Reaper DPS Guide — Endwalker 6.1

Reaper is a melee builder and spender job with a fast-paced and flexible burst window. Their weapon of choice is a scythe and they wear maiming-style armor focusing on Strength as a core stat. Reaper also comes to battle with a small raid buff and a powerful utility AoE healing ability. Their core gameplay is about using abilities and weaponskills to generate their two main resources: Soul and Shroud. Once they obtain enough Shroud they can enter a powerful and fast burst window that ends with a large AoE nuke. The job has an incredibly flexible burst window and most optimizations will be centered around placing more damage into party buffs. It is an easy to play but difficult to master-style job with a lot of minor gains from optimizations.

Strengths

• Flexible burst window
• Fewest positionals out of all melee
• Strong AoE healing tool
• Easy-to-use disengage and re-engage tool

Weaknesses

• Odd timings make a perfect rotation impossible
• Must maintain a debuff on enemies at all times
• Ability cooldowns may drift due to resource generation

If you are not at max level, it is highly recommended that you check out the Reaper Leveling guide linked below.

Reaper has a good amount of resources available to it, and building and spending these resources will be the core of the gameplay. Here is a quick breakdown of these resources:

• Soul — Soul is the first Resource you will learn how to use as a Reaper, represented by the red bar on your Job UI. You gain Soul by performing your basic combo or by using Soul Slice or Soul Scythe and will spend it to obtain Reavers.
• Reavers — You will spend Soul on Gluttony, Blood Stalk, Unveiled Gallows, or Unveiled Gibbet to gain Reavers, which is a buff you obtain.
• Shroud — Shroud is the third resource you will have to juggle as a Reaper, represented by the blue bar on your Job UI. You will gain 10 Shroud from spending a Reaver on Gibbet, Gallows, and Guillotine and can gain 50 shroud every 2 minutes from the ability Plentiful Harvest. When you have 50 Shroud, you can spend it on the ability Enshroud which will enter you into your burst phase. While Enshrouded you will lose access to a few abilities, others will change to upgraded abilities, and you will gain access to a powerful AoE nuke: Communio. Your UI will update and you will enter another builder and spender phase using two new resources:
  • Lemure Shroud — You immediately gain 5 of these and they are represented by the blue orbs on the job UI. These will be spent by using the upgraded abilities, Void Reaping, Cross Reaping, and Grim Reaping. Communio also requires one Lemure Shroud, but will end your Enshroud phase once used. When spending a Lemure Shroud you will gain a Void Shroud.
  • Void Shroud — Two Void Shrouds, represented by the pink/purple orbs, can be spent on the off-global abilities Lemure's Slice and Lemure's Scythe.

Additionally, Reaper has a debuff called “Death's Design” that must be maintained at all times in order to increase the Reaper's damage. Shadow of Death and Whorl of Death both apply this debuff. A Reaper can also support their party through Arcane Circle, which provides a 3% boost in raid damage or Arcane Crest, a shield that, when popped, will heal the party a large amount.

Below you can find the Reaper Rotational Guide that will give you a more in-depth look into the job.

While leveling it is generally best to get whatever gear has the highest item level. Do not worry about what stats the gear gives you until you reach Level 90, as more item level will make you stronger. When you reach Level 90 there will be a few pieces of gear and melds that you can choose from. For a more in-depth look at how Reaper interacts with each stat you can check out the Reaper Melding and Gearing guide below:

If you are looking for the current best in slot sets you can find that in the Reaper BiS Guide below:

If you are looking at improving your Reaper gameplay, below are our frequently asked questions and a quick guide on how to improve.