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Weapon Training
This is a skill that works only with 4 types of weapons, Axe, Club, Sword and Thrown types. This means that if you won't equip one of these 4 types, you will not get the buffs of the skill. Attack Speed is always useful to have and there are almost no cases where increasing Attack Speed would be a problem. Offensive Ability is always usefull if you play with melee weapons and want to attack your enemies and hit them. You could also play with melee weapons and just use them as stat sticks, meaning you wouldn't rely on weapon attacks to hit and kill enemies, you would only hold them to get the global stats that they provide. For new players, this is a must, try to max it out as soon as possible.
Dual Wield
It allows equipping 2 melee or 2 Thrown weapons! You can not combine one melee with one thrown weapon in this game, also you can not dual wield when you use a spear. It also has a dual wielding attack which uses your weapons one after the other to hit the enemies with and triggers randomly based on a chance which goes up to 22% at level 6/6. Usually it is a good idea to max out this skill in case you want to use it unless you want to use 2 weapons as stat sticks, which by the way is something that new players shouldn't try to do.
Hew
This is a powerful addon to dual wielding attacks and when it triggers it really deals a great amount of damage. Again, it triggers randomly based on a chance and at level 6/6 the chance will be 10%. The +50% Physical damage will not change but it doesn't really matter as it is powerful enough, especially if you use melee weapons that already deal a lot of physical damage. This skill does not work with thrown weapons, only with melee.
Cross Cut
This is one more attack that works only with melee weapons. The good thing is that this one hits up to 2 targets maximum and it applies Bleeding damage to them. This bleeding damage is not really an enemy killing effect but it's a secondary type of damage which can help a bit killing enemies faster especially if you base your build around Bleeding damage and increase the effect of this too. The animation of this skill is amazing, it looks great. Use it if your builds increases Bleeding damage by a lot or if you have points to spare, do not spend points here if you dual wield thrown weapons.
Tumult
Almost the same things that have been said about Cross Cut, can be said about this one too. The differences are that this one also stuns enemies, it hits up to 3 enemies and has a 360 arc of attack. This is a stationary attack that will hit enemies with both weapons and it will apply the effects, for example imagine having on one of your weapons some Energy leech over time and on the other some Life leech over time. You will apply both effects to your enemies and especially the Life leech will help very much to keep you alive and have an easier time. It is a good idea to max out all 4 dual wielding skills if you want to dual wield melee weapons but for using thrown weapons you should use and max out only the first skill of this tree.
Battle Rage
This skill triggers when you get hit by enemies and it provides some bonus physical damage and +33% Offensive ability. The only stat that goes up by leveling up the skill, is the physical damage. This is a flat number of damage which is added to your attacks that already deal their own damage so even if the number looks small, it really is not that small. The buff to Offensive ability can allow you to deal more critical hits with your melee attacks. Offensive ability increases the ability to hit enemies and if you have much more Offensive than the Defensive ability of enemies then you deal critical hits. So, in this case, the O.A. buff could increase your chance to critical hit enemies and of course kill them faster. For new players, i'd suggest to spend one point on this one in the beginning and come back much later after you have invested in more important skills.
Crushing Blow
This one will give more chances to your attacks under the effect of Battle Rage, to deal more physical damage which also can affect the damage of your critical hits. Battle Rage provides bonus damage which can not affect the damage of your critical hits, this one actually does affect those, so if you care about critical damage then you should max out this skill. Of course for the best results as a critical damage based build you should also max out Battle Rage and increase your Dexterity as much as possible.
Counter Attack
This is a passive skill that has no animation of your character attacking enemies, it triggers automatically on enemies which they receive this number of physical damage retaliation. Whenever you see in this game the wording "x Damage" it is always physical damage and when you see "x% Damage" it is all types of damage. This skill is not necessary to have but if you have points to spare then invest in it, the 15% chance to trigger is fixed and won't change by leveling up the skill.
Slam
This is one of the skills that come with Atlantis dlc, and it is a powerful one! We can see that it has multiple effects and the type of damage it deals is physical. The percent reduction to enemy's health is a stat that works on the current health of enemies, this means that if an enemy has 100 points health bar and he received damage and now it has 50 health, so half of his overall health, then if you attack with this stat it will not affect the 100 Health points, it will affect the current 50 points. This means that to get the most out of this stat you would need to hit enemies that have received no damage yet and have fully filled health bars. This happens because the more health they have, the more points you reduce, here is an example: 100 points on enemy, 20% Reduction to enemy's health = 100 - 20% = 80
50 points on enemy, 20% Reduction to enemy's health = 50 - 20% = 40
So, we can see that in the 100 totally filled health bar, the enemy lost 20 points whereas in the 2nd case of 50 points he lost, 10 points of health. This skill also provides other good stats that can help defeat enemies easier, especially the skill disruption is awesome as it can disrupt powerful skills of enemies and make battles easier for you. In general this is a very powerful skill and it has a good range of effect although its projectile travels in a straight line so it is a bit limiting.
Dodge Attack
This is pretty much self explanatory and it's a good idea to always max it out, unless you've got other sources of the same stat that have maxed it out and you don't need to invest points here. The cap of this stat is 80%.
Battle Standard
This is one of the most powerful skills in the whole game. It is great for all types of builds, solo builds, pet builds and in multiplayer because it affects pets and allies too! The % Damage Absorption is different from Armor Absorption and it protects against all main types of damage so in case your overall resistances/defenses are bad, this one can really do the trick and save your life. You also get +1 to all skills of all masteries which is fixed and will not change.
The flat number of damage is physical damage as we have said before and it will be added only to your weapon attacks, spells do not deal these flat numbers of damage. The great thing is that it will be added also to your staff attacks and to skills that use your weapons directly to attack with, such as Take Down, Onslaught e.t.c.
This is a skill you should always aim for unless you are an advanced player and know some cases where you wouldn't need it. As a beginner, it is one of the skills that should be a priority. Reach the skill, spend 4 points in Normal difficulty and later (in Epic difficulty) come back and max it out.
Triumph
With this addon, the base skill becomes even more powerful. This is a debuff to enemies that are inside the radius of effect of the skill and it reduces their physical damage and their resistances to physical and stun! You need to max out this addon no matter what but it's not necessary to max it out in Normal, spend 3 points only and in Epic difficulty max it out.
Onslaught
This is a skill that works as a default weapon attack and it's compatible with almost all types of weapons except staves. You assign it to your left or even right mouse buttons and use it all the time to attack with your weapons. Every time you attack you charge it up and increase the buff to physical damage. This is a buff that will increase your current physical damage, it is not a flat number so it will not be added to your attacks.
It can also increase the physical damage of your spells that do this type and of the pierce damage that comes as a result from the pierce ratio conversion on weapons that you may be using with this skill. For example, if you use a sword that has 10% pierce ratio, with Onslaught, the buff of this skill to physical will increase the resulting pierce damage that comes from the sword's pierce ratio conversion. It will not affect pierce damage of other sources like for example skills that deal pierce damage such as Blade Barrier e.t.c.
The skill also increases the projectile speed of your bows or throwing weapons which makes it a very good skill also for this type of items. If you don't have other skills that can work as default weapon attacks then use it, also use it even if you don't deal physical damage because you will still benefit from its addons, but in this case spend only a single point on Onslaught to be able to gain access to the other skills.
Ignore Pain
This addon will provide only physical and pierce resistances which you will most probably need, especially if you start a new character and don't have inherited items in your transfer stash. Both of these resistances are very important and you will need to max out the skill at some point of the game, it is not a bad idea to max it out when you gain access to it and then continue investing points elsewhere. Just remember that you get the full amount of this addon even if you hit one enemy only once, it doesn't rely to charges of attacks as the base skill does.
Hamstring
This addon is great especially if you want to deal the most possible physical and critical damage to enemies. The reduced armor stat reduces the armor of enemies so now they receive more physical damage and the reduced defensive ability increases your chances first to not miss the enemy with your attacks and then if you have great offensive ability, to deal more critical hits to them and kill them faster. Max out this skill as soon as possible only if you care so much about critical damage, otherwise spend a couple of points and come back to it later.
Ardor
This one will give you the very much needed attack speed and if you don't get enough from other sources, movement speed. If you want to play with Onslaught as a main skill for your build, you max out this skill as soon as possible, especially if you dual wield melee weapons. Dual wielding thrown weapons, reduces the max attacking speed to 141% so in case you have reached that point by using other sources and you don't need more movement speed, then do not spend points on this addon.
War Wind
This is a movement skill which means it uses its own movement speed buff to reach and attack the enemies. The great thing about it is that it has a full circle attack and hit multiple targets, up to 4 maximum. The minus to physical damage is a debuff to your characters damage when it uses the skill specifically but this is not really a problem since this attack hit multiple targets and it is still powerful enough. The skill starts at - 28% physical damage at level 1, at level 5/8 it removes the debuff to your damage and at maximum level 8/8 it provides 21% physical damage so if you max it out, it will become very strong.
The skill is useful even if you don't care about it because as a movement speed skill it can help you move faster in the maps by reaching your enemies faster so even spending a single point just for this cause, it's a good idea. Of course it works only with melee weapons even if you are dual wielding them.
Lacerate
This addon will add up to 3 targets maximum to the base skill which means you will now hit up to 7 targets which is a huge amount and it applies bleeding damage to all of them! Imagine applying at the same time Life leech over time to 7 targets, your build will gain great survivability this way. This bleeding damage number of course can be increased much more by investing to gear,skills and attribute points accordingly and it will also stack with other sources of flat bleeding damage that work with your weapon attacks.
For example, if you have a bracers item providing a flat number of Bleeding damage, that number gets applied by weapon attacks which means it can stack with the bleeding from this addon and now you will deal much more bleeding to enemies. This is a powerful mechanic that can greatly increase the value of War Wind skill with its addon. If you don't care about this bleeding damage buff, it's still a good idea to level up this addon to level 6/8 where you will unlock the 3 targets maximum and don't spend more points on it.
War Horn
All this skill does it to stun enemies which can be super useful especially when you don't have good defenses overall and it is easy for enemies to kill you.It is not really a mandatory to use skill, at least not for advanced players but for beginners it is a good idea to spend a single point when you unlock it and then come back to it later. Leveling up the skill increases energy cost, the meter radius and the duration of stun. It is not necessary to max it out but much later, you lose nothing if you do this, it is more important though to spend points to other skills first.
Doom Horn
This addon will reduce the armor of enemies and their health by a percentage. These 2 stats have no correlation to each other, one does not affect the other. We have talked about these 2 before in previous skills. This is a good addition to the base skill and it helps with the overall performance of the build. Just keep in mind that if you use this one and then use it again to the same enemy, the reduced armor will not stack, it will only reset the timer but this is still a good effect if you have great recharge reduction to skills to be able to cast War Horn very frequently. It's a good idea to spend at least one point to this one and later max it out.
Ancestral Horn
This is a pet skill and gets affected by items that provide bonus to all pets. It also gets affected by skills that benefit allies, such as Battle Standard and more. It summons 3 ghost warriors for some time that deal physical damage with melee attacks to enemies but if you take the skill at level 5/16 it will summon 4 warriors and at level 10/16 it will summon 5 which is the top the skill can get at even if you take it up to plus 4 levels, at 20/16.
The damage these warriors deal is not big and you will need to use some items or skills that benefit pets, for example since they deal physical damage, it would help greatly if you could equip jewels that provide bonus to all pets: physical damage. In that case and in combination with skills like Battle Standard or more, these warriors will be killing enemies on their own. The problem with the skill is that they last only 24 seconds and they have a very long recharge time. So, it would be better to use this skill, if you are making a pet build or if you have finished investing points to important skills of your build and you have points to spare.
Lasting Legacy
One more skill of Atlantis dlc. This one is epic because it adds extra life time to this pet and makes it much more viable for pet builds. Taking the skill to maximum level 6/6 it will add 21 seconds and taking it to plus 4 levels at 10/6 it will add 40 seconds! Now, the life time of these warriors is 64 seconds (24 seconds of the base skill + 40 seconds) and if you max out your recharge reduction to skills at 80%, you will be able to have these pets running with you all the time, you will only need to be summoning them every 64 seconds and they will be there for you 100% of playtime! If you want to take a look at such a build, take a look at my NECROMANCER build guide video in my YouTube channel, that build is truly EPIC!!!
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