Correct use of aether?

This is one reason to exactly why I don't support Aether very much, especially on Defensive Arena Teams. I only use Aether if the unit comes with it.

You'd most likely have better results if you ran the special appropriate for your build. (That is unless Aether IS the appropriate special and no other special suits the build better.)

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In my perspective, though, Aether requires timing to get the most out of it (usually when the foe has full health or when it's enough HP to heal the unit back to 100% HP.) and is best suited for things like Tempest Trials/Chain Challenges and Reinforcement Maps; anything that's gonna keep the unit using it going for at least a little while.

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Skill-wise, anything that accelerates cooldown should help, like Breath Skills and Slaying Weapons. Another good two are Special Spiral and Wrath. And Pulse skills work nicely, too.

Dragons + breath. Definitely defensive by my view. That’s the way to go. But like Pacman says, I don’t use for Defense like you stated... takes too long to activate when exposed to player phase

Honestly, this is pretty true. My W!Lissa has Aether for sustain, and it works pretty well most of the time. However, sometimes a blue unit will just get destroyed by her first hit and have no health for her to feed off of; likewise, some red units will have super high defenses and negates her 47 attack stat, and she gets nothing from Aether. That's mostly why I have her paired with L!Tiki and they both have swap: W!Lissa murders most mages and blue/green units in sight with an Earth blessing/With Everyone!, and Tiki murders anything red and dragon. Tiki still doesn't have Aether yet, but I'm planning to since Moonbow works really well for her even with her -Atk.
A good attack stat for Aether is probably around the low 50's. Most units have their attack stat in that area anyways so it's perfect.

I've used Aether on my Soleil for about the entire time I've had her. Wrath and Heavy/Flashing Blade allows you to fire them off incredibly quick. Even with having high attack, if she does too much damage to one unit where they're in the single digits, I send her off to another. Wo Dao + Wrath makes any non-tank (Or most tanks that aren't blue) drop from full. It's excessive, but gets the job done.

Your mindset isn't right for aether.
Imagine sitting int he arena against something that your team isn't equipped to deal with after just one special. Thats where aether comes in, to keep your unit alive for as long as possible until a kill can happen. Aether is for long drawn out battles that aren't over in a couple turns.

Yeah, it's hard to visualize a situation like that if you've never experienced it, but aether is the single best skill in the game because it mostly negates the usefulness of a healer.in most game modes, for example, tempest trials, where staying alive is the most important thing.

Survival > Hitting more hardering hurr durr memebow fury

"I'm starting to think of it as a defensive skill."
We been knew/if u build a unit right thats not always the case.

Take this fir for example. Shed much rather have her prf weapon. But as a support unit she gets too many kills with it plus she needs the extra res to ploy as well as the bulk

My Sheena build can easily solo Kana's Infernal mode by herself and doesn't even need Aether honestly, without Aether she can end the battle with 42 hp out of 56, yah it's mainly help do to defensive tiles and Guard Axe but does she really need the Aether no, mainly just their for healing

I have only given 1 unit aether and that's my ayra,other then that the unit would have vto already have the skill in there kit for me tp use it.

I use it for her ep build with barrier blade to complete abysmal challenges etc.

My Sheena has Special Fighter with Quick Riposte seal, Sack o' Gifts, Distant Counter, and Aether. Her amazing mixed bulk keeps her alive easily especially with Aether and she can still kill enemies. Her first hit from retaliation won't do too much because of her middling Atk usually, but that's perfect because Aether will add more damage and heals for more because the enemy had more HP.

A friend of mine has a +10 unit (I think a S!Tiki?) who runs Slaying Axe, Steady Breath, and Special Spiral on quite the nice speed stat. She takes a single hit and heals up with an instant Aether, it's pretty impressive.

I have a +10 Sheena and it is GREAT on her for PVE. If you want to keep yourself alive in those abyssal maps you need it! The thing is, you also need distant counter and vengeful fighter, so it's a pretty expensive build.

There are other types of units who can use it very well. For example units with very high defense/low speed and who can run steady breath (no horses or fliers). For example Lukas and A!Tiki are great choices (don't forget the steady breath!)

For PVP in the past I would say it's meh... But nowadays I would say that it's actually the best special for your BONUS unit! My strategy is to buff him with everything there is out there (all the C/S slots in my other 3 units are planned to buff my bonus unit or debuff the enemies) and then the bonus unit can usually tank enemies of the opposite color. But he does need some healing in order to keep doing this 4 times, so I give him Renewal and aether (you need the arena score anyway, so it's either this or galeforece). It works just fine even without cooldown acceleration.

For arena defense... It sucks! Dunno why would anyone ever use this in arena defense. You need to kill 1 opponent ASAP, Aether doesn't help you do this, especially not when compared to a lot of other skills.

breath+special spiral+slaying weapon, makes aether pretty useful, because you will always proc it off a 100% HP enemy.
damagewise, it's basically luna. it has been become a defensive special in heroes, but originally, it was sol + luna seperated in 2 damage.
so if it works like in the original, the damage output of aether might be on par than ignis/glacies.