Introduction
T4 Mage has a fancy name: Destroyer, except they don’t destroy many things, though. At least they open another pure fire build, which works extremely well against mobs. There’s a build with Water - Frozen, but from our testing, it’s kinda lackluster, so while you can feel free to try it, don’t expect much from it.
New Important Skills
Formation Breaker - When you are being carried by whales, equip this one. The ATK buff scales on your own stat, which is meme compared to them, but it has 50% to accelerate their actions, which is always more than welcome.
Wind Blade Spiral - It’s technically a smaller Howling Hurricane, but cooldown faster and thus deals more damage.
Thunder of Judgment - Highest single target damage of Destroyer, prioritize boss too, so you won’t miss it to random mobs like Wind’s delight.
Fiery Burst - One of the two core charms for the Fire build. This damage won’t bounce between targets, though (the spread only happens once per target, which means an AoE hits 2 enemies and somehow crits, each enemy will receive 2 instances of Fiery Burst.
Explosive Spirit - It provides crit buff for each fire tech you use, which also helps trigger Fiery Burst a lot too. Can be substituted by the Mana Surge in case you haven’t rolled it yet.
Builds
AOE Build
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The core of Destroyer is still
Radiant Sear, but you can pair it with 
Cyclone Lament for the extra damage, considering you use 2 Wind techs here and Laceration can stack. This setup does just fine when you meet the boss + some mobs are set up too.
Note for strong players: Since you tend to overpower the challenge, you can drop 
Void Bubble or any defense tool and go for more offensive charms.
ST Build
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- Wind Blade Spiral can be replaced with
Tempest Sphere . For any boss that’s smaller than 3x3 size, you can consider dropping 
Divine Wrath for 
Meteoric Flames.
Fire AoE Build
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This setup works best when you fight a horde of mobs. The core damage is
Fiery Burst; all 4 tech just exist to trigger it.
Elsa Build
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It may do something when you fight a moderate size of mobs (because horde size nothing beats Fire build). Also, you can replace
Ice Spike with 
Aqua Vortex and put it in the first slot to increase the chance to freeze enemies. This build is weaker on bosses because bosses can only be frozen once their white gauge has been worn out.
Stats
Secondary Main Stats
Below are the recommended secondary stats to look out for when gearing up. Having the right secondary stats is important for maximizing performance, but significant “power/gear score” upgrades or pieces with better additional stats can overwrite this priority.
Do note that from Season 2 onward, we can inherit secondary stats, so if you somehow have a god-tier staff, you can transfer those stats to a new seasonal staff if you want. This action will destroy the old staff immediately without leaving any shards (compared to using Cauldron).
Staff |
Elemental Mastery > Crit > ATK > Speed > Effect Hit Rate |
Codex |
Elemental Mastery > Crit > ATK > Speed > Effect Hit Rate |
Helmet |
DEF >= Physical Res = Elemental Res > HP > Effect Res |
Chest |
DEF >= Physical Res = Elemental Res > HP |
Boots |
Elemental Mastery > Speed > ATK |
Sub Stats
All item slots will roll a number of additional stats on them, which are chosen randomly from a universal pool. Below is roughly the order of priority to look out for on your gear; however, just because an item has great additional stats doesn’t make it the best choice. Make sure to consider the item's overall power and whether it has the optimal secondary stats as well.
Starting S2, it will be possible to transfer gear substats. Lock pieces with great substats, as it can be helpful to salvage higher-rarity pieces with terrible rolls.
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Fantomon
Your job is to maximize your damage output while still being alive somewhat (because a dead Mage deals 0 damage). Therefore, at the early stage, you should consider this:
Armopi : It gives you a bit of DEF and a slight shield based on your DEF. Hope it can buy you a turn, because for Destroyers, sometimes 1 turn is all you need.
Still, not for every content you need to focus on staying alive - for example, the daily Dragon, Guild Raids, or even Dungeons. Pick one of the more offensive options in those scenarios:
Zeioletus : It provides you with an additional damage burst every turn.
Sylvaerie : It gives you basically a permanent ATK and SPD buff - both stats help with attacking more often and hitting harder.
When you have enough pull (on average, 500 pulls), you will have 60 hearts to redeem a Mythic Fantomon. Go for this one:
Nyxarchon : The Dark Fantomon that debuffs enemies with max -30% def, and also deals good damage itself. Very suitable for a glass cannon like Destroyer.
Gems
The Inlay system allows you to infuse Gems into your gear, and in season 2, you can infuse 2 Gems per gear once your gear reaches level 130. Gems don’t have to be different in a slot, so you can stack 2 Obsidian Gems just fine. Priority is top-to-bottom, but be aware of your total power; check whether you need it to surpass a certain checkpoint.
Weapon
Obsidian: ATK doesn’t matter, but the damage buff is great
Amethyst: Crit rate is good, especially for the mage, who needs to work toward at least 120% crit to guarantee 100% crit (due to the penalty system of fighting enemies ahead).
Off-hand slot
Obsidian: ATK doesn’t matter, but the damage buff is great
Amethyst: Crit rate is good, especially for the mage, who needs to work toward at least 120% crit to guarantee 100% crit (due to the penalty system of fighting enemies ahead).
Moonstone: It gives damage resistance, but you have better options here, so don’t chase it unless there’s nothing better.
Boots
Amethyst: Crit rate is good, especially for the mage, who needs to work toward at least 120% crit to guarantee 100% crit (due to the penalty system of fighting enemies ahead).
Armor
Moonstone: It gives damage resistance, which is the most valuable stat here.
Helm
Citrine: It gives a small Speed boost, which is better than nothing.
Beryl (%HP) or Sapphire (%Def): Depending on whether you have the HP conversion or Def conversion line, you can pick the corresponding gem. Still, both are bad, and therefore, Helm is just power padding (slap the highest-level possible gem here for power).
Relics
Important note for Relic!
The %stats (beside Crit Rate, Crit DMG, Accuracy, Block, Crit Res, Effect Res, and Damage boost) are all scaled on your Character stat, not total stat. For example, if your total flat ATK from character stat is 10000, and you have a relic that increases 5% ATK, it will give you 5% x 10.000 = 500 more ATK even if your total combined ATK is more than 133000 already.
Actually, the formula is a bit more complicated, since the 5% can be improved by your character’s trait, too. For example, a Warrior has a 15% ATK bonus that comes from the class, which means the final %ATK from the relic is not 5% but 5% x 115% = 5.75%. This rule applies to almost every category except the Class stat group - it runs a different formula, which we don’t really care much about.
This makes all %ATK, %Spd, %HP and %Def extremely underwhelming because they scale on a very small stat. This applies to even Gears and Inlays effect too, so you should look for flat stat at least, or strong % effect like Block, Acc, Crit etc
Since you are playing a Destroyer, you have to accept that you have to go more ham into Elemental than other classes. Of course, at best, you need to go all 5, but you can compromise with this:
Light: Must. Your strongest output setup always revolves around Light techniques and their charms.
Fire: It’s T4 now; there is an AoE setup that relies on Fire damage, which is very strong.
Other elements can be prioritized as Wind > Water > Dark (it’s because, besides Nyxarchon , you will have 0 sources of Dark damage). Since the relic hunt is more about RNG, we will list the best Relic to be showcased instead (gaining them is on you). These relics are updated up to Loong Haven (Season 2 Map - Destroyer region).
Note: Since you are a damage-per-turn character, you look to maximize your damage output first (Affinity - ATK - Speed), not power.
There might be situations where you have to put a %stat Mythic relic on display instead to gain more Affinity, which is better than some small ATK/Speed gains. To do this, you can put a %stat Mythic relic on, check your stat in Profile, replace the Mythic Relic with a Flat Stat Relic and check your stat again. Only do this if you don’t care much about the Elemental of the relic, because as you progress, the Elemental Affinity/Aegis will play a more important role than some small difference in ATK/Speed/HP/Def.
Light
Luminous Edict (SPD - Legendary - Light Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Cinder Ridge II.
Crown of Unbinding (ATK - Legendary - Light Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Cinder Ridge V.
Thunder Wraith (ATK - Legendary - Light Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Aqualis VII.
Yata Luminary Mirror (ATK - Mythic - Light Affinity).
Fire
Everburn Throne (ATK - Mythic - Fire Affinity).
Hellbloom Delusion (SPD - Mythic - Fire Affinity).
Crimson Agate (ATK - Legendary - Fire Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Aqualis XII.
Scarlet Cannon (SPD - Legendary - Fire Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Aqualis XVIII.
Wind
Fate’s Grand Banner (Elemental Mastery - Legendary - Wind Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Cinder Ridge XIV.
Wind Pouch (ATK - Mythic - Wind Affinity).
Bell of Eternity (%Crit - Legendary - Wind Affinity).
Banebreaker Arrow (ATK - Legendary - Wind Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Aqualis VIII.
Water
Mirror of Reflection (Elemental Mastery - Legendary - Water Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Cinder Ridge XV.
Stillwater Vambrace (ATK - Legendary - Water Affinity). Can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Verdantglate III.
Ascension Box (%Crit - Mythic - Water Affinity). You want more crit this time due to Fire build.
Nymph’s Swordhilt (%Crit - Mythic - Water Affinity).
Dark
Soul Keeper’s Armor (ATK - Mythic - Dark Affinity).
Abyssal Glyph Whip (Elemental Mastery - Legendary - Dark Affinity).
Obsidian Key (ATK - Legendary - Dark Affinity). This one can be explored by Destiny Fruits in Verdantglate X.
Amethyst Baton (Elemental Mastery - Legendary - Dark Affinity).