Best Classes in Xenoblade Chronicles X

Xenoblade Chronicles X pushes you to ditch the Drifter class as soon as you hit rank 10, so you can pick something else, but Drifter is the rare instance of a starting class that remains highly versatile and useful for the entire game. For those familiar with the first Xenoblade Chronicles, Drifter is basically Shulk, albeit with a smaller pool of skills to learn. This class gives you access to a variety of debuff and offensive arts, including skills that stagger and topple, along with one that even regenerates health, so you don’t have to rely on party members who might not heal you in time.

Drifter uses assault rifles for strong ranged damage and knives for powerful melee attacks, so you’re covered regardless of where and how you want to fight. Best of all, though, Drifter has the highest number of skill slots of any class in the game. Even if you swap to other classes – which you should do, for experimentation and to master new skills – it’s worth changing back to Drifter later, so you can customize it to your liking.

Full Metal Jaguar

Full Metal Jaguar, Elma’s class, is a risky class, but the rewards of keeping your HP low to boost your power more than pay off. Full Metal Jaguar gets a critical hit rate boost when your HP is lower than 50 percent, and one skill ensures you almost always will be at lower than 50 percent HP by reducing your health when you attack. The Ghost Factory skill lets allies evade incoming attacks. Electric Surge deals ether damage – something most melee classes can’t do – and even the class’ basic skill, Shadowstrike, is powerful.

Duelist

Duelist is a self-sufficient attacker who excels at close-range combat, but can handle ranged attacks just fine as well. They use a longsword and an assault rifle – essentially like an upgraded version of the Drifter’s weapon setup – and gain access to a wide range of useful skills. One of them, Last Stand, uses your own TP to increase the party’s TP, so if you’re waiting on someone to deal a heavy attack with their best skill, this is the way to make sure it happens.

Soul of the Samurai lets the Duelist infuse their basic attacks with area-of-effect properties, and True Stream Edge recovers restores TP when your morale level is more than one. Easily one of the best skills in the game, though, is Blossom Dance. Not only does it stagger enemies and set them up for toppling, but it ignores their resistances as well. That might not happen for certain Tyrants, but it’s incredibly useful anyway.

Mastermind

If you prefer controlling enemy behavior over dealing huge amounts of damage, then Mastermind is an excellent pick. None of its arts are as strong as, say, the Duelists’, but they can make lengthy fights against tough opponents easier to deal with. The Mastermind removes enemy buffs and, at level seven, learns a skill that reduces enemy debuff resistance when you land an attack. That’s in addition to abilities that boost TP and a capstone art that inflicts the virus effect on any opponent. Mastermind is a balancing act where you have to pay more attention than usual to what’s going on in battle, but it’s worth the effort.

Galactic Knight

The general consensus is that the Galactic Knight is only for Skell users, and while it’s true that Galactic Knight has some Skell-specific bonuses, it still gives you plenty to work with outside your giant fighting robots. They can remove debuffs and heal allies while dealing heavy, specialized damage themselves. Galactic Knights can even reduce their own cooldowns by pulling off a melee combo. Meanwhile, their Skell-centric abilities restore appendage HP and increase combat power outright, without having to meet any requirements.