Description¶

Attack Gems are all about changing the way your character’s attacks can be modified such as adding Debuff effects to them or increasing elemental damage. It’s a category with a wide range of useful Gems and some of the best for certain characters will be found in this category. One other main difference here compared to the other categories is that all of these Gems can only be equipped on your weapons.

• Uses: Agility Down is one of the more useful Stat Down Gems you can equip, purely due to how useful a stat Agility is. Reducing an enemy’s Agility will mean they miss more often and have a greater chance of not evading your attacks, especially useful for higher level foes.

• Best Characters: This Gem is best saved for Physical based characters and of all of them, Shulk, Seven and Dunban are your best options. The Gem works based on auto-attacks and all three of these characters (Seven especially) can make use of a high Double Attack rating meaning more chance for this to land on your target.

• Uses: Back Attack Plus is one of the more useful Gems, increasing damage from all sources when behind the enemy. This means Arts like Back Slash and Sneaky will deal even more damage, just beware of spiking Aggro.

• Best Characters: Any character that has Arts with multipliers from behind will benefit greatly from this Gem such as Shulk (Back Slash), Riki (Sneaky) and Seven (Double Blade) however more interestingly, Melia is a great choice for the Gem too. Due to the nature of her playstyle, you should be aiming to have her behind the enemy as she doesn’t rely on auto-attacks and with this Gem, her Ether Arts will hit that much harder.

• Uses: The Bind Gem is a rather unremarkable Gem that doesn’t have too many uses. This will give your auto-attacks the chance to inflict Bind on your targets, the problem here is Bind as a Debuff has limited uses. For the most part, you never need to stop an enemy in it’s tracks so increasing that chance is redundant.

• Best Characters: There isn’t a best character for this Gem, especially with it requiring a weapon slot and there’s so many other useful Gems to fill that role.

• Uses: Blaze Attack will allow your auto-attack to take on the properties of a Blaze based attack. Like most of the elemental Attack Gems, they’re highly situational based on the enemy that you’re fighting and it’s important not to get it confused with the more useful Blaze Plus Gem.

• Best Characters: Another Gem that’s hard to recommend for any characters but if you must, go with any Physical attacking character rather than an Ether based one.

• Uses: Blaze Plus, like all of the elemental Plus Gems, are a lot more useful than their Attack counterparts. Blaze Plus will increase any Blaze related damage dealt, including Arts.

• Best Characters: Despite being more useful than it’s Attack counterpart, Blaze Plus is still not as useful as the others. Melia is the obvious candidate for Summon Blaze but her weapon slots are better saved for the more useful Plus Gems like Electric and Poison.

• Uses: Bleed Attack will allow your auto-attack to take on the properties of a Bleed based attack. Like most of the Attack Gems, they’re highly situational and something you should only ever consider if you have a spare slot free (you shouldn’t).

• Best Characters: Like the other Attack Gems, another one that’s hard to recommend for any characters but if you must, go with any Physical attacking character rather than an Ether based one.

• Uses: Bleed Plus, like the other Plus Gems, are a lot more useful than their Attack counterparts. Bleed Plus will increase any Bleed related damage dealt, including Arts, useful for Riki’s and Seven’s Bleed related Arts.

• Best Characters: Once again, Bleed is one of the less useful Debuffs and as such, the Gem has less use. If you must go with anyone, Riki is probably your best bet for this Gem.

• Uses: Break is one of the Gems that sounds more useful than they actually are. When auto-attacking, you’ll have up to 25% chance to inflict Break however the issue is, the characters that should use this Gem all have Arts they can easily use for the same effect.

• Best Characters: Break should only be put on Physical based attackers and even then, their Arts are more useful for inflicting Break rather than hoping for it to trigger from this Gem.

• Uses: Chill Attack will allow your auto-attack to take on the properties of a Chill based attack. Like most of the Attack Gems, they’re highly situational and something you should only ever consider if you have a spare slot free (you shouldn’t).

• Best Characters: Like all of the Attack based Gems, a Physical based character is your best choice for this Gem but it’s use is limited and one you should pass on.

• Uses: Chill Plus is the first of the Plus Gems that is really useful. With this Gem, all Chill based damage is increased from all sources, most importantly, Arts. Seeing as Chill is the second most useful DoT in the game, this is a Gem well worth setting.

• Best Characters: This Gem is a prime candidate for Melia as one of her better Gems to set. Summon Ice is one of her stronger DoTs in the game and hits a wide area so increasing that damage is always a plus. Likewise, Riki can make good use of this Gem for his Freezinate Art.

• Uses: Daze Up is an interesting Gem like all of the other Topple Combo based Gems. When set, all damage you inflict to an enemy suffering Daze is increased by x%. This is more useful when paired with Daze Plus (which keeps the enemy Dazed for a longer duration) and is good for parties that make full use of the Topple Combo.

• Best Characters: Daze Up is less useful than it’s Plus counterpart but it’s still a Gem worth setting to any of your Physical based characters. Just note that unless you have Daze Plus as well, Daze Up loses it’s effectiveness due to enemies not being Dazed long enough.

• Uses: Strong contender for one of the best Gems in the game, especially for Physical based characters. This Gem will increase the probability at which you perform Double Attacks and you can enhance it further with Skills and Auras to really ramp up how often you’re performing Double Attack. Better yet, pair it with the excellent Haste Gem and you’ll attack faster, further increasing that chance.

• Best Characters: Every physical based attacker will benefit from this Gem and you should equip it where possible. Shulk and Dunban are especially great for this Gem, Shulk to increase his Talent Gauge quicker and thus more Monado Arts usage and Dunban’s damage output will go through the roof with it. The best character for it however is Seven, she has many Skills which enhances it and her already fast attack speed and high damage will turn her into a monster when supplemented with Haste Gems too.

• Uses: Chill Plus is the next of the Plus Gems that is really useful. With this Gem, all Electric based damage is increased from all sources, most importantly, Arts. Electric is useful for burst damage on many of the characters who feature Electric based Arts meaning this Gem will help with that.

• Best Characters: Another Gem that is a prime candidate for Melia as one of her better Gems to set. Summon Bolt is one of her stronger Arts in the game for burst damage and with this set, will really ramp up the damage. Be wary of spiking Aggro with Melia with this set however so be sure to have a tank that can pull back Aggro easily.

• Uses: On paper, Ether Def Down is a really good Gem as it has a chance to inflict the Ether Def Down Debuff. This means that the enemy will take increased damage from all Ether sources, great right? The issue however is that your Ether based characters shouldn’t be spending as much time auto-attacking, thus making this less useful.

• Best Characters: Unfortunately not much use for this Gem as there’s better Gems for your Ether based characters and it’s a complete waste on the Physical based characters. This Gem is a victim of it being a Weapon based Gem.

• Uses: Ether Down is a highly situational Gem that makes it less than ideal to set. This Gem will give your auto-attacks a chance to inflict the Ether Down debuff, thus reducing the damage their Ether based Arts will deal. The issue here however is that most enemies in the game go with Physical based Arts meaning there’s few situations where you’ll benefit from this Gem.

• Best Characters: Like Ether Def Down, unfortunately not much use for this Gem. There’s just not enough situations in the game that calls for you to reduce the damage of your enemie’s Ether Arts.

• Uses: First Attack Plus is yet another highly situational Gem that you should pass on. In practice, you can deal some impressive damage on your first attack as this will increase all sources of damage however it’s only useful for battles that are over almost instantly. Anything lasting longer than a few seconds and this Gem becomes worthless.

• Best Characters: Not much use for anyone but can see some uses for characters like Shulk who can start a battle against lesser enemies with a Back Slash.

• Uses: A rather unremarkable Gem considering how difficult it is to obtain. When set, this Gem will give your auto-attacks a chance to restore HP based on the Rank. The only real characters that will benefit from this are Tanks and it doesn’t restore enough to make it viable.

• Best Characters: No character should run this Gem however if you must, consider both Reyn and Dunban as your choices as they’re the characters that should be losing HP the most.

• Uses: Lightning Attack will allow your auto-attack to take on the properties of an Electric based attack. Like most of the Attack Gems, they’re highly situational and something you should only ever consider if you have a spare slot free however this one has a higher cap.

• Best Characters: Like all of the Attack based Gems, a Physical based character is your best choice for this Gem but it’s use is limited. If you must go with it however, consider Seven due to the speed in which she attacks.

• Uses: Paralysis is a useful Gem that will give your auto-attacks the chance to inflict the useful Paralysis Debuff. This will lower the enemy’s auto-attack rate to just 25% and prevent them from countering or Double Attacking.

• Best Characters: Most Physical based attackers can make good use of this Gem with Shulk perhaps being the most useful. Paralysis is an incredibly useful Debuff however so you can’t go wrong with anyone provided you have a slot free.

• Uses: This is one of the more useful Attack Gems, having this set will give your auto-attacks the chance to lower the enemy’s Physical Defence and thus, increase all Physical based damage to the enemy. The fact that this stacks with Arts that lowers Physical Defence is the cherry on top, be sure to slot this where possible.

• Best Characters: Most Physical based attackers can make good use of this Gem with Shulk and Dunban being the prime candidates. Both of these characters are fast attackers and also have Arts that further increases the Physical Defence Down debuff, allowing a Physical based party to deal massive damage.

• Uses: Like most of the Attack based Gems, far outclassed by their Plus counterparts. Poison Attack gives your auto-attacks the chance to inflict the Poison DoT, the strongest one in the game. Like always with the Attack Gems however, it wastes a Weapon slot which has many better uses for a Physical based party.

• Best Characters: There’s not really a good choice here outside of the general recommendation of a Physical based character.

• Uses: Poison Plus is an incredible Gem and one you should seek as soon as possible. As mentioned before, Poison is by far the best DoT in the game and with Poison Plus increasing its DoT damage by up to a further 100% makes it that more powerful. The Gems are more difficult to find but when you do find them, they’re the best for those characters.

• Best Characters: This is the Gem that turns Melia into a DoT powerhouse. Summon Earth was already an incredible Art but paired with this Gem, it becomes devastating so be sure to reach the cap with Melia. Riki also can make excellent use out of this Gem with his Lurgy Art, another that focuses on the Poison DoT (just not as potent as Summon Earth).

• Uses: This works similar to the Paralysis Gem in that it gives your auto-attacks a chance to inflict the Slow Debuff. The issue with this is that Slow is a less useful Debuff than Paralysis and if you were to go with one of these Gems, Paralysis is the clear winner.

• Best Characters: There’s not really a good choice here outside of the general recommendation of a Physical based character.

• Uses: An unremarkable Gem with very little use. When set, you will reflect up to 250 damage back to your attacker. Seeing as your tanks should be the only ones getting hit and 250 is the cap, this is useless for the most part.

• Best Characters: There is no best character this time around, you should avoid this Gem.

• Uses: Like most of the stat Down Gems, this is useful to stop your enemies from dealing as much damage to you. Unfortunately, as weapon slots are a premium, both Agility Down and Phys Def Down are far more useful.

• Best Characters: There’s not really a good choice here outside of the general recommendation of a Physical based character.

• Uses: Topple Up is an interesting Gem like all of the other Topple Combo based Gems. When set, all damage you inflict to an enemy suffering Topple is increased by x%. This is more useful when paired with Topple Plus (which keeps the enemy Toppled for a longer duration) and is good for parties that make full use of the Topple Combo. This is the better Gem to go with over Daze Up due to Topple being easier to inflict.

• Best Characters: Topple Up is less useful than it’s Plus counterpart but it’s still a Gem worth setting to any of your Physical based characters. This is especially useful for Reyn who has the quickest Topple Art in the game.