One word: Options.

I think it's a matter of playing style and perspective -- if you're risk-averse, go ahead and use the utility skills for their utility and ignore the combo mechanic. If you're willing to take a risk and go in claws swinging, though, you're rewarded with both better offense (roughly +1 damage per combo rank, ignoring resists, plus some EDR) AND better defense (especially Magic Resist and Magic Reflect, but also Dodge, Counter, and a bit of regen later on).

Got a zoo with a convenient chokepoint? Start chewing, and the combos help you chew faster and more safely. Octos along the back wall? Dashing Strike to close the gap. Low on health and surrounded? Double Jump to relative safety, or go for a long Shrike's Passage out. And so on, and so forth. It's designed to give melee-focused characters more options (mobility to get both in AND out), and enhance the options they already had (hitting stuff).

(And yes, I probably did spend too long mulling that one over. Apologies.)

I don't quite understand this, the abilities seem to emphasize kiting and running away with their cooldowns, but you have these combo skills that try to punish that behavior (ineffectively). Seems a bit schizophrenic to combine the two as the player is likely to decide that he'd rather play it safe and kite with Skyward Strike than exploit the combos unless he really didn't have anything to worry about in the first place.

That's one of the best skill mods that I've seen, you used a very good theme. :)

I'm loving this skill set. It may be a bit on the strong side, particularly because of the mobility. I love that the 1st level skill can be used to go through bars and doors.

Such great rogue trees coming out recently! Trying it out now.

that's so cool you did a crossover

that pic look's so happy xD

lets see how this works shall we...?