Halo's Skilltree Wallpaper 01

I think for the blue orb, the top dots are Flight Assist and the bottom dots are Terrestrial Speed, branching off into Celestial Speed, aka Warp Speed. Since the flight orb cancels vertigo, and increasing the bottom increases her speed by a fair margin,  I think that the others will assist her in flying as well. Better reflexes or sharper sight or Spidy Sense for things coming at her.

All of the heptagonal's nodes, except the ring with two lit pips in the middle, are dual function abilities. You can see how the heptagon connects each orb the the two adjacent and how each orb is connected to each other orb within the heptagon. While the exact combo abilities are a mystery, each of those pips will be a combination of the two orbs they connect.

The inner ring with two lit pips, I believe, is wholely separate from the heptagon and it's inner crossings. While each pip of the inner ring does correspond to an orb, I believe these pips are actually required to activate the functionality of the center shape. See how the inner ring pips all have a line connecting to the corners of the absolute center geometric? That is something important and having all of the inner ring pips are what turns it on.

Then we have each orb's individual ability pips. These are things like shield strength, ppo damage increase, ppo attack style, flight speed, flight type, telepresence distance, teleport distance, truesight radius, lighthook strength, lighthook length, etc.

My guess, though, is that each orb's single double lined pip is the thought activated/autoequip function. Each orb has one and I draw evidence for this by the emerald orb's actions in #541. It HAS it's solo pip filled in, so it's function requires no manual input. Sydney was clearly reaching for her mask tether, probably thinking "I need to grab this so I can breath!". The Emerald orb's autoequip function kicked in and placed itself in her hand.

Also, if you think about it using the personal spaceship theory from #542, the Citrine Orb most likely has healing functions.

PERSONAL SPACESHIP
Ruby Orb: Offense
Amethyst Orb: Defense
Sapphire Orb: Propulsion
Citrine Orb: Medical
Raspberyl Orb: Tractor Beam
Topaz Orb: Communications
Emerald Orb: Life Support

be more awesome to actually known what possible skills are. the suspense not knowing is a killer

HEY IT'S THE GOD OF THE SEVEN FROM GAME OF THRONES!!!

Not sure if you still check these, Dave, but I thought a picture of the skill tree would be an appropriate place to ask this; You said on the latest page (#511) that you already know what each pip does, however, I was wondering whether you actually have them mapped out or if you simply know what all the possible abilities are. Any chance of enlightenment? 

hmmm...lets start a thread offering up ideas as to what the powerup for each orb and the grid in general  would do.  The Lighthook orb is a good place to start.  it has five unique power ups for it.  so starting left to right;  Use within the shield, lifting capacity  length,  shape and penetration.  sorry for the last one, they did try to call it the Molestorb in the comic.    

i wonder what all the activation points on light hook are for?

I think the link between the shield and the PPO might allow for shooting through the shield to prevent blowback (like the sand), but given the PPO power levels, she's probably not going to test that.

What does it mean? What does it meeeeean?! I MUST KNOW, DAVE!

Some more specualtion as to the powers both locked and unlocked in Sydney's grid.

-I think the Flight orb line that has 2 points in it might be her "deflector" that I think DaveB has mentioned relating to her not needing a shield when flying at certain speeds, and that the nearly complete speed line will likely lead to something for potential interplanetary/interstellar speed boosts.
-Also maybe the grayed out line in the Flight orb relates to enhanced senses or reflexes for when she's flying at her higher speeds to give her time to dodge or otherwise react to potential obstacles and threats
-I think the orphan nodes that are enclosed in the lines might be something akin to passive or always on mode and the reason the speculated green healing orb hasn't healed her bruises automatically is that perhaps what she has unlocked in it isn't the line for healing physical injuries, or perhaps she hasn't figured out how to control it through thought/will alone
-The comm-ball is difficult to guess with due to the number of paths it has but I think the path that has 4 in it is the truesight path due to its immense power in seeing through illusions, and that one of the others with only one in it is the telepresence self due to its inability to interact with solid objects and its inability to use truesight through it which I think the one with the double bond at the end will eventually unlock. It may also gain the ability to allow the telepresence self to act independently so that she can focus on more than one thing at a time (which with her ADD will be difficult to master if true unless it also grants a small measure of what Harem's mind is like)
-With the lighthook, I think the path with 3 unlocked is its lift strength and at least one of the other paths is it's overall potential length, one possibly being the number of hooks spawnable at the same time, and perhaps the other that's unlocked is her capacity at manipulating its shape
-The PPO I think the path with 3 unlocked nodes I think is overall beam strength and range and the 2 unlocked in the circle give it its fire element with the explosion modifier, the others potentially being other elemental paths (ice/water, lightning, air, etc). Meaning she might have the ability to fire a basic laser beam without the explodey bits but is only familiar at the moment with the firey part so everything burns
-Now the shield path with 4 unlocked nodes is obviously its strength and I agree the orphan node is likely a kind of oxygen scrubber ability, while the yet to be unlocked 3 path with the double bond might be a path for multiple shields allowing projection around others that she's not with though it also looks like it will link to the flight path so who knows the potential there
-The bond between the Flight and PPO might be a kind of booster for when those are the two she's holding, maybe why the beam and resulting explosion were more powerful than she seemed to expect when she demonstrated it at the range and those two seem to have some, as of yet unlocked, linking skill paths that could unlock some interesting combo skills between the two (auto air defense to targets she deems hostile while flying maybe)
-The other synergys have lots of potential like between the PPO and lighthook might allow her to pass on unlocked elements to the hook for added damage potential, the Shield and Comm-ball might allow anyone inside a shield to see what Sydney sees or even teleproject anyone inside a shield, PPO and Healing orb could allow for huge bursts of healing projected in beam form, Shield and Lighthook for hooks to spawn inside or outside the shield or for the hook itself to project a limited shield by changing its shape, Flight and Shield to change the shield shape for better aerodynamics and thus increased speed and control

I really want to know what the brown ball does and even more so what will happen when she fully unlocks that 7 part wedge system in the middle of the grid. I'm thinking a kind of temporary control of all orbs making her a nigh unstoppable force of nature during which she hopefully retains what presence of mind she usually has.

Rampant, highly specific speculation:
I figure the flight/telepresence synergy will allow her to swap places with her light clone. Handy!
In that case, the unclaimed branch on the flight orb is probably the teleport system proper. Guessing the nearly unlocked branch is warp speed, meant for space flight.
The orphaned node on the shield orb is obviously the oxygen refresher.
The tentaclorb/telepresence synergy should let her light clone actually touch things.
The unclaimed telepresence branches might be telepathy and invisibility, and I'm guessing the orphaned node is either 'lie detection' or 'auto-translate'.
Also, the truesight branch is likely the one with a double bond in the end, signifying "always on".
Finally, the central circle is IMO the "how many orbs usable at the same time" limit.

It'll be interesting to see how many of these predictions I get right

I would soooo pay money for a spoileric copy of your notes on this thing.  I'd even sign an NDA.  I love Grrl Power, but you're never going to live long enough for Sidney to complete this tree.  She's gained 1 skill point in, what, 4 years?  The anticipation is killing meeeeee

Reminds me of the skiltree in one of the Final Fantasy games. Inspiration?

so did you decide what the last two orbs do? or are you still mulling them over.