Field Guide

Skills are bought with Mastery Points on the Mastery page and learned WHOLE: one press buys the node at full effect. Every node in the game has its own section in this chapter, listing its effect, what it costs, what it needs first and what it locks out.

• The four battle pathways are MUTUALLY EXCLUSIVE: learning any node commits you to that pathway until you respec, which refunds every point.
• A full pathway costs exactly 75 Mastery Points including its APEX node.
• APEX+ is a free choose-one pair unlocked by the pathway's APEX plus character level 300. The Pinnacle pair beyond it needs the full Cross Mastery chain maxed and costs 100 points.
• The Combat Mastery tree is a SECOND tree on the same points, opened by holding any battle APEX — it is exempt from pathway exclusivity in both directions. AL Mastery is a THIRD.
• ACTIVE skills cast in combat under the casting rules; PASSIVE skills always apply.

Your FIRST mastery node decides your pathway, and the other three close. Nothing is lost for good — RESET MP refunds every point you have spent — but you cannot run two pathways at once, so pick the one whose plan you like rather than the one with the biggest number on it.

• Physical Pathway — The damage tree: Strength, Critical Hit and the biggest single hits in the game, ending in Execution.
• Defense Pathway — The survival tree: Defense that converts into attack through Jagged Spikes, shields, reflects, and Revenge.
• Magical Pathway — The Intelligence tree: Brains Over Brawn converts ALL Strength into Intelligence and every attack becomes Holy Smite at 100% Spell Power. Nothing outside this tree scales off Intelligence.
• Elusive Pathway — The Haste and Malice tree: dodges on top of Evasion, Poison Blade, turn theft through Skip!, and conversions that turn speed into Physical Attack.

None of the four is a trap and none is the obvious answer. Physical and Elusive kill things fastest, Defense survives longest, and Magical is the only tree that can heal a whole Dungeon party. Whichever you take, the Combat Mastery tree and AL Mastery are open to you afterwards on the same points.