The main purpose of this guide is to provide information that is usable across all magic guides and to supplement my other guides or other magic-related guides! Please feel free to reach out to me (IGN: Choi or Tokki) for any questions or feedback!

For a List of Magical Class Guides:

• Arch Mage: Choi's SVS Arch Mage Guide
• Soul Ascetic: Choi's Soul Ascetic Guide
• Cardinal: Choi's Magic and Support Cardinal Guide
• Cardinal: In Depth Guide for Full Support Cardinal with Johnny
• Elemental Master: Lxna's Elemental Master of Puppets Build Guide
• Elemental Master: The Complete Elemental Master Guide by Goldie
• Imperial Guard: Lxna's Here Comes the (Cross) Rain Again Guide
• Troubadour & Trouvere: The Performer's Life By Conga Lyne
• Hyper Novice: Psoron's Magic Hyper Novice Guide

If your guide is up to date and you want it to be included in the list, please let me know!

Last updated: March 31st, 2026

Generally, Stats should be based on what best suits you. As such, I won't provide my exact Stat distribution, as you should update yours accordingly. Instead, I'll provide my priority and the benefits of each Stat:

1. Int: Provides the highest bonus in StatusMATK. It also provides the second-highest reduction in Variable Cast Time.
2. Dex: Provides the third-highest bonus in StatusMATK. It also provides the highest reduction in Variable Cast Time from stats.
3. Vit: Provides a lot of tankiness through HP, SoftDEF, and SoftMDEF.
4. Agi: Provides some additional tankiness by providing FLEE, and the ATKSPD improves DPS by reducing Cast animation.
5. Str: Provides additional weight capacity which will help for farming.
6. Luk: Provides the second-highest bonus in StatusMATK. However, I use more Dex than Luk because of the cast time reduction.

Traits are additional stats that provide bonuses for fourth classes. Traits are bit more straightforward:

1. SPL (110): Provides the highest bonus in S.MATK and your abilities will additionally scale off SPL.
2. CON (100-110): Provides the second-highest bonus in S.MATK.
3. WIS (50-82): Provides Magical Resistance which I prioritize over Physical Resistance, as you will have a lot of Flee for physical damage.
4. STA (0-32): Provides Physical Resistance.

Cast Time: You can see the Cast time of your skills in its skill description.

• Variable Cast Time (VCT) can be reduced by gear (all types of gear) and stats. The formula to calculate your Variable Cast Time Reduction is 1 -¹⁾/530)) * (1 - Bonus VCT from gear)).

• The VCT reduction through stats and the VCT reduction through gear in the formula is multiplicative. This means that 100% VCT reduction is only obtainable by getting 100% VCT reduction from one way or the other and not through a combination of both.
• Fixed Cast Time (FCT) can be reduced by equipment (Most often through Shoes, Costume Enchant Stones, Accessories, and Higher Level Headgear).

While you are still progressing in gear, my recommendation is not to focus on Variable Cast Time through gears too much and just allocate a lot of stats into int and dex. In the future, however, you will want to try to have high VCT % reduction and not focus as much on VCT through stats. That being said, FCT reduction should be one of your primary goals early on.

To get an understanding of how Cast time reduction works, let's use Soul Vulcan Strike which has a 1s Fixed and 3s Variable Cast Time. To reduce my Fixed Cast time, I could use +7 Grace Magic Boots [1] (470021) for -.5s, Minor Casting Stone (Garment) (25170) for -.3s, and the Brilliant Light Sapphire Ring [1] (490064) and Brilliant Light Sapphire Necklace [1] (490065) combo for -.2s totalling -1s FCT. For Variable Cast Time if I had 151 int and 84 dex (84*2 + 151) I would have 319/530 = 77.58% VCT Reduction. Additionally, if I had 77% VCT reduction from stats, my total VCT left would be (1-.7758)*(1-.77) = 0.05156 (5.16%) giving me a total of 94.84% VCT reduction, and my SVS cast time would be .154 seconds.

If you're not a nerd, just note that early on you should get a lot of int and dex and don't worry about VCT % from gear!!!

You can see the Cool Down and After Cast Delay of your skills in its skill description.

• Skill Cool Down (SCD) is the internal cooldown of a specific skill that blocks that specific skill from being cast again until the Cool Down is over. During this time, other skills can be cast. SCD can only be reduced by gear, and there are very limited ways to reduce Skill Cool Downs of Fourth Job Skills.

• Note: Skill Cool Downs for fourth job skills can currently only be reduced by Time Dimension and Another Dimension Gear.
• After Cast Delay (ACD) is the global cooldown of skills that block all skills from being cast again until the ACD is over. ACD can be reduced by gear, but unlike Skill Cool Downs, there are many options available to gain ACD reduction.

Both of these limit how frequently you can cast your skills. However, since Skill Cool Down has the least amount of ways to be reduced, your SCD will serve as the hard limit on how often a skill can be cast. As such, your goal will be to reduce your ACD to at least the same time as your main skill's SCD. However, if you rotate multiple skills, you should attempt to gain more ACD reduction.

To calculate how much ACD reduction you will need to match your skill's SCD, you should divide the Skill Cool Down of the skill by its After Cast Delay and subtract that from 1 i.e. (1 - (SCD/ACD)). To use an example, Crimson Arrow has a SCD of .3s and an ACD of .5s, so (1 - (.3/.5)) = (1 - (.6)) = .4 which means that you need 40% ACD reduction to reduce the ACD of Crimson Arrow to be .3s like its SCD. In this way, with 40% ACD reduction, you can spam Crimson Arrow at the max possible frequency that the skill allows.

As I mentioned, if you are rotating your skills rather than using just one skill, more ACD may be desirable than just the amount of your skill cooldown. Soul Vulcan Strike build Arch Mages for example don't need any ACD reduction for SVS. However, as they also use their other skills as part of their rotation, more ACD is desirable. One note is that because of animation speed, you don't need your ACD to be lower than .14s.

You can see your Attack Speed in your status window.

• Attack Speed (ASPD) is the number of hits you can do per second or the frequency of your hits. ASPD can be increased in many ways including gears, stats, and common consumables like Berserk Potion (657) .

Even if you are not an auto attack build, ASPD is still very important as it reduces the animation speed of your skills which will be important for low cooldown builds. Even if your cooldown on your skills is low, you can not cast more frequently than your animation speed allows. Increasing your ASPD can be thought of as increasing the number of hits you can do per second.

The formula to calculate your hits per second is (50 / (200 - ASPD)). So, for example, if you have 180 ASPD, then your hits per second is (50 / (200 - 180)) = 50 / 20 = 2.50 hits per second.

As I mentioned, you can not cast more frequently than your animation speed allows, so when considering the cooldown of your skill, you will want to also calculate the amount of ASPD you need to have. To do so, you would need to calculate the amount of time your skill can be cast per second.

The formula to calculate your max cast per second is (1 / Skill Cool Down). So, for example, Talisman of White Tiger has an SCD of .4s, so the max casts per second is (1 / .4) = 2.50 casts per second.

I want my ASPD to allow at least the same hits per second as my casts per second, and I know from my previous calculation that 180 ASPD is required to hit 2.50 hits per second. So, to spam Talisman of White Tiger, I would want 180 ASPD. The overall formula then would be ASPD necessary = ²⁾ - 50) / (1 / SCD). So for example, with the SCD of .4s: ³⁾ - 50) / (1 / .4) = ⁴⁾ - 50 / (2.5) = (450) / (2.5) = 180 ASPD.

If you're not a nerd, here's a table:

ASPD Table
Skill Cool Down	ASPD	Hits per sec	Relevant Skills
.14s	193	7.14	193 is the max ASPD. Relevant Skills are skills with no Cool Downs
.25s	188	4.00	Chulho Sonic Claw
.3s	185	3.33	Crimson Arrow, Rock Down, Talisman of Blue Dragon, Hyunrok Cannon, Framen, Napalm Vulcan Strike
.35s	183	2.86	Crescive Bolt, Storm Slash, Triple Laser, Hogogong Strike, Mega Sonic Blow, Only One Bullet
.4s	180	2.50	Talisman of White Tiger, Metallic Fury, Abyss Dagger
.45s	178	2.22
.5s	175	2.00	Diamond Storm, Terra Drive, Acidified Zone Fire, Dragonic Breath, Eternal Slash, Wild Fire
.55s	173	1.82
.6s	170	1.67

Any skills with higher cooldowns will likely not be gated by ASPD. For example, something with a .7s cooldown only requires 165 ASPD which is very low. Similar to ACD Reduction, if you are rotating your skills, more ASPD will be desirable.

Additionally, you can use this calculator to determine how much ASPD, ACDR, and Cast Time reduction you need for a specific skill to get the maximum hits per second.

Animation Cancelling is also a very useful skill to learn. Animation Cancelling is when you cast a skill but cancel or finish the animation early by entering a new command (e.g. movement). So whenever you cast a skill, to maximize your damage output, you should click to move to cancel the animation.

Madame Celery's Guide to GemstoneRO has a very useful section for Gear Progression and Useful Cards, so please check that out! The table I will provide for Gear Progression will be more specific to Magic Damage Classes. This table has links that will guide you to the relevant pages. Additionally, keep in mind that this is a supplement to class-specific player guides. Other class guides will provide more details on how to progress your gear.

It may be tempting starting out to want to rush your end-game gear. However, I do not recommend doing this and instead recommend improving your gear gradually, so you can farm more effectively.

Shadow Gear is a great bonus to your power and can also provide additional benefits. Starting out, you should get the Beginner Shadow Gear from Lucy at Eden. Once you reach level 100, you should work on getting the Advanced Paradise Shadow Gear. The Advanced Paradise Shadow gear will give great benefits early on including ignoring 50% def/mdef pierce.

However, more powerful Shadow Gear and Shadow Gear Enchants are available in the main office basement. For these, you can either go for a mix of the advanced Shadow Gear or the Master Shadow Gear

The basic Master Shadow Gear is a slightly weaker but easier option than the mixed shadow gear. The Master Shadow gear provides both 100% DEF/MDEF penetration and 20% RES/MRES penetration. As such, it is a flexible shadow set that can be used on both physical and magical classes. However, the enchants on the Master Shadow gear give bonuses for specific skills e.g. Arch Mage Soul (Soul Vulcan Strike) (312241) , so with the enchants it is the most build specific shadow gear. Additionally, the enchants on the Shadow Gear, while pricey, are specific and won't require RNG. Master Shadow Gear is a great option even though it is a little bit weaker as it is cheaper and easier to enchant.

Mixed Blue Shadow Gear is the stronger than basic Master Shadow Gear and provides a lot of flexibility for magic classes. Mixed Shadow Gear refers to the various kinds of advanced Shadow Gear that are available. These Shadow Gears can provide additional bonuses like permanent Endure status with the Lord Bearer's Combo Lord Bearer's Shadow Armor (24764) . Unlike Master Shadow Gear, you can mix and match different Blue Shadow Gear but do note that they still have their own combos. Mixed Shadow Gear is more expensive as their enchants require RNG. However, due to their enchants not being skill-specific, they can be used for all your magic damage classes.

Some great options for Blue Shadow Gear are:

Shadow Gear	Combos	Notes
Full Tempest	Full Tempest Shadow Earring (24665) & Full Tempest Shadow Pendant (24668) Full Tempest Shadow Armor (24667) & Full Tempest Shadow Shoes (24666)	Provides 100% Magical Defense Penetration with the full upgraded combo and some damage. I recommend you always get a two piece combo of this and prioritize this over the rest of your shadow gear.
Full Spell	Full Spell Shadow Armor (24883) & Full Spell Shadow Shoes (24884)	Provides the highest amount of damage.
Magical Spell	Magical Spell Shadow Weapon (24753) & Magical Spell Shadow Shield (24754)	Provides a decent amount of SPL and damage.
True Gemstone	True Gemstone Shadow Armor (24675) & True Gemstone Shadow Shoes (24676) True Gemstone Shadow Earring (24677) & True Gemstone Shadow Pendant (24678)	Provides a high amount of damage and nullifies gemstone requirements. Also provides a small amount of VCT reduction.
Clever	Clever Shadow Weapon (24736) & Clever Shadow Shield (24737)	Provides a good mix of damage and VCT reduction.
Centering	Centering Shadow Pendant (24885) & Centering Shadow Earring (24886)	Provides a good mix of damage and VCT reduction.
Lord Bearer's	Lord Bearer's Shadow Armor (24764) & Lord Bearer's Shadow Shoes (24763) Lord Bearer's Shadow Earring (24766) & Lord Bearer's Shadow Pendant (24765)	Provides permanent Endure status with the full upgraded combo. Also provides a good mix of damage and HP.
Spell Caster's	Spell Caster Shadow Armor (24747) & Spell Caster Shadow Shoes (24748) Spell Caster Shadow Earring (24749) & Spell Caster Shadow Pendant (24750)	Provides FCT reduction with the full upgraded combo. Also provides the highest amount of VCT and a small amount of damage

As mentioned before, your Shadow Gear can be mixed, so one combo you could possibly use is: Full Spell Shadow Armor (24883) , Full Spell Shadow Shoes (24884) , Magical Spell Shadow Weapon (24753) , Magical Spell Shadow Shield (24754) , Full Tempest Shadow Earring (24665) , and Full Tempest Shadow Pendant (24668) ! But please review the different options, and see what would benefit you the most. Spell Caster, for example, provides a lot of VCT that your build may need.

Special Master Shadow Gear

The most powerful option that is available is the Special Master Shadow Gear that combos with the Master Shadow Weapon (24792) and Master Shadow Shield (24793) . It particularly provides higher damage against high MRES mobs. However, it doesn't provide the flexibility of stats that mixed blue shadow might provide, as it mainly damage-focused and does not provide other stats that blue shadow gear might provide. The Special Master Shadow Gear has three sets which provide similar stats but damage for different elements:

Sets	Shadow Gear	Modifier
Magical Master	Magical Master Shadow Armor (24993) , Magical Master Shadow Shoes (24994) Magical Master Shadow Earring (24995) & Magical Master Shadow Pendant (24996)	Increases Magical Damage with Water, Wind, Earth, Fire and Shadow element.
Spell Master	Spell Master Shadow Armor (24997) , Spell Master Shadow Shoes (24998) Spell Master Shadow Earring (24999) & Spell Master Shadow Pendant (1270000)	Increases Magical Damage with Neutral, Holy, Shadow, Ghost and Undead element.
Sorcery Master	Sorcery Master Shadow Armor (1270001) , Sorcery Master Shadow Shoes (1270002) Sorcery Master Shadow Earring (1270003) & Sorcery Master Shadow Pendant (1270004)	Increases Magical Damage with Fire, Water, Wind, Poison and Neutral element.

The Special Master Shadow Gear is currently the most expensive and difficult to obtain shadow gear available as it requires Ancient Language Document (7914) from Special Instance Coin (50209) . As such, before creating the Special Master Shadow Gear, I recommend creating either a mixed blue set or basic master shadow set and completing Phase 5 of gear before working on the Special Master Shadow Gear.

Costume Stones provide a great deal of damage. The costume combos related to your specific class (e.g. Arch Mage Stone (Garment) (1001787) ) will generally be your best option. However. a good general combo is the Arch Bishop Combo Archbishop Stone (Top) (1000857) , Archbishop Stone (Low) (1000859) , and Archbishop Stone (Garment) (25709) / Archbishop Stone II (Garment) (1000019) .

Cute Pets: White Knight Egg (9134) , Gloom Under Night Egg (9122) , Dark Illusion Egg (9139) , and Icewind Egg (9147) are good choices.

For more card information, Celery's guide has a great list of relevant cards.

Addition to this table, Chapter 1 has many useful cards that are strong against specific property monsters.

Equipment	General	Neutral	Water	Earth	Fire	Wind	Poison	Holy	Shadow	Ghost	Undead
Upper Headgear	Katrinn Card (4366) Elite Rgan Healer Card (300459)	Plaga Card (27310)	Lichtern Blue Card (4597) Ice Gangu Card (300359)	Lichtern Yellow Card (4600)	Lichtern Red Card (4599)	Tikbalang Card (4586)	Diligent Vitata Card (300238)	Mutant Heart Hunter Sanare Card (27309)	Lavaeter Card (300258)	Lichtern Green Card (4598) Pierrotzoist Card (300247)
Middle Headgear	Dark Illusion Card (4169) Elite Rgan Healer Card (300459)	Plagarion Card (300251)	Vanilaqus Card (300257) Ice Gangu Card (300359)	Fulgor Card (300259)	Fillia Card (300256)	Litus Card (300255)	Venedi Card (300253)	Deadre Card (300252)	Lavaeter Card (300258)	Lichtern Green Card (4598)
Armor	The Chief Knight of Abyss Card (300665) Two Eyes Dollocaris (300376) Yortus Conjurator Card (300529) Meyer Lugenburg Card (300308) Agav Card (4409)		Ice Straw Card (300361)
Weapon	Shadiest Card (300662) Lunarina Card (300660) Mutating White Knight Card (27384) Copo Card (300455) Velelling Card (300507) Yormi Missionary Card (300520) Deadsera Card (300442) Regenschirm Scientist Card (300265)	Solace Card (4394)						Solace Card (4394)
Shield	Mutating Khalitzburg Card (27385) Renovated Upper Rgan (300379)
Garment	Friedrich S. Heine Card (300424) Napeo Card (300260)	One Eye Dollocaris Card (300375) Yordos Investigator Card (300521) Smile Card (300273)	Yordos Judge Card (300522) Faceworm Larva Card (27167)	Yordos Judge Card (300522) Arc Elder Card (4629)	Yordos Investigator Card (300521) Nightmare Ancient Mummy Card (4657)	Yordos Judge Card (300522) Abysmal Phen Card (300149)	Yordos Judge Card (300522) Erzsebet Card (300293)	One Eye Dollocaris Card (300375) Yordos Investigator Card (300521) Pray Card (300272) Yellow Pitaya Card (300122)	One Eye Dollocaris Card (300375) Yordos Investigator Card (300521)	One Eye Dollocaris Card (300375) Yordos Investigator Card (300521) Eldest Card (300269) Cave Flower Card (300372)	Yordos Judge Card (300522)
Footgear	Nightmare Verit Card (4658) Icewind Card (300458)	Midnight Dio Anemos Card (300178) Midnight Fei Kanabian Card (300190) Dio Anemos Card (27250) Tumblering Card (300221)	Midnight Ordre Card (300183) Boiling Water Marc Card (300121) Ordre Card (27255)	Midnight Fei Kanabian Card (300190) Verporte Card (300090)	Midnight Geffen Thief Card (300179) Geffen Thief Card (27253)	Midnight Ordre Card (300183) Ordre Card (27255)		Midnight Rechenier Card (300188) Midnight Geffen Thief Card (300179) Boiling Water Marc Card (300121) Geffen Thief Card (27253) Rechenier Card (27259)	Tumblering Card (300221)
Right Accessory		Icebear Card (300470)	Crow Duke Card (300268) Headless Mule Card (27125) Elite Rgan Warlock Card (300464)	Melibe Iceslug Card (300469)	Crow Duke Card (300268) Melibe Iceslug Card (300469)	Melibe Iceslug Card (300469) Elvira Card (4577)	Elite Rgan Warlock Card (300464)	Elite Rgan Warlock Card (300464)	Icebear Card (300470)	Icebear Card (300470)	Midnight D.Y Card (300191) Jennifer Card (300294)
Left Accessory		Ashhopper Card (300218)	Calmaring Card (300364)	Ash Toad Card (300211)	Lava Toad Card (300216)	Firewind Kite Card (300222)	Cave Calmaring Card (300371)	Dispol Card (300448)	Disposed Native Rgan Card (300369)	Disposed Midrange Rgan Card (300370)	Midnight D.Y Card (300191) Jennifer Card (300294)

Lastly, the Jitterbug Card (27109) , Playing Pere Card (27107) , and Singing Pere Card (27108) Combo is a very useful card combo against Betelgeuse (20994) and Rigel (22174)

To explain more about Calculating your damage and overall discuss Diminishing Returns, I will be using Soul Vulcan Strike as a reference.

The formula for Soul Vulcan Strike is MATK ⁵⁾ * (Base Level/100))%. Afterwards, all modifiers applied on your ability's damage is multiplicative. Other than the specific skill's formula, the behavior for the modifiers are similar for all magic damage abilities.

• Spell Magic Attack (S.MATK): Final status magic attack and final equipment magic attack increases by %. This is increased by your equipment but also the SPL and CON from your traits.
• Skill Damage Modifier: Modifiers to a specific skill's damage. e.g. the Glacier Flower Spell (Illusion Soul Magic) (311294) enchant on your Dim Glacier Weapon.
• Skill Element Modifier: Modifiers to your magical damage with a specific element. e.g. the Glacier Flower Spell (Magical Grade) Lv5 (311458) enchant on your Dim Glacier Weapon.
• Element Modifier: Modifiers to your magical damage against a specific element. e.g. Singing Pere Card (27108)
• Race Modifier: Modifiers to your magical damage against a specific race. e.g. Dragon Scale Lv5 (310246)
• Size Modifier: Modifiers to your magical damage against a specific size. e.g. Mutating White Knight Card (27384)
• Class Modifier: Modifiers to your magical damage against a specific class (Boss or Normal). e.g. Brilliant Biosphere Gem (Boss Type) (311943) and Brilliant Biosphere Gem (Normal Type) (311942)

You can check your total modifiers through the command @bs in game. Keep in mind that Class Modifier, Race Modifier, Element Modifier, and Size Modifier are often for a specific class/race/element/size rather than say all in that category e.g. magic damage against all race.

The formula can then further be broken out for Soul Vulcan Strike to say S.Matk ⁶⁾⁷⁾ * (Base Level/100))% * (1 + Skill Damage Modifier) * (1 + Skill Element Modifier) * (1 + Element Modifier) * (1 + Race Modifier) * (1 + Size Modifier) * (1 + Class Modifier)).

The main takeaway is that the modifiers that you add are multiplicative with one another, so when thinking about gears and cards, you should consider two important concepts:

• Each additional increase in a specific modifier provides less benefits the more of that modifier you already have.
• Spreading out your modifiers is more beneficial than indexing into one modifier.

To put this into a relevant example, Regenschirm Scientist Card (300265) and Mutating White Knight Card (27384) on a +12 staff provides 30% Skill Element Modifier or 20% Size modifier, respectively. For this example, if you already have a 50% Size Modifier, the Mutating White Knight Card (27384) will provide more benefit than Regenschirm Scientist Card (300265) once you already have 130% additional damage with element:

• Regenschirm Scientist Card (300265) : (2.3 + .3) * (1.5) = 3.9
• Mutating White Knight Card (27384) : (2.3) * (1.5 + .2) = 3.91

Keep in mind that this is theoretical and may not be exactly accurate as the cards give flat and % matk as well.

Generally in the late game, Class Modifier > Race Modifier = Element Modifier > Size Modifier > Skill Damage Modifier > MATK% > Skill Element Modifier = S.MATK. Mileage may vary and keep in mind that Class Modifier, Race Modifier, Element Modifier, and Size Modifier are often specific rather than say all race. My priority of these does not have anything to do with the weight of these values on the calculation, but the lack of access to these modifiers which makes them more valuable per %.