Skills

A Rogue's action drawer with all class skills unlocked.

One feature of the Class System is that players can spend any available Mana Points on Skills to use on their Tasks, themselves, and their party members. Skills are temporary advantages, such as boosts to the player's or party members' stats. Players earn their first skill at level 11 and get one more per level until level 14, totaling to 4 class skills. If the player changes their class, the previous class's skills are removed and are replaced by the new class's skills. The new skills do not have to be re-learned.

Using Skills

UsingMana — As the player hovers over a task when using a task-targeting skill, the task will have a purple outline and the cursor will turn into an icon and description of the skill.

Each class has a certain set of special skills. These appear in an action drawer in the bottom of the Tasks page on the Habitica website, and under Skills in the menu on the iOS and Android apps. Each skill has a target, which can be either a task (Daily, Habit, or To-Do), the player, or the player's whole party.

Task Skills

On the website, for skills that target a task, click on the skill and then click on a task. On the apps, tapping on a skill will bring you to a list of tasks you can cast the skill on; then tap the desired task. The skill's effect will be applied immediately, and a confirmation message appears indicating mana has been deducted. At this point, the skill has been applied to the task. Note that casting a skill on a task does not complete the task and the task does not need to be completed at the same time that the skill is applied. Casting on a completed task or completing the task after the skill is applied does not maximize the effect of the skill or maximize the reward of completing the task.

Website notification indicating Backstab skill was applied to Check Emails task

Skills can be applied to a task more than once. This method is called stacking. Each cast of the skill has approximately the same effect.

Task skills cannot be cast on challenge tasks. However, if a player chooses to keep the challenge's tasks after the challenge has ended, the player can cast skills on those tasks.

Changing Your Mind

If the skill being cast requires a task to to be selected, it is possible to "back out" while casting the skill. To back out, after clicking on the skill but before clicking on the target task, reload the Habitica web page or hit the Escape key to cancel the skill use. On the iOS app, tap the "Cancel" button in the top left corner of your screen. On the Android app, tap your phone's back button. There is no way to undo a skill after it has been fully cast (i.e., after clicking on the target task). To refund the mana spent on a skill cast by accident, use Fix Character Values under Settings > Site (direct link) on the website.

Player Skills

Up-arrow next to level icon indicating a buff.

For skills that target yourself, simply click on the skill. Its effect will be applied immediately. If the skill is a buff, it will last until your next Cron, and your avatar will have a small up-arrow icon next to your level to indicate the presence of a buff; however, this shows up on the website only.

Party Skills

Party Chat Screen — A party chat showing that a Healer has recently cast Blessing, a party skill

For skills that target the party, click on the skill. Its effect will be applied immediately to each of the players in your party. To see a message indicating the selected skill was cast on the party, click the "Fetch Recent Messages" button in your party's chat. The message will be displayed in pink text on a grey background.

If the skill is a buff, the effect will last until each player's own Cron. An avatar with a buff active will have a small up-arrow icon next to the player's level.

Skill Strategy

Buff skills can stack, but are calculated on the base stat and are thus not exponential. Still, this can enable a party to temporarily achieve very high stats. See the Buff page for more information.
As mentioned above, buff skills will last until the next Cron, so it is often considered most strategic to cast a buff right after your cron for the day, for individual buffs, or soon after the majority of party members have cronned for the day, for party buffs. This enables the buff to last as long as possible. Alternatively, players in parties that span several time zones may want to consider spacing buffs so that players with different schedules all receive some benefit.
To see when all your party members last cron, and thus have an idea when they will next cron, you can use the Party & Guild Data Tool

Productivity Benefits

Players can use skills to help motivate themselves when they are struggling with difficult tasks or to reduce the damage that was taken, rather than having to restore health with a potion. For example:

During illness, Warriors might take a Defensive Stance, as an alternative to resting in the Inn, to reduce (but not remove) health loss.
When faced with a major new task, such as a project for work or a major household repair, Mages might award themselves more experience by using Burst of Flames on the task. This also moves them closer to leveling up, reducing the chance they will die from other Dailies they had less time to accomplish.
When faced with a disagreeable or taxing task, such as an unusually high pile of dishes after a party, Rogues might Pickpocket that task for a motivating gold boost.
Rogues can also use Stealth when a particular Daily or particular Dailies are threatening their health (i.e., already low health or a lot of red Dailies that may not be completed) that day.

Party Benefits

Players who have formed parties can use their special abilities to help each other. Depending on their class, party members can defend each other from damage triggered from neglected Dailies or bad Habits, deal extra damage to bosses, recover the HP or MP of the rest of the party, and encourage each other with increased stats for more experience gain, gold, or drops.

Available Skills

This section is an overview of the available skills for each class. Please visit the Warrior, Rogue, Healer, and Mage pages for more in-depth descriptions of the skills for each class. Icons for skills were released on April 12, 2016.

Icon	Class	Skill name	Skill cost	Target	Level	Effect
	Healer	Healing Light	15 MP	Player	11	You gain a boost to your health.
	Healer	Searing Brightness	15 MP	Player	12	Your tasks become more blue/less red.
	Healer	Protective Aura	30 MP	Party	13	Party gains a buff to CON.
File:Shop heallAll.png	Healer	Blessing	25 MP	Party	14	Your whole party regains health.
	Mage	Burst of Flames	10 MP	Task	11	You gain XP and deal extra damage to bosses.
	Mage	Ethereal Surge	30 MP	Party	12	The rest of your party (except other mages) gains MP.
	Mage	Earthquake	35 MP	Party	13	Party gains a buff to INT.
	Mage	Chilling Frost	40 MP	Player	14	Uncompleted Dailies' streaks won't reset to zero after Cron.
	Rogue	Pickpocket	10 MP	Task	11	You gain gold.
	Rogue	Backstab	15 MP	Task	12	You gain gold and XP.
	Rogue	Tools of the Trade	25 MP	Party	13	Party gains a buff to PER
	Rogue	Stealth	45 MP	Player	14	Some unticked Dailies are ignored by Cron.
	Warrior	Brutal Smash	10 MP	Task	11	You damage a boss, task becomes more blue / less red.
	Warrior	Defensive Stance	25 MP	Player	12	You gain a buff to CON.
	Warrior	Valorous Presence	20 MP	Party	13	Party gains a buff to STR.
	Warrior	Intimidating Gaze	15 MP	Party	14	Party gains a buff to CON.