The Swordmaster is one of the Adept Archetypes in Metaphor: ReFantazio. It is focused on slicing through enemeis with attacks to help conserve MP. It is weak against Wind attacks but resistant to both Piercing and Fire.

The Swordmaster is a part of the Warrior Lineage and investing in it will allow you to unlock its Elite form: the Samurai. The Swordmaster Archetype is rather easy to use compared to many others, focused on simple attacks and not requiring much growth to be useful.

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How to unlock the Swordmaster¶

The Swordmaster is unlocked upon levelling Strohl’s bond to Rank 3. This can be done by speaking to him in Martira. As with other Adept Archetypes, you will also need to level the Warrior to Rank 20 and then spend a chunk of MAG.

Swordmaster Skills¶

The Swordmaster has access to 3 damaging and 3 passive Skills:

• Barge Past - [Hero Passive] Being hit by an enemy attack during overworld combat will not trigger battle with enemy advantage
• Round Slash - Deals weak physical Slash damage to all enemies (14 MP)
• Slash Dodge - [Passive] Increases evasion against Slash attacks
• Rising Slash - Deals medium physical Slash damage to all enemies (24 MP)
• Raging Edge - Deals heavy physical Slash damage to all enemies (38 MP)
• Martial Lore - [Passive] Increases basic attacks’ power by 50%

The diverse set of passives here are incredibly useful, offering boosting damage, evasion, and makes overworld combat easier. But the Slash attacks are also strong focusing on damage to all enemies in an effort to conserve MP. This makes the Swordmaster great for targeting large groups of enemies you are fighting against at the same time. This does make the Archetype weak against single targets or bosses.

Swordmaster Synthesis Skills¶

The Swordmaster has access to four different Synthesis Skills:

• Vorpal Blade - Deals extreme physical Slash damage to all enemies. Decreases their attack for 3 turns (18 MP) [Allies needed: Gunner, Faker, or Summoner Lineages]
• Phantom Swordswarm - Deals medium physical Slash damage 4-6 times to one enemy. If it’s a killing blow, adds one Turn Icon (16 MP) [Allies needed: Brawler, Merchant, or Summoner Lineages]
• Bamboo Splitter - Deals heavy physical Slash damage to one enemy. Adds one Turn Icon on a killing blow (6 MP) [Allies needed: Warrior, Brawler, or Berserker Lineages]
• Peerless Stonecleaver - Deals severe physical Slash damage to one enemy. Adds one Turn Icon on a killing blow (22 MP) [First ally needed: Warrior, Thief, or Masked Dancer Lineages & Second ally needed: Warrior, Brawler, or Berserker Lineages]

Unlike the basic Skills, these Synthesis Skills are where you can deal significant damage to one enemy. All three are worth using and Bamboo Splitter is especially strong for how little MP it costs. You also have a high amount of Slash damage which can hit multiple enemies thanks to Vorpal Blade.

For a full list of the Archetypes in the game, check out our Archetypes list.