Now that Ive put more time into it, Im really getting into it. I have finally figured out how to use abilities. As I mentioned, it is a complex process, and the instruction manual tells very little. However, after reading up on discussion boards and experimenting, I figured it out for the most part, at the most basic level.
Each character in the game is assigned three “aspects”. These aspects are also called skill trees, as each one contains five individual combart arts (special moves/magic) that can be learned. Thus, each character can learn up to fifteen moves. So when you level up, you get the opportunity to assign points to the aspect itself, which makes all corresponding combat arts stronger (more damage, shorter regen time, etc.)
I’ll use my Shadow Warrior (undead warrior) as an example. He has three aspects- Death Warrior, Malevolent Champion, and Astral Lord. Death Warrior combat arts are all about doing massive close-range combat damage. Malevolent Champion skills are close-range combat moves that are not as massive, but quick. The Astral Lord combat arts are all the cool undead skills such as summoning skeleton helpers and arrow-firing towers.
Each character can learn up to ten skills, which are additional “areas of proficiency.” The character’s three aspects can be in there, as well as stuff like “sword use”, ” bow use”, “mount riding”, and “blacksmithing.” All of these skills raise the characters ability to perform well in these activities. So when my character levels up, I can use my skill points to upgrade any of my three aspects, which in turn strengthens the five corresponding combat arts.
Now to learn each individual combat art requires you to find the rune of that skill during combat, and then use it. The good thing is that these runes are easy to come by, as once I figured all this out, I had at least two of each in my inventory. Enemies drop these runes like crazy. So you figure out what combat art you want to learn, then see if you have the rune. If you do, then you use it, and blam…you can now use that combat art.
Now heres the interesting thing. There is no sense of mana/magicka/mp in the game…each aspect has its own separate recharge rate. So if I was to use a combat art from Astral Lord, I would have to wait until Astral Lord was fully recharged to use another Astral Lord skill. In the meanwhile, I could still use combat arts from Death Warrior or Malevolent Champion, so long as they were recharged. In this respect, it is recommended that you dont waste runes and such leveling up all the skills, but stick to a base two or three in each set (I’ll explain another reason why later in the post).
Heres one of the coolest aspects of combat arts…not only do you level them up with more runes, but you can also modify them. Let me give you an example. Under Astral Lord, there is a combat art called Nether Allegiance. This combat art summons two skeletons to fight with you in battle until they are defeated or you send them back. There are three modification categories for each combat art, and each category has two abilities, and you choose one. So with Nether Allegiance, the first option was either “skeletons do more damage” or “summon one additional skeleton.” I chose the latter, so when I use that skill now, three skeletons show up instead of two. Then when I unlocked the second modification, the two options were “skeletons have better shields” or “summon yet another skeleton.” I thought three was enough, so I decided to make them tougher by giving them better shields. There are other examples also, as Ive seen that the fireball the Inquisitor (Wizard) casts can be modified to either be one huge fireball, or a series of smaller fireballs. This was a very interesting aspect of the game. So you assign points to aspects to make all the corresponding combat arts stronger, and use runes to learn and strengthen individual combat arts. Occasionally, you unlock the ability to modify these combat arts to really alter them and make them better. Also, there is a way to create “combos” in which you can make up to four combinations of different skills, but I havent delved into that yet.
Heres the thing with runes…not only do you find them, but you can also buy/trade them from a rune master. So all the unused runes you have, and you will have a lot, you can trade to him/her for runes for combat arts you actually use. So if you only use two combat arts from Astral Lord, you would be able to trade the three other runes to this guy for one of the two you actually use.
As I said, its a complex system, and Im sure I didnt fully explain everything, but I think I did a pretty close job of nailing it on the head. As I said previously, its difficult to master, but once you have some idea of whats going on, you feel a lot better. I was so relieved when I got my level 11 Shadow Warrior to finally use his first skill.
UPDATE:
I recently wrote a character build guide for the Shadow Warrior and High Elf . I will be creating more character build guides in the near future for the other characters.
