Combat Depth
A charged technique used to be safe just because it took a second to gather. It no longer is — and Wu Xing counters, which were never duel-exclusive to begin with, finally have a reason to matter in open PvP too.
Interrupting a Charge
Land a hard-enough hit on someone mid-charge on a gathered technique and their gathering shatters unspent.
- The threshold is a percent of the target's own max health, not a flat number — so incidental chip damage in a longer fight cannot trivially cancel a charge.
- Tunable and independently toggleable via
Technique-Interrupt-*inCombatDepthConfig.json.
The Punish Window
Landing an interrupt opens a short Punish Window against the same target — your very next hit on them lands harder, consumed the instant it does.
A plainer, more common trigger exists too: any ordinary Wu Xing-favorable hit — the same counter-cycle bonus that already applies outside duels — opens a smaller Punish Window. You don't need to land an interrupt specifically to get a taste of this mechanic; you just need to hit the right element.
Tunable via Punish-Window-* in CombatDepthConfig.json.
Wu Xing PvP Reward
Winning the elemental matchup on a real player kill now pays a flat Spirit Stone reward, on top of whatever else that kill already earns.
Any sanctioned duel kill — plain or Dao Duel — is excluded from this reward. A duel already has its own stakes and its own elemental bonus; this reward exists for open-world PvP, not to double-pay a duel that already pays for itself.
Tunable via Wuxing-Pvp-Reward-* in CombatDepthConfig.json.
How the Three Relate
| Mechanic | Trigger | What it does |
|---|---|---|
| Interrupt | A big enough hit on a charging target | Shatters the charge |
| Punish Window | An interrupt (large window), or any Wu Xing-favorable hit (small window) | Your next hit lands harder |
| Wu Xing PvP Reward | Winning the matchup on a real player kill | Pays a flat Spirit Stone reward |
All three are independently toggleable, and none of them touch Dao Duel's own separate Spirit Stone wager and elemental bonus — Combat Depth is about open combat, and a duel's own stakes are untouched by anything on this page.
Tuning
Every setting on this page lives in the new CombatDepthConfig.json: Technique-Interrupt-*, Punish-Window-*, and Wuxing-Pvp-Reward-*.
See Techniques for what a gathered technique's charge actually is, and Dao for the Wu Xing counter cycle these mechanics key off.