Thoghts on best skills, augmentation and gear

[lo_fabre]

Actually I've just got acces to CBD, without completely finishing the Industrial and Grid districts (achieved all Downtown). During my gameplay I've foud that some skills and gear seems very superior than others. I'll explain what I think in every class. I'll be glad to know if every one is doing the same, and specially if you're doing something different, what are you doing and why?

Common Skills

Weapon specialist:

Increases damage, althought I haven't found it really useful, because this game seems more about stealth than killing.
It's interesting in Soldies because it increases your weapon slots on 3rd and 4th levels. This allows you to carry a laser for shields and a plasma for armored soldiers, and alternate between them depending what you're figting. It's the only I've invested points, and only to 3rd level, because don't think the 4th slot very useful.

Health (sorry don't remember the name):

I dind't invest for the same reasons as above.

Pack mule:

I've found interesting to have only one lvl, and after doing all Downtown. This way you can put a shield and an armor to each unit and still have a free slot for an specific gear.
Still I did all Downtown without need to put both armor and shiel on every soldier, so I only invest points after getting other skills.

Common augmentation

Found specially useful the Atlas legs/arms to gain acces to high vents. didn't purchase for Infiltrator, because it has on a skill.

Common gear

A shield and an armor after Downtown. Useful if guardcaught you.

Soldier

Skills

Hardwiring:

My first chose to spend points and get 2 lvls. I've only go to 3rd and 4th after increasing "Explosive specialist". It's very useful to lock down cameras and turrets. I could wait to get the higher lvls until completing Dowtown, but had to get it later anyway.

Explosive specialist:

After 2 lvls of hardwiring I maxed it. Explosives allows you to destroy generators and loking down cameras. Also allows you to destroy almost every door with one grenade on 3rd lvl, so you can open it without having current.
Useful to kill groups of guards, but if you have hide well probably you only need to use thi way few times.

Rage:

I didn't invested on it.

Draw fire:

Put 1 lvl. Didn't see the point.

Hardening:

Same as before.

Gear

Grenades please!

Support

Skills

World scan:

First I maxed. It can be done quickly and on 3rd lvl you can scan people for free, so you don't have to pay when looking for good clones.

Stim packs:

Good to invest at least one lvl. It allows you to have an analogue to a pase button and gain some time to give orders to your soldiers. I've maxed, but not sure if it is useful after one lvl.

Team Leader:

Always good having more energy. I've invested after the previos skills.

Medic:

Just one lvl. Not very useful if you're playing an stealth game.

Mark target:

Didn't invest one point.

Hacker

Skills

Hacking:

Max ASAP. Yu'll need for obvious reasons.

Hijacking:

Max after hacking. You'll need new clones, but probably not after few missions.
It's also ineresting to neutralize guards. This ability is wall-piercing and doesn't requires line of sight, and has a great range with every lvl, so you can "neutralize" lonely guards without being noticed from behind a wall or door, then both use as explorer and meat or send to cloning.

Drone puppeter:

Invested one point. Get the drone. Didn't see the point.

Master technician:

Invested one point after other skills. Always useful to have better shields, but not at the cost of Hijack and hack.

Augmentation

This Firewall thing that makes you immune to jammers. They're a pain in the ass when blocking all my hacker useful things.

Infiltrator

Skills

Cloak:

Get one lvl ASAP. Very useful for stealth. After first lvl I found useful to max it, but fisrts I invested point on Master thief and Sword slash.

Master thief:

Get two lvls ASAP. You'll need acces to high vents and zip lines. Specially useful combined with cloak. After two lvls may be useful but I prefer maxin Sword slash.

Sword Slash:

Max after one point in cloak and two in Master thief. Very useful to kill lonely guards.

Master assasin:

didn't invest. In previous gameplay on first version of this game found the sniper very underpowered, don't know if fixed it or simply doesn't match my gameplay.

Gear

This Proxi thing, that allows you to use your Hacker lvl when hacking. It allows completing some missions using only your infiltrator.

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Well that's all. I hope people palying different ways put their opinions.

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I aopologise for spelling and other mistakes, but as you can see I'm not a natural english speaker. Don't hesitate to correct me.

[brbrbr]

master assasin useful for sniper used in "setup" mode from time to time. you will find sniper REALLY helpful on vantage/key point in setup, prepared in late part of game. just bring him ammo-pack feed his sniper rifle by something ;)

[TwistedMinds]

For a long time I had a very similar build (and reasoning behind it) to you lo_fabre. But in my last game I decided to go completely nut and rampage everywhere i go, house-rule is never let the heat/wanted-level go behind 1 bar (when possible). And wow.
You say the game is more oriented toward stealth... of course, you geared and skilled for stealth! Put points in Health (massive amount once maxed), and weapons skill (INSANE damage increase). It's easy to see the first Health skill and think it's useless, but as every other skills in this game, they increase exponentially. A skill maxed is rarely wasted. 1 points in it is meh. Rage, Draw fire, Harden, Mark target, Drones, Medic, Hijack/Scramble are your best friends.
You cannot get enough of gear slot, so pack mule is extremely powerful. Armor and shields are almost mandatory, but now since you are a man and face your enemies you will die. And it sucks. Bad. Add a F.R.E.D. That's 3 slot minimum for everyone. What about grenades (soldier), a medipack (support), 2 drones minimum (hacker) and Proxy Hacker/Remove explosive (infiltrator)? You almost need to max Pack Mule eh?
Stealth skills are only superior if you stealth. :) Try it, death balling is fun.

[brbrbr]

generally stealth as important for infiltrator as katana ;) its not essential to max it ASAP, but it makes life Lot easier for infiltrator and it finally Start making something usable for team :) draw fire and mark target wasn't really helpful, IMO. because cooldown for and weak effect in 1st case.

[todt]

I found smoke, emp, iron lung and speed legs v2 are also usable items.
But sniper is probably the worst item in the game.
The first thing I do in a run is replacing sniper with an uzi.

Edit: and yes I have completed the game and tested the recent changes to sniper.
It doesn't get better.

[Wintermute]

Master assassin is worth taking for speed increase. Priceless when you need to stealth-kill somebody and get out before energy ends.

As for katana - I'm not sure it's worth maxing. It fails to kill heavies and commanders after some point, and i use it to take out non-executable guys anyway (drones and dogs). So i wonder what level is enough to take those down.

[Wintermute]

BTW, what scramble does? I'm yet to find anything it can be activated on

[elbobo19]

Rage is really useful when maxed out because it gives the damage bonus to your whole team, you can just dump damage into the big enemies.

[Creamysmooth]

Originally posted by Wintermute:

BTW, what scramble does? I'm yet to find anything it can be activated on

That is something I still haven't figured out properly, I thought it was supposed to work against mechs and turrets or cameras, though I think it just sends people crazy, it's one that I have never used because I never really figured out what it did, I just hijack instead.

[B0sh1]

Ammo pack + arming your team all with frags is hilarity

[Gillsing]

Originally posted by todt:

The first thing I do in a run is replacing sniper with an uzi.

In my first game, the first thing I did was the opposite: I changed all uzis to sniper rifles with silencers. It wasn't that impressive, so I didn't do that next time. But for my current game I did it again, and this time it worked much better, as I focused less on stealth and finesse and more on killing. See, a silenced weapon with such long range can kill regular Dracogenics Infantry in one salvo when all four agents fire. And even those that don't die generally come running/walking without firing their own noisy, shorter ranged uzis, so they're easy enough to kill quietly with a second salvo.

Now, unlike in Syndicate Wars, I have no plans to keep those sniper rifles forever, but they do the job nicely when used at the range they're designed for. And at shorter range I can bum rush the enemies and kick them to keep them down. No reinforcements for you!

[Disky]

I like to play all out combat, I Never Ever Stealth. Mitch is the opposite of me..

[Wintermute]

Guess devs don't know what scramble does either :P