What are the three Sword Skill types in Echoes of Aincrad?

Every Sword Skill is tagged as a Sword Strike, a Severing Attack, or a Crush Attack. Sword Strikes are balanced hits with fast recovery that let you guard or dodge almost immediately. Severing Attacks are the part-breakers — they shear off horns, tails and armour pieces, and several of them carry invincibility frames, but they leave you exposed on the back end. Crush Attacks exist to shatter guards and build knockdown stacks that stun the target.

Should I equip one of each Sword Skill type?

For most weapons, yes. You can only hold three Sword Skills at a time, and a kit of one Sword Strike, one Severing Attack and one Crush Attack answers essentially every situation the game presents — crowds, breakable parts and shielded enemies. The exceptions are the Rapier and Dagger, whose early skill lists are almost entirely Severing, so they cover guards through Break-heavy skills unlocked later instead.

What is the difference between a Severing Attack and a Crush Attack?

A Severing Attack cuts — it targets destructible body parts and works like a charged heavy attack, removing horns, plating and limbs. A Crush Attack impacts — it drains Break Markers and enemy guards and stacks knockdown until the target is stunned. Against a shield you want Crush; against a horned beast or a boss with a breakable part you want Severing.

Do Severing Attacks give invincibility frames?

Several do. Because Severing skills lock you into a scripted animation, a number of them carry i-frames during the active window, which makes them a legitimate way to move through a boss AoE while still dealing damage. This is not universal — the trade is that the recovery on the back end of a Severing skill is long, so a mistimed one is worse than a plain dodge.

How do I unlock more Sword Skills of a specific type?

You cannot pick. Skills unlock through Weapon EXP earned by defeating enemies with that weapon type, and each weapon has a fixed unlock order containing its own mix of the three damage types. Weapon EXP is tracked separately per weapon type, so switching mains restarts the list from zero. If your current weapon has no Crush option yet, keep levelling that type rather than hunting for a shop.

Which weapon has the best Sword Skill type coverage?

The One-Handed Sword. Its first three skills — Slanted Edge, Vertical Slash and Horizontal Slash — are a Crush, a Severing and a Sword Strike respectively, meaning a fresh sword user already has perfect type coverage in three slots. The Mace is close behind. The Rapier is the narrowest, with a starter list that is almost entirely Severing Attacks.

Combat Systems·Updated August 2026

Sword Skill Types Explained

Every Sword Skill in Aincrad carries a hidden tag that decides what it is actually good for. The game mentions it once in a prologue tooltip and never again. This guide covers the three types — Sword Strike, Severing Attack and Crush Attack — what each one answers, which types your weapon actually gets, and how to fill three slots so nothing in the castle counters you.

Echoes of Aincrad player executing a glowing Sword Skill against an enemy — Three Types, Three Slots
You can hold three Sword Skills at once. Which three types you pick matters more than which numbers are highest.

The Three Damage Types

Sword Skills are not just scaled versions of each other. Each one is classified as a Sword Strike, a Severing Attack or a Crush Attack, and that tag decides whether the skill is absorbed, whether it removes a body part, and how exposed you are when it ends.

Sword Strike

Balanced damage & control

The safe, all-purpose type. Sword Strike skills deal balanced damage and — crucially — let you raise your guard or dodge almost immediately after the animation. Most of the game's wide arcs, shockwaves and launcher moves live here, which makes this the type you reach for when you are surrounded rather than duelling.

Fast recovery, crowd coverage, safest to throw blind

Severing Attack

Part-breaking & i-frames

The cutting type. Severing skills behave like your weapon's charged heavy attack: they shear destructible parts off targets — horns, tails, plating — and several of them carry invincibility frames during the active window, letting you dance through a boss AoE while dealing damage. The cost is the worst recovery of the three types.

Highest raw numbers, breaks body parts, punishing whiff

Crush Attack

Guard breaking & stun

The impact type. Crush skills tear through shields and raised guards and stack knockdown damage until the enemy is stunned outright. Against an intact Break Marker these are worth more than any amount of light-attack pressure — this is the type that turns a damage sponge back into a normal enemy.

Shatters guards, builds stun stacks, opens the real damage window

Crush Attacks also exist as a normal action — holding the heavy attack input produces one without spending SP. See the guard break guide for how the Break Gauge itself works.

Which Type Answers Which Problem

The taxonomy only matters because Aincrad puts specific defensive layers in front of you. Match the type to the layer and fights collapse; mismatch it and the same enemy feels like a damage sponge.

Situation	Best Type	Why
Shielded kobold or armoured elite	Crush Attack	Frontal light and Severing damage is absorbed by the Break Marker. Crush drains it directly, and one strong crush skill can delete a hand-held buckler outright.
Horned or plated beast	Severing Attack	The horn or plate is a destructible part, not a guard. Severing damage is the tool that shears it away and permanently removes that attack from the enemy's kit.
Three or more enemies at once	Sword Strike	Wide arcs, shockwaves and launchers are concentrated in the Sword Strike list, and the fast recovery means you can guard the second enemy's swing instead of eating it.
Boss telegraphing a wide AoE	Severing Attack	The i-frames on several Severing skills let you pass through the attack while contributing damage. Just make sure the recovery lands after the AoE ends, not into the follow-up.
Enemy already staggered	Highest ATK multiplier you own	Damage reduction is gone during a stagger, so type stops mattering and raw multipliers take over. This is where a Cascade or Volcano Slam earns its slot.
Low stamina, need breathing room	Sword Strike	Sword Skills spend SP rather than stamina, and the Sword Strike recovery is short enough to guard out of. It is the only type you can safely throw with an empty stamina bar.

Starter Skill Types by Weapon

You cannot choose which types you unlock — Weapon EXP unlocks skills in a fixed order per weapon type. Here is the first three skills each weapon hands you, tagged by damage type, so you know what your kit is missing before a boss teaches you the hard way.

One-Handed Sword

Complete

Skill	Type	Damage	Motion
Slanted Edge	Crush	160 (+200% ATK)	Diagonal downward swing
Vertical Slash	Severing	180 (+200% ATK)	Straight overhead cut
Horizontal Slash	Sword Strike	120 (+250% ATK)	Sweeping crowd arc

The only weapon whose first three skills are one of each type. A brand-new sword user already has perfect coverage without a single extra unlock.

Mace

Complete

Skill	Type	Damage	Motion
Clashbang	Crush	90 (+250% ATK)	Gap-closing thrust
Beatdown	Sword Strike	(+270% ATK)	Diving overhead swing
Bull Rush	Severing ×2	60 slam → 30 + 140 (+250%)	Body slam into two cuts

All three types plus the best innate Break output in the game. Bull Rush counts as two Severing hits, so it strips parts unusually fast for a blunt weapon.

Two-Handed Axe

No Severing

Skill	Type	Damage	Motion
Fierce Shock	Sword Strike	200 (+200% ATK)	Ground-slam wave
Roaring Jolt	Crush	120 (+250% ATK)	Piercing lunge
Volcano Slam	Sword Strike	400 (+270% ATK)	Launching upward wave

Enormous Sword Strike numbers and a genuine Crush option, but nothing that severs parts early. Pair with charged heavy attacks for anything with a horn.

Two-Handed Sword

No Crush

Skill	Type	Damage	Motion
Swordfall	Severing ×2	80 + 120 (+150% ATK)	X-shaped double cut
Brave Leap	Sword Strike ×3	80 + 80 + 120 shockwave	Launcher into slam
Cascade	Severing	270 → 710 held (+200% ATK)	Chargeable vertical

Cascade held to full is the single biggest starter-skill number in the game. Guard breaking falls to your held heavy attack until a Crush skill unlocks.

Dagger

Severing-heavy

Skill	Type	Damage	Motion
Flick and Twist	Severing	130 (+200% ATK)	Retreating cut
Single Stab	Sword Strike	130 (+200% ATK)	Thrown knife, ranged
Rapid Bite	Severing	140 (+250% ATK)	Teleport behind, cut

No early Crush option at all — the dagger's answer to shields is Fulmination, unlocked further into the proficiency list. Until then, route around guards instead of through them.

Rapier

Severing only

Skill	Type	Damage	Motion
Linear Strike	Severing	120 (+200% ATK)	Backstep into thrust
Lateral Lunge	Severing	190 (+250% ATK), 55 SP	Counter stance, repels head-on hits
Pyre Dance	Severing	110 (+200% ATK)	Lunge with backstep exit

The narrowest starter kit in the game — three Severing skills and nothing else. The rapier compensates with the parry game, not with type coverage.

Damage values are the launch-build numbers for each weapon's first three unlocks. Later skills extend the list and often fill the missing type — see the full Sword Skills guide for unlock pacing and SP costs.

Four Three-Slot Loadouts

Three slots, and skill layouts save per weapon — so you can keep one configuration and swap it at the inn when the content changes. These four cover almost everything the launch floors throw at you.

Boss Duel

Crush · Severing · Sword Strike

The default. Crush opens the Break Marker, Severing removes the breakable part behind it, and the Sword Strike is your safe filler while stamina recovers. Works on every single-target fight in the game and is the kit to bring to Asterius the Taurus King.

Mob Clear

Sword Strike ×2 · Severing

For dungeon corridors and open-field packs. Two Sword Strikes mean you always have a wide arc off cooldown and can guard out of both. Keep one Severing purely for the elite that inevitably walks into the pack.

Break Specialist

Crush ×2 · Severing

Mace and Two-Handed Axe builds that treat the Break Gauge as the real health bar. Stack knockdown until the enemy is stunned, then cash the whole stagger window in with the Severing skill.

Death Game Safety

Sword Strike ×2 · Crush

Permadeath runs want recovery frames, not damage ceilings. Sword Strikes let you guard immediately after the animation; the Crush handles shields without asking you to commit to a Severing whiff you cannot survive.

Rules the Game Never Tells You

Five behaviours that sit underneath the type system and change how you should slot skills.

◆Skills cost SP, not stamina. Normal attacks, dodges and guards drain stamina; Sword Skills spend SP, and SP refills by landing normal hits. That is why a defensive playstyle starves your skill economy — you have to press to afford the payoff.
◆Layouts save per weapon. Each weapon type remembers its own three-slot configuration, so you never have to rebuild a kit after swapping. Weapons themselves can only be changed at an inn.
◆Proficiency starts after the prologue. Weapon EXP does not begin accruing during the scripted intro, so the prologue is a free trial period — sample all six types there, then commit.
◆Type does not override the Break Marker. A Severing skill thrown into an intact guard is absorbed exactly like a light attack. Order matters: Crush the layer, then sever what is underneath.
◆Focus status accelerates everything. When the faint blue glow appears at the screen edges, both stamina and SP costs drop — chain your expensive Severing and Crush skills inside that window rather than spreading them out.

Six Loadout Mistakes

The type system is invisible on the loadout screen unless you read every tooltip, which is exactly why these repeat across every difficulty.

Mistake	Why It Happens	Fix
Equipping three skills of the same type	Most weapons hand you a same-type starter list, and it is easy to just take the top three unlocks	Read the type tag on every skill before slotting it. Rapier and Dagger users especially need to check what they are missing.
Throwing Severing skills into a raised guard	Severing damage is absorbed by an intact Break Marker just like light attacks	Break first with a Crush skill or held heavy attack, then sever the part underneath.
Using a Severing skill as a panic button	The recovery is the longest of the three types — a whiffed one is worse than doing nothing	Save Severing for openings you created. Use a Sword Strike when you need to attack but are unsure.
Assuming the i-frames cover the whole animation	Invincibility only covers the active window, not the recovery tail	Time the skill so the AoE lands in the middle of the animation, not at the end of it.
Switching main weapons to chase a skill type	Weapon EXP is per type — a new weapon starts with an empty skill list	Stick with your main and unlock deeper. Missing coverage is a temporary problem; a reset proficiency bar is not.
Ignoring skill types on the loadout screen entirely	The game never explains the taxonomy after the prologue tooltip	Treat the three types as a rock-paper-scissors layer sitting on top of raw damage numbers — it decides more fights than ATK does.

Build Around Your Skill Types

Weapon choice decides which types you get, EX-Mods decide how often you can afford them, and stats decide how hard they land.

Sword Skills Guide →Guard Break Guide →EX-Mods Guide →

Frequently Asked Questions

What are the three Sword Skill types?

Sword Strike, Severing Attack and Crush Attack. Sword Strikes are balanced hits with fast recovery that let you guard or dodge almost immediately. Severing Attacks shear off destructible body parts and several carry invincibility frames. Crush Attacks shatter guards and stack knockdown until the target is stunned.

Should I equip one of each type?

For most weapons, yes — three slots covering all three types answers crowds, breakable parts and shielded enemies. The Rapier and Dagger are exceptions: their early lists are almost entirely Severing, so they solve guards with later unlocks such as the dagger's Fulmination instead.

Severing or Crush against a shield?

Crush. Severing cuts parts off, but an intact Break Marker absorbs it the same way it absorbs light attacks. Break the guard with Crush damage first, then use Severing on the horn, plate or limb behind it.

Do Severing Attacks really give i-frames?

Several do, during the active window only. That makes them a real option for passing through a boss AoE while dealing damage — but the recovery tail is not protected, so time the skill to finish after the attack ends rather than into the follow-up.

Can I choose which type unlocks next?

No. Skills unlock in a fixed order per weapon type as you earn Weapon EXP by defeating enemies with that weapon. There is no skill shop and no points to spend, so missing coverage is solved by levelling your current weapon deeper, not by switching.

Which weapon has the best type coverage?

The One-Handed Sword — Slanted Edge (Crush), Vertical Slash (Severing) and Horizontal Slash (Sword Strike) give perfect coverage from the first three unlocks. The Mace is close behind. The Rapier is the narrowest, with three Severing skills and nothing else.

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