This guide is targeted at players looking to play and understand Reaper as they level up. It will cover some basic priorities for each level tier and will also serve as a priority list for playing Reaper at lower levels (for ultimates and such). If you are level 90 and looking to explore other guides please visit the following links:

Basic Guide

Advanced Guide

Skill Details

How to Unlock

To unlock Reaper, you must first have these prerequisites met:

• Endwalker expansion purchased and registered to your Mogstation account.
• Level 70 on any Disciple of War or Disciple of Magic job

You can unlock Reaper in Ul’dah at 12.8, 8.6

Here, you will have to complete a short quest. Once complete, congratulations – you have now unlocked Reaper!

Gear

• Reaper wears Maiming gear; the same armor type that Dragoon wears.

• You can purchase a better mainhand weapon in Rhalgr’s Reach by spending 600 of Allagan Tomestones of Poetics.

  • Eschina at 13.8, 11.7
  • Select Scaevan Gear Exchange
  • Purchase Augmented Scaevan Scythe

• You can purchase armor using Allagan Tomestones of Poetics in Rhalgr’s Reach

  • Enna at 13.8, 11.7
  • Select the DoW II option
  • Purchase Augmented Scaevan Armor
  • • It is recommended that you start with left side pieces. You may not need an earring if you pre-ordered Endwalker and received Melphina’s Earring, or you obtained the Bozjan Earring, as they will provide a 30% boost to experience gain.
    • You can purchase two of the same rings from this vendor!
  • You should ideally be around iLvl 400 at this time.

• As you run dungeons and do other content you will obtain new gear that has a higher ilvl, in which you should generally put on. Don’t worry about having the right stats as having a higher iLvl will let you deal more damage and survive more hits.

Know your Role

• Multi-target: When you are DPSing in dungeons always do AoE abilities when there are three or more enemies. 

• Don’t hold cooldowns: Trash pulls are often more taxing on healers and tanks so dealing with them quickly will lead to a more successful dungeon, so don’t hold any cooldowns for a Boss.

• Soul Sow: When you are at level 82 or above you want to Soul Sow in between each mob pull as it is an instant cast. Make sure to use the Harvest Moon on each AoE pull when the monsters are grouped up.

• Arcane Crest: At level 84, Arcane Crest turns into a potent heal. If the dungeon mobs do unavoidable AoE then don’t be afraid to pop Arcane Crest to help out the healer a little bit. It can also be useful for boss AoEs.

• Always be attacking: Thanks to our Sprint and Ingress we are able to keep up the tank and maintain damage on adds as you are running in-between packs. This is a great time to build up soul gauge and preliminarily use Whorl of Death on targets. I recommend Whorl of Death on the first pack and spamming Spinning Scythe > Nightmare Scythe while moving to the next. Use your Ingress to get to the second pack the same time the tank does and apply Whorl of Death to them and finally apply it a second time when the initial pack shows up again. This should give you 60 seconds of the debuff on all targets and you should start with a decent amount of Soul gauge.

  • At higher levels you may also want to consider using Soul Scythe, Grim Swathe and Guillotine while moving from pack to pack.

Reaper Rotations

While Reaper may start at level 70, there is a good chance you will end up playing Reaper in synced content. Below are some general guides for playing Reaper at certain levels:

Levels 1-49

Below level 50, there are only two main things you can do as Reaper:

• Maintain the Death Design’s debuff on targets at all times.

  • Ignore the debuff for multi-target until you have Whorl of Death!

• Do your combo actions in order.

Single Target

• Maintain Shadow of Death on the target at all times.
• Use Slice > Waxing Slice > Infernal Slice (Available at level 30)

Multi-target [Three or more Targets]

• Maintain Whorl of Death (Available at level 35) on enemies at all times.
• Use Spinning Scythe (Available level 25) > Nightmare Scythe (Available level 45).

Levels 50-69

You gain access to the Soul Gauge at level 50. 

• You gain Soul by using your basic combo or by using Soul Slice/Scythe. Soul Slice and Soul Scythe share a cooldown, Slice is your single target attack while Scythe is your AoE. 
• You spend soul by using Blood Stalk or Grim Swathe. They both cost 50 Soul. Blood Stalk is a single target attack while Grim Swathe is a multi-target attack.

Single Target 

• Maintain Shadow of Death on the target at all times.
• Soul Slice (Available at level 60) on cooldown as long as you are at 50 Soul or below. 
• Blood Stalk if you have 50 Soul Gauge or more.
• Slice > Waxing Slice > Infernal Slice as your main combo.

Multi-target [Three or more Targets]

• Maintain Whorl of Death on targets at all times.
• Use Soul Scythe (Available at level 65) on cooldown as long as you are at 50 Soul or below.
• Use Grim Swathe (Available at level 55) if you have 50 Soul Gauge or more.
• Use Spinning Scythe > Nightmare Scythe

Levels 70-79

At level 70 you gain access to a resource called Soul Reavers, which you can spend on the Gibbet, Gallows, or Guillotine. A Soul Reaver is generated by spending 50 Soul on Blood Stalk, Unveiled Gibbet, Unveiled Gallows or Grim swathe. 

• When you use Gibbet or Gallows it will grant you a buff that will enhance your next Gallows or Gibbet respectively. This buff will also upgrade Blood Stalk into an Unveiled Action corresponding to the correct buff. The Unveiled action will not consume the buff.

Shadow of Death and Whorl of Death apply a debuff to enemies that increases the damage you deal to them. It also grants you 10 soul if an enemy would die with the debuff on. It is important to maintain this on enemies at all times. Also when AoEing in dungeons, you will be getting a lot of Soul as enemies in the pack die so make sure you are spending it quickly.

Level 72 will provide you with your first raid cooldown, Arcane Circle, which provides a 3% damage up buff to you and the rest of your team.  You will want to use this on cooldown.

Level 74 will give you a quality of life upgrade on Hell’s Ingress and Hell’s Egress. Whenever you use one of the movement abilities, you will leave behind a portal – and the other movement ability will change to a skill called “Regress”, which can be used to move back to that portal within ten seconds.

Level 76 will provide you with a powerful single-target and AoE ability called Gluttony. This ability costs 50 Soul Gauge, but will provide you with 2 Reavers, which must be spent on Gibbets, Gallows or Guillotine. Just like with the Reavers produced from the Unveiled Actions, Blood Stalk and Grim Swathe, if the next weapon skill you use does not consume Reavers, you will lose both stacks immediately.

Level 78 will provide you with a huge quality of life improvement on your Soul Slice and Scythe abilities by allowing you to stack this ability up to two times. This will make your usage of it less rigid and more situation dependent. 

Single Target

• Maintain Shadow of Death on the target.

• Use Arcane Circle (Available at level 72) on cooldown.

• Use Gluttony (Available at level 76) on cooldown.

• Use Soul Slice on cooldown as long as you are at 50 Soul or below.

• Use Gibbet > Gallows if you have any Soul Reavers.

  • These are your first positionals. Gibbet is used from the flank and Gallows is used from the rear. The potency lost from the positional being missed is the same as the potency loss from not doing the combo, so for simplicity, always alternate the two.
  • These are combo actions. When you use one, it will buff the other for 60s. This is signified by the glowing border on the ability, should you ever forget which one to use next.

• Use Blood Stalk / Unveiled Gibbet / Unveiled Gallows if you have 50 Soul or more and no Soul Reavers.

  • Unveiled Gibbets and Unveiled Gallows share the same button as Blood Stalk and are all functionally the same but deal slightly more damage.
  • When you use these abilities it gives you a Soul Reaver which must be spent on Gibbets or Gallows. Any other weaponskill will consume the Reavers.

• Use your basic Slice > Waxing Slice > Infernal Slice combo.

Multi-target [Three or more Targets]

• Maintain Whorl of Death on all targets.
• Use Arcane Circle (Available at level 72) on cooldown.
• Use Gluttony (Available at level 76) on cooldown.
• Use Soul Scythe on cooldown as long as you are at 50 Soul or below.
• Use Guillotine if you have any Soul Reavers.
• Use Grim Swathe if you have 50 Soul or more and no Soul Reavers.
• Use Spinning Scythe > Nightmare Scythe as your main combo.

Level 80

Upon reaching level 80 you will not automatically learn your next ability, Enshroud. In order to learn it you must complete the job quests. They can found in Ul’dah in the location where you finish your last Reaper quest. These quest are relatively quick and will even provide you with some base level tutorial on the job.

Enshroud costs 50 Shroud and is a buff that will enhance your gauge, modify a few skills and disallow access to a few skills. Here is a breakdown of the changes, and how to use Enshroud:

• Gibbet, Gallows and Guillotine will all generate 10 Shroud.

• When you have 50 Shroud and execute Enshroud, your gauge will activate and you will gain five Lemure Orbs (Red Orbs).

• When entering Enshroud, the following abilities will change to gain some additional functions

  • Gibbet changes into Void Reaping
  • Gallows changes into Cross Reaping
  • Guillotine changes into Grim Reaping

• These upgrade weaponskills cost one Lemure Orb and has a 1.5s recast, so they will be a lot quicker than your normal weaponskills.

• You will also have limited access to your kit while under the effect of Enshroud. Here are a few skills that will still be available:

  • Shadow of Death and Whorl of Death
  • Arcane Crest
  • Arcane Circle
  • Cross-Class Abilities

• Enshroud has a duration of 30s, but the actual sequence will take about 7.5 seconds at level 80. In order to make good habits and properly utilize your cooldowns, follow these two rules while leveling:

  • Do not enter Shroud if you are nearing 2 stacks of Soul Slice. Try to always keep one charge of Soul-like abilities on cooldown.
  • Do not enter Shroud if Gluttony has less than 10 seconds on its cooldown. You want to try and use Gluttony cooldown.

• It is possible to Enshroud back-to-back in raid buffs, but will require you to extend your first Shroud by timing your Shadow of Death usages within that Shroud. Normally, there will need to be three GCDs between each Shroud.

  • You shouldn’t need to worry about this much in dungeons but don’t forget you can always re-apply Death’s Design while enshrouded.

Your new rotation at level 80 will look like the following:

Single Target

• Maintain Death’s Design at all times using Shadow of Death.
• Gluttony on Cooldown
• Arcane Circle on Cooldown
• Spend Reavers on Gibbet or Gallows, whichever is buffed, when you have them.
• Always ensure that at least one charge of Soul Slice is on cooldown. Remember that it gives 50 soul so make sure you use at or below 50 Soul gauge.
• Enshroud when at 50 shroud gauge.
• • Your Enshroud rotation should look like this:
  • • Void Reaping > Cross Reaping > Void Reaping > Cross Reaping > Void Reaping.
    • The ability you start on doesn’t matter just make sure you alternate.
• Unveiled Action when at 50 or more Soul
• Use Slice > Waxing Slice > Infernal Slice combo as filler

Multi-target [Three or more Targets]

• Maintain Death’s Design at all times using Whorl of Death.

• Gluttony on Cooldown

• Arcane Circle on Cooldown

• Spend Reavers on Guillotine when you have them.

• Always ensure that at least one charge of Soul Scythe is on cooldown. Remember that it gives 50 soul so make sure you use at or below 50 Soul gauge.

• Enshroud when at 50 shroud gauge.

  • Your Enshroud rotation should look like this:

    • Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping.

• Grim Swathe when at 50 or more Soul

• Use Spinning Scythe > Nightmare Scythe as filler.

Levels 81-90

At level 82 you learn two new abilities: Soul Sow and Harvest Moon. This is a special ability with some special rules.

• Soul Sow is instant out of combat, but has a five second cast time during combat.

• Soul Sow turns into Harvest Moon once you have the Soul Sow buff.

• Use Soul Sow in the following scenarios:

  • Between each pull.
  • If a boss is untargetable for five seconds or more.

• Use Harvest Moon in the following scenarios:

  • Once every AoE Pull
  • Once every boss fight or before a boss becomes untargetable for five seconds.
  • Use it if you have to disconnect from the boss or near the end of the fight or before the boss becomes untargetable.

At level 84, your Arcane Crest will receive a significant upgrade. Whenever you break the shield on your Arcane Crest, you will give all surrounding party members a 100 potency regen that will last for 15 seconds. This will effectively restore 500 potency of healing to your party members, which is pretty massive. While this is not directly related to your damage, it is recommended you get used to utilizing this ability, as it will be a powerful tool in your tool kit.

At level 86, you will gain a passive that will enhance your Enshroud phase. The following aspects will change:

• After executing Cross Reaping, Void Reaping or Grim Reaping you will generate a Void Orb (Blue orb).

• Blood Stalk will change to Lemure’s Slice

  • Costs 2 Void Orbs

• Grim Swathe will change to Lemure’s Scythe

  • Costs 2 Void Orbs

• Your enshroud combo changes to the following sequence:

  • Single target: Void Reaping > Cross Reaping > Lemure’s Slice (Weaved inbetween) > Void Reaping > Cross Reaping > Lemure’s Slice (Weave inbetween) > Void Reaping

At level 88, you learn Plentiful Harvest. You will gain a passive that alters how Arcane Circle functions.

• Arcane Circle will now generate two additional buffs to you and your party.

  • You and your party gain one stack of the Ceremony Circle Buff that will last for 5s.

  • While under the Ceremony Circle buff, the next weapon skill or magic attack used will consume a stack and give the Reaper who casted Arcane Circle a single Immortal Sacrifice Stack.

  • Immortal Sacrifice can stack up to eight times. Each party member and the RPR themselves can only provide a single stack.

    • In light parties, the maximum is four.

  • Immortal Sacrifice stacks will enable you to cast Plentiful Harvest.

• Plentiful Harvest will become available to cast as long as you obtained a single Immortal Sacrifice stack, six seconds after you initially use Arcane Circle.

  • Plentiful Harvest builds 50 shroud allowing you enshroud instantly right after.

At level 90, you will learn your final skill, Communio. Communio is a cast spell that is only available during Enshroud and will effectively replace the last global cooldown during the Enshroud. 

Your new Enshroud rotation will look like this:

Single Target

• Void Reaping → Cross Reaping → Lemure’s Slice → Void Reaping → Cross Reaping → Lemure’s Slice → Communio

Multi-target  [3 or more Targets]

• Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Lemure’s Scythe > Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Lemure’s Scythe > Communio

That’s it! You made it to level 90. I hope this leveling guide helped you ease your way into playing Reaper. When you have a good grasp of your abilities, I recommend you head on over to the Reaper Basics guide located here to learn some more about how to more effectively play Reaper.

Single Target

• Maintain Death’s Design at all times using Shadow of Death.
• Gluttony on Cooldown
• Arcane Circle on Cooldown
• Plentiful Harvest when its ready after using Arcane Circle
• Spend Reavers on Gibbet or Gallows, whichever is buffed, when you have them.
• Always ensure that at least one charge of Soul Slice is on cooldown. Remember that it gives 50 soul so make sure you use at or below 50 Soul gauge.
• Enshroud when at 50 shroud gauge.
• • Your Enshroud rotation should look like this:
  • • Void Reaping → Cross Reaping → Lemure’s Slice → Void Reaping → Cross Reaping → Lemure’s Slice → Communio
    • The ability you start on doesn’t matter just make sure you alternate.
• Unveiled Action when at 50 or more Soul
• Harvest Moon if boss is about die, become untargetable or is out of range of a normal attack.
• Use Slice > Waxing Slice > Infernal Slice combo as filler

Multi-target [Three or more Targets]

• Maintain Death’s Design at all times using Whorl of Death.

• Gluttony on Cooldown

• Arcane Circle on Cooldown

• Plentiful Harvest when its ready after using Arcane Circle

• Spend Reavers on Guillotine when you have them.

• Always ensure that at least one charge of Soul Scythe is on cooldown. Remember that it gives 50 soul so make sure you use at or below 50 Soul gauge.

• Enshroud when at 50 shroud gauge.

  • Your Enshroud rotation should look like this:

    • Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Lemure’s Scythe > Grim Reaping > Grim Reaping > Lemure’s Scythe > Communio

• Grim Swathe when at 50 or more Soul

• Harvest Moon

• Use Spinning Scythe > Nightmare Scythe as filler.