[EMS] Puncture

Puncture (KMS: Incising, MSEA: Incizing), one tertiary skill that is among the bottom layer of underused skills in a Hero's tool kit. Why's that? Dunno, don't ask me.

Hero is one of the few classes in MapleStory that has one skill for both bossing and mobility, being able to change Raging Blow's form to enhance its versatility. In most cases, classes have one skill that focuses on mobility and one that focuses on hitting hard on a limited amount of enemies. Most classes have at least one signature skill to weaken a target - Hero is no exception. In fact, Hero has two of them: Panic and Puncture.

Panic applies Blind on targets at an almost guaranteed percentage, which applies to another skill of Hero called Chance Attack. Chance Attack gives a damage multiplier to enemies that are either Stunned, Blinded, Frozen or Binded. Puncture applies damage over time on targets. This damage over time effect multiplies your damage if the damage is a critical hit. Nowadays, running 100% critical rate is pretty much standard and many people recommend it for good reasons. I mean, there's little reason not to run 100% critical rate on any class, really...

Unfortunately that's not all there is to Puncture. Puncture is one of the few skills in a Hero's lifetime that has barely changed since its introduction. While that might sound stale at first, that's because Puncture never needed a change. It was already broken since it's introduction, and its use has only been made more useful and more versatile in a short span of three years, to a point where a nerf is going to be imminent the moment when more people will figure this out.

I'm not going to say "Puncture is better than Raging Blow". It doesn't have to, therefore, it never will. However, the fact that we're talking about a tertiary skill getting this close to Raging Blow is quite an exceptional sight. And the fact that Nexon has been steadily improving Puncture in the past three years while this stayed unnoticed in the community is baffling to me. Because apparently the general opinion about Hero has always heavily relied on a single person showing on a community forum how to "Git Gud". Not just once - I've seen this happen several times since I've been playing on my Hero daily for the past 10 years.

I'm aware that it probably sounds bonkers that some internet dude claims "Puncture to get close to Raging Blow's level". Because let's be honest: it does sound bonkers. However, this isn't just a blog or blogpost with me rambling on with text without any proof. And I know that most of you recurring readers know that if a blogpost here is just called "[EMS] Puncture", there will a lot to nerd (and read) about. Let's dive in.


Probably one decent way to prove a tertiary skill's usefulness is to exclusively use this skill as the only attacking skill in combat. Cuz nothing says more than solo-ing freaking Alien Visitor PQ with only using Puncture as your main attacking skill. And to keep things fair: because Alien Visitor PQ was initially released for 4th Job, I intentionally unequipped everything 5th Job related in this video, as that would cheese things too much. I prefer to have a clean, fair and legitimate showcase. So, if such a stripped keyboard and layout could already clear Alien Visitor PQ with only a skill that is more or less considered as "a skill that only exists to increase your Raging Blow damage", you know there's something wrong with Puncture's hitbox...

Puncture's hitbox has been like that since the beginning. In fact, during the time when Puncture came out in 2013 (KMS) as part of the RED update, consider that:

1. Raging Blow's hitbox was much smaller. Raging Blow's hitbox has been changed multiple times - both its original hitbox (plus original attacking speed for that matter) and the hitbox back in 2013 was way less useful than it is right now. You couldn't even hit above your head, to give an example. The Enraged Raging Blow mobility was introduced for the Valhalla Hyper Skill during the Reboot update, which came in 2015.
2. Shout didn't have a ridiculous hitbox, and it didn't have a cooldown. Its hitbox was much smaller than it is today. Combo Force didn't have the Hookshot ability, and it required Combo Orbs to use it, and it couldn't charge Combo Orbs. Rage Uprising was much slower and its hitbox was smaller, and it also had a cooldown of 30 seconds. Most of these appreciated changes to improve these skills arrived in 2015 and 2016.
3. Plenty of Maplers considered Alien Visitor PQ as impossible for a Hero, which I debunked in 2014 when the RED update hit EMS in 2014. As mentioned in the description of this video, Puncture was the real decisive factor for clearing this PQ - unless you were already way past Level 208 at a time when Twisted Aqua Road and the Masters' Road Battlefield were the only decent places to grind post-200. Back then, you had a chance to miss for every level you were under a target's level, which could make the difference between killing it in two skills or three. Time you couldn't afford much in a thing such as Alien Visitor.
4. Puncture originally required 4 Combo Orbs to be casted. You could hold two Punctures at once. Since Puncture had no cooldown, one could argue the Combo consumption was a way to have some sort of a cooldown. You would need to recharge Combo orbs in order to use it again. However, this old thought of mine has become moot over time because ever since Raging Blow's hitbox was improved, they have reduced the Combo Orb consumption count from 4 to 2, and recently from 2 to 1. You can literally hold ten freaking Punctures now. Most likely these changes were done in order to make sure you wouldn't lose too much damage to cast Puncture (as four Combo Orbs is a pretty heavy cost for your damage because Combo Attack basically has always been the decisive factor for your output), or it was Nexon's attempt to mock people (or some internal bet between two Nexon developers) and see how many improvements Puncture will require until the general public explodes with forum headlines about "OMG CHECK PUNCTURE" or something. Cuz clearly this blogpost isn't going to be going to be shared on different MapleStory forums and explode in views like some Lania's Triple Lunchbox blogpost of mine did, as this blogpost is just about some trivial skill not many Hero mains seem to care about apparently.
5. Puncture is still a skill to apply a debuff. Back in 2013, its hitbox was larger than Raging Blow and to an extent, had a better upward reach than Shout. But still for some reason, nobody noticed this hitbox. Is it because not many people played Hero? Is it because almost nobody talked about this to the general public before? Is it because nobody verified its hitbox and just blindly used it to increase your bossing damage? We'll probably never know for sure...

Of course, nowadays Alien Visitor PQ is more feasible because a lot of things in this game has improved for the best. However, that doesn't take away the fact that Puncture can be considered a bit too versatile. Talking about Alien Visitor was only to show its hitbox. With 5th Job you can solo it for sure, but just the idea that Puncture - a skill of such niche use - can be used like that exclusively by itself with success... We haven't even talked about Puncture's attacking speed.


Puncture's attacking speed as you could see in that particular video, never really gets faster than either of the Raging Blow variants. For almost every speed stage, you can throw about eight Punctures in the same time as ten Raging Blows. Nonetheless, Puncture still remains a very fast attack, and its hitbox is larger than current day's default Raging Blow. You don't always have Valhalla or Sword of Burning Soul active, so the amount of E.R.B.'s you have remain limited.

So there are scenarios where using Puncture is probably better than Raging Blow, although I can understand that casting Raging Blow is preferred because it's a tad easier/comfier to use and it doesn't require Combo Orbs. Don't forget, we're still talking about a scenario where a tertiary skill is better suited than your freaking main attack. But of course, secondary and tertiary skills have their situational uses as they are not your primary attack - but we're talking about mobility. And Raging Blow is like, intended to be your main mobility skill when others are on cooldown right?

Hmm, for some reason, the template of that video feels very familiar though...

It's worth to mention that skills such as Soul Driver, Slash Blast, Brandish, Brave Slash and Panic are (much) faster than either Puncture or Raging Blow. Soul Driver is probably the fastest of them all, with almost four attacks each second at Speed 0! But none of these skills have a hitbox that gets as close as Raging Blow's as much as Puncture does.

Anyway, regardless if Puncture costs "a single Combo Orb", there are several things that kills the reason not to sacrifice one Combo Orb for an arguably better experience, because:

• Unlike Panic, Puncture consistently costs one Combo Orb and has a 100% success rate at Level 30. Panic costs two Combo Orbs, and its hitbox is much smaller. Plus, Panic has that one penalty system where the costs for recasting it within 10 seconds increases the consumption count, which makes it less appealing to continuously use in short terms. Less Combo consumption means less damage loss, and since you can consistently charge 2 Combo Orbs with investing in ACA's Hyper Skill for Double Chance Rate, losing one Combo Orb is almost trivial because you can have an almost 100% chance to recharge two orbs if you Combo Force two or more enemies as each enemy has a 80% chance by itself, rather than "80% for the entire attack" like all other Hero skills do.
• If there's an Elite Monster around and you can't kill it within a few seconds, using Puncture or Panic would shorten the time required to kill it. In fact, using both Panic and Puncture might be a tad overkill as that would throw away more Orbs than you have to (which would result in a kill requiring more time), and if you had to choose between Panic or Puncture, it's probably better to pick Puncture. I know Puncture does not apply to Cadena's Skill Link, but let's be honest: Panic's hitbox needs some rework as it's incredibly short and fairly small. Either way, only use Panic for serious bosses where you need it, and use Puncture for the more casual targets when five or six Raging Blows isn't enough. Plus, Puncture comes with a smaller risk as its hitbox enables you to keep your distance from particular enemies you don't want to get close to.
• For maps like Spirit Savior where time is of the essence, using Puncture might not be such a bad idea if you walk past Rock Spirits because when you return, the Rock Spirits should have that fancy debuff for reinforced damage ready. Yes, the damage over time from Puncture isn't that great (we'll get back to this later on this blogpost), but having the Rock Spirits with lower HP really made the difference of an additional coin per run to me as I don't kill the Rock Spirits within a reasonable amount of attacks. Try getting more than 4000 points at Spirit Savior when you need five to seven Raging Blows for each Rock Spirit kill. I wish you good luck if you're not controlling your Hero like a mad man who has played this game for over 14.000 hours on that particular character.
• If you're really having some issues with OCD about how many Combo Orbs you have left despite Combo Force (or Hero's ridiculous attacking speed in general) recharging Combo Orbs like crazy, the Russellon's Pill trick is the end to all Combo consumption arguments. Its effect also lasts for about five minutes.

No seriously, if you don't believe me on the last point, check this out:

Don't forget you have Combo Synergy to have a 30% chance to trigger a charge after gettng hit, which works with the poison status effect. I have mentioned this on my blog multiple times, but I can't express this often enough until these items become retired or if Nexon patches it suddenly after leaving it as an option for the past 4 years. I mean, most people heavily seem to rely on potions, buffs, spawn modifiers, 100% Burning Fields, gear swapping mid-combat and such. So I guess poisoning yourself (possible pun unintended) with another "I-always-seem-to-need-this-even-though-I-don't-really-have-to" tool shouldn't hurt your gameplay too much. *shrugs*

Just don't forget that you can guarantee to recharge two Combo Orbs instead of one, and with a skill like Puncture costing only one Combo Orb (unlike Panic or Combo Death Fault), your chances to keep throwing Punctures are pretty good as you wouldn't have to recharge too often with another skill. I also have to mention that for some reason, poison in general (such as Russellon's Pills, Death Mines geysers) stops working when you hit 100 or higher Status Resistance... but pffffffffffffft, who tells you to fund over 100 Status Resistance anyway. Apparently mainstream nowadays calls it totally useless, so I guess because everyone says so, it's clearly the indisputable truth... (that was some sarcasm by the way)

Is there something worth to mention about Puncture that Raging Blow in no way could achieve? Given Puncture is a separate skill by itself so it clearly needs to do something that other skills can't do. I mean, the Shout and additional damage reinforcement aside, there is one thing of Puncture that Raging Blow can't touch, unless you're able to swing over six hundred Raging Blows within two seconds all of a sudden. No, I'm not kidding about the "over six hundred" thing. Read the next few paragraphs and the following video.


The "particular thing" has to do with the damage over time effect from Puncture.

Damage over time usually comes in two main shapes: damage over time based on your damage range and damage over time based on a target's HP. Puncture's damage over time is based on your damage range, but unfortunately Hero is a permanent low range class, so Puncture's damage is not going to utterly destroy normal enemies by bleeding them to death. But it doesn't have to, since Puncture's damage over time is just there to reinforce the damage of your other skills, not to chip large chunks of HP and rely on damage over time as a significant source like some other classes do.

With the streamlining of several game mechanics during the 5th Job update, damage over time effects was one of the lucky mechanics to be improved on. In some cases where you're forced to hit a maximum amount of damage (i.e. all hits can't go higher than 10), damage over time that is based on your range can now bypass this limit on most non-boss enemies. Princess No is one of those raid bosses that totally got pooped on since this particular change, as that makes everything so much easier and more convenient.

One could argue that you could use a familiar during Princess No or a Potential line to apply poison to tackle those Oda Spirit Walkers, Oda Swordsmen and Oura Shogun's Summoned Eels, but who is really going to use any of those? Just stick with Puncture, that's much more efficient. Plus, you might want to consider reserving that familiar slot for a Goby familiar, as that bites deep in Mikagami's HP. It's such a blessing to beat Mikagami without getting spike teleported all across the map, by only poking a sentient sword in the ground and letting a sugar-driven fish summon chip all of that HP away.

Anyway, before I close this blogpost, there are two small remarks left about Puncture to mention:

• Yes, Puncture has a large hitbox, but it suffers from the "Zero's Shadow Rain" syndrome as it has a limited amount of targets that just can't make good use of that sweet hitbox. Puncture only applies to six targets, which you can only extend further up to nine with the Pipsqueak Luminous from Monster Life, Inner Ability line and the Nodestone enhancement for Puncture itself. In comparison to Raging Blow, it has a +2 targets Hyper Skill, and with the three upgrades, Raging Blow can hit up to thirteen targets. Speaking of Hyper Skills...
• Puncture has no Hyper Skills, while Raging Blow has them. Yes, Puncture's damage might be almost identical to Raging Blow's, but that really gets a huge gap (pun-cture intended) if everyone reinforces Raging Blow's damage with Hyper Skills/5th Job and not many Maplers would mention anywhere that it might be a good thing to improve Puncture's damage alongside Rage Uprising, Shout and Combo Force. Then again, almost nobody recommends the +2 targets Hyper Skill for Raging Blow or the Inner Ability upgrade for +1 targets on all skills that don't hit 15 targets already. Of course I would recommend these, but eh well. Can't do much about what others write about Hero or MapleStory in general I guess.

So, I hope y'all can understand that despite Puncture is by no means as useful, consistent or strong as Raging Blow, it definitely is not your standard trivial/tertiary support skill. It has quite a hell of a list of remarkable feats it can do despite what it supposed to be... and I challenge Nexon to be brave enough to figure out a way to nerf this skill, because let's face it: it probably needs one. Being a supportive skill to apply a debuff is one thing, but Puncture isn't like Panic at all. I hope this blogpost will fill up a (knowledge) gap for the Maplers who read this, and I'll probably get slapped in the face by someone for making another terrible pun...cture. Woops.

It's way past bed time again. That's it for today - I'll see you guys again next post! (also: belated happy holidays)