SkillsRPG

Eight skills, sixty abilities and a reason to specialise

SkillsRPG adds eight skills to Paper and Spigot servers (1.17 to 26.x) that level from 1 to 100 as players mine, fight, farm and fish. Levels give points to unlock and rank up abilities, which players fire from a three-slot ability bar using mana. Milestone challenges and cross-skill synergies unlock 40 more abilities along the way. It works on the first start with nothing to configure.

How it works in play

Skills: Swords, Axes, Archery and Defense for combat; Mining, Woodcutting, Farming and Fishing for gathering. Each one levels from 1 to 100.
Abilities: each skill has four abilities bought with points and ranked up to 5, and four more won in milestone challenges. 64 in total.
Ability bar: three slots, four from total level 200. Press F (swap hands) to switch the active ability and right-click with that skill's tool to fire it.
Mana: 50 plus 1 per total skill level, up to 500. It regenerates 5 per second out of combat and shows in a boss bar.
Milestones: a challenge at levels 25, 50, 75 and 100 of every skill, 32 in total. Completing one unlocks that tier's ability.

The eight synergies

Reach level 50 in two linked skills and a combined ability unlocks on its own:

Riposte (Swords + Defense): blocking returns part of the damage.
Battle Dance (Swords + Archery): switching between bow and sword stacks damage.
Stoneshield (Mining + Defense): mining builds shield charges.
Resource Surge (Mining + Woodcutting): a 5% chance of double drops in both.
Hunter's Patience (Archery + Farming): hits while standing still stack damage.
Berserker's Edge (Axes + Woodcutting): more damage the hungrier you are.
Provider (Farming + Fishing): regeneration for nearby allies.
Anchor (Defense + Fishing): less damage taken on water.

How to use it

Install: drop the jar into /plugins, restart once and paste your licence key into config.yml. English is the default; set language: es for Spanish.
Play: XP comes from breaking blocks, killing mobs, harvesting crops and fishing. Open /skills to spend points.
Balance it if you want: the XP curve (with per-skill overrides) is in xp-curves.yml, XP per block, mob, crop and fish in xp-sources.yml, and every ability rank in abilities.yml.
Network: switch storage.type to mysql so several servers share the same progress.

Fair XP

Blocks a player placed themselves give no XP, spawner mobs give 20% of the usual XP, and adventure mode gives none. All three are in config.yml.

Commands and permissions

Everyone: /skills (the hub), /skills bar, /skills challenges, /skills synergies, /skills respec, and /skill <skill> for one skill.
Respec: the first one is free, then each costs more through Vault (1,000 to start, times 1.5 each time).
Operators (skillsrpg.admin): reload, set a level, add XP, reset a player, and unlock or lock an ability.

Placeholders

With PlaceholderAPI installed: %skillsrpg_level_<skill>%, %skillsrpg_xp_<skill>%, %skillsrpg_xp_pct_<skill>%, %skillsrpg_total_level%, %skillsrpg_mana%, %skillsrpg_synergies% and %skillsrpg_unspent%.

Requirements

Paper or Spigot from 1.17 to 26.x, forks like Purpur included, on the Java version your server already uses.
Optional: Vault (paid respec), WorldGuard (respects no-PvP regions), PlaceholderAPI (placeholders) and MySQL (shared progress on a network).

None of them is required. Without Vault every respec is free. The plugin never refuses to start because an optional plugin is missing.

FAQ

Do players have to open a menu to use abilities?
No. Once equipped on the bar, abilities are switched with F and fired with right-click during play.

Can players farm XP by placing and breaking the same block?
No. Blocks a player placed give no XP when broken.

Can I make one skill slower to level?
Yes. xp-curves.yml has a shared curve and an override per skill.

Can I translate the messages?
Yes. English and Spanish are included in lang/, in MiniMessage, and missing keys fall back to English.

For questions or bug reports, use the discussion tab on this page or our Discord.