Staff Evie: My initial opinion.

• TA wrote on 2010-11-01 21:05
  After having played my Evie to 28 so far, I've come to some conclusions about Staff Evie thus far.
  
  First of all, the preconceptions that Staff Evies do amazing damage and outdamage Lann/Fiona are totally wrong. They aren't even in the same room as right. It's painfully obvious doing Speed AP runs and you can see the real difference between having a primarily Lann/Fiona party and a Staff Evie party. The difference is minutes. Primarily the two other classes and you get about 1.5-2 min runs, primarily Evie and you get about 3.5-4.5 min runs.
  
  This preconception, in my mind, stems from the fact that Firebolt does massive spike damage early on, which of course looks amazing when you're fighting Shadowfang and etc., but as you go on, you'll realize that all of the other classes severely outdamage you. Badly. Firebolt doesn't even come close to a fully charged stigma. Basically, the problem is that Lann and Fiona do a lot more normal damage with their combos and almost as much damage with their finishers.
  
  Evie can do good damage twice at the start and then only once every 30 seconds. You may not realize it, but a Fiona can do Amaranth every 5 seconds or so with maybe 10-15 seconds rest after 5-6 of them.
  
  What people also fail to realize is the other classes smaller combos like L+R, LL+R, LLL+R actually kill mobs, where as all of the Staff Evie's combos and even throwing some magic arrows won't kill even normal mobs once you get to boat 3. And I say that with Rank A Intelligence Mastery and Rank B Magic Mastery.
  
  It's also bad because you can only do about 5 or so magic arrows which is your secondary main source of damage and then you're depleted. The combos don't take any stamina, but they're near worthless. Firebolt is useful for clearing rooms, but so are the other class's finishers. The problem is the normal Staff Evie combos don't do squat and the magic arrow takes way too much stamina and/or does too little damage to be really useful.
  
  So, in conclusion... A Staff Evie is not a big damage dealer, it's not a glass cannon like people seem to make it out to be. It is a support character. If you want to do a Staff Evie, expect its primary use to be using Healing. You'll get to do some damage, but it'll never be on par with the other classes DPS output. Quicker burst, but far underwhelming in the other respects.
  
  As for whether Scythe Evie will be better as a damage dealer, I can't say yet. I assume yes. But, this is just my initial opinion on Staff Evie. At this point though, I can comfortably say I'm going Scythe. More than that, I'm going to use Light armor... because cloth is worthless breaking after 1 hit.
  
  By the way, I'm not saying I don't like Evie. She's fun. I've just come to some conclusions about her so far.
  
  Feel free to discuss.
• silentselene wrote on 2010-11-01 21:23
  I really like Staff Evie's melee fighting style, it's quick and you can easily stop to dodge something, while Fiona has more delay frames. It's also really nice how backstep can cancel everything.
  
  But she does have damage and stamina issues, and Magic Arrow, despite its damage, seems so weak. If they made it have physics, it'd appear more powerful, but since no physics are attached to it it feels like you're just blowing wind at an enemy. And there's no easy way to use it without taking your hand off of WASD, unless you map it to Scroll Wheel Click, which is equally awkward.
  
  How is Staff Evie in terms of speed?
• Sloth wrote on 2010-11-01 21:25
  Make sure you comparing SAME levels. Like a level18 Fiona with a level18 Evie. You might be used to a High Level Fiona which can change things a bit.
  
  
  Also about your stamina problem you don't have to spam bolts you can just make a good combo and use 1~2 bolts and repeat this combo so while your normal attacking you regain your stamina and can use more bolts. Your only hurting yourself by spamming bolts and making your stamina go down to 30 or less.
  
  To play staff Evie imo you need good combos
• Shirayuki wrote on 2010-11-01 21:37
  Evie has terrible DPS imo. Even with 4k M. Att., I can only pull off as much damage as a non ranked Amaranth with 4 Magic Arrows. Staff is probably only support since they don't have enough damage to effectively pull off any damage later on, and are probably only good characters for a quick stun and a heal...
  
  Scythe seems more damage oriented but probably still won't have as much DPS as either Lann or Fiona imo.
• Ampersand wrote on 2010-11-01 21:42
  Staff Evie makes me want to get a Razer Naga :< I want my attacks on the mouse please...
• EndlessDreams wrote on 2010-11-01 21:45
  Staff Evie is just good at doing these hit/run ranged attacks, and that is about it. Killing stuff with objects is such a pain as Evie.
  
  I thought it was pretty obvious that Evie's DPS is complete crap compared to Lann/Fiona.
• Cannibal wrote on 2010-11-01 21:47
  I pretty much agree 100% with what you say. It makes me want scythes ASAP, since I love my Evie and would like her to stay my primary character, but I want to be able to deal a significant amount of damage.
• EndlessDreams wrote on 2010-11-01 22:06

  Quote from Damn;200722:

  I pretty much agree 100% with what you say. It makes me want scythes ASAP, since I love my Evie and would like her to stay my primary character, but I want to be able to deal a significant amount of damage.

  
  
  Yea, same here. I really want Evie to be my primary character too. Hopefully those scythes lives up to its hype. I am not expecting to deal more damage than Fiona or even Lann though.
• Tablo wrote on 2010-11-01 22:09

  Quote from Randomcheese;200702:

  Make sure you comparing SAME levels. Like a level18 Fiona with a level18 Evie. You might be used to a High Level Fiona which can change things a bit.
  
  
  Also about your stamina problem you don't have to spam bolts you can just make a good combo and use 1~2 bolts and repeat this combo so while your normal attacking you regain your stamina and can use more bolts. Your only hurting yourself by spamming bolts and making your stamina go down to 30 or less.
  
  To play staff Evie imo you need good combos

  
  
  beginning-mid game for staff-evies are good. You can hop around to dodge attacks and fireball those mobs that take forever to attack. magic arrow is awesome for being a ranged attack which even gives you more time to react to the mob. HOWEVER, towards the higher level, staff-evies are absolutely worthless other than being a support char, as the op has stated. What's your evy's level?
  I'm playing evy because the character is fun, not necessarily hack-and-slash.
  
  You need good combos for each of the characters in the game. Like you said, evy is not an exception.
  
  I can kill bosses much faster with a melee character than evy. Also from my experience from party runs it seems that support character is unnecessary unless you have a player who just suck at controlling his/her character (i.e. fails to dodge, suicide-fb, etc). The battles/missions at the moment are too easy, just wait for more updates to kick in.
• Andy-Buddy wrote on 2010-11-01 22:23
  My opinion as a Fiona partying with Evies.
  
  They're wonderful support, and in a long-term fight, such as the Trampled Plains boss battle, they're saviors. I love their healing, but I wish they could do more than throw Mercury traps and missing with their Magic Arrows.
  
  They also die very quickly, as the boss just rushed them each and every time, so I had to stay near them.
• Hiccup wrote on 2010-11-01 22:26
  Staff Evies are OP pre-weapon change. Even though I've been ranking up my magic skills I don't see much of a difference in the damage output. They are good for soloing though, well Evies in general, since they have 5 mana shields. It's a refreshing break from the other classes which are pure melee, so I enjoy that. I do hate partying with other classes and everything gets plowed down before I can even kill something. I also find it easier to play as an Evie then any other class though thats probably cause I've been playing for a while now.
• Osayidan wrote on 2010-11-01 22:44
  I'd say 90% of the staff evies are playing it to build up to scythe when nexon fixes it. I agree her damage sucks, but I did in 2 days what I couldn't do in 2 weeks with fionna using my evie, soloed everything into second boat so far and just need to finish some quests to get to third, which probably won't happen until next weekend.
• Shirayuki wrote on 2010-11-01 22:48

  Quote from Osayidan;200781:

  I'd say 90% of the staff evies are playing it to build up to scythe when nexon fixes it. I agree her damage sucks, but I did in 2 days what I couldn't do in 2 weeks with fionna using my evie, soloed everything into second boat so far and just need to finish some quests to get to third, which probably won't happen until next weekend.

  
  
  Motivation goes a long way, and Staff Evy is probably only good for solo in the beginning and suck later on. I don't know who said it, but soloing the Reaper will be hell for an Evy too.
• PandaSong wrote on 2010-11-01 23:00
  I have to agree that Fiona's and Lanns kill faster. I do tend to notice more a support option in the third boat, especially at the bosses, though. Firebolt is nice for knockdowns on some of the bosses as well. I just wish we did more damage with our magic arrow, or we could spam it a bit more. It's kind of tiring to have to try to decide between helping kill the boss or keep the stamina in reserve, because you know that as soon as you use it - someone is going to need healing ASAP.
• Lolicon wrote on 2010-11-02 00:24
  I think Evie is a "take-it-slow-and-efficiently" class. I can solo chieftain faster on my Evie than on my Fiona even when it was around lvl 15 or so.