Rift Slip

Rift Slip is one of Odin's Eikonic Abilities in Final Fantasy XVI that the player can assign to Clive's loadout. It is a quality of life ability that streamlines combat by canceling out other actions' animations to act faster and slowing time for everyone but Clive. It does not do damage, but has various offensive and defensive uses and might become one of the most used abilities in a player's loadout.
==Obtained==
Clive gains access to Odin's powers as part of the story, during "The Last King", usable in his loadout after the events at the top of Reverie. Rift Slip is then learned by spending 100 AP in the Abilities menu.
==Mechanics==
Clive can use Rift Slip in battle whenever it is equipped to his current loadout. He can have two Eikonic Abilities alongside his Eikonic Feat, which for the dark loadout is Arm of Darkness. 
Using Rift Slip outside of amid another action does nothing and wastes it, but using it during another action (any time the game does not respond to the player's inputs, such as in the middle of sword combo, lunge, Eikonic Ability or Feat, casting, stunlock, etc) immediately ends the action and gives player control while also slowing down time for everyone and every persistent effect but Clive himself and his cooldowns. This canceling of animations allows the player to chain abilities smoother, and also to escape a stunlock or to execute an opportune parry.
Using Rift Slip during an attack before it finishes dealing damage cuts the damage short, so timing is crucial: using it too early misses out on damage, but using it too late misses the slowing of time from animation cancelling.
E.g. after using Gigaflare, Clive usually takes a moment to gather his bearings during which he is unable to do anything. Using Rift Slip at the tail end of Gigaflare slows down time and allows Clive to immediately use another ability after. Though skipping the recovery animation that is only a couple seconds long may not seem like much at first, combined with the ensuing time slowdown that affects everything, including Clive's Limit Break drain or an enemy's stagger recovery, means that weaving Rift Slip into Clive's combos allows him to squeeze in more damage in-between an enemy's attacks and to extend stagger windows.
After being upgraded, Rift Slip can be better used to recover from an enemy's attack, immediately restoring Clive to battle readiness.
Rift Slip activates the battle technique, , when using an ability to attack an enemy, using Rift Slip during the animation, and then immediately following up with a different attack.
Rift Slip has a 15-second base cooldown before being able to be used again. When used during another ability's animation, cooldown is halved. Unusual among Clive's Eikonic Abilities, upgrading Rift Slip shortens cooldown further for intended use cases. 
AP cost 	Effect
100 (Base) 	Able to equip Rift Slip to Clive's dark loadout.
700 (Upgrade)	Immediately recover after taking damage, also halving cooldown when used for this purpose. Lengthens the time other action is slowed and further shortens cooldown when used amid executing another ability.
1000 (Master)	Able to equip Rift Slip to any loadout.
==Use==
Rift Slip is worth upgrading to improve and add new use cases for the ability, and is perhaps the one ability in Odin's loadout worth mastering to be able to equip to any loadout, as it is generally useful.
To practice using Rift Slip, the player can simply hit the attack button (), then use Rift Slip when Clive's sword strikes the enemy: time will slow down for the enemy while Clive can execute a sword combo at his normal speed.
Using Rift Slip to slow down time allows the player a moment to consider their next action, and makes parrying enemies' attacks easier. It allows Clive to chain skills with windups that tend to miss evasive enemies, such as Titan's Windup and Odin's ultimate ability, Dancing Steel: using Rift Slip at the end of the preceding action to slow down time, and then using the ability with windup during the slow motion to ensure it will hit.
If Clive is hit by an enemy's follow-up attack, Rift Slip allows him to escape a stunlock situation where he would otherwise be a sitting duck for an enemy's multi-hit barrage.
During a boss's stagger, Rift Slip enables Clive to get in more attacks before the stagger period ends by continually canceling other abilities' recovery animations and slowing down time, also slowing the pace the enemy recovers from stagger. Using it during other abilities' animations already halves cooldown, and using Eikons' ultimate abilities also momentarily halts all action but Clive's, including the enemy's stagger recovery, while Clive's abilities continue to cool down at normal pace. If the player also has Shiva, the player can do Rift Slip into Cold Snap to halt the stagger bar completely.
Rift Slip also has synergy with Ifrit's Will-o'-the-Wykes, as during the time freeze the wykes will expire slower whereas the ability will keep cooling down at normal pace.
Another way to cancel animation is by engaging Clive's Limit Break. Limit Break does not take an ability slot and is available as long as Clive has at least one bar charged, but Rift Slip is more versatile.
During the chronolith trial with the Odin's abilities, triggering three times by using Rift Slip to cancel recovery time from a previously landed attack and then immediately attacking earns an 8-second time bonus.
==Etymology==
The "rift" in the English name may refer to Interdimensional Rift, a recurring term for extra-dimensional spaces in the Final Fantasy series. An Interdimensional Rift also appears as a mini dungeon in Final Fantasy XVI at the end of Stonhyrr.
Category:Eikonic Abilities in Final Fantasy XVI