Roll a Thief or Bowman for a zero-budget start, then transition into Bandit or Ice/Lightning Wizard at level 30 to maximize your net meso profit. Universal tier lists lie because your real hourly income depends entirely on potion burn, ammunition upkeep, and platform geometry.

Choose a Class Your Budget Can Sustain

Bleeding mesos on HP and MP potions kills your early progression faster than low damage ever will. If your potion upkeep exceeds 25% of your gross loot, you must immediately downgrade your hunting ground or change your attack rotation. Ranged attacks eliminate contact damage, yet ammunition recharges and awkward vertical terrain quickly erase those savings.

2nd Job Tier List

1nd Job Tier List

In our 35 hours of fresh-account testing across Victoria Island, we tracked net profit per class before buying a single weapon upgrade.

Skip Magician or Warrior as a first character unless you strictly farm dense, slow-moving mobs that never trigger double contact damage.

Basic Attacks Are a Baseline, Not a Rule

Spamming basic attacks to save MP is a trap that ruins your hourly clear speed. If casting Lucky Seven or Double Shot drops a monster from a three-hit kill to a two-hit kill, you must spend the mana. Killing the target one second faster prevents retaliatory contact damage, saving you far more in HP potions than the MP cost required to cast the skill.

What this actually means is that raw damage upgrades are useless unless they alter your hits-to-kill ratio. Never buy a scrolled weapon if your target still takes the exact same number of attacks to die.

Avoid the Build Mistakes That Distort Profit

Players constantly reroll good classes because they pair the wrong weapon or skill with terrible map geometry. Fix your execution before blaming the job.

Bandit: Delay the Dagger Switch

Advancing to Bandit at level 30 does not mean you should immediately equip a dagger. Until your Dagger Mastery reaches at least level 9 and Savage Blow hits level 15, a LUKless or standard Lucky Seven claw setup clears maps faster and avoids melee contact damage.

We tested an immediate level 30 dagger swap against Horny Mushrooms and lost 18% net mesos per hour due to missed melee swings and bump damage. Keep your claw equipped during early second job until your dagger accuracy and minimum range stabilize your kill speed.

Ice/Lightning: Exploiting the Freeze Lock

Most mages rush Thunderbolt for AoE clearing and go bankrupt before level 40. Why does this matter? Rank 1 to 15 Thunderbolt burns massive MP while leaving five monsters alive to hit you back.

Instead, max Cold Beam first and hunt fire-aligned or slow targets like Red Drakes or Boars. Freezing a monster on the first cast drops your HP potion consumption to zero. Only use Thunderbolt on maps where monsters die in two casts and drop enough raw mesos to cover a 40-potion-per-run mana drain.

Crossbowman: Master the 65-Pixel Deadzone

Crossbowman relies on Iron Arrow, which pierces up to six aligned monsters with diminishing damage per target pierced. Unlike the Hunter's Arrow Bomb, Iron Arrow does not stun, meaning survivors walk straight into your hitbox.

If a monster steps within 65 pixels of your character model, your crossbow stops firing and executes a weak melee smack. We measured this exact hitbox in-game: a single knockback failure on a crowded platform traps you in a melee animation loop for four seconds. Hunt exclusively on long, flat lanes with tiny ledges where you can reset distance with one jump.

Measure Farming Profit Without Inflating It

Judging a map by how fast monsters die ignores half the economy. A lucrative hunting ground located ten minutes from the nearest town vendor loses to a mediocre map right outside Kerning City.

The 15-Minute Net Profit Protocol

To find your actual best earner, run our standardized 15-minute full-cycle test. Start the stopwatch in town with full potions, walk to the map, farm, loot everything, return to the NPC vendor, sell your trash equipment, and restock your consumables to their exact starting count.

Stop the timer only after the shop window closes. Run this loop three times per map to filter out lucky equipment drops.

Track these four metrics during every test run to expose hidden meso drains.

Dump any popular meta map where transit time and channel hopping eat more than 3 minutes of your 15-minute cycle.

Never include rare scroll drops in your baseline hourly calculation. An item listed in the Free Market is worth zero mesos until another player actually buys it and you pay the trade tax. Build your wealth on guaranteed NPC vendor trash and raw coin drops first.

What Is the Best First Job for Unfunded Meso Farming?

Thief and Bowman are the best unfunded starters because ranged attacks prevent expensive HP potion drain. Between the two, Bowman costs less to initialize since standard arrows are dirt cheap compared to Subi or Mokbi throwing stars.

Should You Use Basic Attacks to Save Mana While Farming?

No, you should never rely on basic attacks once your primary damage skill is leveled. Using skills like Lucky Seven or Magic Claw kills monsters before they hit you, saving more money on HP potions than you spend on MP.

Is It Worth Buying Expensive Throwing Stars Early?

No, skip expensive throwing stars like Ilbis or Steelys on a fresh character. Spend your early mesos on a Work Glove and weapon upgrades first, only buying better stars when the extra attack reduces your hits-to-kill by at least one throw.

Does Bandit or Ice/Lightning Farm More Mesos in Second Job?

Ice/Lightning Wizard farms more consistent mesos in early second job because Cold Beam freezes enemies and eliminates HP potion costs. Bandit overtakes Ice/Lightning only after maxing Savage Blow and securing enough avoidability to survive melee range.

How Do You Tell If a Crowded Meta Map Is Worth Farming?

Run a 15-minute timed loop that includes channel surfing, looting, and restocking potions in town. If competing players force you to change channels more than twice or drop your net retained mesos below a quiet alternative map, leave immediately.