15 Useful Tips And Tricks Assassin’s Creed Odyssey Doesn’t Tell You

Here’s a sentence you never thought you’d read or here ten year’s ago- Assassin’s Creed is a RPG. A full-fledged, full blown RPG. And you know what? It’s really, really good. Being a massive RPG set in an open world environment, though, means that more than any of its predecessors, Odyssey is absolutely brimming with content, and with lots of different systems, mechanics, and features. And though most of the larger features, the ones that are front and centre, are easy to grasp, the game doesn’t always tell you about some of the smaller ones, which can actually come in very handy and prove to be very useful at times. In this feature, we’re going to take a look at fifteen tips and tricks in Assassin’s Creed Odyssey that you should keep in mind as you start playing the game.

THE SPARTAN KICK IS INCREDIBLY USEFUL

The Spartan kick is one of the most useful and versatile moves you’ll find in the entire game. Several enemies down the line might be carrying shields, or might be a bit too quick, and using the Spartan kick on them stuns them for a couple of very useful seconds. In naval combat, when you’re boarding ships, kicking your enemies into the water is one of the easiest ways to dispatch them. Meanwhile, in stealth sections, if you find an enemy’s health or defence is too high to be assassinated in one hit and you find them standing at the edge of a cliff or a tall structure, you can always kick them off the edge and let gravity do its work.

INVEST IN CROWD CONTROL MOVES

Assassin’s Creed Odyssey’s combat can pretty tough at times, and it’s at its toughest when it throws large number of enemies at you. Thankfully, though, the game’s skill tree lets you invest in plenty of crowd control moves that can be very useful in such situations. From moves that stun enemies with a blinding flash of light to moves that let you bull rush at everything that lies in your path, there’s plenty of options, so invest in them wisely. Additionally, you should also unlock the charged heavy attack as soon as possible, because these attacks, when used with heavy weapons like axes, staves, and spears, are very effective in tight situations.

GET THE HEALING SKILL ASAP

Healing in Odyssey is no longer done by consuming potions or medicine. Instead, it too is a skill that you have to unlock manually. The game’s combat scenarios can be pretty hard at times, while status affecting moves by enemies can also drain your health pretty fast, so get that healing skill unlocked as quickly as possible.

GET THE SHIELD BREAK SKILL

As I mentioned, plenty of enemies in Odyssey will come at you with shields, and as the game progresses, that number will grow, and the shields will grow larger and sturdier, and can prove to be tricky to deal with in some of the more hectic battles. While using heavy attacks is an effective way to deal with shields, it’s mostly temporary, and these attacks take a couple of seconds to unleash. As such, once you’ve got the bare necessities (like healing) out of the way, you should think about unlocking the shield break skill at the earliest.

USE PARRIES AND PERFECT DODGES

Using skills and perfect dodges in combat is by no means necessary, but can be very useful. Parrying at the right time opens up two-three second window of opportunity where you can land a flurry of attacks, which can be particularly useful against tougher enemies (or larger groups). Not all attacks can be parried though, and in such situations, perfect dodges can come in very handy. Similar to Breath of the Wild, dodging an attack at the perfect moment slows down time for a couple of seconds, allowing you to land of series of hits on any and all opponents around you.

PAY MORE ATTENTION TO ARMOUR RATINGS

While you might think picking the right armour for your mercenary as as easy as just looking at the total armour rating at the bottom right corner of your inventory screen, it’s not quite as cut and dry. Certain pieces of gear can effect how much damage you do across the three disciplines of combat- ranged, melee, and stealth. As such, if, for instance, you like to do things quietly, even though some pieces of armour might have lower overall ratings, equipping them for significantly higher assassin damage can turn the tide in a lot of situations.

EQUIP GEAR WITH ENGRAVINGS

Equipping your weapons with engravings is something Odyssey briefly explains you can do early on in the game, but that doesn’t do justice to how important that can be. Engravings provide a variety of benefits, from higher damage across the three styles of combat, to other boosted stats, and the more you level up, the better engravings you unlock. These can even provide significant buffs to lower level gear, so don’t ignore engravings.

DON’T DISCARD LOWER LEVEL GEAR

Speaking of lower level gear you might be tempted to sell of or dismantle armour or weapons that are lower levelled as you get better equipment, but you might want to hold off on that. Upgrading your gear at blacksmiths is always an option, and bringing a lower level piece of Rare or Legendary gear can reward you with some particularly useful weapons and armour pieces. Combined with engravings, that number that denotes the level of an item becomes far less important.

CLEAR OUT ENEMY CAMPS WHENEVER POSSIBLE

Odyssey’s Ancient Greece is littered with tons of enemy camps across the map, from camps to military outposts to forts to fortresses, and these come with certain objectives of their own, such as killing a certain number of captains and Polemarchs, or freeing a certain number of captives, or looting chests, or burning war supplies. It’s usually an excellent idea to complete all of these objectives, because not only does things like killing captains and Polemarchs and looting chests reward you with some pretty sweet loot, but clearing all the objectives of camps also gives you a decent amount of XP.

DON’T WORRY TOO MUCH ABOUT THE FACTION WARS

As a mercenary, in Odyssey, you have the choice to side with whichever side of the Peloponnesian War you want to, which, in terms of gameplay mechanics, boils down to faction wars. What the game doesn’t tell you is that these parts don’t really make much of a difference. Helping a faction gain dominance in a region doesn’t do much other than changing the colours of banners on the walls. While the massive set piece battles these faction struggles end with can prove to be exciting and enjoyable set pieces (especially early on) and can also give you a decent amount of XP, you shouldn’t be too worried about being the one to decide the course of the war- it doesn’t make much of a difference either way.

YOUR CHARACTER’S GENDER DOESN’T CHANGE MUCH

Assassin’s Creed Odyssey is also the first game in the series that lets you decide whether you want to play as a man or a woman. Really, though, that doesn’t impact the story, or the dialogue, in any significant ways. Alexios and Kassandra are, for the most part, the same character, so rather than worrying about how the story or the world might react to your character’s gender, you should instead make that early decision based on your own personal preferences.

RECRUIT MORE CREW MEMBERS

Naval combat and exploration is an important aspect of Odyssey, even if it isn’t quite as emphasized as it was in the pirate dream we all know as Black Flag. One new mechanic that Odyssey adds to the naval sections is that of recruiting. Essentially, like in The Phantom Pain, you can knock out literally any enemy you come across and get them to join your crew on your ship. It’s an entirely ancillary mechanic that, if you should choose, you can ignore entirely- I would recommend that you don’t do that, however, since each new recruit brings his or her own set of buffs and debuffs, and picking with recruits to attach to your ships can yield some interesting results.

GET THOSE ANCIENT TABLETS

You can, of course, also upgrade your ship, which will require certain resources. And while you can get your hands on most of these resources by just playing the game like you normally would, things known as Ancient Tablets are harder to come by. These are usually found in enemy forts and camps (which we discussed earlier), and whenever you spot on, it’s probably a good idea to seek it out, because nearly every single ship upgrade requires these tablets (and the required number of tablets only increases with each level of upgrade).

DON’T IGNORE UNDERWATER EXPLORATION

While the vast Aegean Sea of Odyssey is the perfect sandbox (waterbox?) for naval combat and exploration, there’s plenty going on beneath the surface too. Underwater segments in the game, from lakes to streams to even the larger sea, hide some excellent locations, such as caves or crumbled temples or sunken ruins, and these areas often hide some of the best in-game loot. So do yourself a favour, and don’t ignore underwater exploration. Just be mindful of the sharks.

KEEP CHECKING THE MAP FOR NEW SIDE QUESTS

Being as large and expansive as it is, Odyssey is also full of side quests for you to tackle. However, it doesn’t always throw them in your face, or point you in their direction. Often, side quests might pop up in earlier areas of the game that you haven’t visited in hours. As such, it’s usually a good idea to keep checking the world map, to see if the side quest icon has popped up anywhere. These are usually fun, interesting stories and questlines, and I wouldn’t recommend ignoring them.

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