶

Stat based Gems are all about raising your characters’ primary stats such as Strength, Ether and HP. They all have a maximum amount they can raise that particular stat to as shown by the value in yellow whne it reaches its cap.

• Uses: Agility is arguably one of the most important stats in the game, it impacts both your accuracy and evasion and is even more vital when you’re going up against high level enemies. As a general rule, you don’t want to fight any enemy that’s 5 levels above you without reaching the Cap on Agility. Agility Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: You can’t go wrong with any character that needs to physically hit the enemy but it’s especially vital for Dunban and Reyn. Both need to hit the enemy regurarly to maintain Aggro and Dunban’s whole Evasion tanking is revolved around his high Agility.

• Uses: AP is needed to increase the Ranks of your character’s Arts and the later Ranks start to require 15,000+ AP. The AP Up Gem will increase how much AP you gain up to a max of 200% extra. You won’t come into contact with these Gems often and they’re saved for special rewards but as you get them, be sure to set them. Ap Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: All of the party needs AP to level their Arts but Shulk especially has some pricey Arts to rank up, especially the Monado ones so it’s a good idea to have AP Up on him if you’re lagging behind a bit with them.

• Uses: When you look at your weapons in the equipment menu, you’ll notice that they have both a min and max attack value. Attack Plus will increase the max attack value, allowing the weapon to hit for greater damage. This doesn’t just apply to auto-attacks however, this will also impact both your Talent Arts and regular Arts too. Attack Plus can only be equipped on Weapons.

• Best Characters: Due to the nature of the Monado and it’s attack power being based off Shulk’s level, he’s an excellent candidate to make use of these Gems. Likewise, Seven is a good choice for her high damage output along with both Dunban and Reyn as damage dealt applies to Aggro.

• Uses: Just like Attack Plus above, Attack Stability will increase the min attack value, allowing the weapon to hit for more consistent damage. With the changes in Definitive Edition, this takes less of an important role but can still be useful in certain situations. Attack Stability can only be equipped on Weapons.

• Best Characters: For all of the same reasons as Attack Plus, the same characters will benefit from Attack Stability. So long as the characters are physically attacking, both of these Gems will be useful.

• Uses: Critical Hit Rate impacts the chance of scoring a Critical Hit, dealing high damage with your attacks and Arts. You may only be able to raise it to a cap of 25% but considering a Critical Hit will increase the Party Gauge along with many characters having useful skills related to Critical Hits and this is an important Gem. Critical Up can only be equipped on Weapons.

• Best Characters: Critical Hits are not a bad thing on any characters but both Reyn and Dunban can benefit greatly from it, Dunban especially due to his skills and multihit Arts. More importantly however is Seven, everything about this character is about Critical Hits and having these on her will make her even more deadly.

• Uses: Ether Defence is one of the more forgettable stats in the game, it impacts the damage you take from Ether based Arts. In general, most of the enemies will usually stick to Physical based Arts and even then, you can make up the difference with equipment and Skills making it hard to waste Gem slots on this. Ether Def can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: As mentioned above, there’s not that many uses for this Gem in general. Melia has the lowest HP and large area of effect Ether Arts could deal some damage to her but that’s too situational to waste Gem slots on.

• Uses: Ether is one of the most important stats in the game for any character that focuses primarily on Ether based Arts such as Melia, Sharla and Riki and it has a high cap of 150, one that you should strive to meet on these characters. Ether Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: Melia is the obvious choice here, all of her main Arts are Ether based and reaching the cap will allow Arts like Summon Bolt and Earth to really pack a punch. Sharla and Riki are also good contenders for this gem for Sharla’s healing Arts and Riki’s DoT based Arts thus creating an Ether based party.

• Uses: As you may expect, you need EXP for your characters to increase their Level which in turn, impacts their accuracy and evasion. The EXP Up Gem will increase how much EXP you gain up to a max of 200% extra. Like the AP Up Gems, you won’t come into contact with them often and they’re saved for special rewards but as you get them, be sure to set them. EXP Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: All of the party needs EXP but it might be worth prioritizing the character you control most often as party leader and any characters that seem to be lagging behind.

• Uses: HP Up does exactly the thing it says, raises a character’s maximum HP. This can be useful to increase a character with low HP but for the most part, these are the Gems you go to if you have nothing else in mind to set. HP Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: Dunban is a good candidate for a HP Gem, it allows a bit of safety when he goes up against higher level enemies and his evasion doesn’t kick in. Likewise, Melia has the lowest HP in the game so it can be a good idea to increase it a little.

• Uses: Muscle Up will increase that character’s Physical Defence to a maximum of 100. Although on paper this sounds useful, there’s so many ways to increase your Physical Defence be it from Equipment, Skills or Buffs that make this Gem a waste of a slot. Muscle Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: There really isn’t one for this Gem, you could always throw a Gem on Dunban or Reyn but Agility Up is far more valuable and even Melia, who is the most vulnerable of the party, shouldn’t be getting hit enough to warrant this Gem.

• Uses: Like Muscle Up, Strength is another stat that has many ways of increasing it but this is still useful to boost both your auto-attacks and Physical Arts. Like Ether Up, there are some characters that if you have some spare slots or are just going for an pure damage build, these are key to it. Strength Up can be equipped on both Armour and Weapons.

• Best Characters: There are certain characters that will benefit from it the most with Shulk and Seven being the best candidates. Reyn can find some use of this too, he can be built to output massive amounts of damage with Sword Dive, especially in Chain Attacks.