Skills & builds

Your path across the Passive Atlas decides which weapons you can master. Your weapon decides which Codex of skills you can learn. By level 40 you have 8 skill picks to spend on learning skills or ranking them up, and you spam your attack skills through the Mouse1 chain (up to 8 slots).

◆1. Paths → weapons (3 on every path)

The owner's "INT+AGI" and "AGI+INT" requests are the same Atlas path (Storm), so they share one row (ADR-006). Suggested later builds (region 2, not in data yet): Hexbinder (bone bell, curses, INT), Sandseer (earth sigils, INT+STR), Dunestalker (javelins, AGI+STR).

Equipping requires (a) that weapon's Mastery node on the Atlas and (b) the item's stat requirement: pure 18 + 2.3 × ilvl (ilvl 40 → 110), hybrid 12 + 1.45 × ilvl in both stats (ilvl 40 → 70/70). Your origin gives the starter Mastery of one of its pole's weapons (Wayfarer: any hybrid weapon).

◆2. The Passive Atlas

• 247 nodes, 318 connections, six 60° sectors with three weapon lanes each: Iron at the top, then clockwise Jade, Lantern, Storm, Wind and Steel.
• Rings: Wayfarer hub → Crossroads (R110) → Caravan Ring with the 12 combo payoffs (R300) → pole starts / hybrid Crossings (R420) → Lane Ring (R570) → 18 lanes (diamond clusters, notables, Masteries) → Outer Road (R1040) → far clusters and 6 Keystones.
• 45 points at level 40 (39 from levels + 6 from story quests), 111 at level 100.
• Costs to reach a Mastery: own pure weapon 6 points, adjacent hybrid 8–10, far side 12–13. The Wayfarer is 9–10 from everything. Far-side weapons cost about twice the points (tested).
• Rules: only your start is free, other starts block, and every node connects back to your start. Removing a node also removes every node that depended on it (shown before you click). Respec is free until level 20, then 100 × level gold per node, in town.
• The Atlas page is a playground (ADR-023): framed node art, your origin's painting behind its start, the sector artwork moving with the tree, game popups on every node, undo/redo (Ctrl+Z / Ctrl+Y), share links and one-click example builds.

◆3. The Codex: 8 picks, ranks and facets

• A pick learns a skill (rank 1) or ranks a learned skill to 2 or 3.
• Ranks 2 and 3 each add +18% and a facet: choose 1 of 2 modifiers (e.g. Quarry Wheel rank 2: Grinding Wheel +2 spins or Wide Arc +1 m radius). Facets can be swapped at a trainer.
• Each weapon Codex has 7 skills unlocking at levels 1 / 3 / 6 / 10 / 15 / 20 / 27 with fixed roles: chain (spammable) · AoE · burst/control · mobility · stance/buff/aura · signature · finisher.
• Each pole has a 6-skill buff Codex, 3 self and 3 team buffs (below). Hybrids can use both of their poles' codices.
• So at 40 a pure build chooses 8 picks from 13 candidates, and a hybrid from 19. A typical result is 7 skills with 1 ranked up: attack skills in the Mouse1 chain, any skill or buff on Q E Z X C, extra buffs on quick slots.

◆Finishers (conditional ultimates)

Every codex ends in a finisher at level 27: the biggest single hit of the build (650–1,100%), a 18–24 s cooldown, and a condition on the target. Taking it costs a pick, so a finisher build has one skill fewer (ADR-015).

In the Mouse1 chain the finisher is checked before every step: if the condition is true and it is ready, it fires on that press; otherwise it is skipped and the chain continues. Pressed by hand without the condition, it shows "No opening" and does not go on cooldown. So a stun build (stun skills + a stun finisher) plays as: spam Mouse1 → a stun lands → the very next press is the finisher.

◆Self buffs vs team buffs

Every skill also carries scenario tags (farm, boss, party, duel, arena) shown on its card, and every build lists suggested swaps per scenario (e.g. duel: swap War Drum → Unbroken Will). Respec items make swapping cheap; the alpha grants 999 of them (ADR-016).

Codex planner — 8 picks by level 34

Warblade — Greatsword

RecommendedUndoClear8/8 picks

#1 · L1

Horizon Cleave

learn

#2 · L3

Crescent Wave

learn

#3 · L6

Sunfall Thrust

learn

#4 · L10

Iron Riposte

learn

#5 · L15

Blade Oath

learn

#6 · L20

Sunbreaker

learn

#7 · L27

Zenith Cut

learn

#8 · L34

War Drum

learn

Recommended plan loaded. Click skills to build your own.

Warblade Codex (Greatsword)

Horizon Cleave
L1 · attack · chain · r1Crescent Wave
L3 · attack · chain · r1Sunfall Thrust
L6 · mobility · r1Iron Riposte
L10 · attack · chain · r1Blade Oath
L15 · buff · r1Sunbreaker
L20 · attack · chain · r1Zenith Cut
L27 · attack · chain · r1

Iron Codex

Iron Banner
L10 · buffWar Drum
L10 · buff · r1Bastion Skin
L15 · buffRallying Roar
L15 · buffBloodrage
L20 · buffUnbroken Will
L20 · buff

MOUSE1 CHAIN — 8 SLOTS (attack skills only)

1

2

3

4

if

6

7

8

QUICK SKILL SLOTS — skills or buffs

Q

E

Z

X

C

Mouse1 runs slots 1→5 in order; a finisher (“if”) jumps in on the next press only while its condition holds.

Quick slots: —

SIGNATURE COMBO

Iron Riposte (stagger) → Sunfall Thrust (+knockback) → Crescent Wave → Sunbreaker (+60% vs staggered with High Noon).

Chain Horizon Cleave and Crescent Wave, parry big monster swings with Iron Riposte, finish with Sunbreaker.

◆4. The 18 builds

18 builds · 3 per path

Iron · STR3Steel · STR+AGI3Wind · AGI3Storm · AGI+INT3Lantern · INT3Jade · INT+STR3

Ravager

Greataxe · dps

Iron · STRmeleealpha

A berserker of the caravan wall who opens wounds and spins through crowds.

Signature: Earthsplitter · Finisher: Crimson Reckoning

Warblade

Greatsword · dps

Iron · STRmelee + wavesvertical-slice

A disciplined sun-sworn swordmaster: big readable swings, parries and sword waves.

Signature: Sunbreaker · Finisher: Zenith Cut

Earthshaker

Warhammer · dps

Iron · STRmeleealpha

Every swing is a landslide: stuns, fissures and leaps that crater the desert.

Signature: Mountain Fall · Finisher: Tolling Verdict

Every build page shows its 7 skills with timings, shapes, combos, facets, animation/VFX/SFX briefs, a recommended 8-pick plan, the Mouse1 chain list, quick slots and scenario swaps. Production order: vertical slice = Warblade, Windarcher, Pyromancer (one per pole) → alpha = the remaining pure builds → beta = the 9 hybrids.

◆5. Combos, states and payoffs

Combos come from states that one skill applies and another skill pays off:

Follow-ups: some skills turn their key into a second strike for 1.5–2.5 s (Rending Cleave → Rend Apart, Gale Step → Return Gale). Payoff rule: a hit cannot pay off a state it applies itself. All conditional bonuses share one 60% cap. Bosses take break pressure instead of hard control, and control-conditional payoffs give half value during a break.

◆6. Designing a new skill (recipe for agents)

1. Role slot. Pick which of the 7 codex roles it fills (or a pole buff, self or team). Don't add an 8th skill to a codex without an ADR.
2. Contract in skills.json: timing (windup/active/recovery), damage (% × hits, type, element), shape, impact, special, applies, payoff, cost, cooldownS, unlockLevel, scenarios, scope (buffs/auras), requires (finishers), 4 facets (2 per rank). chainable is true exactly for kind: attack.
3. Guardrails:

Belt movement gems are a separate contract (ADR-027): each consumes a positive mana cost, and a legal activation interrupts any own attack phase. Owner-suggested starting reuse is Cairn Vault jump 1 s, Reed Rush dash 0.3 s; these do not replace weapon attack cooldown guardrails or set all gems to the same delay. Author exact costs, travel, root exceptions and remaining gem cooldowns before implementation. Silk Roll is blue and retains its listed 0.25 s evasion window; tune immunity uptime separately. Its legacy green icon needs a blue art revision during production; classification/socket color is already blue in the wiki. Movement preparation.

4. Presentation briefs: presentation.anim (key poses + timing), vfx (layers, colours from the build palette), sfx (layers), hitReactionNote, deathStyle. These drive the production docs.
5. Icon: reuse a matching accepted icon, or set iconRequest. The art request is generated automatically.
6. Tests: run pnpm data:test. The suite checks unlock levels, facets, the chain flag, finisher conditions and damage, self/team counts, scenarios, briefs, icons and states.
7. Gate: the skill is shippable only after the skill production gate.