As the protagonist of the adventure, you’ll be witnessing all events through the eyes of the Luminary. Raised in the quaint village of Cobblestone, the Hero awakens his ability as the Luminary during his coming of age ceremony. The Hero uses two weapons in the game, a sword and greatsword. Both of them have their uses, although the greatsword tends to outshine the other in the earlier parts of the game. Once you get into the later portions, though, the sword quickly catches up and becomes worthwhile to use, especially since he can pair it with a shield to become more defense, although Dual Wielding is the better option for damage.

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The Hero of Dragon Quest XI.

Spells¶

The Hero learns a number of spells as he levels up in the game, although he tends to not really be good at much of anything. His offensive spells are good in the earlier portions of the game, though, as they can help in dealing with large groups of enemies. The only problem with this is the fact you will probably not be focusing on increasing his Magical Might stat, so his spells won’t be as powerful as someone like Veronica or Rab.

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The Hero’s skill tree at the beginning of the game.

Swords¶

One of the two weapons the Hero can wield, the sword is one-handed and can be used with a shield. Once you learn Dual Wielding, you can use two swords at the same time. This one is not very useful in the beginning of the game, as Flame Slash is about the only skill worth using. This is because the other two early skills are situational in their uses. Metal Slash is only going to be really useful against Metal Slimes, while Dragon Slash should only really be used against dragon-type enemies. Being able to use a shield, though, does make the Hero a little more defensive, which can be a blessing in the earlier portions of the game. You should always have Flame Slash, though, to use the Itemized Kill Pep Power with Erik.

Greatswords¶

Greatswords are one of the two weapons that the Hero can use in battle, and they’re two-handed weapons. That means he won’t be able to use a shield with them, but to counter that, greatswords do more damage than normal swords. The good thing about greatswords is that the earlier skills are pretty good, as they focus on damage more than anything. Helichopter hits an entire group of enemies, while Cutting Edge is a strong attack against a single foe. This makes the greatsword great for cutting down random battles, as well as effective for boss battles. Once you gain access to Unbridled Blade later in the game, you can substitute it for Cutting Edge. Towards the end of the game, you might be able to switch back to normal swords.

Swordmastery¶

Swordmastery is located at the top of the Hero’s Character Builder, so you would need to either go through Swords or Greatswords in order to reach it. If you go up the right side, from the Greatswords area, you will gain access to the Strength +25 node, which is always a nice boost for damage. Most of the skills in this area are quite expensive, meaning that they put a big burden on your MP. They are great skills, no doubt, but you can’t really be using them too much, or you’ll be left with no MP at all. Sword Dance is one of the more useful abilities, though, especially when going up against bosses.

Gigacrash and Gigasmash will only hit a single group of enemies, while Gigaslash and Gigagash will hit all enemies. All of them will deal magical damage, specifically lightning, so you will need to be a little careful around foes that resist that. Blade of Ultimate Power is a very powerful attack, even moreso because it’s non-elemental, but it costs a whopping 48 MP to use, so it’s going to drain your mana very quickly. Your best options here are Gigaslash/Gigagash, as well as Sword Dance and the passives.

Luminary¶

The Luminary skill tree looks a bit barren at first, but it will get filled out more later on in the game. At the start, though, Zap is a great spell to help with clearing out monster encounters, plus you will want the Pep nodes to help with achieving Pep Mode. In fact, Pep Up is a skill that triggers it on command, for an even 25 MP. This can be important, since the Hero is a part of so many Pep Powers. Once the Luminary tree gets fleshed out, you will want to go to the right and get Charm +40, which is a special node, as that nets you an extra 10 Skill Points. You can reset this section after to get your points back to spend elsewhere.

The Pep-Up Power-Up and Pep Chance +10% are great to have, too, if you don’t feel like wasting MP on the skill itself (the former should be grabbed, no matter what). The Zap line of spells are nice, since they hit a group of enemies, but the later ones tend to cost quite a bit of MP, especially Kazap. You will definitely want to pick up Fullheal and Omniheal, as they can be great to have in a pinch, although the latter uses a high amount of MP. Unfortunately, the Hero doesn’t have access to something like Multiheal, so there is really no reason to chase after the Magical Mending stat here, although you might want to grab the Magical Might one, depending on if you use the Hero’s offensive spells.

The following skills will unlock after reaching a major plot point in the game.

Character Build¶

The Hero’s choice in the beginning portions of the game is pretty easy to figure out, since the Swords section is a bit underwhelming in terms of abilities, as only Flame Slash is really useful. Greatswords offer some great abilities for both normal enemies and bosses, so you should focus on that and go straight for Unbridled Blade, while picking up Helichopter and possibly Cutting Edge. This should last you until you can start making your way towards Sword Dance in the Swordmastery section. In fact, this ability will be able to replace Unbridled Blade as a boss killer, but you will unfortunately need to leave the skill alone, as it’s needed to unlock Sword Dance.

Don’t forget to also grab Pep Up in the Luminary section, as this makes it a little easier to trigger some of the Pep Powers. Once you reach the late portions of the game, you could go for Gigaslash and Gigagash, as well as Zap and Zapple. Although, it might be better to forgo the latter two and go for the Charm +40 to get the free Skill Points, then reset that section to gain all those spent SP back. The Strength passives are probably what you want to get with the Hero, as the others are either a pretty small increase, or not needed due to the Hero’s build.