If you’ve spent hours trekking across The First Descendant’s massive open zones, tripping over boss AoE attacks, or missing jumps to hidden collectibles, you’ve probably wondered about better movement options. I spent three days wandering every outpost and grinding random quests before I figured out where to get mid air maneuvering the first descendant, and I’m still mad no clear guide existed to save me the time. This post breaks down every step you need to unlock the skill, avoid common mistakes, and use it to make your gameplay way smoother, no guesswork required.
Where to Get Mid Air Maneuvering in The First Descendant: Exact Unlock Steps
Mid Air Maneuvering isn’t a default skill or a rank-up unlock, so don’t waste time grinding character levels waiting for it to pop up in your skill tree. It’s tied to a specific hidden side quest that only becomes available once you hit a few key progression milestones. First, you need to unlock the Vespers region and Crossroads outpost by completing the first three chapters of the main story. If you’re still stuck in the starting Grassland zone, you won’t be able to access the quest giver at all.
You also need to reach player rank 12 before the quest appears. I hit rank 11 and hung around the Crossroads outpost for two hours checking every NPC, and nothing popped up until I ran a few quick supply runs to hit the next rank. Once you meet those requirements, look for NPC Rian near the outpost’s hangar; she’ll have a blue side quest marked “Wings of the Wasteland” available. The quest has three straightforward steps, but most players get stuck on the first one if they don’t know where to look:
- Collect 12 Scrap Aerofoil parts from defeated Flyer-type enemies in the Red Sands subzone of Vespers
- Deliver the parts to Rian at Crossroads outpost, along with 5,000 standard in-game credits
- Complete a 90-second timed traversal challenge across Vespers Canyon using a test version of the maneuvering module
Don’t waste time grinding Flyer enemies in other zones, I made that mistake first. Only the Red Sands Flyers drop the required Aerofoil parts, and you’ll usually get 2-3 per kill, so it only takes 10-15 minutes of grinding to get all 12 if you stick to the right area. For the timed challenge, ignore the ground path entirely – stick to the floating checkpoints and use the test module’s air dashes to zip between them, and you’ll finish with 20+ seconds left easily.
How Mid Air Maneuvering Improves Your TFD Gameplay
This skill isn’t just for casual players who hate walking everywhere – it’s a game-changer for every playstyle, from open-world collectible hunters to high-difficulty raid players. At its core, it lets you dash, adjust direction, and gain extra height mid-jump, so you can traverse gaps you’d never clear with a standard jump, and cut your travel time across large zones by 60% at least. I used to spend 10 minutes running from the Crossroads outpost to the Red Sands boss arena; now I get there in 3 minutes flat.
It’s also an incredibly powerful combat tool. Most endgame bosses have wide, one-shot ground AoE attacks that are almost impossible to dodge if you’re stuck on the floor. With Mid Air Maneuvering, you can pop into the air the second you see the attack warning, reposition behind the boss’s weak point, and keep dealing damage while other players are scrambling to get out of the way. Mid Air Maneuvering has a 3-second cooldown when used consecutively, so you can chain up to two dashes in a row before you have to touch the ground to reset it.
This skill stacks with any character’s jump boost passives, so if you main a high-mobility character like Bunny or Viessa, you can practically stay airborne indefinitely. I main Bunny, and once I upgraded the skill a bit, I could clear entire traversal puzzles without ever touching the ground, and even skip entire sections of dungeon runs to get to boss fights faster. It also makes rescuing downed teammates in multiplayer way easier, since you can dash over hazards that would normally kill you if you tried to run through them.
Common Mistakes to Avoid When Unlocking Mid Air Maneuvering
Even with a clear guide, a lot of players run into avoidable hiccups when trying to unlock this skill, and I made almost all of them myself so you don’t have to. The first big mistake is assuming you can buy the skill or its parts from the in-game player market. I saw people listing “Aerofoil Parts” for 10,000 credits each when I first started looking, and I almost bought two before I realized they were just common crafting materials that don’t count for the quest.
If you accidentally abandon the Wings of the Wasteland quest, you don’t have to restart your entire playthrough or grind for hours to get it back. Just head back to Rian at the Crossroads outpost, and she’ll give it to you again immediately, no hoops to jump through. A lot of players I’ve talked to thought they’d locked themselves out of the skill forever when they accidentally clicked abandon, and that’s just not the case.
Another common mistake is trying to complete the timed challenge on foot. The test module you get for the challenge has unlimited dashes, so there’s no reason to ever touch the ground. If you try to run the ground path, you’ll miss the 90-second timer by at least 30 seconds, no matter how fast you run. So just focus on hitting the floating checkpoints, and you’ll be fine. The last mistake is putting off unlocking this skill – even if you don’t think you need it right now, it’ll make every part of the game easier, so it’s worth prioritizing as soon as you hit rank 12.
Pro Tips to Master Mid Air Maneuvering After Unlock
Unlocking the skill is just the first step – there are a ton of little tricks you can use to get way more value out of it than just basic movement. First, rebind the activation key from the default left shift to a mouse side button if you play on PC, or a rear paddle if you play on console. Having it on a separate button that you don’t use for other actions means you can activate it mid-fight without fumbling with your keyboard or controller.
You can also upgrade the skill up to level 5 using Aerofoil Upgrade Modules that drop from high-difficulty Vespers region missions. Each upgrade cuts the cooldown by 0.3 seconds, and at level 5, you unlock a third consecutive dash. The upgraded version of Mid Air Maneuvering also grants 10% damage resistance while airborne, which is a huge buff for endgame content where even small hits can take off half your health bar.
One of the most useful little tricks I’ve found is that you can use the skill to cancel reload animations. If you activate the dash right as your character starts reloading, the reload will finish instantly, and you can go right back to shooting. You can cancel the animation of every weapon reload with this trick, and I tested it on 12 different weapons – it works on all of them, and it boosts your overall DPS by roughly 15% if you use it consistently. That’s a bigger damage buff than most rarity 5 weapon mods give you, so it’s well worth practicing.
Now that you know where to get mid air maneuvering the first descendant, you can skip the days of aimless grinding and confusing quest hunting that I went through. This is easily one of the most impactful quality of life upgrades in the entire game, and it works for every playstyle, whether you’re just here to explore the map and collect cosmetics, or you’re grinding the hardest raids for top-tier loot. If you’ve found any other tricks for using this skill, feel free to drop them in the comments below to help other players out.