Dune: Awakening Previews Skill Trees, Weapons, Abilities and More in Combat Gameplay Stream

Yesterday, after keeping mostly hush about it, the Dune: Awakening team ran a live stream that finally gave a larger overview of how combat will look in the MMORPG. The stream had live demonstrations of combat scenarios alongside commentary of different aspects, including skill trees, weaponry, and the famous body shields. 

The combat plays out at a moderate to quick pace, with some weight and pacing baked to each move. Quite importantly, in classic Dune lore style, players will need to drop their shields when directly engaging with others, including shooting guns. There’ll be different shields that players can tap into, with perks such as flying around; however, they can also be worn down, and need to recharge. 

Speaking of recharging, there’s a stamina system that players can tap into in order to dash into and out of combat, or if they’re in a pinch. This is limited, though, so it needs to be used wisely. 

Some guns in Dune: Awakening are also a little more complicated than just a few pew-pews. True to lore, they’re spring-loaded, and as the team mentioned in a Q&A days ago, there’ll be different effects and calculations based on the gun and conditions around it. An example given is that players may encounter a gun that shoots directly into a shield; however, if a player dodges, they can avoid taking a piercing effect head-on. 

As players progress and gear up, NPC-filled areas will be broken down into different difficult tiers. The NPCs will have different levels of difficulty and aggression, and can “hear” any audio quirks that the player makes, such as walking. The developers warn that regardless of where they go, players should always go in prepared.

Players can also take on these enemies in Groups, the Dune: Awakening equivalent of parties, which lets them coordinate playstyles and pick each other up when they’re down. However, the enemies will have higher HP and be more aggressive, and while friendly fire with guns is off, area-of-effect and crowd control skills will affect groupmates, albeit with less damage. 

As for actual ability progress, we got a peek of the different ability trees, which will be divided up by the overarching origins, or the character types that players get to choose in the beginning. Progression will be locked by narrative, so players can’t just blitz into higher-tier zones. 

The Dune: Awakening combat and skill trees we got to glimpse at in the stream are as follows: 

Trooper: 

• Gunnery 
• Suspension Training 
• Tactical Tech 

Bene Gesserit: 

• Wielding Way 
• The Voice 
• Body Control 

Swordmaster: 

• The Blade 
• The Will 
• The Way 

Mentat: 

• Mental Calculus 
• Assassination 
• Tactician 

Planetologist: 

• Scientist 
• Explorer 
• Mechanic

Obviously, the last set of skills are for those who are looking to deal more in the economy. However, it seems that players can mix and match, to some light degree, in order to find a playstyle that works for them. The only trees discussed in the stream itself were the Swordmaster and the Bene Gesserit. 

Swordmaster brings players closer to canon Dune universe characters like Duncan Idaho, with abilities to keep one nimble. Some Swordmaster skills let players press through a shield, run towards an enemy firing shots and deflect those shots, and give a solid knee kick to move towards or away their target. The Eye of the Storm also makes a whirlwind of attacks, hitting enemies around them. 

The Bene Gesserit, meanwhile, function much like they do in the Dune media. The Bindu sprint, referencing the word for “musculature,” lets players sprint in and out of combat, while the weaving step puts the player directly behind their enemies. A Bene Gesserit player can also utilize the Compel command to incapacitate the enemy and damage them before muscle control returns.  

The full stream, which you can play above, has a nifty few demos of combat, including what happens when you accidentally start a demo dehydrated and out in the sun (oops), plus two NPC areas, done once with solo combat and once with a group. The team says that they’re still fine-tuning things based off beta feedback, and hopefully the extra three weeks, as they explain in yesterday’s delay announcement, will give them more time to “cook.”