Ten Ton Hammer - Taking MMO Gamers to the Next Level!

The Passive tab may not be one you'll need to check on a regular basis, but it is important to know you have it. When you use the opportunity to gain some skills in the future, this is the tab all the ones skills not in your Active tab go to restare found. Unlike the Active, Emotes, and Actions tab, none of the skills here can be moved to a hotbar. Like the name of the tab implies, all of the skills listed there are passive so they're always active. You don't have to do anything with them except be aware where they are.

The final tab, and the one that will occupy the majority of your time in relation to the others, is the Active tab. This is where all of those skills you use to heal your friends and crush your enemies reside. Your available skills and chain skills can be found on this tab. When you click on the Active tab, a second window will open beside it with two more tabs of its own: Skill List and Chains. The Skill List tab is just another way to view your skills, but the Chains tab is another beast altogether.

Chain Skills 102

The Chains tab will display not only the chains you currently have, but chains that your current skills will allow you access to in the near future. The chain trees you'll see in the window are set up just like a tree of skills, but flowing from left to right, rather than straight down (or up, depending on the game). There are two possible arrow types showing the path between the various skills/reactions in each tree: solid and light grey. The solid arrow means that the next skill/reaction in the chain will always come up. The light grey arrow means the next step in the chain may or may not occur.

When it comes to both the number of chains and how deep down the rabbit hole they go, all classes are not created equally, so if you're really keen on having a large amount of possible chains, you'll need to investigate this tab for each class. For example, when a Spiritmaster is in their mid-teens, they have far fewer opportunities for chains compared to a Cleric. A Spiritmaster has two possibilities that will always occur since the arrows are solid. At that same level though, a Cleric has a possibility of four chains. Not only do they have more chains, but they're also deeper than those of the Spiritmaster. Deeper chains tend to mean bigger rewards at the end, so keep this in mind when choosing your class.

When a chain is triggered, players only have a few seconds to continue them. They can either click on the icon that will briefly appear on the screen, or click the same button that triggered the chain in the first place. If a Sorcerer cast Flame Arrow I, not only would an icon for Blaze appear on the screen, but the Flame Arrow I icon on the hotbar also turns into the Blaze icon. To the best of my knowledge, the only way to cast Flame Arrow I after triggering Blaze I is to wait for the chain skill to fade away and let the hotbar key revert back. As you progress through your adventures, you'll find there actually are times when you don't want to continue a chain. I haven't discovered a way to cancel them out yet.

Common among all the classes is the addition of certain effects or requirements within their chains. Using the Spiritmaster and Cleric example again, both have chains that end with an effect called Knock Down. Knock Down does just what it implies, knocking the target to the ground and freezing them in place for a few seconds like a Root spell. Unlike Other skills/effects in a chain, Knock Down occurs automatically. There's no need to hit any icon or key. Besides having a chain that ends with it, the Cleric also has a chain that starts with it as well. Classes with these types of abilities may appear to have chains of extraordinary lengths, but they are technically just combining two chains together. It doesn't make the "have nots" feel any better about it, but that's the way it is.


Is there anything you feel I've left out, or a trick with skills and chains I just don't know about? Post a message on our forums or send me an email!