Skills

Skills are the special moves a hero uses in battle: strikes, spells, heals, buffs, summons and ultimates. You choose which skills a hero carries and in what order; the hero then uses them on its own once the fight starts. Each class has its own skill kit, learned through the skill tree.

How skills work

Skill slots and loadout

A hero carries up to five skills at a time, one per skill slot. Any skill can go in any slot, with one limit: a hero can carry at most one ultimate. You change the loadout on the hero's skill screen in your keep, and in the preparation window before a delve. Swapping skills between slots is free.

Only learned skills can be slotted. A hero fights with basic attacks alone if no skill is slotted.

Skills in battle

You never aim a skill yourself. When a hero acts, it goes through its slots from slot 1 to slot 5 and casts the first skill that is ready, meaning it is off cooldown, its target is in range and the hero can pay its cost. If no skill is ready, the hero uses its basic attack instead. A skill that cannot be paid for is skipped without using up its cooldown, so the next slot gets a turn. Put your most important skill in slot 1.

Battles are fought on a hex grid, so ranges and areas are counted in hexes.

Resources: mana and stamina

Every hero has health plus one skill pool, decided by its class: martial classes spend stamina, casters and support classes spend mana. Warrior, Ranger, Rogue, Monk and Beastmaster use stamina; the other eleven classes use mana. A skill's cost is taken when the cast starts. Each time a hero acts it regains a share of its pool; Willpower speeds up mana recovery and Endurance speeds up stamina recovery. Intelligence lowers mana costs a little and Strength lowers stamina costs a little, so the costs on the class pages are the base values.

Cooldowns

After a skill is cast it cannot be used again until its cooldown, shown in seconds, has run out. Passive skills and auras have no cooldown.

Cast time and interrupts

Most skills land at once. Some, mostly the stronger spells and heals, have a cast time: the caster stands still while the cast builds, and the skill lands when it finishes. A cast can be broken before then by a stun or incapacitating effect, by a silence, or by a skill that interrupts, such as Palm Strike, Flying Kick, Disrupting Shot and Discordant Note. A broken cast is not refunded: the cost and the cooldown are already spent. Dexterity and Agility shorten cast times. While you watch a fight, a cast bar and a thin gold line from the caster to its target show a cast in progress.

Targeting

Skills come in a few shapes. Self skills affect the caster, or the ground around it. Ally skills pick the ally who needs them most (the lowest health percentage in reach). Enemy skills hit one enemy in range. Area skills hit every enemy in a cone, a line or a circle of hexes around the impact point.

Which enemy a hero goes for is the hero's target setting, chosen per hero: Closest (the default), Lowest health, Highest health, Weakest armor, Support first, Ranged first, Top damage, Farthest or Random.

Damage types

• Physical and Ranged damage is reduced by the target's armor.
• Magical damage is reduced by magic resistance and ignores armor, so a party needs some magic damage against heavily armored enemies.
• True damage is not reduced at all.

Many skills also leave an effect behind, such as a bleed, a slow, a stun or a shield. The skill's description says which.

Kinds of skills

Ultimates

An ultimate is a hero's strongest skill. It lives in the same five slots as every other skill, but a hero can carry only one. Ultimates are learned for a single skill point and have no ranks. The first one opens at hero level 12, once enough points are spent in its branch of the tree. Put the ultimate in slot 1 if you want it cast as soon as it is ready.

Learning and ranking skills

A hero earns one skill point per level and spends points in the skill tree. A point either learns a skill (rank 1) or raises a learned skill to a higher rank, up to rank 5. Higher tiers open as points are spent in the tiers below. Skills are learned for good; only retraining returns the points.

New heroes start as Recruits and cannot spend skill points yet; the points are banked until the hero completes class training in your keep (see Buildings). Which class a hero trains into decides which tree it gets.

Racial skills

Besides its class skills, every race grants two racial skills. They are covered on the race pages: see Races.

List of Skills

Every class skill in the game, in skill tree order. The cost shown is the base cost; "Unlocks at" gives the tier of the skill tree and the earliest hero level that tier can be open, or the level of an ultimate. Click a class tab, then a skill, for details.

See also

• Skill Tree
• Races
• Buildings