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Character Guides - Brooks - Abilities, Body - May 30, 2020



Pushback


Pros

Like all characters in Story Mode and Endless Dungeon, Brooks starts with Pushback. Brooks, through his Crossguard tree, can gain Pushbreak, which inflicts a debuff to an enemy on successful Pushback that causes them to take 5x Knockback collision damage from all sources for 5 seconds. Pushbreak itself is so valuable for Knockback collision damage builds, and even hybrid builds will benefit greatly from Pushbreak. Brooks can gain Leaps and Bounds from his Heavy Focus tree, which lets his wider area Blastback inflict Pushbreak to all enemies hit (and making it so Brooks does not need to get up too close to inflict Pushbreak).


Cons

Pushback itself will likely not be used much, as the benefits brought by it can be achieved through Augmentor investment to gain both Pushbreak and Leaps and Bounds for Blastback, which has greater area and range, as well as having damage and Knockback.



Knockdown


Pros

Like all characters in Story Mode and Endless Dungeon, Brooks starts with Knockdown, and is useful for making an enemy unable to fight back for 2 seconds while they receive 50% more damage.


Cons

Knockdown is nice for what it is, but it does not do anything beyond its status ailment. Its 15 second cooldown for its simplicity is also rather high.



Crossguard


Pros

Crossguard is a Body ability that acts as an invincible parry -- if enemies hit Brooks during this parry, he will inflict Knockback to a large area around himself for the length of his parry. Maxed out, successful Crossguards make Brooks invincible for 3 seconds afterward, removes 3 seconds off of all of his active cooldowns, boosts Knockback distance and deals 4x Knockback collision damage, with a cooldown of 8 seconds.


Cons

Crossguard has a very tight timeframe for which the parry frames take place -- using it too early or too late can cause Brooks to suffer his enemies' attacks.



Pickaxe


Pros

Pickaxe is a melee Body ability that, maxed out, deals up to Attack x 6 damage with a cooldown of 15 seconds, and deals 4x damage during the Body Field Effect. What sets Brooks apart with his 4x Body Field Effect ability is that he can replicate it in the Earth Field Effect (making it so Brooks does not suffer the double damage the Body Field Effect normally provides) -- his Golem Spirit passive in his Power Drag tree lets his Body abilities deal 4x damage during the Earth Field Effect and his Overcompensator weapon lets his Body abilities deal an extra 2x damage.


Cons

Outside of the Earth Field Effect or Body Field Effect, Pickaxe will likely not be used. Being able to use Pickaxe effectively outside of the Body Field Effect requires Augmentor and Weapon investment.



Home Run


Pros

Maxed out, Home Run is a melee Body ability that deals up to Attack x 3 damage with a cooldown as low as 5 seconds. What makes Home Run stand out is that it can gain a 10x collision damage modifier -- with Pushbreak, Brooks' general Collision Damage passives and maybe Claire's Throat Jab, Brooks can deal over-the-top damage with Home Run.


Cons

Despite its very low cooldown, Home Run is not ideal for damage dealing outside of its massive Knockback collision damage bonus. Investment in Power Drag may be needed to grab an enemy to drag towards a wall/battle boundary so Brooks can slam them into a wall, but the enemy will also need to be targetting Brooks more than likely -- if they are not, they will likely run away back towards their original target.









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