Eventually, the story opens up and you unlock more Eikon skills to use in combat. One thing I didn’t notice early on, that I have used to great effect now, is that you can actually mix and match the Eikon skills — you don’t have to keep a single Eikon exclusive to its own element.
To explain that a little better, let’s say you want to create a quick access setup for taking out multiple enemies with AOE damage. Scarlet Cyclone, one of the earlier skills you get as part of the Phoenix’s fire arsenal, is excellent for crowd control. But you can also pair that, on the same control wheel, with something like Ramuh’s Pile Drive. When both of these skills are used one right after the other you can take out huge swarms of enemies, especially when you’re fighting humans.
This may seem obvious to some but it’s still an excellent tip to keep in mind.
How to mix and match Eikon skills in Final Fantasy XVI
The steps are fairly simple, but make sure you’ve unlocked additional Eikons and their skills first. I won’t spoil the events, but those don’t become available until a bit later. If you don’t have anything else yet, just be a little patient.
Here’s how to mix and match your Eikon skills:
- Head to Gear & Eikons in the character menu.
- Go to the Eikon’s shortcut bar you want to customize — right now I have bars 1, 2, and 3, for example.
- Highlight the button/shortcut you want to change, either □ or ○ then press X to customize.
- Select the skill(s) you want to swap from the list.
Bear in mind, however, that the Phoenix icon can only have its fire skills equipped. If you want to mix and match you’ll have to use one of the other Eikons.
The good news is that you can adjust the Eikon order in your lineup by simply pressing □ at the Gear & Eikons menu. That allows you to swap your mixed skill set to the top of the order, which means you’ll have it equipped first in combat.
