RandomNPC – Video Game RPG Reviews, Editorials, and Features

As many players find out in their path through Glory of Heracles, which abilities a player decides to put on which character determines a great deal of their combat potential. This week, we’ll be taking a look at some of the more powerful Abilities, and some of the more basic and useful skill combinations.

First, a word about Abilities. Although each character gets a few Abilities from the various statues and altars players found during the course of their quest, the vast majority of Abilities will come from equipment. This is a bit of a double-edged sword. Although it means that most characters can learn most skills, since there is no mechanism for permanently learning an Ability, it’s not uncommon for characters to have to compromise their stats in service of holding on to a critical skill.

Perhaps the most critical offensive skills are those that grant extra turns or attacks. The best of these, Dispatch and Dual Strike, are especially useful given how many monsters are Undead, and thus have to be Overkilled to avoid having them rise from the grave at the end of the turn. Dispatch is the less useful of the two, since it only activates to finish off a weakened opponent, but both have their uses. Interestingly, Critical is also classified as an Ability, meaning it is affected by things that increase Ability activation rates. Dangerous doesn’t begin to cover it.

Defensively, the most basic of skills also tend to be the most useful. Defend and Shield, for example, can combine to reduce something like 90% of physical damage to a character, and both are available very early in the game. However, their magical equivalent, Mindshield, isn’t available until much later, and is nearly essential on all characters late in the game. Interestingly, there are a couple Abilities that will allow characters to completely avoid attacks, but the only one players are likely to see on a regular basis is Evade, which Leucos learns, and which forms the basis of her ability as a tank.

But the most important Abilities, regardless of offensive or defensive leaning, are those that cause other Abilities to activate more often. There are two of these, Peak and Pinnacle, and although Pinnacle is the more effective, there’s no rule saying you can’t use both at once. Peak and Pinnacle are more or less required abilities for certain character builds, but they find the most use on offensive characters, allowing hugely damaging moves like Dual Strike to activate at almost every opportunity, effectively doubling a character’s damage output with no real cost. Neither Peak nor Pinnacle is really all that common, unfortunately, so make use of them where you can.

As far as Abilities in general go, the fact that you can’t hang onto any single setup forever means that players need to be a bit flexible when it comes to what they want their characters to do. Keep an eye on how your skills interact, and don’t be afraid to take the time out to mess with your setups a little bit and you should do fine. Until next week, remember to shampoo the dog!