Shulk/Gameplay (XC2)

Shulk is a Rare Blade in Xenoblade Chronicles 2.

Overview
Shulk is a very strong offensive and defensive support Blade. He has the highest auto attack stat in the game (which determines all damage calculation, not just auto attacks), and can increase his entire party's damage output even more at max affinity with Monado Enchant. He also has the skill Vision, which allows the player to totally nullify one fatal blow every 100-60 seconds (depending on skill's level).

Additionally, Shulk has surprisingly high defense mods for being an attacker type Blade, and also has the ability to permanently boost your party's evasion and accuracy at max affinity, with the skill Monado Speed.

Perhaps Shulk's other, non-Visions, defining capability is his level 1 special, Monado Purge. Purge removes status from an enemy, which is a challenge mode exclusive effect. Only Shulk has the ability to do this! (Corvin's level 2 special, Lacerna Noctis, removes enemy status, which is very similar to Awakening, but also very different.)

Also, his level 2 special, Monado Cyclone, is a five hit circular AoE.

Shulk's Blade weapon, the, has its animations based on Shield Hammers, modified to be sped up. The Monado has driver combo arts on Mòrag and Zeke, defense arts on Rex and Zeke, topple damage up on Mòrag Nia and Rex, and also has aggro reduction arts on those three plus Zeke. Mòrag, Zeke, and Nia have damage up against machines, and Rex and Nia have positional damage up.

Strategy
This section contains ideas for how to use Shulk in game, which means this section spoils eureka moments in build design.

On Mòrag, Shulk has both a topple art, and a topple damage up art. This is really good, because Mòrag has fast Monado animations! Rex also has fast, high damage arts, and is another solid driver for the weapon.

Shulk's level 2 special, Monado Cyclone, is a circular AoE multi hit, meaning it is very strong at building count in fights with adds. Monado Cyclone has an internal critical damage effect, making it very powerful in conditions where Shulk can achieve a high critical rate. In cases where Cyclone can hit damage cap, it being a multi hit also let's it connects multiple damage cap hits, effectively dealing more damage than the cap in one special.

His level 4 special is very high damage and completely ignores enemy block rate and defense stats, making it do even more damage. Since it also hits multiple times, it also has the possibility of doing effectively higher than cap damage.

Gallery
Shulk (XC2)