AnungUnRama hefts his axe up and brings it down

　　AnungUnRama hefts his axe up and brings it down in a slash across the ghilliedhu's trunk, starting combat. The sentient tree is quick to react, but its devastating attacks are slow. While the aman dodges the creature's fists, I cast a constant barrage of energy attacks, lining up each shot so that they hit their target. The beast succumbs to its wounds and we are victorious against our first foe! Not missing a beat, we collect the gold and crafting materials it drops and run over to the nearest ghilliedhu standing and bring war to it and its kind.

The ghilliedhus are stunningly easy to kill, but then again I've been playing TERA for a year now. What they're actually doing is teaching you how the game works in very slow motion—they lumber around (see what I did there?) and do everything that later mobs do, just at a quarter of the speed, giving you plenty of time to learn how to respond and move.

TERA's combat system feels kind of like a fighting game—you get into a groove and start performing combos as you learn what skills take how long to charge, recharge, and work best against your various enemies. The ghilliedhus are kind of like practice dummies that occasionally hit back. You'd have to be pretty slow to get hit (and, full transparency, I do get hit a few times), but fighting them gives you a great introduction to how your character is going to work.