Take a look at all the best skills Horizon Forbidden West offers from each of its six skill trees.
Horizon Forbidden West is the second installment in Guerrilla Games’ action RPG franchise of Horizon Zero Dawn. As Aloy embarks on a dangerous journey across the Tenakth tribe lands, she has to rely on her skills to survive against human enemies and machines alike.
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Aloy’s skill tree is divided into six categories: Warrior, Hunter, Survivor, Infiltration, Trapper, and Machine Master. In order to always stay ahead of enemies and make exploration around a vast open-world much easier, you will need to allocate your skill points carefully. In this guide, we’ll go over the best skills to unlock in Horizon Forbidden West.
Top 10 Best Skills to Unlock in Horizon Forbidden West
Below we have listed our top 10 picks for the best skills that you need to unlock in Horizon Forbidden West as soon as possible.
10. Potent Medicine
This is a Survivor skill. It is also one of the most basic and important skills to unlock in the game. In Horizon Forbidden West, your main source of healing comes from Medical Berries found in the wild. With Potent Medicine, you not only regain more health from consuming medical berries but also heal yourself at a much faster rate.
Getting more health out of medical berries is always desirable, but a boost in healing speed is also essential when battling faster machines. The skill increases both your healing amount and healing speed by 50%.
9. Resonator Blast
This is a Warrior skill that increases the overall damage dealt on opponents. The skill allows you to charge up your spear when you’re engaging in melee combat, leaving your opponents with a weak spot.
Once it is fully charged, you can energize your opponent and shoot them with an arrow to deal a significant amount of damage. You’ll have to rely on this skill quite a bit in the newly introduced Melee Pit Challenges.
8. Burst Fire
This is a Weapon Technique for the Warrior Bow under the Warrior skill tree that allows you to shoot three arrows at a time. It not only makes shooting off parts of machines quicker but also allows you to inflict status ailments much faster.
For example, if you manage to freeze your enemies right at the beginning of the fight, you’ll be able to take them down much easier with regular arrows while they are in the Brittle state.
7. Weapon Stamina+
This is a Hunter skill. The newly introduced Weapon Techniques are special moves that consume Weapon Stamina to use. So, players are restricted from using these special moves when their weapon stamina bar depletes. The Weapon Stamina + skill will increase your weapon stamina threshold by 50%. You can further enhance this skill with Weapon Stamina +2.
6. Concentration+
This is another Hunter skill that is a must-have for players. One of the best skills in the first Horizon Zero Dawn was the Concentration skill, which allowed players to slow down time when aiming. The skill continues to be useful in Forbidden West because you really do have to rely on your bows quite a lot.
Even in ground-level combat with larger machines, Concentration will allow you to make some of the most critical hits. That’s why you must invest in Concentration + as it will increase the duration of the slowed-down time by 200%.
5. Sustained Burst
This is a Weapon Technique for the Bolt Blaster under the Hunter skill tree that deals a great amount of damage to large enemies. By unlocking the Sustained Burst skill, you can unleash hell on opponents by shooting an entire clip from your bolt blaster. With that being said, you will be immobile during the duration of the attack. Moreover, it also costs a lot of weapon stamina.
When using this skill, it is best to find a vantage point where your enemies can’t attack you. Using Sustained Burst in Concentration mode will allow you to carry on the attack for longer and hit all of your enemy’s weak spots. Moreover, you can also use elemental bolts with this technique to speed up the status ailment effect.
4. The Destroyer
This is a Warrior skill that allows you to unleash a chain of melee combos on enemies. It is incredibly fast, and your enemies will get no opportunity to hit back. Moreover, this is also a hard-hitting skill, so it will inflict a lot of damage and send chunks of the enemy’s armor flying.
3. Spitting Spike
This is a Weapon Technique for the Spike Thrower under the Machine Master Skill tree. It allows you to inflict damage over a large area of effect. Once you throw the Spike in the air, it will split itself and come raining down on enemies. This skill is great against larger machines as well as for hitting multiple enemies. Hitting and inflicting damage on monstrous machines becomes easier with this skill.
2. Low Health Defense
This is a Survivor skill that will help you get out of tight situations alive. Combat against larger enemies can be overwhelming, especially when each hit takes away a large chunk of your health. The Low Health Defense skill helps you resist taking more damage when your health is below 25%. You can stack the effect of this skill by unlocking both Low Health Defense 1 and Low Health Defense 2.
1. Stealth Stalker
This is a Valor Surge under the Infiltrator Skill tree which allows you to become near-invisible to enemies. By activating the cloaking device, Aloy can get around enemies undetected and perform Silent Strikes without having to hide in tall grass. This skill is especially useful when navigating across heavily guarded areas. However, you will need to unlock Silent Strike+ 1, Low Profile 1, and Quiet Movement 1 first to unlock this skill.
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