Character Development is the skill-tree system that gates which armour and weapons you can equip, and which resources you can gather and refine, as you level up. Press the quote key ( ' ) to open it, or click the icon at the top of the map; use the arrows to scroll between trees. Several crafting and gathering skills live here: Fishing, Archaeology, Forestry (Wood Cutting), Disassembly, Mining and Smelting and Roasting — alongside the Weapons and Armour trees.
Progression on every tree starts at the bottom and climbs upward.
Nodes, tiers, branches and trees
The vocabulary
- A node is a single box on the screen.
- A tier is vertical progress — grey Tier 1 up to orange Tier 5.
- A branch is a horizontal line of nodes, e.g. *Tier 3 Light Armours*.
- A tree is a whole skill, e.g. *Fishing* or *Armours*.
- Mastery is completely filling a horizontal branch — after which continuing to use that equipment earns Surplus XP (if it's turned on).
Horizontal vs vertical
- Horizontal progression improves the thing you're doing — faster, more yield, less durability loss — one bonus per node along a branch.
- Vertical progression unlocks higher-tier equipment and materials.
- You don't have to max a branch horizontally before climbing vertically — both earn at the same time.
Which way to spend?
As a rule, go horizontal to do something better or faster, and vertical to unlock better equipment or new materials. Think before applying Free XP, because climbing a tree means choosing between the two.
Earning experience
Using a skill with the right equipment — say, Fishing with the matching bait — earns three kinds of XP at once:
- Experience — applied to the specific skill node you're using.
- Free XP — earned automatically; can finish any node on any tree.
- Surplus XP — earned by continuing to use a branch you've already mastered, when Surplus is turned on.
Free XP
Free XP is earned automatically alongside regular XP, at a base rate of 2% (earn 100 XP → 2 Free XP). It's global: spend it to fully unlock any node on any tree, as long as you have enough to finish that node in one go.
This is the trick to levelling a skill you don't enjoy — dig with Archaeology, bank the Free XP, and pour it into Fishing. In theory you can level an entire tree without ever touching it.
Faster Free XP
Tick "Turn off Surplus Experience" and your Free XP rate doubles to 4% — a touch slower overall than banking Surplus, but it skips needing Conversion cards. The checkbox only appears once you have at least 1 Surplus XP.
Surplus XP & Conversion Points
Surplus XP is earned by using a fully-unlocked branch. It can't be applied to nodes directly — you must convert it to Free XP at a 2:1 ratio (10,000 Surplus → 5,000 Free) using a Conversion Points Card.
Conversion Points Cards
- Bought with Contribution Points at the Glory Quartermaster.
- Bought with Ambers in the Supporter Shop (K).
- Come as 50,000 or 250,000-point cards.
Cards don't *create* XP — they only convert Surplus you've already earned into Free XP. You can also spend Conversion Points to pull XP back out of a filled node to re-spec — but empty the higher tiers first, or you may lock yourself out of the nodes above.