Introduction
- Regular Attack
- Physical Damage
- Position
- Melee
Cutter is a Swordmaster Guard more capable than her rarity suggests. Her low skill SP costs mean her bursts are frequently available as long as you’re keeping her on the front lines. Given her low rarity and good offensive ability within the branch, she’s the most approachable for players looking to try them out. However, her complete focus on damage renders her less useful in more developed rosters due to the availability of units with higher burst output, better survivability, or more consistent damage.
Operator Stats
- Health
- 2320
- Attack Power
- 641
- Defense
- 325
- Attack Speed
- 1.3 sec
- Arts Resistance
- 0%
- Block
- 2
- Redeploy Time
- 70 sec
- DP Cost
- 21
- Range
Y1 Y2 X1 operator cell active cell
She has notably lower HP and somewhat lower DEF than the other swordmasters. When combined with her pure damage focus, she ends up the most squishy out of them - not too important, but something to keep in mind when using her.
Strengths
- Low SP costs and some initial SP make skills easy and consistent in use
- SP talent can proc on both hits from normal attacks, helping offset some of its randomness
Weaknesses
- SP talent is chance-based, which leads to unpredictable benefit and makes it unreliable
- S1 random targeting will spread damage out too thin with multiple enemies in range
Talents
Photoetched Marks
When dealing damage, has 20% chance to recover 1 additional SP
This talent addresses the need to raise her SP generation to around 1 SP/sec in combat. It’s important to note the talent is linked to her hits, making it more or less on-par with other similar talents, but capable of being even better. While there is some randomness involved, she doesn’t need much in the first place to bring her roughly up to par with her peers.
Skills
Redshift
Offensive RecoveryManual Trigger- Initial SP
- 5
- SP Cost
- 11
- Duration
- 0 sec
Immediately attacks random enemies within range 4 times with throwing knives, each knife dealing 340% of ATK as physical damage.
| Y1 | Y2 | Y3 | Y4 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| X1 | active cell | active cell | empty cell | empty cell |
| X2 | operator cell | active cell | active cell | active cell |
| X3 | active cell | active cell | empty cell | empty cell |
This skill has the best offensive potential in her kit and offers good, reliable DPS when focusing the entire burst on a single enemy, but requires them to be the only thing in range. Not that impressive when spread out over a crowd. This does however help you use it more often, making its spammability more pronounced.
Skill Mastery
- Recommended Rank
- Mastery 3
- Priority
- Low
There are no real breakpoints, as every step of mastery decreases the SP cost and increases the damage multiplier by the same amount. These are fairly noticeable in usage, making it a pretty cost-effective investment for those looking to expand their roster with more melee DPS options. What makes it a low priority is the fact she doesn’t really excel in it or offer any special utility to those with more developed rosters, but she’s capable enough to recommend.
Crimson Crescent
Offensive RecoveryManual Trigger- Initial SP
- 5
- SP Cost
- 12
- Duration
- 0 sec
Deals 450% Physical damage to up to 6 nearby enemies
Damage is doubled against aerial enemies
| Y1 | Y2 | Y3 | Y4 | Y5 | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| X1 | empty cell | empty cell | active cell | empty cell | empty cell |
| X2 | empty cell | active cell | active cell | active cell | empty cell |
| X3 | active cell | active cell | operator cell | active cell | active cell |
| X4 | empty cell | active cell | active cell | active cell | empty cell |
| X5 | empty cell | empty cell | active cell | empty cell | empty cell |
With a fairly large coverage and decent multi-target damage, the skill is mainly held back by the offensive recovery recharge type and her inability to make use of downtime. With a slightly higher cost for less damage overall per target, it banks hard on the multi-target aspect to make it worthwhile. Below 3-4 targets it’s just plain worse than S1 in output for a higher cost.
The skill’s bonus against aerial units is a welcome boon in situations where she’s in a position to charge and still catch them overhead, but this is rendered impractical due to her inability to hit (and thus charge off of) drones – instead requiring you to save it when fighting melee threats.
Ultimately, the niche of a melee backup option against flying enemies is better covered by other units which can either innately target drones or don’t rely on hitting ground enemies to prepare the skill in time for them.
Skill Mastery
- Recommended Rank
- None
- Priority
- --
Similar to S1, mastery decreases the SP cost and increases the damage multiplier consistently. Except, with this skill, it doesn’t really significantly alter the way you use it. The multiplier improvements likely aren’t worth the investment for the kinds of enemies you’d be targeting with it anyway, and since you’re saving already the SP cost decrease isn’t significant enough to help too much there.
Modules
- Attack Power
- +65
- Health
- +150
Replaceable Tool Set
SWO-Y
The module helps with the stats the branch struggles more with, which is their lower HP and ATK stats. The DEF ignore is nice for her off-skill performance as it applies well to her multi-hit attacks, especially notable on S1. Its upgrades improve the talent activation chance, which can proc on both hits, making it noticeable even with an increase as low as stage 3.
- Recommended Stage
- Stage 2+
- Priority
- Medium
The module’s additional trait mostly affects Cutter’s multihit capabilities, that being her S1 and auto-attacks. The DEF ignore will apply to every hit, which makes a sizable difference in potential damage up to mid def levels, especially combined with the additional ATK boost. It doesn’t provide a very noticeable boost to her S2 comparatively against single targets, but adds up if Cutter is able to hit multiple enemies consistently. The second stage is cheap while providing a very high boost to her talent, making it even easier to spam her skills. Stage 3 isn’t as impactful, but can be useful to players wanting a little more of a boost while still being cheap.
Synergy
Ch'en
A notable synergy due to Cutter’s low SP costs. The boost to her SP generation makes the most of her downtime and stacks in combat, making her offensive recovery much more pleasant to work with. For S1 this means you can almost always open with it against an enemy wave and spam it much more often, while for S2 it actually allows her to perform as a reliable line against drones or wait for multiple targets nearby, all without necessarily requiring her to be exposed to a lot of pressure.
Skadi the Corrupting Heart
She offers a nice boost to her already sizable multipliers and gives her the defense and healing support she needs to be a reliable frontliner. Due to her bigger emphasis on consistent damage, Cutter benefits the most when kept directly in Skadi’s immediate range, but the Seaborn’s high availability and uptime mean you don’t need to prioritize her over other units in your lineup to make it work well.