Search the Community

Before continuing on I’d just like to say there’s already an existing guide for gypsy by Victoria http://www.forsaken-ro.net/forum/topic/23702-gypsyclown-guide/ I haven’t really read it but clowns and gypsies are very much similar. She’s currently inactive but hopefully would update more about gypsies. This guide is more specific for clown. I’m writing this guide in the hope that more people in the server would play clown as their main character. This is a comprehensive guide for those who have little knowledge about the class and want to play clown. CONTENTS I. Intro II. Equips III. Skills IV. Stats V. PVP strategies VI. WoE Tips VII. Outro I. INTRO Clown is one of the arrow users in RO and could deal strong ranged damage, petrify, freeze, coma, reduce ATK of target and other stuff to get your enemies out of their comfort zone. They are also very useful during WoE for supporting guildmates! Pros: - Can kill anyone just by being lucky - Very strong in 1v1 situations - Useful for ganging Cons: - Slow killer - Low HP - No AoE - Difficult to survive gang II. EQUIPS Semi-geared: Upper- Vote helm && Ship Captain hat Midgear- L. Aura Lower- Vote Clown Cape Weapon- L. lute && L. clown bow Armor- Vote Armor Shield- Forsaken King Shield Boots- Vote Boots Cloak- Vote Cloak Accessories- Dex Gauntlets Fully geared: Upper- LTD valk expa hats or Halloween headgears (skull cap, ministrel hat etc.) && Ship captain Hat Midgear- Skull Aura is my personal favorite. If not Emp Aura or LHZ/ROP Lower- Clown blessed ring/jacket Weapon- Bragi’s Lute of resonance and Clown soaring bird Armor- King Armor Shield- Frigg’s Shield Boots- King Boots Cloak- King Cloak Accessories- Freyr’s gauntlets CARDS: Headgear – On Ship captain: 3 Kiel cards On [2] slot Headgear: 3 Kiel + F. soldier Weapon- On Lute: 2TG + 1 skel worker + Incantation or Thana. Good to have 2 lutes On Bow: VR, SK, LOD, Maero of thanatos or any annoying cards you want to put Armor- Default = TGK+GR. Others: TGK+HP, TGK+puppetring, GR+RSX, 2TGK. Cloak- Default = SinX+skoll. Others: SinX+raydric, 2 raydric, 2 deviling, noxious+skoll. Boots- 2 FBH Shield – 1 usakoring and 1 shield with GTB Accessories- My default is 1dex rune + marine sphere. Others: errende ebecee (for pneuma), owl baron (for lex). I’ve never used them though ARROWS: 1. Immaterial- most players have GR armor as default especially when there are champs and biochemists around. This would be the best arrow to use during WoE or when ganging 2. Fire- use it when you stone your target. Also useful when your opponent wears undead armor because they try to avoid getting frozen or stoned 3. Wind- use it when you freeze your target. This is my default arrow when I know my opponent doesn’t have FCP. Break their armors by spamming Tarot then cast Unbarring Octave 4. Shadow- sometimes people switch to Holy armor and I use this 5. Holy- sometimes people switch to dark or undead or wear anti-element cards so I use this too III. SKILLS Arrow Vulcan (AV)- Main clown skill that deals 9 hits. Currently in this server the max spam is 4. Regularly I can spam 3 AV and can only spam 4 AV once in a while. It’s necessary that you can spam 3 AV consistently. When an someone attacks you and causes stunlock then you can add an additional AV. So for me, I could spam up to 5 AV because getting hit cancels the animation delay. It is a ranged attack so it doesn’t work on pneuma and flip tatami. Tarot Card of Fate- This skill is what makes this clowns and gypsies special. Different cards appear purely by chance each with different effects. I will only mention the ones that are really important. Here is a link to what the cards look like http://irowiki.org/wiki/Tarot_Card_of_Fate. I recommend that you know what each card does 1. Death – Drains the opponent’s HP to 1. It is countered by GTB 2. high priestess- debuffs the opponent. It bypasses GTB 3. Fool- drains the opponent’s SP to 1. It bypasses GTB 4. Chariot- randomly breaks armor (cloak, shield, armor, headgear, even boots!) 5. Hanged Man- Freeze, stone or petrify (meaning opponent can’t walk). It is countered by GTB 6. Strength- halves target’s ATK for 30 seconds Unbarring Octaves- Freezes anyone on screen including party mates and guildmates but not you. It bypasses GTB Jupitel Thunder- You can only have this skill if you have the custom lutes. It is not used for damage but it is use to push opponents. It is also helpful to know if opponent is wearing GTB Improve Concentration- increases AGI and DEX. This is useful to remove sprite delay! It also reveals nearby cloaked users. Melody Strike- Single arrow hit not as powerful as AV but spammable. I use it when opponent spam their seeds everytime I touch them. It’s useful to get targets out of their seeding pattern. IV. STATS If I was a semi-geared clown STR: 51+28 AGI: 71+55 VIT: 235+32 INT: 61+50 DEX: 252+208 LUK: 1+24 This is just an example, once you get better equips you should put more on DEX and less on VIT. Guidelines: When putting stats, I wear my default gears and Ship Captain Hat on upper. Then I remove all buffs except for improve concentration. DEX- 250-280+ The more dex the stronger the damage, but damage isn’t everything so make sure you leave enough stat points for others. Make sure it is divisible by 10 e.g. 273+187, or 285+195 etc. AGI- add until 195 ASPD. Get decrease agi when setting this if you want so that your ASPD would still be 195 even against champ INT- 50-100 You want INT because if it this is 0 then you will miss using Jupitel thunder against magic users since they have high MDEF. Get a friend with magic gears (prof, wiz, biochem etc..) and add as least amount of INT you need to hit them. This is optional, if you don’t find JT useful then leave this 0. If you cast JT and you get a single MISS then he is wearing GTB. If you get MISS MISS MISS MISS then you know he is not wearing GTB and your INT is not high enough to hit him. VIT- Aim for 230-250k HP If you don’t put enough VIT then you will be easy targets by full Asura champs STR 50-100 Put the rest in here but make sure you can carry at least 200 ygg seeds. LUK- 0 Contrary to what others might say, increasing this does not increase the likelihood of casting Death card when using Tarot V. PVP Strategies First thing I do is cast Jupitel Thunder because it could do 2 things: push the enemy, and let me know if he is wearing GTB or Usakoring. If he is wearing GTB, then I use Alovera and Ship Captain Hat and any other buff you could think of then spam Arrow Vulcan and make sure he dies. What I normally do is spam 3 AV then use cloak and spam AV again. I use cloak so that I don’t receive as much damage but also to remove sprite delay. If you don’t have SinX card on your cloak then you can also use improve conc in between your AV spam. If your damage isn’t high enough it might be because you’re not wearing the proper arrow. Your damage should be 8k-13k on average depending on your gears and on your opponent. If he is wearing Usakoring, then spam Tarot until coma comes up. Make sure you know what it looks like then quickly use JT or AV to finish him off. If your opponent seeds too fast or you’re too slow to follow up the coma then I would recommend that you use the “annoying” bow. What’s special about the clown bow is that it auto-casts tarot when you are being attacked. All you need to do is normal attack while he attacks you triggering tarot and if coma shows up, he should die even if he can seed really fast. The downside with this is you would waste a lot of seeds and the coma could take a long while to show up and he could kill you by then. If you would do this at all, I recommend you getting Soaring Bird because Tarot is triggered much more frequently than if only using L. Clown bow. I use this bow strategy when: 1. He can pots really well 2. I don’t want to lose to him and I don’t mind wasting seeds 3. I feel like trolling Most of the times, your opponent will be switching shields. What I do is use tarot then I randomly just spam AV and if he happens to be wearing GTB then he’d probably die. Another thing you need to know playing as a clown is recognizing headgears that don’t give freeze immunity. Examples of these are Loli Hat, Helm of Darkness, Kobold hat, Kafra Hairband and a few others. Switch to Wind Arrow and if you successfully freeze target you have 2 options. Either use Tarot or spam AV. If you think he is wearing GTB then just spam AV, and if he survived then try freezing him again. What I normally do is use tarot until coma shows up, and when it does I spam AV using wind arrow so that he could die even if he was wearing GTB. It’s a bit of mind game and some luck SUMMARY: Use JT to know if he is wearing Usakoring or GTB. If on GTB, kill using AV. If on Usakoring, spam tarot. Special Cases: Pneuma Users (champion, whitesmith) If not on GTB, then do as explained above. But if wearing GTB, then it would be harder to spam AV since they are hiding in their pneuma. What I use is magnum break->improve conc. -> spam AV. I use improve conc in between because it cancels the sprite delay and it actually gives me more time to spam AV before he can use pneuma again. If you don’t have freyr’s gauntlet then I recommend that you put marine sphere card on a clip then switch really fast back to dex gaunts after casting magnum. If that doesn’t work for you or your opponent is wearing RSX then use cloak and wait until he comes to you or his pneuma disappears. Btw, if he’s wearing RSX then he’s likely not wearing puppetring with it so you can wear your Ship Captain hat but be careful getting stoned especially against champ. Champion - intermediate These guys are easy to beat if you can seed as fast as they asura. I wear SinX+raydric on my cloak but if his asura is too strong then I recommend SinX+deviling and if it’s really strong then just go 2 raydric. If he is using GTB, he will likely hide on pneuma and use TSS. I recommend you use cloak and wait for a chance to AV him. If you don’t have cloak then try to go near his pneuma so he can’t use his TSS on you. He will likely push you and if he does then cloak right away and repeat the process until he comes out of pneuma. He will likely switch to Usakoring shield and spam asura on you, that’s when you need to spam seeds and tarot and hope for a coma. If you don’t have the proper gears you could die in one hit because clowns have low HP. Watch out for the x2 champs, there are lots in the server so make sure you dispel them first. Whitesmith - difficult More difficult to fight because cart termi goes through pneuma so you can’t do the same trick you do against TSS. What I do is run around and cloaked waiting for the target to expose himself. They don’t have snap skill so they’ll have to walk from pneuma to pneuma and you need to kill them in that brief moment they are exposed. If your damage wasn’t enough to kill him then he might be on GTB so spam tarot. If he’s wearing AOG or HOD then spam Unbarring Octave first. This skill goes through GTB but the downside is that it has delay so a pro WS can switch helms really fast without freezing. If he switches around like this, I recommend that you use Unbarring Octave randomly and if you catch him make sure he never gets out of that ice alive. Magic Users (prof, wiz, priest etc.) To be honest I didn’t have much experience dueling magic classes since they mostly go with groups so I can’t really tell how difficult it is fighting them. For the ones that I’ve encountered, I just use GTB then spam tarot. I spam tarot even if they are on GTB so that I can debuff them (prof and wiz have energy coat, while priest usually have assumptio) once that card shows up I spam AV. If they don’t wear GTB, you can simply spam tarot or use the annoying bow since it is triggered by stave crasher. Biochemist- intermediate Technically bios are magic users but the strategy against them is quite different. The “anti-bio” gear is GR+RSX, 2deviling, GTB but just like the other magic users, biochemists are rarely on their own so it might be better to use 2 raydric or 2 noxious on cloak instead and alternate between GTB and Usakoring. Annoying bow doesn’t work against them since the auto-tarot is not triggered by acid bomb. The fun part though is that if he spams acid bomb on you, you will be stunlocked and you can cast 5 AV!! Perhaps even more, it’s really hard to count with all the things going on. Ranged Classes: Sniper- easy These guys are my favorite to kill especially since there are so many of them and they all do the same thing over and over. They wear Usakoring shield by default because they don’t have any anti-range skills and their HP is not that remarkable so they will die instantly on GTB by AV spam. I love killing snipers with x2 buff, it’s fun watching their damage go from around 50k to about 9k per FAS once you spam tarot on them. If they wear Ship Captain Hat you could switch to puppetring or just wait for the tarot card to stone them. If they repel you, you can cloak then walk closer again. If they keep doing this to you, then use your annoying bow so that you can still hit them even if they are far. AV and Tarot have a shorter range so if you’re annoyed having to walk closer then just do to this. If your damage increases then he might’ve switched to GTB so spam your AV and make sure he regrets for even thinking of doing that. He’ll likely stay on Usakoring and just spam FAS. You should be able to win unless you get too cocky or try to save seeds like me then he can actually kill so watch your HP! I love watching them FAS so hard and deal high damage but they die helplessly on normal attack (+ auto-tarot) The reason a lot of people play sniper is because all you have to do is FAS and you can get lots of kills especially during WoE but clowns are cooler. If you are hesitant on which of the two to play, choose clown okay? :D Stalker- easy It doesn’t matter what type he is, the first thing I do is tarot. As soon as the debuff card shows up, I spam AV so that he loses his copied skill. By then he will probably backslide and hide. They won’t fight out in the open on their own, but if they do use the same strategy as when fighting a sniper. If he’s magic type the only skill he can have is cold bolt but he needs to use HOD or AOG, so first is spam Unbarring Octave. Clown It’s actually scary facing another clown or gypsy because it’s hard to predict the outcome if you both know what you’re doing. If anyone switches to GTB then he’d probably be dead since AV spam would be hard to tank. You might be able to tank AV on GTB if you cast The Strength card since his ATK is halved but only for 30 seconds. You can also spam AV on each other but chances are you will more often be using Tarot on each other. It’s funny to watch, then when you run out of FCP you try to strip each other. It’s literally just like playing cards – some skills with a bit of luck! Ninja- intermediate These guys are very tricky to fight because of their evasive skills. Most ninjas would wear GTB, and if they don’t just spam Tarot as always. If they are wearing GTB, then spam tarot anyway until the debuff card shows up. Similar concept when fighting magic users, except that ninjas have flip tatami so they can still block your AV. You can try to push them using magnum break because tatami only works on 1 cell. Look out for your HP and don’t forget to cloak! Eventually they will get tired spamming tatami and jumping around, that’s when you destroy them with your AV since their HP is low too. Les Tanks Lord Knight- difficult I used to think that clown is the strongest class 1v1 in this server. Clearly I was mistaken since each class has a weakness and LK is definitely the most challenging job class to duel for me as clown. The reason being is their enormous HP, they will likely wear GTB and tank your AV spam. Some LKs that I duel wear skoll and I can kill them since each hit on my AV averages on 11k. Once they wear 2 noxious then it drops down to 8k and they could easily seed through even 4 AV. So thanatos card is necessary fighting a fully geared LK since there’s really not much you can do if you can’t use tarot and they can tank your AV spam. But don’t lose hope! You could try changing your AV pattern such as spamming 1 or 2 followed by 3 or 4 the next time. You could also use Melody Strike to poke him and take out some HP then spam AV. This could get them out of their seeding rhythm and hopefully kill them. I recommend using noxious+skoll as default against LK. If he spams spiral pierce on you, then you could spam 5 AV and actually kill him. You could also do this if he spams BB so fast on you but watch out for your HP since you can’t tank as much as them. It’s most challenging for me because I need to spam seeds while trying to spam 5 AV and the spamming pattern is different. Paladins- difficult These guys don’t even count when we are talking about what’s the strongest job class on 1v1 since they literally tank everything. I wouldn’t fight them 1v1 but if you absolutely have to, I would say debuff them first because they have defending aura. Then use the same strategy when fighting an LK. If he can’t really kill you then just wait for FCP to run out then spam tarot, break all his armors, or at least his shield then coma. Assassin X There are many possible builds for this class and I will only go over the ones I’ve encountered in the server. Melee SinX- easy I wear raydric+skoll and 2TGK or TGK+HP. Wait for them to attack then spam tarot, they die so fast because as soon as coma shows up they die by reflecting their own damage. You will need Frigg’s shield, Skull aura or any item that reflects melee damage even if it is small %. The tricky part about these guys is that they come out of nowhere and have high damage so you really need to spam your seeds at the same time you are spamming tarot. These fights for me lasts in just seconds, either I didn’t use seeds fast enough and died or he was killed by coma then reflect. If you could really waste your seeds away then it’s an easy win. If his damage isn’t strong enough then he is likely wearing GTB, in that case spam AV instead. Again, since you are being attacked really fast you can spam up to 4 or 5 and he should be dead if you are doing it right. Sonic Blow SinX- intermediate These guys are trickier because you can’t just spam tarot on them. What they do is spam sonic blow -> back slide -> cloak. You’ll be able to cast 1 tarot card while he spammed 3 or 4 SB and you’ll likely be dead if you keep doing this. You need to fight like them. What I mean is get a SinX card, cloak then once you are near use improve concentration then spam AV. Wear puppetring if you think you can tank his SB spam. **NOTE** These are my strategies on PVP but there are definitely other ways out there you can try to beat your opponent. For example, I haven't talked about Double-Strafe type Clown. Be creative and explore playing clown :-) VI. WOE Tips The stats and gears that I mentioned here is not at all what I use during WoE. I play redux clown build just because I don’t like dying then walking back to castle. If you think you can use seeds fast enough then use the build I taught here and you can get your own kills. If you don’t mind just playing support then redux gears are just as good. Currently in this server, ensemble skills don’t work during WoE. This is where the difference in the roles of clowns and gypsies are more distinct but I will only be going over clown skills. Tarot Card of fate – I already mentioned multiple times what it is for. The best ones to target are the ones getting attacked because once they get the coma card they die right away. Most pallies during WoE wear GTB but it doesn’t mean your tarot is useless because it is the only way to debuff their defending aura and reflect buff. Magic Strings – Reduces skill delays of anyone in the area (including your enemies). Very useful for defending when you are surrounded by guild mates. Works best on Lord knight’s BB, Gunsligers’ desperado, acid bomb, fire and cold bolts. Song of Lutie – Increases HP of anyone in the area (including your enemies). I use it when we get e-called so we don’t all die in one spot if the enemies are expecting us. Also useful to provide extra HP to pallies and breakers in your guild when attacking the emp. VII. Outro Clowns and gypsies are special because of the tarot skill and no one likes to mess around with it. Some people are scared of it because they don’t really know how it works or how to counter it. Some are frustrated because it messes up their damage or their HP could go from 100% to 0% in a second. Once a champion asked me to fight him without using tarot so I said I’d agree as long as he doesn’t use Zen. I also hear snipers saying that all I do is tarot to which I reply all you do is FAS. It’s part of your skills and it’s what makes you special so make sure you utilize it well. Those who complain just don’t get it, just ignore them and keep using it. Take caution using tarot, if you make too many enemies it would be difficult to fight a gang. As strong as the skill could be, they’re not always reliable. One time I was fighting a newbie and I was spamming tarot for minutes and I never saw the coma card show up and I looked like a complete noob. I’ve also played against amazing players and within the few seconds I spammed tarot, there was coma followed by fixed damage thus instant death and it made me feel like a pro. My point is be prepared in the case your coma card doesn’t show up. I might write a redux tarot build in the future but I don’t see it necessary seeing there are lots in the server already. I didn't include any tips on Raiding because I suck at it. However I will attach link to Aerofox's Clown Raid guide, once it is finished. I hope this guide was helpful!! May the odds ever be in your favor Credits: Special thanks to my Paradise guild family. I’ve never even played clown until I joined this server. All I could afford back then were redux gears so I played clown. I played as tarot slave and barely even knew what the skill really does. I wouldn’t be playing clown if it wasn’t for this guild. Now I’ve been playing battle clown for over a month and I love it. I’d also like to thank my friend Zazul/Zheenx for teaching me how to play clown and for helping me hone my AV spam. Also thanks to my forum friends Aerofox and Victoria for encouraging me to write this guide. And also to all my friends and all the bullies at for_fild, there are too many to mention but you guys know who you are, thanks a bunch!

So, I'm a big fan of Clowns/Gypsy (among other things) and have always been pretty good at it up until recently, hitting up 3 AVs average and occasionally 4-5 if I'm being sprite-locked. Now, my ping is amazing, so don't even bother blaming the upcoming point on that, but I just can't seem to be able to spam more than 2 AVs. I understand that there was a server-side delay implemented to prevent stuff like Breakneck and spriting, but to have it affect just my AV like this is ridiculous. Now, as a comparison, as some of you have noticed with me chillin' in for_fild, I spam like a god. I can get 4 Sonic Blows in without issue, lock you in place eternally with Spiral Pierce, and Arrow Sling like no other (you may have also noticed my sexy sitting/spinning, too). The fact that AV is the only skill that I can't effectively spam (and others have commented on how difficult it is to get anything more than 2 in there as well) is upsetting. This pretty much forces me (and other musicians/teasers) to resort to spamming tarot for the kill, which irks me just as much as warp abuse. tl;dr: Do something to make us a little more versatile than twats that do nothing but tarot and coma again.