Arcanist's Normal skills build your Deck Meter and some provide Synergy. For the Empress's Grace Engraving they serve as filler skills that you'll always want to keep on cooldown.

• Call of Destiny
  • Call of Destiny can serve one of two functions, generating more cards or increasing your damage and building stacks. Quick Draw grants a chance of drawing a card upon hitting a target. An important thing to note is that Quick Draw can proc even when hitting invincible targets. "Fake Flip" actually changes this skill to be Stacking, granting 2 stacks upon use. Arcanist has multiple builds to choose from, taking "Fake Flip" makes your stack generation much quicker. Dark Destiny grants a short 3.0 second Critical Damage buff that you'll want up as much as possible. Highly recommended to run a cooldown gem on this skill as you'll be using this on cooldown quite often.
• Return
  • Return provides the party with Critical Rate Synergy & gives the Arcanist an insane boost in Critical Damage for 5 seconds. Ideally within Exposed Darkness you use two Ruin skills and are buffed with your cards to deal great amounts of burst damage. The first part of this combo skill also serves as your Counter, just to make this already important button even more useful.

Stacking skills are part of Arcanist's build up to increase damage on their Ruin skills. Some of these skills also provide Arcanist with self buffs or party Synergy.

• Scratch Dealer
  • Scratch Dealer is a combo skill that becomes 3-steps when you use the Safety Device tripod. You'll only generate a maximum of two stacks from the first two hits (one each). The entire combo, including Safety Device serves as a dash while ending with a backstep. This skill can also serve as an escape tool with its movement tripods, although at the cost of gaining stacks.
• Quadra Accelerate
  • A multi-hit skills building two stacks; one from the initial three hits and one from the final hit. Nimble Movement along with Safety Device's speed bonus hastens the animation to make it easier to land on target.
• Spiral Edge
  • Spiral Edge is another 2-part combo skill that moves you on both uses. With Ruthless Shot & Quick Prep, this is the fastest way to build stacks. It has a higher base cooldown compared to the aforementioned Stacking skills, but is alleviated by having a good cooldown gem equipped. During your Return windows, you'll want to use this between Ruin skills to maximize stacks quickly.
• Dealer's Flip
  • Dealer's Flip is taken in some builds for the extra Move Speed that this gives via "Excellent Mobility". Overall it can enable a bit more mobile play at the cost of replacing Quadra Accelerate. If you play with Raid Captain, this skill helps upkeep that bonus damage. However, this skill has quite a high base cooldown, prompting you to run a high level cooldown gem to avoid having a roadbump in your rotation.

Ruin skills are your big money, big damage buttons that have huge bonuses attached to them detonating stacks and their tripods.

• Celestial Rain
  • Celestial Rain does immense amounts of damage with the risk attached of having no push or paralysis immunity. It does have more range than other Ruin skills, so make sure you are in a safe position before using this to avoid interruption.
• Secret Garden
  • Secret Garden like Celestial Rain, has no CC immunity and has even less reach. You'll be forced to be in melee range before using this skill. Thankfully, the damage registers immediately so there is less worry about being interrupted.
• Serendipity
  • A skill that makes you think Critical Damage actually means something. With Lucky Blow, Critical Damage is increased upwards of 500%! As if that wasn't enough for you, remember Exposed Darkness also increases Critical Damage upwards of 75% along with your Critical Rate. The caveat to Serendipity is the setup required to make it the strongest hitting skill in your arsenal is very easy to fail with improper play. This skill hits twice but only benefits from stacks on the first, prompting the card Judgment to be highly effective on this skill in particular. Requiring more thought than the other Ruin skills, builds with Serendipity can have quite the high damage ceiling. However, it's more punishing and can equate to you dealing far less damage compared to easier to play builds.
• Four of a Kind
  • Besides being a poker hand, Four of a Kind has the least damage of the Ruin skills but generates a massive amount of Deck Meter comparatively. This skill does have a lot up its sleeve, with a chance to reset its cooldown and flexibility with its animation cancel, similar to Wardancer's auto attacks.

Call of Destiny tripods vary depending on what build you are making. Nimble Movement is a must and players have the option between Quick Draw and Dark Destiny when paired with "Fake Flip". It's your choice between wanting an easier time drawing cards or getting a 3.0 second self buff to your Critical Damage and being able to generate more stacks.

Return is fairly straightforward, giving party Synergy and a self-buff. It's recommended to take Weakness Exposure, Concentrated Card & Exposed Darkness.

Scratch Dealer takes a 1/3/2 setup with Weakness Exposure, Weak Point Attack & Safety Device. Quadra Accelerate takes a 2/3/2 setup with Nimble Movement to help with attack speed, Card Draw for increased damage and a chance to proc 4 stacks immediately. It's final tripod, Accelerate Concentration gives even more damage and makes this your strongest non-Ruin skill.

Spiral Edge prioritizes Quick Prep to enable building stacks even faster. Ruthless Shot & Quick Pace are taken for their bonuses to increase stack count, damage and Move Speed.

You'll want to max out all of Celestial Rain's tripods for increased damage a critical rate. Those being Vital Point Hit, Enhanced Strike & Weak Point Detection. As for Secret Garden, you'll take Vital Point Hit, Perfect Secret and Secret Chance. These are strict Critical Rate and damage increases that you should max level!

Four of a Kind can become a spammable skill if you're lucky with procs from Swift Preparation. Card Enhancement & "Full House" straight damage increases, with Full House giving additional Critical Rate. Serendipity if taken will want Piercing Strike and Lucky Blow. Both of these are proc based, massive damage increases that are supplemented by Intended Luck to ensure they are procced. If only there was a tripod like this for honing rates.

Return can take Rage, its low cooldown gives multiple chances to proc works well with Raid Captain users. Spiral Edge takes Galewind. The shortened cast speed is welcomed to prevent whiffs and increase the speed of stack building. Celestial Rain can take Protection to synergize with Barricade. Because it's solely to work with Barricade, the rarity is the main focus. Four of a Kind's strength is Deck Meter generation, so Wealth is advised. Even without a Legendary rarity rune, you should prioritize whatever is your highest onto this skill.

Quadra Accelerate, Scratch Dealer & Dealer's Flip all can take the Galewind, assuming you have Legendary on Spiral Edge. Protection can be thrown onto your Ruin skills if you are running Barricade. Arcanist does have some flexibility with Call of Destiny, Purify is an option or whatever choice you have. Additional options vary based on what build you take, the ones recommended serve as a general baseline for what's effective. Taking more Wealth or Quick Recharge works as well.

Gems

3.1.

Damage

• Celestial Rain
• Secret Garden
• Four of a Kind
• Serendipity

3.2.

Cooldown

• Return
• Call of Destiny
• Scratch Dealer
• Quadra Accelerate
• Spiral Edge
• Celestial Rain
• Secret Garden
• Four of a Kind
• Serendipity

4.

Changelog

• 30 Nov. 2022: Guide Added.

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