Arene

General overview

He fills a unique role among ranged guards with his drone priority, and his skill 2 helps him fill even more gaps by essentially turning him into a ground caster. If you don't need the hybrid damage, you may find that you’d be better served by bringing a dedicated sniper or caster, but his flexibility and low cost make him extremely valuable, especially in CC/IS, where your roster may be limited.

E2? He does his job fine at E1, but for how cheap it is, you may want to end up getting him to E2 once you have your more urgent priorities taken care of.

Talents

Talent - Structural Decomposition

E1 Prioritize attacking drones; ATK +20% (+3%) when attacking drones

E2 Prioritize attacking drones; ATK +40% (+3%) when attacking drones

The thing that sets him apart from other ranged guards and, in some cases, allows you to use him as your sole drone killer. This combined with the arts damage in his skill 2 makes him fantastic for dealing with armored drones. (Keep in mind that blocking enemies will cause him to attack them first, so if you want him to always prioritize drones, don’t let him block anything.)

Skills

Skill 1 - Just Kidding

Skill effect: Cannot block enemies. Attacks strike twice and deal 130%/150% physical damage each.

Overview: In a lot of cases, you will probably find the arts damage from his skill 2 more appealing, but this skill still has its uses. Being able to turn off his blocking can be useful: it helps him go after drones without potentially getting derailed by ground enemies, or you can use it to strategically let strong enemies move past him. (Alternatively, he was never blocking to begin with, which means not blocking isn't really an issue either way.) The double hits give him incredibly potent single-target damage as well.

Skill 2 - Deadly Prank

Skill effect: Range expands and ranged attacks no longer do reduced damage. Attacks deal 140%/160% Arts damage and target an additional enemy.

Overview: There are times where this skill will work out better than Lappland skill 2: it doesn’t do as much damage in terms of raw numbers, but it charges more reliably and is manually activated, so it’s easier to get consistent damage with it, especially if you need it to charge between waves. It has a nice range expansion to boot. If you're using him to block, hitting 2 targets means that he can still hit drones if he's only blocking one enemy.

M3 commentary: He doesn’t get massive gains from M3 so this isn’t a priority, but it’s relatively cheap, it fills some good niches, and M3 shaves 5 seconds off the charge time, so it’s worth considering eventually if you reach for him a lot.