Risen World

Chapter 239: Knowing your Troops Part 2

After figuring out what the four leaders of the new group could do Joshua decided to turn his attention to the other new members that had come along and trying to figure out everything they could do. He decided to start out with the three Carsen brothers since he knew them all so well. What surprised Joshua when he first started to ask them about their capabilities was not the fact that they were all level seventy and had come a long way, but the fact that they had all decided to go the route of berserkers. Each one of the brothers had large axes on their back that looked prepped for tearing into their opponents.

From what he learned from them about their jobs of berserkers he realized what their specialty was when it came to being tanks. Unlike with Jayce who had a shield as a knight and the ability to use shield wall to block off a large area berserkers didn't focused on defending against large groups. All of their defensive abilities basically came down to their good regeneration, extremely high vitality, and timed buffs that allowed them to take more of a beating while fighting. They didn't have any abilities that focused on completely blocking off attacks like knights seemed to focus on.

Instead berserkers were the kings of taking on the attention of one powerful creature and keeping it. They had a taunt that focused in on one enemy and kept that enemies attention no matter how many injuries other people caused to the creature for a period of time. This made it so that they could take one creature out of a fight on their own and hold them in positions for others to take care of. This basically made them all perfect off tanks that focused on a single important target instead of an entire group of enemies like Jayce did. Berserkers also had incredibly high strength so that they could do some damage from their heavy blows although their dexterity was a bit low and they had no control over mana whatsoever.

Their soul beast all had to deal with boosting their vitality greatly and improving their ability to take damage. There were small variations between the different brothers in how they liked to fight. Dave is overbearing in his fighting style and likes to keep up the pressure on his target as much as possible. He does it to not only make certain that he keeps his enemies attention, but also to deal as much damage as possible to the beast he is stalling before the rest of his group comes over to help out. Dillon is happy go lucky and always seems to be toying with his enemies as he taunts them and is a bit more evasive than his two brothers in his style of combat. Lastly Devin is of course the simplest one who takes the easy approach of dodging major attacks and blocking small ones while doing his best to avoid taking too much damage as he keeps his targets attention.

After Joshua had gotten enough information about the three Carsen brothers he then decided to turn his attention to Adam who he met before in the past, but had never actually learned about his abilities. It turned out that Adam was a close range fighter who focused on fighting with two short swords. This made his combat style most comparable to Adrian, but instead of being a swordsman Adam was actually a dagger specialist like Madalyn. He just chose to use a bigger version of weaponry when it came to combat. This meant that he gained all the same stats as Madalyn along with similar boost, but that's where the similarity between the two ended. Adam didn't have poisons or anything like that to focus on when it came to combat and he primarily focused on close range combat that used his larger daggers as a specialty. He also seemed to have gained a skill that he focused his combat style around that allowed him to leave a clone behind that was made of shadow. This clone would last for half a minute and copy his movements against the enemy dealing about thirty percent of the damage he does himself.

This skill in the end made his combat style more all in and aggressive than Madalyn or Adrian ever were. When it came to his soul beast he had some sort of hound like soul beast that actually increased his strength and put him on par with most berserkers when it came to strength with the stats boost he gained. This was unusual for a dagger specialist, but it meant that his quick blows also packed a punch behind him more so than others. The style of combat just seemed to match the large man in Joshua's opinion. His soul beast also made it so that he was stronger when working with others than alone which was interesting. It was as if he had a bit of a pack buff going for him that constantly gave him a ten percent boost in all stats as long as he was fighting alongside three other people when it came to combat.

Now the last few people that Joshua needed to learn about were all the women that Madalyn had brought along from her guild to help out in their expedition. When Joshua first looked at them he could get an idea of what they're roles would be from the gear that they were wearing. The one he had a duel against was clearly the tank that Madalyn brought along. There were a set of three girls that looked remarkably similar to each other which Joshua quickly found out why when they told him that they were triplets. There was a shorter girl that was around Lilly's height that had a bow on her shoulder that proved she was an archer of some sort. Lastly there was another slender robed women that carried a staff which proved she was most likely a mage.

Joshua first asked the tank of the group about herself and her abilities since she was the one he was the most familiar with. He found out that her name was Abigail Morris and her role was that of a heavy swordsman. She was a bit tall for a woman and with her helmet off Joshua could see her face which was well toned but still fairly attractive. She was still a bit subdued in their conversation after having lost the duel to Joshua, but it was clear that she was quickly getting over it. Joshua found out that her role as a heavy swordsman was somewhat of a mix between berserkers and knights. They did have a skill that allowed them to block off large groups with a mana like shield projection, but they didn't have several ways to block off enemies like knights with their shields. They could do a lot more damage than a knight could do though, but not on the same level as a berserker. They were basically the middle of the road between the two jobs.

Abigail had two important things going for her that helped get her this far along in her life as an explorer. The first was an early skill that she gained that went extremely well with the rest of her skill set. This skill was called stunning strike and it was a rather simple skill that made her more capable than most people that had her class. All though the heavy swordsman had a little bit of both the berserker and the knight it wasn't exactly perfect at either of the roles. This made it so that most heavy swordsman ended up playing the role of an off tank that could switch in for the main tank for a short time. The main reason for this was because they were a jack of all trades that couldn't lock on to one target as well as a berserker or block off several targets as well as a knight.

Stunning strike had given Abigail the ability to do either role when needed. It was relatively similar to a shield bash technique from a knight that allowed them to stun a target while handling another. What made it even better was the fact that it had far more range since she could do it with the reach of her large sword and it affected everything she hit with the sword while the skill was active. It may only be active for one swing, but that swing could easily hit multiple targets with the size of her weapon. She had tried to use the skill against Joshua during their duel, but he spent most of the duel avoiding it.

Her soul beast was actually something similar to a rhinoceros. It gave her a decent boost to her strength and vitality. It also made it so that her strikes became more powerful depending on the momentum she gained while doing so. So if she was allowed to build up steam she would do far more damage as the fight went on. Abigail bowed her head in apology after explain her abilities and Joshua just gave her a small smile showing her that everything was fine between them.

Next Joshua turned to the triplets who he found out were named March, April, and May. They all had the last name summers so Joshua figured it might have been a little joke by their parents to name their daughters after the months of spring while their last name was summers. It sounded like an everlasting dad joke to him. The three were all under the basic healer class for now and they even all had similar soul beast. They were rabbit like soul beast that improved their mana regeneration and gave them the ability to make their presence fainter so that enemies wouldn't target them while they were in the back healing everyone. They also learned a spell that was essential for all healers that made it so that they created a shield around them that would protect them from one lethal attack. Joshua had made sure Monika had gained the spell as well before having Jayce's group join the expedition.

The three triplets all looked rather similar and all stood at about five and a half feet. They all had a more athletic build even if it was hidden by the robes they were wearing and had light brown hair. The only way Joshua was able to tell the difference between them was the fact that their hair was in different styles. March had short hair that was cut off at her shoulders, April had long wavy hair that went all the way down her back once she let it out from her robes, and May had long hair as well but it was straight with a bit of a darker shading as if she had died it a bit. Joshua was just glad he'd be able to tell them apart and not mix them up thanks to that.

The archer that Madalyn brought along was named Becca Baker and she was a short girl that had a nearly childish body if not for her mature face and slightly womanly figure. She had a bit of a cold stare to her and Joshua figured she might have the same attitude as Marcus when it came to her height. She kept her light brown hair into a pony tail that fell down her back. It didn't surprise Joshua when he found out that she had a rather similar role to Marcus in the group as a thief that focused on traps and ranged combat. Marcus focused more on moving in and out from using his daggers to using his traps, but he also used a crossbow from range every so often. Becca however seemed to prefer to use a bow from a good distance while leading her enemies into traps along the way.

The two did defer into what types of traps they preferred to use and Joshua figured out why because of the soul beast that Becca had. Her soul beast allowed her to have heightened senses which went well with her role in the group, but more importantly it increased the duration of status defects of traps and other skills she used. Her soul beast was a bat of some sort that also allowed her to have a different type of vision when closing her eyes that made it easy for her to find tracks or see traps. She didn't have much fire power, but she was definitely useful in a crazy unknown place like the canyon.

The last member of Madalyn's guild that came along was the mage girl named Amber Price. She was a bit tall standing at five foot ten inches, but she was incredibly slender in comparison to someone like Abigail. She had curly black hair that was mostly hidden by her hood, but based off of the amount that was spilling out it was most likely fairly long. She seemed to be more outgoing then the rest of her group and had a smile on her face now that she knew the tension had mostly disappeared. Her attitude was refreshing compared to the others of her group who seemed a bit to serious.

Amber was a mage that focused on earth magic which meant that her specialty was defensive magic for the group. Magic such as putting up walls to block off enemies, or using sand to slow their movements down. She would do well in a support role alongside Henry since she wasn't as much of an offensive mage as the rest in the group. Her soul beast was actually a mole rat that seemed to make it so that she had a greater connection to the earth which explained why she seemed to specialize in that field of magic over others. It also made it so that she had an ability where she could use her mana as a shield around herself in dangerous situations. Of course she'd run out of mana if the shield was broken through, but at that point the others could help her out.

Joshua finally let out a deep sigh after he had figured out everything he needed to know about everyone. Now it was just time to set up ranks for the expedition and get some sleep.