Aion 2 Gladiator Endgame Build Guide: Best Skills, Stigmas & Macros

In Aion 2, Gladiator is a hybrid melee character who sometimes acts as the tank. Therefore, skill upgrades and a proper build are crucial. If you want to upgrade your Gladiator build in the late game of Aion 2 but are unsure where to start, this article is highly recommended.

Unlocking certain Stigmas at level 20 and certain skills at level 16 can significantly boost Gladiator's damage output.

Stigmas and Skill Upgrade Priorities

1. Lunge Stance to Level 20

Stigmas, as Gladiator's dedicated skill slots and enhancement options, play a vital role in determining the character's build direction in Aion 2. It is recommended to first upgrade Lunge Stance in Stigmas to level 20 to unlock the buff, which has a 50% chance to reduce the cooldown of all skills (including mastery skills and Stigma skills) by 1 second for 20 seconds upon a critical hit.

You can obtain Abyss and Nightmare Stigmas simply by using in-game currency or by using Stigma Shards during Shugo Festival.

2. Upgrade Rending Blow and Overhead Slam to Level 16

Then, upgrade Rending Blow and Overhead Slam to level 16, selecting Remove Cooldown and Critical Hit on Hit specialities for a significant damage increase. Before upgrading the third skill to level 16, it's recommended to upgrade Overhead Slam to level 20 to unlock Upward Strike Chain Skill. Remember to change Rending Blow's speciality to Movement Skill and Restore 50 Mana on Critical Hit.

If you're unsure how to choose your third upgrade skill, I highly recommend Ruinous Rlow. For its specialities, I suggest 30% Critical Hit and Extra Damage on Hit.

3. Unlock Critical Hit on Hit

Unlocking Critical Hit on Hit is also crucial. We can trigger it within 20 seconds of its activation, and there's a 50% chance that our level 20 Lunge Stance will trigger the effect of reducing the cooldown of all skills, allowing us to continuously use Overhead Slam. Keen Strike will also continuously trigger, and after 20 seconds, we'll have its effect.

4. Two Important Movement Skills

The movement skills Leaping Slam and Rush Strike are also key. They can help us create or close the distance with the boss.

Furthermore, Rush Strike speciality should be set to restore 300 stamina on hit and -10% cooldown, which can help us escape dangerous situations when necessary. Leaping Slam's speciality can be set to prepare a battle effect for 3 seconds and provides 20% PvE damage tolerance.

These two movement skills, combined with Ankle Slice, allow you to attack bosses from a distance, employing a battle preparation strategy. The skill lasts for 3 seconds and provides 20% PvE damage tolerance.

5. Using Focus Block

The final skill is Focus Block. At level 5, it provides a strong damage mitigation mechanism, but has a long cooldown. Level 20 Lunge Stance compensates for this, giving you two Focus Blocks. Additionally, it restores MP and stamina.

Because Gladiator in Aion 2 is a class that primarily deals damage from frontal attacks, maximizing damage by rushing in front of the boss. Therefore, it's recommended to use Focus Block in conjunction with Keen Strike from Mastery. For its speciality, it's suggested to select "restored 20% mana" and "-1 [ruinous blow] cooldown on hit," providing a damage bonus in both experience counter-strike and PvE/PvP.

However, the parry effect is the most important; it increases PvE damage bonus for both the caster and allies by 11.8% for 20 seconds. Therefore, we need Wranth Wave from Stigma, which allows us to parry instantly when hit, preventing us from being passive.

How to Set Up a Macro?

Next, let's integrate the macro settings, linking Zeikus Blessing, Rage Burst, and Sword Aura Rampage tabs to Macro. These will be added to the macro settings along with Ruinous Blow and Rending Blow.

Note that you should select MP Recovery and Multi-Hit on Hit for Sword Aura Rampage's specialization, so you don't have to worry about running out of MP when the boss is knocked down.

Then, it's recommended to set Rage Burst and Overhead Slam together as a macro. When the target is hit by Rage Burst and Overhead Slam is triggered, it can be used continuously (the cooldown has been removed), resulting in a significant damage boost.

This is your macro.

Because the critical strike chance cap on Aion 2's overseas servers is 50%, Keen Strike cannot be completely ignored, and there's also the ability to restore MP with Rending Blow. Therefore, it's recommended to use Keen Strike to restore MP when using macros.

Core Skill Recommendations

We open Divanian board, where we need to focus on improving our main skills. For example: Overhead Slam, Leaping Slam, Blood Absorption, and Identify Weakness.

Keen Strike, Ruinous Blow, and Overhead Slam are crucial for builds, so it's recommended to prioritize them as core skills.

How to Increase Gladiator Weapon Damage?

You can do this in Soul Binding. When you enter the second tab, you can choose a piece of equipment to reroll its attributes. With luck, you'll get a weapon damage boost, which is a significant advantage for weapons.

Besides this, we also need to look for attributes like combat speed, power, damage increase, and attack power.

Forest Spirit Wings are a good option. Although they require more materials, their price is clearly within an acceptable range compared to items like Dark Veil rings, making them easily affordable even if your Aion 2 Kinah reserves are not plentiful.

That concludes this sharing session. Wishing everyone a better Aion 2 Gladiator experience.