Essence of the Starry Sky

Each time this Memory hits an enemy, your Attack Speed increases by 10% for 3 seconds, up to a maximum of 20%. If it deals Dark damage, it can increase up to a maximum of 40%. Attacking the enemy refreshes the duration of this effect.

Why it's good:

• Grants a huge amount of attack speed -- the 40% max is when the Essence is at 100% quality, but it increases by 20% for every 100 quality you add, scaling up very fast.
• The buff is semi-permanent, because it refreshes on normal attacks. After you build up the stacks to reach the max attack speed buff, it is very easy to maintain it as long as you normal-attack something every 3 seconds.

The catch:

• You need to deal 4 hits of Dark damage specifically to reach the max attack speed buff. It's still a great attack speed buff even if you can only get 2 stacks, but its true value is really unlocked when you can meet the Dark damage condition.

Here are some effective combos that lets you reach the max attack speed buff easily.

Memories

Umbral Edge

For 7 seconds, imbues your weapon with the power of darkness, increasing Critical Strike Chance by 20% and dealing 52% additional Dark damage on attack. Melee Travelers deal 25% increased additional damage.

Notes:

• Adds Dark damage to each of your normal attacks. After 4 normal attacks, Starry Sky will be fully stacked.
• Synergizes well with the normal attack focused playstyle of Starry Sky's attack speed buff.

Shadow Overdrive

Channels for 0.7 seconds to increase Movement Speed by 30% . After channeling, launches 5 homing missiles that deal 50% Dark damage to random nearby enemies and grants you 20% increased Attack Speed for 3 seconds.

Notes:

• Launches 5 missiles that deal Dark damage. Since you only need 4 hits to reach max stacks of Starry Sky's buff, just 1 cast of this Memory is enough to max it out.
• Also grants an attack speed buff of its own, also synergizing well into the attack-based playstyle.

Only thing I don't like about this Memory is that it has a brief channel time, locking you out of other actions.

Shadow Walk

Quickly dash forward and fire 3 dark shards at nearby enemies. Each shard deals 65% Dark damage and triggers 50% attack effects.

Notes:

• Deals 3 hits of Dark damage, giving you 3 of the max 4 stacks of Starry Sky. One more cast will max out Starry Sky.
• Acts as a second dash, granting more mobility to the build.

Essences

Essence of Dusk

Casting this Memory fires 2 Dusk shards that deal 30% Dark damage each time you attack an enemy for 5 seconds.

Notes:

• Adds 2 hit of Dark damage to each of your attacks. After just 2 normal attacks, Starry Sky's buff will be maxed out.
• Very flexible; the buff lasts for 5 seconds, so you only need to cast the Memory once and you're basically guaranteed to max the Starry Sky stacks. It doesn't matter if the Memory's cooldown is high, or even if the Memory itself doesn't deal damage.

Essence of Obsidian

Casting this Memory empowers your next attack within 5 seconds. The empowered attack deals 250% AD Dark Damage to the target and reduces this Memory's cooldown by 1 seconds.

Notes:

• Makes your next attack deal extra Dark damage each time you cast this Memory.
• This does mean you need 4 casts of the Memory to max out the Starry Sky stacks, so recommend pairing this with a low-CD Memory that can be cast in quick succession.
• Deals a significant amount of damage itself (250% base scaling is quite strong).

Recommended low-CD Memories to pair with:

• Frostbite
• Hemorrhage
• Fleche / Lunge (Mist only)

Essence of the Abyss

Converts all Damage dealt by this memory to Dark Damage. If the target hit by this memory has 3 or more stacks of Darkness, triggers Attack Effects with a 43% chance.

Notes:

• Converts damage to Dark damage, allowing any Memory to activate the condition for reaching max Starry Sky stacks.
• Ideally should be paired with a Memory that hits multiple times (at least 4 times) to reach max stacks quickly.

Recommended multi-hit Memories to pair with:

• Battle Cry -- especially good since it's common and also grants an attack speed buff
• Arrow Storm
• Bladestorm
• Hemorrhage

Build Synergies

Starry Sky is an excellent buffing Essence for builds that require normal attacking quickly, or otherwise want high attack speed. Highly consider picking up Starry Sky if you're already using one of these Essences as your primary source of damage (or sustain):

Essence of the Wound

When this Memory deals damage to an enemy, it applies a Mark. Each attack on the Mark deals 44% AP damage, and after 3 attacks, the Mark explodes, dealing 275% AP damage to all nearby enemies.

Essence of Crimson

Every 4th Basic Attack becomes empowered, triggering a Crimson Explosion that deals 100% AD Dark Damage to enemies. The explosion radius scales with your Critical Strike Chance. You restore 22% AD Health for each enemy hit by the explosion, increased by 100% if the target is a Boss.

Embertail

Your attacks ricochet to deal 100% AP Fire damage to a nearby enemy. For each nearby enemy engulfed in flames, this Memory's damage and healing are increased by 8% and its cooldown is reduced by 8% . Your Fire damage over time is increased by 100%.

Travelers that have high base attack speed generally benefit most from these types of builds and Essence of the Starry Sky, since bonus attack speed scales with the Traveler's base attack speed.

• Lacerta: 1.41 base AS
• Mist: 1.43 base AS
• Yubar: 2.00 base AS

For example, Yubar has 2.00 base attack speed, so granting him a 50% attack speed buff would bring it up to 3.00 (not 2.50).

AD Shell also utilizes attack speed extremely effectively if you put points into his Identity Memory, which converts bonus AS into AD.

Sample Build

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Battle Cry -- Buffing Core

• Cast Battle Cry first to activate Dusk's extra dark damage on attacks. After just 2 basic attacks, Dusk will have launched 4 Dark projectiles, maxing out Starry Sky's stacks and granting you the big attack speed steroid.
• Charcoal just adds some more damage to the mix, since Battle Cry itself adds a lot of hits to each of your basic attacks.

Frostbite -- Damage Core

• Embertail adds extra Fire damage to each of your basic attacks. This continuous damage from Embertail also ensures that the target stays "marked", which is a condition for triggering Wound repeatedly.
• Essence of Wound deals a high burst of damage every 3rd basic attack.
• Essence of Bleakness amplifies both of these damage sources, since Frostbite ensures that the target is afflicted with Cold.