Summary
- Players can choose from 4 unique vault hunters in Borderlands 2 with varying playstyles and skill trees.
- Maya has skills to increase healing, shield capacity, element damage, and is vital when playing with friends.
- Maya also has skills like Flicker, Wreck & Cloud Kill that offer significant combat advantages against different enemies.
Players who get the base game for Borderlands 2 will have four vault hunters to choose from. Each of these vault hunters has a very different way of playing and will have different skill trees to develop. Axton is great for players that want to throw out a turret and be a one-man army. Salvador will appeal to players wanting a damage output machine that can tank incoming damage. Zer0 is all about stealth and sniping, making them perfect for rogue archetype enthusiasts.
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Lastly, there is Maya, who is perfect for exploiting every weakness enemies may have. Maya’s skill trees will let her develop well into either dealing damage at face value, being an invaluable support, or tearing through enemies in record time by exploiting their elemental weaknesses.
8 Wreck
Much Bigger Payoff Than Accelerate When it Really Counts
- Fire rate increase
- Damage increase
Wreck starts off by giving a +10% increase to fire rate and a +6% increase to gun damage. However, these benefits will only apply while an enemy is Phaselocked. These values increase to +50% and +30% respectively.
While Accelerate can get up to +15% increase gun damage without enemies being Phase locked, Maya can increase the duration of her Phaselock to create a comparison that utterly dwarfs Accelerate's damage increase. This allows players to deal with incredibly dangerous elites that become trapped in her Phaselock, unable to fight back before falling to this skills damage.
7 Sweet Release
Keeps Players Topped Up on Health for The Early Game
- Frequent healing
During the early game, players will need to keep their health topped up using healing syringes. This is one of Mayas earliest skills, and can give her, and her teammates, a consistent means of healing.
This comes in the form of life orbs from killing enemies trapped in her Phaselock ability.
Players will have access to far better healing options in the endgame, but this makes survivability skyrocket for the games earlier parts. The more levels players invest in this skill, the more life orbs will be created.
6 Ward
Enemies Can’t Deal Damage Against a Well Maintained Shield
- Higher shield capacity
- Shorter recharge delay
Shields are an intrinsic part of staying alive. Enemies will need to shatter the player’s shield before they can get to their health, but players can duck behind cover to let it recharge. This skill will give players +5% shield capacity and -8% to their shield recharge delay.
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These values will increase to +25% and -40% respectively. This is ideal for players that want more survivability, and can let them pop in and out of cover while regaining all lost health through their Sweet Release skill.
5 Restoration
The Best Skill to Have When Playing With Friends
- +Max health
- Consistent teammate healing
Restoration will give players a +3% increase to their maximum health and allow them to heal allies for 6% of the damage simply by shooting them. These values will increase to +15% and +30% respectively. This skill is not only good at early game, but endgame as well.
It lets players skyrocket their allies healing and lets them attack from a safer distance with increased maximum health. Playing further away than allies lets players keep a watchful eye to see who needs healing, and when they can put their focus back on dealing damage.
4 Res
Invaluable Skill to Have During Boss Fights
- Manually revive teammates
A lot of times players will be in the midst of a Fight for Your Life situation. However, there will also be plenty of times when there will be no enemies to kill. This can be especially true during boss fights.
Luckily, not only can Maya heal up her allies by shooting them with her Restoration skill, she can also instantly get downed allies up by using her action skill on them. This can turn a group of Mayas into a near-unstoppable squad of high-damage medics that constantly revive one another.
Getting the hang of this early will pay off for most of the game, and its many DLCs.
3 Flicker
Elemental Effect Chance is Far More Valuable Than Face Damage
- Elemental effect chance increase
Dealing damage and healing may be very important elements, but they are not as important as using the actual elements. Elemental damage is the ideal approach to dealing with different types of enemies, and this skill will give players a +6% chance to trigger elemental effects.
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When maxed out, it will have a total increase of +30%. Swapping between the right guns with this skill will rack up insane amounts of damage.
Maliwan is a great weapons manufacturer for players going down this route, as they specialise in elemental damage.
2 Immolate
Target the Nearest Red Health Bar When in Fight for Your Life
- Damage increase
- Higher second wind chance
There are plenty of fleshy enemies to set ablaze in Borderlands 2, and this skill will give Maya an extra 10% damage in the form of incendiary damage when she enters Fight for Your Life. This can be pushed up to a maximum of +50% damage.
This bonus damage on its own is a lot of help, but using it against enemies with red health bars can keep players from getting back up from the brink of death to fight on. It's easy to see why Maya is such a beloved Borderlands character.
1 Cloud Kill
There Is a Massive Number of Robotic Enemies in the Game
- Constant access to corrosive damage
Borderlands 2 doesn’t just have red health bars and blue shield bars to be on the lookout for. Many enemies in the game will have yellow bars that can render their fire and shock weapons performing poorly.
Cloud Kill sits in the middle of the Cataclysm tree, which means it can be the 10th skill a player picks up. This allows players to create a cloud of corrosive damage to melt robotic and armored enemies regardless of what gun they have. Players that don’t get a good corrosive weapon with other classes might find plenty of areas challenging, but this single skill can make any of these moments significantly easier ordeals.
Borderlands 2
- Released
- September 18, 2012
