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When you boot upRise of the Roninfor the first time, you may be overwhelmed by the sheer number of systems and mechanics contained within. While Team Ninja have always been renowned for their exquisite action design, the game’s open world necessitates more intensive tutorialization for the various ways players can interact with it.
This can mean that even simple functions like how and why you earn skill points for your character can be lost in the weeds. It can be made even more difficult when considering Rise of the Ronin has not one, but two different experience systems that dole out upgrades for you. Luckily, they’re easy to understand once properly explained.
Leveling Up, Explained
Leveling up in Rise of the Ronin works just how you would expect. After reaching a certain experience point threshold, your level will increase, andyou will be gifted another skill point to use.
However,this is a generic skill pointwhich can be used to purchase upgrades in all four of the stat skill trees (strength, dexterity, intellect, and charm). Each of these skill trees has upgrades that willonly unlock by earning skill points of their specific stat type, and that’s where Karma comes in.
Karma, Explained
As youkill enemies, you willbuild Karma. Filling the Karma gauge will net you skill points, but you have tocash in at Veiled Edge Bannersin order to reap your rewards.
You can continuously bank Karma even after completely filling the gauge,causing your Karma level to increase.
Doing so will earn you generic skill points andrare skill points that correlate to each core stat. These arerequired to unlock more powerful abilitiesthat relate directly to each attribute, and most take multiple points to unlock.
If you’ve fought a lot of enemies and haven’t been to a Banner in a while,don’t forget to claim your rewards!
If you’ve banked a large amount of Karma, it’s imperative that youvisit a Veiled Edge Banner as soon as you can. If you’re killed before you claim your skill points, the enemy that did the deed willstart a Vendetta,stealing all the Karmayou’ve accumulated.
The only way to get it back is to return andkill them or perform a critical hit. Should you die again,all your Karma will be lost for good.
How To Allocate Skill Points
Once you have a collection of skill points, you can pause the game andnavigate to the Stats menu to select the upgrades you would like.
Some are one-time purchases, whileothers can be bought multiple times to bolster their effects. Learning a certain number of skills in each category (shown in the bottom left corner of the upgrade menu) willfurther buff your character’s corresponding stats.
