Min/Max Guide

[Lucius Kern]

Attribute Points
You get a maximum attribute point of a total of 12 after that you stopp getting any while leveling
this means you can have 2 attributes at 5 and one at 2.
For Staff combat you are going to want Strength
For Technomancery you are going to want Willpower
For Dagger/Gun you are going to want Agility.
For Shield/Mace you are going to want Strength

Consitution is the least useful stat IF you can avoid being hit, a skilled player will most likly ignore this attribute compleatly as all it does is health and carry weight limit.

Tip on Build
The Staff is VERY powerful against multiple opponents and is really nice to team up with Technomancery. First playthrough I was planning on Dagger/Gun but ended up on staff because it is crazy efficent against multiple opponents. Technomancery is also extreamly good against multiple opponents and tough opponents when talented correctly. This is why I went 5 str, 5 will and 2 agility. Constitution is perhaps the biggest joke, unless you are going for shield/mace, i am thinking you want High CON, STR and low Willpower. You will be able to have decent gloves at willpower 2 but nothing with the proper Omph, Electric weapon and Magnetic Shield is all you are going to want in such a build to deal added damage and have a damage reduction shield.

Character Talents
You have Charisma, Science, Crafting, Lockpick/Traps, Exploration and Stealth.
You get a total of 9 talent points after that you stopp getting any while leveling.

A Min maxer will simply have 1 point in charisma, lockpicking/traps, Science and Crafting.
This is because you get equipment that gives +1 bonus and companions giving an additional +1 bonus. However make sure that your favoritt companion gives this bonus that way you will always be at 2 in that skill either by companion or gear, or 3 if you got the time to change armor.

Andrew - Companion Technomancer; when friendly gives +1 to Charisma
Neisha - Companion Rogue: When friendly gives +1 to Lockpick
Amalia - Companion Guardian: When friendly gives +1 to crafting
Scott - Companion Healer: When Friendly gives +1 to science
Phobos - Companion Heavy Hitter: When friendly gives +1 to Exploration

Note: I have not found any equipment with Science +1.

Talent Usefullness

Charisma: Buffs up companions damage, health and lower cost in shops. Also this skill lets you do conversation options releated to charm and intimidation. Mercant type armor gives +1, Andrew friendly gives +1. You only need 1 or 2 points here nothing more.

Science: You can use healing on companions in combat, also this skill lets you do conversation options releated to science. I actually took this one up to 3, because healing the companions myself meant i didnt need to bring with me scott which uses Health Injections like they were tictacs.... it is to costly to have Scott as a healer in the party, better to dodge to a companion hit E buttong and jump into the fray again.

Crafting: You use this to craft more advanced upgrade options to armor and weapons as well as having conversation options to aid people with crafting. You only need 1 or 2 points here nothing more. Amalia will give +1 and Worker type clothes will give +1

Stealth: Get this puppy to 3 it is totally worth it when you can take out heavy armored ASC units at the end of the game with a little love tap of the Technomancer glove during stealth. Ofcourse if you hate stealth use the points on something else.

Lockpicking/Traps: Potentially my biggest love/Hate talent, traps are deliciously powerful if used right but for lockpicking you only need Neisha, Vory clothing and 1 point to lockpick the worst locks.

Exploration skill is NOT worth it, if loot is really important and you are struggling to upgrade gear to you I suggest just hunting mutant animals for poor quality leather and serum, or humans for gear to recycle. There are helmets with +1 exploration bonus and thats about it, you wont need anything else, the items gained from mobs should be more than enough to keep you going.

Suggestions
3 points in Stealth, 3 Points in Science, 1 point in charm, lockpick, crafting.
That will be your 9 points. That way you can heal others yourself, stealth and take down the high end mobs with a single stealth takedown without breaking stealth and by quick saving before conversations you can get the time you need to change armor. With this skill set up
Andrew, Neisha and Amalia will be your primary companions to worry about. When crafting in the cities you take on Amalia and worker clothes and you will be at Rank 3. In conversations with Charm action you take on the Mercant type clothings and I always use Andrew so I always have the added bonus from being his friend. Neisha is kinda the same, you will have 2 ranks in trap/Lockpicking most of the time and when you face a tier 3 lock you simply take on the Full Vory Jacket and woola no lock is going to stop you.

When grinding materials Phobos might be a wise choice to bring due to his Exploration bonus but honestly that skill isnt worth it. Rank 3 is really nice to make injections whenever and wherever but not worth all those points in it.

Ability talents
Electric Fist: This ability is my bread and butter against any opponent, the fact it debuffs their electrical and physical defenses with 25% for 20 seconds means a Electric fist followed by staff hit or another electric fist can easily decimate an opponents health severly.

Overload vs Magenetic Shield
Okay here is a tough one, if you are skilled at dodging enemies and feel that consitution is a joke then yeah overload is far superior. But if you feel that the enemies always manage to get a shot in I would go Magnetic Shield. Personally I used Magnetic Shield in the start when you are fighting alone alot the armor is great especially when surrounded from all sides, but as soon as I got Overload that was no longer the case. With a maximum of 4 Fluid points and overload, electric weapon and magnetic shield takes up a whole point when active it is not wise to have all 3 active at all times. Sure you can still use magnetic shield in tough fights if you want, but as I am pretty much dodging everything and spend my injections mostly on companions I stopped using it all together.

I guess you could drop electric weapon and use magnetic shield instead of that, but I prefer to be all out offensive than defensive in this game.

Thats it, hope it can be of use when you are planning your character.

[Necro]

good overview!, particularly the limits of when you stop getting the talent points!

[Yograin]

Doctor Coat gives +1 Science

[player1]

Note that some equipment that adds talent bonuses also have ability prerequisites.

For example clothes that give +1 crafting also requires 1 point in agility.

So make sure to take that into account when planning.

[Panic Fire]

Doctors Coat and Cival Servant Coat both give +1 science.

[OneAngryGamer]

Absolute bul lshit :) Stopped reading at "i maxxed and relaxxed science uhuhuh"
You don't need Science on more then 1 point and only cuz it's makes you regen health out of combat like 100 times faster, healing companions is useless since even if they get knocked off - they still get up after you kill mobs and regen themselves.

U gotta take LockPick to 2(cuz Niesha will give you 3rd) and Crafting to 3(or 2 if you want to deal with swapping companions autism) due to free ~10-20%(depends on wep) crit chance in the late game.

U gotta max Charisma due to it's bonuses to companions and useful dialogue chance buffs throu ENTIRE game.

Stealth : Terrible choice and most useless talent tree - ignore it completely :)

As companions you should use : Niesha and Phobos due to them being most useful - Niesha cuz lockpick+1 and poison attack and Phobos cuz he got most dmg/tankiness among them and also gives free 250 weight. While Scott being completely useless(zero dmg/zero tankiness), Amelia = Guardian - worse then any others in general and Andrew simply being shi ttier version of Niesha with useless bonus and less dmg.

P.S i've passed the game on hardest difficulty and didn't had any real chalenge while using Staff/Technomancy talents combo with 5STR/4AGI/3Power stat destribution.

[Panic Fire]

The fact is when it comes to talents its simply a question of how much busy work do you want to do?

[Necro]

as for talents i went with, 3 science, 2 lockpick, 2 crafting, 2 charisma - and i'd drag around charisma / crafting companions, stealth didnt really interest me

[Lucius Kern]

Well I am playing on Top Difficulty and science at 3 really do help a lot then. And if you had continued reading you would see I mentioned all the things you did as well. Clothing + Companion bonus will work great for you. Using Andrew you will have charisma at 2 with one point and when you are about to speak to a quest mark you simply take on mercant clothes and then you will have 3. As for Charisma 3 above Science 3 I can see that it has its appeal, but honestly I would rather have the option to heal them for 25% with one heal injection than the last charisma bonus, but it is all a matter of opinion. Infact seeing as Lockpicking only gives you mats and use items (or in the very rare case equip items) you could drop it all together and use it on charisma instead, having 2 charisma, 3 with andrew and only throw on Beggars/Full vory jacket and use nisha to handle 1-2 locks. And in all fairness the companions cannot hope to match you in combat, they are simply there to annoy the heck of the enemy giving you the room and time to take them out. But yes Charisma 3 is a good alternative but seeing as I primary use stealth first I never had much problem with enemies and since I hate scott and only used him when I was forced too I choose Science. Since I single handedly can deal with most enemies before fight even starts boosting companions seem like a waste and Science gives the convo option and never using scott I would have no means to boost it to 3 with a single skill point, the healing companions was a decent bonus in hard fights with multiple enemies. Hench Science 3 over Charisma 3. But if you think the constant charisma bonus is superior by all means go for it, but Since you need Andrew to open Technomancer gates.... yeah... Charisma was a dump talent for me, still got 2 points in it due to Andrew and skill point (or 3 with clothes for convo reasons) But seeing as I somehow managed to skip the Science bonus on doctor clothes I think that next play through I am going to have only 2 points in science and wear the clothing for Convo reasons, but then again in combat the heal injection on companions will be far inferior to 3 points. Meh... I think I will stay with 3 in science after all, less hazzle with the clothing. BUT if i ever drop Stealth those points will go to charisma seeing as I would need more beefy companions.

[player1]

IMHO, I prefer two points in lockpick, plus beggars clothibg for total of 3, since that is actually only way to open 3rd level locks in the early game.

Additionally, it helps for late game too, since you are not forced to take specific companion with you.

[Lucius Kern]

But only 3 lockpick chest have any rare gear like the first settler glove or the Aurora Technomancer breastplate or at least the ones I have found that is. The most of them have materials, Injections and traps or simple gear you can just vendor or loot of mobs.

The real bonus is in the Traps dealing more damage, or at least for a stealther such as myself.

[bati]

Great thread. How would you rate the combat styles in order of power? I played dagger and pistol for about 2h so far and it's pretty ok but I'm wondering how it stacks vs others.

(I'm on highest difficulty, if it matters)

[Lucius Kern]

Same here: Highest diff.

Personal opinion
1: Technomancery: AOE attacks and the lightning fist with overload and electric weapon is used all the time
2: Staff: Berserker and AOE attacks, great for taking down large groups.
3: Sword and gun: Fun and cool, great DPS against single targets, moderate against several targets
4: Shield and mace: High survivability: Low DPS, might cause nerfed stats.

Staff + Technomancery: Lightning AOE move + Staff AOE move tend to have left all but the strongest armored mobs dead. Incase of heavy hitters in heavy armor or guardians you just smack em twice with the lightning fist and they tend to not be standing for long after that.

in detail

Shield and mace is perhaps the least powerful, the dmg is low but surviability is high but seeing as the DPS companions cannot hope to keep up you should avoid this, except when in solo fights against bosses. It has many cool defensive counter abilities and might be fun to play if you like to block and parry, especially when you get the auto parry ranged attacks and the like, but this is the style i think is the worst.
Attribute Requirement: Strength for maces, shields and armor. Con for HP since you wont be able to dodge explosives and aoe moves a slight mistake in timing can be very unforgiving.
Positive high defense, great survivability, can withstand a lot of damage and attacks with ease
Negative Since you need STR and CON for this set up you need to forsake willpower giving you less use in technomancery. Low damage and low aoe damage

Sword and Gun is perhaps the one thats the most fun to play and perhaps the one with the highest single target damage output and will teach you how to dodge attacks the best. The style require agility for armor and weapons so can be united quite easily with technomancery. This style also resembles Staff combat quite a bit, as you need to dodge incoming attacks. The Style Skills give you the option for a lot of various increasement in dodge, critical dodge and counter attacks with increased critical chance. Sword and Gun strikes me as a hybrid between Shield and Mace and Staff combat.
Attribute Requirement: Agility for both weapons and the armor.
Positive: high mobility dodge, high speed attacks, ranged special move to deal with enemies that can poison or shock you, ranged interrupt.
Negative: crappy aoe damage, otherwise

Staff Combat style is perhaps the most OP one, you will face large amount of mobs in this game and most of them are weak little minons that pack a punch but cant take a beating. So Staff combat will easily help taking out the smaller ones quickly, without being bad at single target attacks. It has talents for improved dodge, improve dodge range as well as making aoe moves wider and with greater chance to knock people over. Use this style correctly and you will be death incarnate.
Attribute Requirement: Strength
Positive: Good interruption, Huge AOE dps output, Quick interruption, Overall balanced style
Negative: None

Technomancer style is a way to amplify the main combat style or be the main combat style.
You have ranged attacks, buffs and melee attack. The Lightning Fist move also packs a debuff in armor and lighting resistance and is best used before unleashing your physical attacks. The Lightning Arc is best used for dealing with near death opponents as you can spawn a fluid recharge point with the proper talents and get back the power you used quickly. The Aoe ''spell'' is a great combat opener as it has a good chance to knock enemies over and deal good amount of damage.
Attribute: Power
Positive: Works well with all other styles
Negative: Fluid Bar limitations between buffs and using spells keep you from being god on the battlefield -sniffles-

[bati]

Thanks, you just sold me on staff combat. I wanted to reroll anyway, rogue style didn't seem to fit my chosen roleplaying option which was to not extract serum from dead enemies.

[WeylandYutani]

Interesting but i would like to know how much Skillpoints are avaible and if theres a New Game Plus aswell ?

[ge$k!lL]

There in total 35 ability skill points. So i am in the middle of the game and leveling up has no effects anymore .. thats sad