This was a pretty big spike in challenge as well as a new layer of skill requirement, as I suddenly was discovering that I had a few more abilities BnS NEO Divine Gems available to me beyond simply hitting the counter stance and pressing a specific series of smaller buttons. Furthermore, the rotation I’ve used for basic enemies that stunned them was not working all of a sudden; I was still meting out some pretty tasty DPS, but it wasn’t as free as it had previously been.

From that point forward, I was being faced with some slightly sterner basic enemies that needed some more focus. I had to pay attention to when my target started blocking attacks. I was needing to use my second dodge move that has a far, far tighter window to get its best benefits. A regular-ass enemy was actually doing things to get behind me. Me, of all people! I’m the Assassin. I’m supposed to sneak behind you, random mob!

Incidentally, the fact that standard fights had me doing more than just one combo string started to make the Assassin feel both daunting and rewarding. I was having some brain whirring moments when I would completely forget what buttons to hit or I would mess up the timing, but then I would also zero in and focus and start to slowly puzzle my way through it all. I hadn’t really felt a comb-heavy buttons-per-minute MMO class like this since pretty much every class in Black Desert. It really started to open my eyes.

That’s not to say that I’m suddenly really digging into this game overall. I am still absolutely abusing the “F” key in order to skip all of this game’s dialogue at breakneck pace, and the game’s “world” still feels like a series of small maps connected by tunnels on a very guided path. Themepark MMOs are often my preference, but hooooo boy is this one uninteresting.

It’s a good thing, then, that the Assassin’s skills and the ramping up of combat in general is still enough to keep me pushing through because there really isn’t much to Blade and Soul NEO otherwise. Fighting might be its only sauce, but hot damn is it a tangy sauce.

I actually have an option available to me. For the most part I’ve been playing alone in a crowd, bar incessant party invites from bot accounts over and over enough that I had to turn on auto-decline. But I’m now at a point when I can get into a dungeon run or two provided I can find a party to join at the times that I’m able to play this BnS NEO Classic Divine Gems for sale game, anyway.