Equipping yourself with the best gear is critical in Xenoblade Chronicles. Along with their weapon, which we’ve touched on here, each character has 5 slots available for their armour and equipment pieces. Not only do these pieces change the way that your character looks, but they’re also crucial in determining both their physical and ether defence. Additionally, some pieces will come with slots that allow you to insert gems, or even come with slots already filled with gems that cannot be removed! All of this being the case, there is a great deal of customisation available to the player, but what if you’re just interested in gathering the absolute best pieces for every character? After thousands of hours with the game, the below choices are those that we consider to the absolute pinnacle of personal protection.
Shulk
- Head: Lancelot Gear
- Torso: Lancelot Armour / Grace Top (Unique)
- Hands: Lancelot Gauntlets / Glory Gauntlets (Unique)
- Legs: Lancelot Leggings
- Feet: Lancelot Boots
The first thing that you’re likely to notice about Shulk’s gear is, ‘wow that’s a lot of Lancelot pieces’. Well, for those that aren’t aware the Lancelot set is an end game set of equipment in which each piece comes with an open slot, but more importantly it has a very well balanced Physical and Ether Defence rating. Don’t be surprised if you find this particular set appears quite regularly as we progress through the article, and instead pay more attention to the Unique pieces that we choose, which in Shulk’s case are the Grace Top and Glory Gauntlets. It’s technically possible, with enough Gem crafting and luck, to produce pieces of equipment that outdo even the best Uniques, but we want to highlight these two specifically because they’re very powerful.
The Glory Gauntlets are quite a simple addition, though they can be relatively niche in their application. Shulk tends to just require a great deal of Strength, opting rather for hard hitting Arts than regular auto attack damage, however it is worth noting that said autos will raise the talent gauge quicker than ever, so if you’re in a battle that requires frequent usage of the Monado then you may want to consider these. Grace Top is rather self explanatory since it houses a 75% Art Seal Resist gem, and since Shulk relies heavily on these for pretty much everything he does, it’s probably a good idea to keep it on standby for some of the tougher opponents.
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Reyn
- Head: Lancelot Gear
- Torso: Eclipse Armour (Unique) / Grace Top (Unique) / Glory Armour (Unique)
- Hands: Lancelot Gauntlets / Asura Arms (Unique)
- Legs: Lancelot Leggings / Glory Leggings (Unique)
- Feet: Lancelot Boots
As you might imagine, given that Reyn is more interested in soaking up damage than dealing it, his equipment selection looks quite different to that of Shulk. He does retain the Lancelot set in both the help and feet section, again mainly because it offers excellent Ether defence along with reasonable physical defence, but the remaining slots do throw up some quite different options. Actually, your choices here really will come down to how you like to build Reyn, so we’ll try to outline the differences with a few reasons why.
In his torso slot we’ve opted for three choices. The Grace Top retains it’s slot from our previous selection, because again having Art Seal Resist is a fantastic boon in the mid to late game, but we’ve also opted for the Eclipse Armour and Glory Armour. The former is quite an unusual choice because it comes with a Damage Heal VI gem, which heals Reyn whenever he takes damage. This might seem unusual, since you’ll often find forums recommending that avoidance is king in the late game, but if you pair this up with a few more passive healing gems like Recovery Up, Reyn can actually receive a constant stream of healing that will keep him alive through anything. The Glory Armour is our second addition, which comes with a Debuff Resist VI gem that offers 75% resistance to debuffs. This might not sound great, but it’s worth noting that this single piece of equipment also offers 250 physical and 180 ether defence, making it the single strongest defensive piece of armour in the game.
In our remaining slots we’ve chosen to highlight the Asura Arms and Glory Leggings. The latter comes with a useless gem (Good Footing VI) but we’re again highlighting it because of the huge defences (215 Physical, 175 Ether). The Asura Arms are probably the easiest to recommend here, because they’re a heavy armour piece that comes with a 75 Strength gem attached which, until you reach the late game of Gem farming, is probably as good as it gets for hand equipment.
Sharla
- Head: Lancelot Gear / Eclipse Gear (Unique)
- Torso: Lancelot Armour / Grace Top (Unique)
- Hands: Lancelot Gauntlets
- Legs: Lancelot Leggings / Grace Bottoms (Unique)
- Feet: Lancelot Boots / Eclipse Boots (Unique)
First things first: We’re not recommending that you pick up two pieces of armour that have HP UP on them, rather we’re just highlighting the two that are available so that you may pick one. Additionally, it’s worth noting that Sharla is essentially a dedicated healer thanks to her Arts, and as such you’re really not going to be bothered about her dodging attacks and keeping her equipment weight down. With the assistance of a few skill links she can go to town on pretty much any type of Light, Medium or Heavy armour without worrying about her performance dropping off, though if you do view this as any kind of issue then the trusty Lancelot set is here to offer all round performance.
Outside of this we’ve opted for the Eclipse Gear helm that comes with Ether Up VI, the Grace Top for that trusty Arts Seal Resist and two unique lower body pieces that offer HP UP. Three of these will combine to keep your healer safe and sound whilst ensuring that she pumps out big enough heals to ensure the same for your team. We’re a bit miffed that we couldn’t find a great Unique for her hand slot, but hey at least you have a free slot to get a bit creative with… Or just chuck another Ether Up in there to max it out.
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Dunban
- Head: Lancelot Gear
- Torso: Lancelot Armour / Grace Top (Unique)
- Hands: Lancelot Gauntlets / Glory Gauntlets (Unique)
- Legs: Lancelot Leggings
- Feet: Lancelot Boots
- ALTERNATIVE: No Equipment
No doubt you will have noticed the sixth option on our list there, but we’ll get to that. Our general recommendation here is to follow a similar path to Shulk. You’ll mainly want to keep the equipment weight down as low as possible since Dunban is more of a dodge tank than Reyn, so heading with the lighter versions of equipment will do well. That said, Grace Top once again makes an appearance thanks to it’s Art Seal Resist, and it’s hard to ignore the Glory Gauntlets and their huge 45% Haste – Dunban already loves haste and this will interact well with his aura of the same effect.
The sixth option really does require a little more information. As noted, Dunban is a character that is very well equipped to dodge attacks, mainly thanks to his high Agility. It’s possible to increase this statistic with gems and equipment of course, but if you invest enough time into his Wisdom skill tree you’ll unlock the Inner Peace skill, which increases his Agility by 30% when no armour is equipped. This, combined with his Serene Heart aura, will grant him a huge amount of dodge rate, making this one of the best tanking options in the late game and specifically an excellent option for the super bosses.
Riki
- Head: Lancelot Gear / Master Glasses (Unique) / Eclipse Gear (Unique)
- Torso: Lancelot Armour / Grace Top (Unique)
- Hands: Lancelot Gauntlets
- Legs: Lancelot Leggings
- Feet: Lancelot Boots
The first of our heavy Ether damage users is Riki, and you can see this reflected in his equipment choices. We’ve again opted for heavy Lancelot usage, again because it’s well balanced and offers slots, and we’d wholly recommend that you fill these with as many Ether improving gems as possible. Given some time the little Heropon can do tremendous amounts of damage to both groups and single target opponents, so it’s worth having quite a few open slots available to maximise this.
Our only real recommendations outside of this are the Master Glasses, which come with a big chunk of Ether Up onboard, and the Grace Top, because an Ether user without Arts is almost useless. Unlike others that might need a bump of HP however, Riki has plenty of options available to him. If you practice your Gem crafting you can max out his Ether Up and, combined with some specific weapon gems, you’ll have quite a few slots free. It’s even possible to squeeze a Strength Up in there in the late game to provide a little nudge to his physical Arts should you wish.
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Melia
- Head: Lancelot Gear / Master Glasses (Unique) / Eclipse Gear (Unique)
- Torso: Lancelot Armour / Grace Top (Unique)
- Hands: Lancelot Gauntlets
- Legs: Lancelot Leggings / Grace Bottoms (Unique)
- Feet: Lancelot Boots / Eclipse Boots (Unique)
Much like our previous option, in fact more so given her lack of red Arts, Melia is all about that Ether. She’s also capable of absolutely incredible things thanks to her spell casting kit, so whilst there are plenty of options for Unique pieces here we would recommend that you do your best to craft her some maxed out Gems where possible. Maxed out Gems will allow you more freedom, since you’ll be taking up less slots in some cases and you can beef her up at the same time.
Outside of max level gems there are plenty of Unique options available. The Master Glasses and Eclipse Gear both provide the same level of Ether Up, and since Melia will suffer no disadvantage from heavy armour types you can pick the latter if you wish. Grace Top and Bottoms are both defensive options, providing Art Resist and HP UP respectively, though we’ve also included Eclipse Boots which are another option for providing the latter. Whether you choose the Uniques or invest time in Gem crafting, you’re basically looking to max out her Ether whilst retaining as many defensive options as possible.
Fiora
- Head: Z Speed Goggles / Speed V Goggles (Unique)
- Torso: Speed V Frame (Unique)
- Hands: Attack V Arms / Speed V Arms (Unique)
- Legs: Z Speed Boosters
- Feet: Segment Drones / Sedna Drones
Before digging into everyone’s favourite auto attacker, we’d first like to note that it’s actually quite nice not seeing the word Lancelot here, isn’t it? Given Fiora’s unique situation, she’s unable to equip normal armour, so as you might imagine our recommendations are very specific. It’s also worth noting that whilst she is capable of both Tanking and dealing Ether damage, we’re leaning directly into the physical damage option here, since it’s likely to be the way that most people will build her.
That said, it’s best to look for as many ways to improve her physical attacks as possible. Speed V Frame is a great Torso option here, since it comes with a near-max Haste gem, and we’re a big fan of including the Speed V Arms to ensure that she’s accurate enough to hit higher level opponents as much as possible thanks to the Agility Up VI gem. Outside of this, the Speed V Goggles are nigh on essential to remove a good chunk of her aggro, and the Z Speed Boosters are an ideal open slot into which we’d chuck some Strength Up.
Her drones are a rather unique proposition, since they’ll determine which ability her talent gauge has available. The better of these is generally the ‘Sword’ type, mainly because Fiora leans heavily towards single target damage, but it’s worth noting that the Sedna Drones specifically will open up an ‘X’ version of the Sword Drones which deals a great deal more damage. It’s a toss up really whether you prefer this to the Segment Drones which come with a slot; another damage gem here will provide passive benefits, but who doesn’t love seeing the massive 10 hit combo offered by the Sedna version?
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