Introduction

Self Introduction

Hello! I'm Koshiro, I started playing Dragon Nest in 2015 and I always loved playing melee classes (at least the fast-paced ones), including Windwalker. Project Duck some time ago gifted us with a game-changer rework that made me fall in love with the class once again, and today I'm here to guide you through your way to conquer the skies and of course bosses.

By the way – if you're interested in learning about other classes, we have a Class Guide Archive. - Vino

Class

Windwalker is a fast-paced melee class with the ability to maintain herself in the air while fighting, which gives you the possibility ignoring of ground based attacks (not all) and DPS while others can’t. Her kit consists of fast attacks with extremely low cooldowns as long you maintain your [Momentum]. Consistency and Control is the key to extract her maximum potential.

Skills

Archer

[Willow Kick] - Now it can only be used in the air and only enhances [Cyclone Kick]. Has a decent airtime and filler damage.

Acrobat

[Somersault Dance] - Utility skill we borrow from our sister class Tempest, has iframe and also does filler damage, use it by pressing [Right Click] after any version of [Falling Star] and [Eagle Dive] to get off the ground again. It has no cooldown.

[Spirit Shot] - Utility long ranged attack for helping maintain [Momentum]. Can also be used for positioning as it chains with [Left Click] after [Spiral Kick].

[Chain Tumble] - Movement and iframe while on the ground.

[Ring Shot] - A weird skill but hey it got an -20% Critical Resistance debuff, if no one in your party got this debuff in his kit (and probably in a usable skill), you’ll want to use it to optimize your numbers. Has iframe on its startup.

[Butterfly Float] - “Float like a butterfly, Sting like a bee”, said a wise man once. Our aerial tumble that will eventually save your ass from incoming attacks. Keep in mind it has a 1s base cooldown, so it's a reliable iframe that will always be there for you. If you press [Right Click] you can chain into [Spiral Kick].

[Spirit Boost]/[Spirit Boost Augment] - After rework this buff gets disabled once you learn your [Class Mastery], for balancing reasons.

Air Pounce] - Press [Spacebar] in the air to kick whoever is below you up to 5 times, each kick lifts you in the air a bit, first kick do more damage, you can use it between your combos as a filler or as a tool to keep/gain height when others skills are on cooldown and you can’t go back to the ground for some reason.

[Spiral Kick EX] - Our main movement tool, you can use it to chase running bosses or reposition yourself (even in the air!), you can also use it to push objects, the first kick is an iframe, you can press [Right Click] to kick ahead once again or [Spacebar] to kick upwards.

[Eagle Dive EX] - One of our core DPS skills. It is affected by [Momentum], turning into a 5s cooldown instant dive that now can be used even in the ground. You can link it by pressing [Left Click] in the air after any aerial skill.

[Blooming Kick EX] - One of our core DPS skills. It is affected by [Momentum], turning into 5s cooldown kick that shoots a wind projectile forwards, you can now use it in the air. Pressing [Left Click] after the first kick will kick one more time upwards while giving you a bit of height. Note that the projectile will spawn on the ground no matter how high you are and it hits even if you’re far from the boss (Blooming Kick works weirdly, if you hit the point-blank kick, the projectile won’t hit the boss again, but if you miss the kick the projectile can hit, dealing the same damage. The EX kick needs you to be close to hit confirm though). Also it inflicts our main debuff, 20% increase in damage dealt. Pressing [Right Click] after the first kick instead chains into [Spiral Kick].

[Cyclone Kick] - One of our core DPS skills. It is affected by [Momentum], turning it into a series of 5 kicks with decent damage and airtime that you can cast in midair, changing its animation to the former CM2 Instant and reducing its cooldown to 3.5s. The grounded version still exists with its iframe at startup, but you shouldn’t ever use it. Due to our [Class Mastery III], after pressing [Willow Kick], using [Cyclone Kick] as the next skill will buff the LAST hit to do significantly more damage. DON’T CANCEL IT BEFORE THE LAST HIT PRESSING OTHER SKILLS MINDLESSLY!

[Falling Star] - Our Heavy hitter. There is 2 versions of this ultimate skill:[Awakened] Falling Star, [Awakened] Falling Star Instant, [Momentum] Falling star - All of these are essentially the same skill with different names. The ‘standard’ version has a charge briefly (iframe) before slamming the ground. They have a cooldown that is separate from the main version below so it can be used for some extra damage when building bubbles.
[Momentum] Falling Star Instant - This version deals slightly more damage and it's way faster while still maintaining the iframe at startup. It doesn’t share its cooldown, and you can reset it entirely by using [Momentum Rising Storm] at 50 bubbles. (Although it only costs 20 bubbles to reset). You also receive a 10% ATK buff upon cast, so you will want to proc it often to maintain this buff.

Windwalker

[Show Time!] - Simply the heart of this class, say goodbye to being restricted by its short duration, as now you can maintain it during your whole fight or DPS window, depending on which content you’re running.
Upon cast, you’ll now receive 2 different buffs, one from Showtime itself, which is -30% cooldown of all your passive skills (this includes your regular [Tumble] and [Butterfly Float]) and one that you’re already familiar with at this point. The most important part of this buff is that it allows you to stack [Momentum].

[Momentum] - This is your most important buff, as it changes your main skills to their [Momentum] versions. Additionally [Blooming Kick] and [Eagle Dive] heal 0.5% of your HP per attack (don't underestimate it), and it's the key to resetting your ultimate.
Under this buff you’ll get a bubble for each hit from your skills and each bubble will give you 0.5% PATK up to 20 bubbles (10% PATK in sum). Note that your Momentum lasts 4s and you’ll lose 25 bubbles if you don’t hit anything within that time. If this brings your bubbles down to 0 you will lose the buff entirely and will need to rebuff, so yeah you better learn how to continue DPSing even between mechanics/attacks that you’re able to.

[Rising Storm] - Finally the last DPS skill affected by [Momentum]. Changes to its instant version that can be used anytime with a 9.5 second cooldown.

Note that [Momentum Rising Storm] is the only way to activate and reset your [Momentum] Falling Star Instant cooldown. This is done by using [Momentum Rising Storm] at 50 bubbles; where it will reset the cooldown at the cost of 20 bubbles.

[Class Mastery] - Standard CM1 passive, gives you 50% AGI but disables the use of [Spirit Boost].

[Class Mastery II] - Standard CM2 passive, using [Rising Storm] will change [Falling Star] to its Instant version, if you use Rising Storm without 50 bubbles all you’ll see is the own cooldown of Falling Star Instant. Keep in mind you got a free cast of this at the very start of any run.

[Class Mastery III] - Mentioned previously, significantly buffs the final hit of [Cyclone Kick] when used directly after [Willow Kick]. No other skills can be used between these to get the increased damage.

[Flash Kick] - Filler skill with awful damage, it’s useful to use between your skills in the air to maintain your height, reposition slightly and generate bubbles quickly.

[Wind Cutter] - Formerly Swift Attack, changed to WWs 2nd awakening active skill. Keeps you in the air while shooting downwards razor blades. It can hit up to 50 times, depending on boss size and/or the position you cast it. Also if you [Left Click] you will stay in the air as you kick the second blade, [Right Click] will throw yourself down, use what the occasion needs.

Invincibility Frames

Windwalker has many iframes, but the majority of them only have small windows so be smart in how you utilize them – the ability to chain a lot of these skills together gives you the potential for extended iframes.

  • [Tumble]
  • [Chain Tumble]: Pretty much the whole animation.
  • [Butterfly Float]: Basically the entire animation. A backwards float iframe will last until you hit the ground.
  • [Ring Shot]: Initial jump in the air.
  • [Somersault Dance]: Entire animation.
  • [Cyclone Kick]: Grounded version only (please don’t use this), first two kicks.
  • [Falling Star Instant]: The brief moment you are charging in the air.
  • [Spiral Kick]: First kick only, basically the whole animation.

Pushing Skills

Windwalker isn’t that great at pushing, but there’s still some skills that allow you to help out with whatever object you need to be pushing. Skills are listed in order of most to least push potential.

  • [Spiral Kick]: Right click after [Spiral Kick] for an extra push (aka to activate the EX).
  • [Cyclone Kick]: Initial first three kicks.
  • [Spirit Shot]: I prefer to [Spirit Shot] after I’ve used [Spiral Kick EX] to push.

If you have [Showtime] up you can spam [Spiral Kick] → [Spiral Kick EX] → [Spirit Shot] → [Butterfly Float] backwards to chain into [Spiral Kick] again over and over and over and over and over!

Skill Build

Unified Skill: Final Damage Boost, Max HP Boost

Skill Crests and Gems

[Rising Storm] CDR
[Willow Kick] CDR
[Cyclone Kick] DMG
[Falling Star] DMG
[Blooming Kick] DMG
[Eagle Dive] DMG
Skill Up: Cyclone Kick +1

Gems: 1 Conversion + 3 Elemental

Gameplay

Abuse your unique kit mobility, height and iframes

As almost every melee class in this game your kit has a lot of iframes and mobility. After getting yourself experienced with the class you'll notice that practically every incoming threat or change has an immediate response or countermeasure, being able to play around all situations while still doing your numbers.

Professor K is about to throw a punch into your face? [Butterfly Float] through it.

Boss teleported somewhere due to some mech or is running away from you? Chase his ass with [Spiral Kick]:

Mechs? pff. We don’t do that here, greed is always the answer (when you're confident).

  • Video by Pikachun

You can also ignore some attacks such as Ligna pull.

These are just basic examples and there’s lots of different scenarios like this, within some practice and time you’ll notice you’re stylin’ on bosses in ways you’d never imagine.

Control the height

With all this vertical and horizontal mobility and short cooldowns in our kit, initially you might have a hard time keeping yourself in range of your skills in the air, especially on small bosses, learn to control your character to avoid staying too much above the boss as your skills will most likely miss and you could lose your Momentum. [Wind Cutter] Right Click or [Moon Kick](Right Click) after [Rising Storm] are your best friend. Delaying the [Cyclone Kick] after [Willow Kick] so you fall briefly is also an option.

Also note that just because you're in the air doesn't mean you're immune to ground attacks, some come from the ground but still have enough AoE to get you up there, or just are global, like one of the "stomps" of the third boss of the Manticore Nest. As you run through content, you will understand what will force you to use an iframe or get out of the way even while flying.

Maintain your Momentum at all costs (except your life)

There will be a lot of pauses where bosses will turn invincible, get in a hard position for you to DPS, or force you to stop and do mechs. In most cases you can’t do anything but just take the L and start over your Momentum again. But there is rare cases you can still maintain your buff between some pauses if you:

  • Time projectiles from skills like [Blooming Kick], [Spirit Shot] or [Wind Cutter] correctly to hit boss asap.
  • Use [Black Dragon - Death Flag Salute] crest to buy time if you need to get far from bosses and the [Momentum Blooming Kick] projectile isn’t enough.
  • Cast [Showtime!] again, doing so will give you 1 momentum bubble, thus refreshing its duration.
  • Hit Minions or Summons. Use the environment in your favor.

Animation Canceling

A lot of Windwalker skills can be animation canceled. This is something to be mindful of as it is very easy to lose damage doing this if not careful (CM3 [Cyclone Kick] is a main culprit). It can also be useful to help evade enemy attacks and even gain damage if familiar enough to skip end animations after all the damage is dealt.

Other Windwalker Things

  • [Willow Kick] can sometimes be unreliable and just won’t seem to work. Try to use it after skills that guarantee an air state like [Rising Storm] or [Wind Cutter] for more success.
  • A lot of things that ‘apply’ to you while flying have a high chance to knock you out of the air even though they don’t deal damage (boss marks/mechs, FDN flower buffs, Physician Injection and many more). While this is incredibly annoying both [Blooming Kick] and [Rising Storm] can be used to recover in the air, on top of the standard [Aerial Evasion] and [Counter Ring Shot].
  • With EXP5 release and the changed defensive values, archers now have low defense. It is very important to take advantage of your aerial safety and iframe toolkit as a lot of attacks other classes can brush off are fatal for us. Tanking hits for more damage is usually never a good idea.

Rotation

Windwalker can be played freestyle very effectively and it is something I recommend when learning the class to help adapt to different situations and attacks. You can follow these steps as a base priority:

  1. Avoid enemy attacks!!!
  2. Rebuff (Fury of the Owl + Show Time!).
  3. Debuff ([Blooming Kick] and [Ring Shot] if there is no better crit debuffer in the party).
  4. Keep up [Momentum] Falling Star Instant attack buff.
  5. Keep [Momentum] skills on cooldown as much as possible.

Remember to pay attention to your bubbles, cast [Rising Storm] when you hit 50 bubbles to reset [Momentum] Falling Star Instant cooldown. This means in an ideal scenario you should try to build 20 bubbles every 7 seconds. As the attack buff from casting [Momentum] Falling Star Instant lasts 10 seconds, there is some leeway here.

An average spread with reasonably high boss uptime should look like this:

  1. [Momentum] Cyclone Kick
  2. [Momentum] Falling Star Instant
  3. [Momentum] Blooming Kick
  4. [Momentum] Eagle Dive
  5. [Momentum] Rising Storm

If there is a lot of downtime where you are forced to lose [Momentum] due to mechanics then [Momentum] Falling Star Instant will drop on the spread, this is normal.

BTG Rotation Example

  • Video by Hoxy

Understanding its Limitations and Conclusion

Windwalker is a very fun and easy class to play, it can really outshine other classes in early to mid content which can be bursted and/or contents where bosses have larger dps windows as she is heavily dependent on her bubbles and its buffs. You have to keep in mind that at bosses with a lot of pauses for mechs which you can’t maintain your bubbles you’ll be starting over with -20% raw attack power than the rest of your party at each reset (I noticed that there's a lot of people don’t realize this, mainly who don’t really played the class. Once an idiot argued with me saying WW losing its bubbles doesn't harm her dps. LOL).

And in some cases you won’t have enough time to rebuild your passive buffs (10% from bubbles, 10% from FS Instant) again as the boss can just throw another mech at you and turn invincible again. It may sound frustrating but that's how the class works and honestly you should be OK with that since it's most likely a tradeoff for her busted kit and flying capability. Peck the boss…

Special Thanks:

  • Ymir for roasting me and helping me getting better
  • Pikachun for providing videos