Shuriken

Shuriken is a stand-alone Psynergy aligned with the Jupiter element. It is one of two stand-alone abilities available to the Ninja Class series, the other being Annihilation.

Basic Characteristics
Shuriken is an offensive, ranged Psynergy that is Attack-dependent, meaning that characters with higher Attack will deal more damage with this Psynergy. In addition, the caster's Jupiter Power and the target's Defense and Jupiter Resistance will all factor into the damage dealt.

Visually, Shuriken features a group of large throwing stars appearing and flying from the user towards the targets.

Damage Calculation
Elemental physical attacks such as Shuriken use the damage dealt by the attacker's standard physical attack as the base damage to be later modified. The total amount of damage dealt by a normal physical attack is half the difference between the attacker's Attack statistic and the target's Defense statistic, as this equation shows:


 * base damage = (User's Attack - Enemy's Defense) / 2

Shuriken's attack takes this base damage value and uses it in the following equation:


 * final damage = ((base damage) * (1 + (User's Jupiter Power - Enemy's Jupiter Resistance) / 400)) * 0.8

To word this in prose, Shuriken takes the base damage of the user's normal physical attack, adds a set amount of bonus damage to that, and then this result is modified by how much higher or lower the user's Jupiter Power is than the target's Jupiter Resistance. The difference between the user's Jupiter Power and the target's Jupiter Resistance is divided by 400, then 1 is added to this, resulting in what can be called the "elemental damage multiplier". This number is what the Psynergies' damage is multiplied by.

For example, if an Adept with an Attack rating of 600 and a Jupiter Power of 150 casts Shuriken on a monster with a defense of 200 and a Jupiter  Resistance of 50:
 * damage = ((Attack- Defense) / 2) * (1 + (Power - Resistance) / 400) * 0.8
 * damage = ((600 - 200) / 2) * (1 + (150 - 50) / 400) * 0.8
 * damage = ( / 2) * (1 +  / 400) * 0.8
 * damage =  * (1 + ) * 0.8
 * damage = * ) * 0.8
 * damage = 200

Therefore, a Shuriken cast under these circumstances would deal 200 points of damage. Unlike most ranged Psynergies, Shuriken does not decrease in power as the distance from the targeted enemy increases. Instead, all targeted enemies are dealt the same damage, barring elemental differences.

Availability
Shuriken is unique to the Ninja class series. Thus, only Mercury Adepts are unable to access the series. Venus Adepts require Mars Djinn and Jupiter Djinn to access the series, while Mars Adepts require Venus Djinn and Jupiter Djinn. Meanwhile, Jupiter Adepts require large numbers of Venus and Mars Djinn to access the series. Shuriken is learned at Level 21.

Analysis
Shuriken is an unusual Psynergy. It is one of the few Attack-based Psynergies to have a damage multiplier that is less than 1. When fighting single opponents,it pales in comparison to Death Leap and Annihilation, in terms of potential damage. However, it is one of the only physical elemental attacks that affects multiple targets. Adding to its usefulness is that all targets are equally affected, unlike other ranged Psynergies. This makes it ideal for battles against multiple opponents, where it can soften up opponents before dealing a final blow.