The Anthem 2.0 October 2020 blog update has finally come out. As Christian has stated both on twitter and repeated at the start of this blog, this one covers Javelin Gameplay, specifically Builds and a peek at the new skill tree system coming with Anthem’s overhaul.
Author of this in-depth analysis of the new skill tree and everything BioWare shared in their Anthem 2.0 October blog is RubyJavelin!
Table of contents
I’d like echo Christian’s note before we begin:
“Please remember, the ideas, mockups, and direction are all works in progress. We are testing and exploring ideas that we are excited to share with you for your feedback, but things can (and usually do) change.”
Frostbite Skill Tree Preview
This blog starts off with a rare glimpse into what a skill tree actually looks like in Frostbite itself, so more on the development side of things rather than what we see. I’ve done my best to go over the text to make it more readable, which can give some insights to how things might work out.
We’ll talk about this later. Let’s just say there’s more than meets the eye to this image and it involves a big surprise and a lot of speculation.
Javelin Gameplay and Builds
One of the bigger goals they seem to have is to allow gear to be more about picking your gear based on comfort, and less about strength or hard to give up passives, from their title of this section, “Choice and Experimentation in your Loadout”.
If this is indeed their direction, it can mean great things for the future of Anthem. Let’s quickly talk about the smaller points they mention in this section of the blog post.
“All items are categorized to one of the 11 available equipment slots”
So as far as it seems, We do indeed have the 11 slots shown. Five Mod slots, Two Weapons, The Artifact, and Three Artifact slots. The most interesting of these so far are the Mod slots, where they are broken down into your melee, your abilities, your support, and your Ultimate.
The slot for the Ultimate has the biggest potential to be a real game changer. Not only does it mean you can mod your Ultimate directly, this could potentially mean the ability to swap your ultimate out with something different.
“Weapons are either Primary or Secondary, allowing distinctiveness in their role”
This seems to mean that they might be buffing some weapons to be formally used as weapons, while others remain as back up weapons. In the case of what they have shown in the image, it’s still two pistols, but a Heavy Pistol and a Machine Pistol. So it’s still a little unclear of the intention behind that statement yet.
Interestingly enough, the masterwork Heavy Pistol seems to have a different model from other existing masterworks of that type. Not going to speculate too heavily, but this could be a hint of more weapons to be seen in the future.
“Mods and Artifact slots replace Components”
This has a ton of implications for the status of a ton of existing builds. Seems like we might be starting from the bottom in terms of builds to use going into this new system, don’t worry though it’ll get figured out quickly enough.
Depending on if Masterwork passives get shifted to Mods and Artifact Slots or not, most builds are likely to take a hit, both offensively and defensively. This is speculation though, as we haven’t really seen much but a glimpse of what a Masterwork Mod looks like outside of the GIF, which will be covered shortly.
“Reliably Create Builds”
The next set of points are focused on outlining what they have envisioned for making builds more reliable to put together without drop luck being involved.
“Abilities are unlocks, not drops! Play with the Abilities you want, when you want”
This is very good for the game’s overall health. Even though it may take time to get the abilities you want to use, you won’t have to worry about getting them again. It’s possible that the Mods may take time to farm still, but appear as if they could be swapped between different pieces of gear.
“Empower your Abilities by equipping them with Mods”
This is rather interesting, as during the GIF you get a quick glance of what appears to be some form of Masterwork stat simply marked as “Rapid Fire”.
There’s nothing shown about what it does, the name implies that whatever you equip it on may be able to be used more often. So potentially a passive that increases Recharge Speed, Ultimate Speed and/or Melee Attack Speed based on where it’s slotted. Assuming that they can be swapped like that.
“Builds are defined by the synergies of Specializations, Abilities, and Equipment”
This is very good as well. This might mean better focus on tuning specific gear or specializations to fit your needs, as well as giving them more angle to balance from if things feel too weak or too strong. It’s hard to say much outside that, but if that’s the direction they’re headed, it’s a great direction for the game.
“Inscriptions improve build synergies, but are no longer the primary factor”
This is excellent news. If you’ve played Anthem at any point, recent or otherwise you likely understand that Inscriptions are a main focus for the current “end game” min-maxing. You’re also likely to be aware of how painful it is to hunt specific inscriptions on specific items. It’s a grind, and a tedious one at that.
This seems to indicate they may be considering dropping a lot of the high tier offensive and defensive inscriptions from the list, or minimizing their impact. There’s a chance that things like Jav-wide Damage or Gear Charges could stay, but it’s hard to say at this point if that’s the intention.
If they do, that allows them to make the base abilities much stronger and instead have inscriptions be minor stats boosts or quality of life stats specifically. Sadly the small glimpse we get of the stats on a mod have them maxed out at 40%, but no stat name given.
Before moving to the next set of points, let’s break down that GIF. It goes pretty quick but there’s a few small details that are worth mentioning as long with some possible hints at what the UI under the Mods themselves do.
It’s hard to be absolutely certain, but it appears that the boxes under the mod light up based on the relative tier or value of the inscription. Notice how the Masterwork mod has two strongly lit boxes as a few dimmer ones? Yep, this Mod has two capped out stats shown to match as seen in the previous image.
Going into the actual UI for equipping Mods, we see that there’s a new melee weapon here, as Ranger was previously outfitted with a Mace. He now appears to be given a Heavy Axe, which also has a Fire variant.
This also lists the Triangle button as the Melee button, which is not the current default control for those playing with a PS4 controller. This may indicate that console players may potentially get the ability to move their binds around to their liking, where they were previously locked to my knowledge. This is reinforced with a later image showing off the Seeker Missile, which is also bound to Triangle.
Skill Trees and Specializations
Now, we’re getting into our first look at Skill Trees and Specializations with the next sets of images and points.
“Provide Choice and Progression through Skill Trees
– Each Javelin can level up, awarding Skill Points
– Skill points can be spent to unlock Abilities, Passives, and Stat Boosts
– Each Specialization has its own Advanced Skill Tree”
This is pretty nice, even if it potentially means having to level each javelin and specialization independently. With each Javelin having three specializations, that could mean a lot of extra play time to max out a Javelin, but if the passive’s are worth it, it could make a world of difference.
While they seem fixed, it’d be nice if they consider leaving the advanced trees more open for future updates and additions, or if they just plan to add additional specializations down the road. Between the possibility of new Javelins and new Specializations being added, there’s a lot of potential to see tons of unique builds.
“Expand on the Fantasy and Playstyles of Each Javelin
– Javelins have access to multiple specializations that cater to different styles of gameplay
– Each Javelin now wields a powerful Artifact that can be customized”
With mention of access to multiple specializations and each having a unique artifact, this could very well be how we swap between them down the road.
If each specialization really does offer different styles of play, this means the odds of finding another player using the exact same build as you might become much lower than it is currently. There could be several fun and viable builds, and they could all potentially be just as powerful.
Now the last parts of the blog dive more into skill trees and artifacts. So let’s dive into what seems to be their goals and thoughts behind these systems.
Exploring Skill Trees
Christian starts it off by saying:
“When considering how you grow and become more powerful in Anthem, we observed that Pilot Level isn’t a satisfying measure of your progress, so we set out to answer the question, “What would it look like for Freelancers to become more skillful at piloting each Javelin?” We’ve been exploring the idea of Javelin experience and levels which allow you to permanently unlock Abilities for your Javelin that you can then customize further with Mods.“
It’s very true that Pilot Levels aren’t really satisfying, you max them out before you get into the “endgame” and after that experience only contributes to Weekly Alliance Progression. With skills becoming much more permanently available and potentially customizable, there’s a lot more room at whatever endgame we get in the rework in terms of exploring builds and such.
“We’re currently testing these ideas via a new skill tree system. In this system, each Javelin would have a “basic” skill tree where all the baseline Abilities, Passives, Triggered Abilities, and Stat Boost for your Javelin can be unlocked.”
Getting Baseline stats, abilities and passives from the tree has a lot of unique potential to it. It sounds like a lot of the Masterwork passives we’re used to may be moving there. The only concern with that is the Perks/Passives from the current Universal Components, there’s no hin whether or not they are going. I worry about them as they are quite powerful but also universally reliable, no pun intended. We’ll have to wait and see through.
“We would like you to be able to focus on the specific style of gameplay you like best about your Javelin, so after the basic tree is completed, we’re also testing the concept of Specializations. Each Specialization would have an Advanced Skill Tree where you’ll unlock Specialization-specific Abilities, Upgrades, and more.”
They mentioned Specialization-specific Abilities, which perhaps might be the encouragement to to level all of them. It could also mean some abilities are locked to each specialization, but that seems unlikely with the way everything is presented.
Now to break down a few things that can be pulled from the Specialization tree as shown.
From this shot, we see the basic tree. We can see the larger node holds Both axe variations, A Grenade, Seeker Missile, the new Support and what appears to be one of the existing supports.
The smaller nodes show five distinct icons. Shields, the Icon for Physical Damage, what appears to be a bullet penetrating a surface, two droplets, and a fire icon. I’m going to assume the Fire icon is either Fire Damage, or a representation of Damage over Time. As for the Droplets, that may be status duration or perhaps increased status if they’re using the current status system. As for the bullet, It’s likely Impact damage, or simply put increased single target damage. Based on the Specialization tree, it could also be increased damage to shields.
As for this much larger tree for the specialization, there’s a lot of interesting details here. We see both the new base line skills, what seems to be an Ultimate as the first node, and nodes that have an upgrade arrow near them, which likely indicates those nodes will be the skill passives.
There’s also one node that is very unclear what it may do, which is in the lower left. It looks like a coding reference, and considering the previous small node is potentially Shield damage, it could be a passive or ultimate that boost/disables/weakens shields, as opposed to the one in the middle along the top that has the icon for ShieldBreaker damage, which could be a passive or ability.
Among the other large nodes we see another new ability, this one being fire based, as well as an upgrade not too far away from it. There’s an upgrade for the grenade, and perhaps a second grenade type. There’s also the icon for Blast Missile on one node, An Axe upgrade node, Shieldbreaker and Armorbreaker nodes, possibly another ability or ultimate in the upper right and a couple support upgrades.
Now for the smaller nodes, there’s only one new one there, which if I had to guess based on placement that they represent Area of Effect. The shape could also be ice, but the only way that makes sense is that the new support is in fact Cryo Grenade being moved to a support ability. In which case it could potentially be Freeze Duration.
So a quick little summary of what I’m expecting for this Longbow Ranger to be like. Very Explosive and Area Damage centric, with some options for single target damage. An all rounder made to deal with both Armor and Shields effectively.
In short if you want a basic way to read the skill tree by context, for future teases of it.. The specialization tree is pretty clear about what it does. The larger nodes with arrows are upgrades, like providing passives. If the icon is an ability, it likely also has a matching passive node on the tree. If not It’s a Javelin-wide passive or an Ultimate ability.
Artifacts
This will be a short section as there’s not a ton to go over with these just yet, but there are a few interesting things here still.
“What is an Artifact?
We’ve heard from you that Components feel like nothing more than stat modifiers. With that in mind, we’re also experimenting with a new Artifacts system to replace them. Artifacts are pieces of super powered tech that set your Javelin and Freelancer apart. Each Javelin type would have a distinct Artifact catering towards its class fantasy. For instance, your Ranger’s rocket pod would be upgraded into the Skyfell Launcher Artifact, a pair of back-mounted pods that transform into powerful rocket launchers.“
So Artifacts are more a replacement for Components than Mods are. This means a lot of the components passive can be found or enabled through mods on this. I like the concept of this, but it has the potential to be very limiting. Most current builds generally relied on one to three Iconic Components alongside Universal Components to get a healthy mix of offence and defence. Given the next paragraph says the following…
“These Artifacts would change in appearance, depending on what parts you equip. There’s also an opportunity to allow for more interesting decision making. The parts you equip would contribute to a powerful passive ability generated by the Artifact.”
It seems the goal is to let us have some of that power, just not all of it. Which admittedly is a fair point. The combination of a lot of passives letting you churn out damage while being hard to kill with the powerful defensive bonuses is a little much.
This may simplify a lot of things, and really have you engage with the content much more as opposed to breezing through as most of us do now.
It’s hard to even speculate here, as there’s not much to go on with even the gif not really showing much more than the UI to switch them. Iit seems like it may directly affect the power of your Ultimate however, as it has a damage stat listed. How core it will be remains to be seen.
Paladin Skill Tree Preview
Remember how I said we’d be coming back to the opening image later? This is why. Also, yes. You did read that right. Paladin Skill Tree. It was shown blurry for a reason. After trying my best to read as many nodes as possible, there’s several very telling nodes that point to one thing, a 5th Javelin.
Fair warning, this is speculation based on what nodes could be. Since the base image is blurry, take into account this is what my eyes see, though some are very clear and easy to read.
So from what I can gather from the nodes that exist, the Paladin Javelin will have these three paths to choose from. Tank, via the Titan Specialization; Damage, via the Harbinger Specialization; and Support/Heal, via the Avenger Specialization. All specialization names are based on nearby nodes. The main node for the tank tree including Titan, and the damage nodes being a bit too blurry to tell if they say Avenger or Harbinger, so both are used.
Given the melee nodes in the start of the tree, say Slash it’s safe to assume this javelin will be close to the depictions of Helena Tarsis’ Javelin, Colossus-like with a large sword. It appears to specialize into Melee and Fire Damage, as those make up the majority of the damage nodes.
It’s starting skills are Judgement, which likely a hard hitting damage skill; Symbol of Soothing, which is likely to be a healing ability; and Taunt, which is likely to be similar to Colossus’ Battle Cry.
As you progress into each specialization you get one of three skills. The word is hard to make out but it’s likely to be Rune or Aura. There’s a variation for Speed, which Titan gets; Fire, which Harbinger gets; and Health, which Avenger gets.
What’s interesting is that each specialization has its own combo effect as well. Titan gets Shield Recovery, Avenger gets Divine Combo, and Harbinger’s seems to be unnamed. Probably safe to say Divine Combo likely heals, or something of that nature. Harbinger is likely a damage combo effect.
As we go further into the tree we see other skills and passives popping up.
Titan gets Strength of Steel, Overcharged Shields, Taunting Strikes, Kinetic Transference, as well as melee upgrades. Strength of Steel is likely a combination of an offensive and defensive skill. Kinetic Transference is likely a passive, or even Ultimate which is likely to absorb/reflect damage.
Harbinger gets what appears to say Bouncing Sword, Thunderous Circle, Call of Justice and Heavy Cut. Call of Justice may be a damage boost, while the rest sound like pure damage skills. Thunderous Circle might be similar to Storm’s Lightning Strike. BOuncing Sword may be similar to Interceptor’s Wraith Strike skill, but with sword projections. Heavy Cut sounds like just an Area of Effect weapon slash. They also get a skill or passive called Leeching.. Something. It’s hard to make out the other words. My best guess is Leeching Defiant Wave, with the main skill being located just under it.
Finally, Avenger gets what appears to read Grand Slash Divine Upgrade, as well as upgrades to Bouncing Sword, Taunt, and Defiant Wave. They also get Holy Fire and Inspiring Leader, as well as two other hard to read skills. Can only imagine Holy Fire to be similar to Storm’s Flame Orb and Inspiring Leader to be another support skill.
Seems like this Javelin might be a welcomed addition, being a more Tank/Support focused Javelin. We’ll have to see just how it turns out. As a final reminder, again this is speculation, so things may be incorrect about this javelin.
A note from Vulkk
We debated if and how to include this discovery about the new Paladin Javelin. It was obvious that Christian shared this image not just as a space-filler. There was a reason behind it and there was also a reason for it to be so small and blurry. He wanted us, the true fans, to dig around it more. And we did!
I am not a fan of big speculations and try to avoid them when possible, but both me and Ruby thought that this hints at a new Javelin and both of us had different reasons to believe it so. After Ruby did an extensive review of the image and extracted literally everything possible out of it, we are confident this is indeed a brand new Javelin. Only time will tell if and how right we are :)))
Conclusion and Social Media Monthly Recap
Aaaand that wraps up the blog post. There’s a lot of things to speculate about here, but overall there seems to be a good future for Anthem with the rework. I’m excited for a new Javelin to have been teased like that honestly. Give all of us something more to be excited about with the rework.
Now, we can recap the Images posted by Christian over on Twitter.
October 2nd, we got another tease of a base in the clouds. Seems a lot like it may be a hub city in the future, like Ft. Tarsis is now. Seems like a very scenic place to be. Wonder who built it, or why. Feels a little too open to be a Pirate of the Blood Wind base, but maybe a defector base?
Have a great weekend all!! :) pic.twitter.com/UtqpjT0JqV
— Christian Dailey (@ChristianDailey) October 3, 2020
October 9th, we got another overhead shot of the base, and what appears to be a large shaper relic-filled canyon. The canyon certainly seems like prime Stronghold material for sure.
Hi All – I hope everyone is staying safe and in good spirits. Awesome discussions as usual. Nothing new to report on this Friday. We are making progress though…. stay tuned. ????️ pic.twitter.com/RHwZkUEnOR
— Christian Dailey (@ChristianDailey) October 9, 2020
October 16th, we get another overhead shot of the base, but with a new addition. An Airship! This seems to be our way back and forth between the base and Rt. Tarsis, or perhaps the base and somewhere else.
Happy Friday friends. Blog is close…. I will let you know when it is off for approvals ????☠️ You are all awesome :) Hmmm I think this picture was missing something…. pic.twitter.com/ExdQHSapzC
— Christian Dailey (@ChristianDailey) October 16, 2020
Finally, October 23rd brought us more Airships. This time a close up and what seems to be a deconstruction of the Airship. Always nice to see artists’ work like that. Do have to wonder if they started at the base in number seven and worked the design up that way.
Happy Friday all! Blog is off for approval! Prepare a boarding party!! ????☠️????☠️????☠️ pic.twitter.com/MaeDI8Du3t
— Christian Dailey (@ChristianDailey) October 23, 2020
RubyJavelin is a regular contributor here at VULKK.com. Check out some of his Anthem guides:
