Good Heavens weapons define your playstyle across three distinct combat tech trees: Warfare, Trickery, and Sorcery. Rather than locking you into a static class, the game allows you to spend Red Essence—earned from defeated beasts and introductory quest gifts—to specialize in direct melee brawling, ranged marksmanship, or elemental spellcasting. Every weapon equips directly to your character's hand slot and pairs basic strikes with a secondary ability bound to right-click.
Combat Tech Trees and Weapon Classes
Early in the game, an NPC grants you 10 Red Essence to unlock your primary weapon branch on the tech tree (opened via the T key). You can expand across multiple branches as you gather more essence from monsters across Xant-Rar.
- Warfare: Focuses on direct physical combat power. This path covers light melee weapons (such as swords and clubs), heavy two-handed weapons (such as hammers), and plate armors. Warfare weapons rely on stamina and close-quarters combos.
- Trickery: Tailored for agility and precision. This tree includes slingshots, shortbows, daggers, and later-tier deployables like traps and turrets. Trickery builds require ammo management and prioritize staying mobile or striking from bushes.
- Sorcery: Built around elemental magic featuring fire, ice, and lightning. Magic weapons, including elemental staves and high-cooldown spellbooks, inflict status ailments like chill, shock, or burn before following up with empowered attacks.
Early Game Weapons and Crafting Recipes
Most early weapons are assembled at the Weapons Bench, which requires logs, stone, and rope to build after placing your initial territory totem and basic workbench.
| Weapon | Combat Tree | Station | Required Materials | Weapon Abilities / Notes |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Wood Club | Warfare | Weapons Bench | Wood Logs, Rope | Basic melee attack; blunt secondary attack |
| Slingshot | Trickery | Weapons Bench | Wood Logs, Rope | Ranged attack; requires craftable Pebbles (made from Stone) |
| Bronze Sword | Warfare (Light Weapons II) | Weapons Bench | 1x Bronze Ingot, 5x Chitin, 1x Rope | Primary slash attack; secondary ability: Heavy Sweep |
Crafting metal gear like the Bronze Sword requires progressing into processing facilities. You must smelt ingots at a furnace (which consumes combustible fuel like wood), defeat armored bugs for chitin drops, and weave grass into rope at a loom.
Weapon Abilities and HUD Controls
Good Heavens does not treat weapon attacks as basic button mashers. Weapons occupy the Hand slot on your character HUD, which governs offensive skills, while defensive and utility slots come from worn armor pieces:
- Hand Slot (Primary Attack / Left-Click): Executes standard weapon swings, projectile shots, or elemental casts.
- Hand Slot (Secondary Ability / Right-Click): Activates the weapon's built-in special skill. For example, the Bronze Sword triggers a wide Heavy Sweep, while two-handed hammers feature a leap attack that closes distance with heavy knockback and stun.
- Chest Slot (Default: Ctrl): Defensive abilities tied to torso armor. Warfare armors grant Fortify Armor, Sorcery mage robes activate a Mana Shield, and Trickery brigandines grant a backward evasive dash.
- Foot Slot (Default: Space): Movement and positioning tools, including sprinting and dashing granted by specific boots.
- Head Slot (Default: Shift): Utility abilities tied to headgear.
Each secondary ability triggers a visual cooldown on the HUD icon adjacent to your hotbar.
Mid-Game Weapon Progression
As you expand into higher-tier biomes like the Drylands, Wicked Forest, and Crystal Lands, weapon options expand through Act 2 progression:
- Heavy Melee Weapons: Developer updates addressed slow recovery times on two-handed weapons by adding gap-closers. The two-handed hammer provides crowd control through area knockback, giving solo and co-op players a reliable way to pin down elusive enemies like running goblins or troll mobs.
- Elemental Staves and Spellbooks: While early Sorcery relies on basic projectile staves like the Icebolt Staff, Tier 2 unlocks elemental Spellbooks. These books have long cooldown windows but unleash heavy area-of-effect damage against grouped targets.
- Ammo Conservation: Trickery weapons rely heavily on inventory slots. Slingshots consume pebbles gathered from mining stone nodes, while bows require crafted arrows. Because ammo stacks in inventory slots, keeping a buffer of ammunition at your base storage chests is essential before undertaking dungeon runs.
Frequently Asked Questions
How do you get Red Essence to unlock new weapons?
Red Essence is obtained primarily by hunting and slaying hostile creatures, beasts, and monsters throughout the world. A starter bundle of 10 Red Essence is provided by an early tutorial NPC to let you unlock your first weapon node in Warfare, Trickery, or Sorcery.
Where do you craft weapon ammo like pebbles?
Pebbles for the slingshot are crafted at your base workbench using gathered stone.
Can you switch between melee, ranged, and magic?
Yes. Good Heavens does not feature rigid character classes. You can spend essence across all six tech trees simultaneously, allowing you to carry a sword for close combat while keeping a staff or bow on your action bar for ranged engagements.
