Unlike previous games, Assassin’s Creed Valhalla is a bit more generous with its level scaling. As Eivor gains experience and levels up, their Power will increase and two skill points are received. You’ll gain levels by playing through the story but make sure to speak to any surrounding characters to unlock optional side missions. These provide additional opportunities for gaining experience. Exploring the map will also open up World Events that can help in this regard (besides offering their own set of rewards). Raids are also a great source of experience and also net a healthy amount of Silver.
As you spend skill points, your Power will increase. More importantly, these skills will provide different bonuses like stat increases, new abilities and so on. You’ll also find nodes that will provide bonuses for specific armor schools. The skill tree is much more extensive in Valhalla with several different branches and some abilities shrouded from the outset. Skills fall into three main categories – Way of the Bear, Way of the Wolf and Way of the Raven.
Recommended Skills and Abilities
Way of the Bear is more melee-focused. It’s suited to players who want to charge forth and beat down their foes. Recommended skills in this category include Stomp, which deals a devastating stomp to an enemy on the ground; Warrior Takedown for taking down a single foe and refilling Adrenaline for every enemy that notices this; and Heavy Dual Wield, which allows you to dual wield heavy weapons. Bow users will also find some useful skills like the Light Bow Combo where consecutive shots deal additional damage and Arrow Volley which will fire all loaded arrows at once.
Way of the Wolf skills are range-focused but also provide some nice benefits to survival. Stealth Recon will highlight foes when you’re crouched and not detected; Last Chance Healing will slow time when critically injured; and Charged Shot allows for shooting two charged arrows with the Hunter Bow (though the attack can’t be cancelled). The Bow Stun Finisher serves the same purpose as Stomp, taking down stunned foes. Arrow Reinforcement is also recommended for collecting arrows from dead foes. You might want to invest in Grit with a melee build since it allows for recovering the red portion in one’s health bar upon attacking.
Finally, there’s Way of the Raven, suited for stealth players. Brush With Death is good for activating slow-mo when narrowly dodging a blow; Advanced Assassination is essential for killing high level targets (but requires some timing); Guided Arrow allows for controlling arrows en route to their targets; and Chain Assassination will let you assassinate a second foe after killing the first. Some other useful skills include Counter Roll, Breakfall and Missile Reversal.
Of course, there are also a number of different abilities to unlock as well. These are obtained by locating Books of Knowledge (with a second book for an ability serving to upgrade it). Some noteworthy abilities include Vengeance of Thor to unleash a powerful, unstoppable attack; Throwing Axe Fury for tossing throwing axes at foes; Rush and Bash which allows for running towards enemies and then picking them up, either to throw them off cliffs or into walls; Rage of Helheim for knocking an enemy to the ground and beating them to death with your fists; and Mark of Death, which allows for holding down the fire button and marking enemies before releasing to fire several arrows. For more details on finding the various abilities, check out the guide below courtesy of Gaming With Abyss.
How to Raise Charisma
Charisma isn’t essential for winning battles but it is necessary to unlock different dialogue choices, some which can have profound effects on quests and events. Increasing Charisma requires winning Flytings, the rap battles that occur between Eivor and another party. The key to winning a Flyting is to choose statements that rhyme while staying on track with your opponent. New Flyting opponents can be found throughout the game and winning a rap battle will net +1 Charisma.
If you lose a Flyting, don’t worry – simply replay it and choose different answerws. When your Charisma is high enough, new dialogue options will be indicated by a mask icon.
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