About the usefulness of certain skills.

[Tryclyde]

Say, I want to do a run using all 3 of the ass skills and don't want to cripple my party by trying to go too much intelligence thus ruining combat prowess, which 'loot' skills can I skip?

Somthing like, a party consisting of a 10 intelligence, 2x4 intelligence and a 1 intelligence combat beast wielding assault rifles, the 3 ass skills spread among them with mandatory surgeon, field medic, leadership, perception and demolitions.
The rest are the socalled 'loot' skills like lockpicking and safecracking.

Now the question: Which loot skills would be the most useless?
I know alarm disabling is crappy so thats a no go in this setup and I guess you choose either lockpicking or brute force, since there is some overlap in usefulness with these 2.

How would you setup this party?

Cheers

[Gillsing]

I think Alarm Disarm has a much easier check for certain high-end electronic safes with random top-tier weaponry, whereas maxed Computer Science only has the minimum chance of success as far as I recall. Then again, I guess explosives always works on safes without destroying the contents? I think there's an alarm that need disarming if you want to sneak into the Titan Temple silo without killing the patrolling monks, but I guess killing those monks doesn't make you an enemy of the monks above ground, so maybe it's not worth it for that?

I've read posts where Brute Force is preferred over Lockpicking, because almost any lock that can be picked can be brute forced. But that does not apply to the hidden weapon caches in Titan's Valley, and I guess there might be more stuff like that later in the game. But unless it's a really good trinket or top tier weapon, I suppose it's not worth the skill points?

One of the main benefits of Lockpicking might be to combine it with Safecracking and max both to get the perk that eliminates critical failures, since even when maxed, there's still a large chance of failure and therefore critical failure in Los Angeles. Brute Force is on the other hand useful for certain quests and locations, though in a lot of cases one could just toss some cheap TNT at the problem. One benefit of Brute Force is that it makes three combat perks available, where melee attacks can stun the target. Might be worth considering if combat is your game.

Surgeon is mainly for quests, as bringing a Ranger back from dying can always be done with a very low skill as long as you have basic trauma kits. Ideally it shouldn't even come into play that often.

[Amanoob105]

Max level if I remember right is 50. With that in mind I Ctrl+C'ed this from another forum.

INT 10 = 5 SP per level; 200 SP by level 40. You can roughly max out 4 and a half skills.
INT 8 or 9 = 4 SP per level; 160 SP by level 40. You can roughly max out 3 and a half skills.
IINT 4, 5, 6, or 7 = 3 SP per level; 120 SP by level 40. You can max out 2 and a half skills.
NT 1, 2, or 3 = 2 SP per level; 80 SP by level 40. You can max out almost 2 skills.

This doesn't account for the free level in a skill you can get from the skill books (try and save them for the last level of any skill their for).

I don't get where all the hate for alarm disabling comes from, it worked fine for me.
Also if you want all the looting skills you will want someone with toaster repair. While the items inside of them are not worth much, if anything, if you can find the right person to give them to....? Oh, then they can be worth their weight in gold (though that's not an analogy that should be taken literally, seeing as most of the items are very light to carry).
Outdoorsman can also help you find the hidden loot/locations on the world map, not to mention make the random fights a lot easier to deal with.

A lot of people like to do as you do and have one person be a "skill monkey".
Though that said, have one other person put a point into surgeon (and keep a kit on them because you can't transfer it over if the person with them goes down). Just incase your surgeon needs a surgeon.

Don't forget that you can add up to three other people to your group that can pick up the slack in any areas that your group is lacking in.

The only time I would say who has what skill really matters is if you want any particular perk that a skill has on a particular person (i.e. the brute force skill has perks that give bonuses in melee).
And because it's easier than trying to go though the whole list, here is the list if you want to plan in advance.
https://wasteland.gamepedia.com/Wasteland_2_skills

[Tryclyde]

Thanks for the replies.
I'm familiar with the basics of the game, so that is not really the issue I'm after.

For toaster repair there's Ralphy, so I don't need it on a main ranger. I pick up the skipped toasters when I recruit him, and since he starts low level you can turn him into anything you want besides toaster repairing. Add a point intelligence at lvl 10 and he gets 3 skills/level. Add an assault rifle to the mix and he is a very solid recruit. He would be my top choice as a low skilled backup surgeon, since adding 2 levels to weapon smithing is needed for the tinkering perk to make him more combat effective.

The brute force synergy with melee is awesome too. A makeshift sword (or any 3 AP blade) with a grip, 10 AP and maxed speed makes a melee ranger quite awesome.

The thing I am really after is, using all 3 ass skills requires you to keep those skills leveled quite early in the game because the skillchecks ramp up quite early, so you need to forfeit other skills. Since I don't want to go for 2 skillmonkies to make up for the early loot loss, which loot skills are the most useless.

cheers

[Gillsing]

Unless you want to have Scotchmo for the rest of the game, you could let him do all your lockpicking, while another Ranger handles safes, and then you ditch Scotchmo and add a higher level recruit. That way you can counter the early ramp-up of skill checks without having to pay the cost long-term, apart from the new recruit not getting XP for the early game. Then again, you could also just ignore all the loot early on and go back to pick it up when you already have the skills you need. Just don't conclude the Titan storyline until you've looted the canyon, as that's the only area in Arizona that becomes unreachable. As far as I remember anyway.

Forfeiting combat skills in the early game is quite feasible. That's what I did, and it worked out so well that now I'm in Los Angeles with a team that can barely fight. I'm feeling the usual betrayal when the game changes to disallow my old tactics, without giving any warning that it would happen. I used to have large enough areas to fight on my terms, but in Los Angeles the random encounter areas feel a lot more confined, and the enemies move faster. I really hate it when the game makers want to control their little battle arenas. I want to be the one in control.

[SnapSlav]

I 100% concur with Amanoob's point, with special emphasis on this part:

Originally posted by Amanoob105:

Don't forget that you can add up to three other people to your group that can pick up the slack in any areas that your group is lacking in.

^ This! VERY MUCH THIS!!!

That being said, it's still possible to get every skill you need on JUST 4 rangers! I found a way to do EXACTLY that with just my team of 4 customized starting rangers! Each had 1 or 2 weapon skills AND were able to start with enough skills to not miss out on anything at the beginning, AND eventually max out EVERY skill! You don't even need them to be 10-INT Skill Monkey types, you can have your crew of 10-4-4-1 Intelligence rangers, and still learn every valuable skill!

Moral of the story is: don't worry about what skills you can and can't have. You can have em all! ESPECIALLY when you maximize the effectiveness of recruits to lessen the skill burden on your primary rangers. They're ALL useful skills, so not only do you not need to skip out on them, you wouldn't even want to!

The following below is a more in-depth explanation/summary of why I'd say the skills are quite valuable, so read on unless you'd rather just take my word for it... =)

. . .

Of all the 19 non-combat skills, I'd say perhaps 1-4 of them could be skipped, but even then, they're still useful, barring aside 1 that's... well, it's really trash.

Alarm Disarm is amazing, even if you don't get "as much use" out of it as, say, Lockpick. Really complex doors require Safecrack to be able to open, rather than Lockpick. Some locks can be bypassed with Alarm Disarm or with Computer Science, so it's possible to get much utility with certain skills in place of other skills. But this isn't consistent across every encounter. SOME locked bunkers have a computer you can hack OR a door you can crack OR a lock you can pick. Most have just 1 way in, and they may be trapped in addition to that (so you NEED Disarm or Demolitions to break in safely). So it's not like these skills can be replaced with other skills.

Mechanical Repair is a pretty useful skill every now and then. It's most useful if you ever critically fail another security skill and you break a lock or something. You can Repair the lock and try again. Weaponsmithing is perhaps the most important utility skill, because it's one of the only ways to get access to really good Weapon Mods! If you want every character to have fully-kitted weapons, Weaponsmithing is an absolute necessity!

Toaster Repair is really the only skill I'd call strictly for "looting", and even then I find it much more valuable than for mere "loot"! Toasters are the ONLY way to find many important Quest Items, so without someone who can tinker with toasters, you're locked off from completing MANY side quests!

However Barter is the only skill I'd say is truly "marginal", at best, or possibly even useless. You get a little extra money, and you save a bit of money. Big whoop. =/

Animal Whisperer is a great way to get "free" attribute points! Many players like to buy the Trinket at the start of the game and charm 3 goats for 3 different rangers, without ever needing to actually learn the skill! I like the setup of 1 Goat, 1 Cow, and 1 Possum on 1 ranger, but that will take half of the game to complete. Still, this minimizes the risk of the animals being killed off by stray bullets if they're all following 1 ranger, not 3.

Speech skills are really good, and the SP expenditure into them can be easily mitigated by using Trinkets, strategic Skill Book usage, and most importantly, learning their level-1 Perks! Those Perks are damned powerful! With just 2 SP per skill per ranger (6 SP spent total), by level 4 you will have saved 18 SP! As you level the skills, you will have saved 36 SP! With the Books and Trinkets by the end of the game, you'll have maxed-out Hard A**, Kiss A**, and Smart A**, and you will have saved over 70 SP, AND they'll still be maxed! So you won't have to lose out on good Speech options in the early game, or by the end game!

Granted, most of this comes with hundreds of hours of toiling with this game over months. So newer players shouldn't be expected to know this from the start. I'm just weird like that... =]

[Gillsing]

I'm not sure why the shrines I just found didn't pop up the first time I went exploring, but now I found the RPG Codex shrine, and unless one can use explosives to open the hatch to the lower level, I guess Lockpicking is necessary to get the Choice trinket with its +5 Combat Initiative at the cost of -15% Evasion.

[SnapSlav]

Originally posted by Gillsing:

I'm not sure why the shrines I just found didn't pop up the first time I went exploring

Discovery-requirements be damned, World Explorer is your friend! =D

[Gillsing]

World Explorer costs a perk. Or three. I have better uses for those.

[SnapSlav]

Originally posted by Gillsing:

World Explorer costs a perk. Or three. I have better uses for those.

But it's really good, particularly on characters who don't need a bunch of "combat essential" Perks. If you're a Sniper, you only need Deadeye, and Tactical Positioning can be convenient at times (which VC comes with, by default), so you have PLENTY of time to invest in other Perks that other characters might not want.

Remember that for every Perk cost, your party has up to 7 opportunities to get it. So a powerful Perk that costs 3 Perks is really nothing amidst a total of 84 opportunities to get it.

[Gillsing]

My Outdoorsman Ranger is my armoured Ranger (three +1 Armor perks), and my mechanic (Handyman), and is about to become a heavy gunner (with all four perks). So no, there aren't any extra perks left over right now, and if there will be, I'd rather pick some combat perks. Finding those shrines is going to be super easy now that I already know where to look. But on that subject, is the safe at the Chia/Pankoa shrine always already looted, or is it only looted if the player wasn't directed to the location as a quest reward?

[red255]

So yeah. words.

So we have a bunch of skills.

safe cracking. used pretty frequently.

Lockpicking, usually has brute force as a second option a few number of locks don't. Brute force if you critically fail you need to wait 4 minutes. whereas if you crit fail the lock pick you need to roll a mechanical repair check for another attempt only getting one second attempt.

there is only one lock in AZ that needs to be picked and thats in darwin's village. Scotchmo got me thru it, his high luck kinda crit succeeded I think.

Brute force - like lock pick except typically better. though tnt works on alot of the things you can brute force.

Computer science -opens alot of things.

Alarm Disarming. its there. It starts as something stealth related and then it becomes something that also opens containers later on.

I typically run a 7 man party and get the skills later on.

Lock PIcking, Alarm Disarming, Barter, Surgeon (give everyone the first 2 point buy in and stock the first tier of raise dead items should be fine) Animal Husbandry,

are skills I put on the low burner. Mechanical repair is also something I tend to delay.

[SnapSlav]

Originally posted by Gillsing:

My Outdoorsman Ranger is my armoured Ranger[...] and my mechanic[...] and is about to become a heavy gunner

(In thick, stereotypical Southern drawl)Well there's yer problem! You put too much on a character who should be more combat-focused!

You should know by now that certain skills just synergize far better than other setups... Like I said, a sniper has an abundance of available Perks to choose from, because they really only need 1 or 2 for their sniping, so they synergize very well with utility, like scouting. Not to say you should have put this on your sniper (assuming you didn't avoid getting one to stick it to the meta-loving crowd), but there's plenty of character designs/plans that lend themselves very well to being a strong utility alongside strong combatant. I think meta-gunners and hacker/infiltrators are really the only builds that are major Perk drains. I find my tank has a hard time SPENDING Perks (after 12), NOT a hard time choosing Perks to take. =/

Originally posted by Gillsing:

Finding those shrines is going to be super easy now that I already know where to look.

Not necessarily. Like I said, there are discovery restrictions on many locations. IIRC, at least 1 shrine in LA cannot be discovered without either being put on your map or by World Traveler, and the Perk also lets you skip ahead and locate the others, too. Knowing that they're there isn't always enough.

Originally posted by Gillsing:

But on that subject, is the safe at the Chia/Pankoa shrine always already looted, or is it only looted if the player wasn't directed to the location as a quest reward?

I honestly do not remember... someone else will need to chime in for this!

Originally posted by red255:

So yeah. words.

You keep using this phrase. I do not think it means what you think it means.

[Gillsing]

Originally posted by SnapSlav:

You should know by now that certain skills just synergize far better than other setups...

I do know that. And strangely enough, my combat-focused Rangers all end up with Intelligence 1, which doesn't leave a lot of skill points for stuff like Outdoorsman, which doesn't have any combat synergies at all. And I tested the Arizona shrines and hidden caches with a quest-ignoring team of cheaters for whom I save-edited in some decent rad suits and power armors, and they found all the shrines and caches when they went to the correct locations, without Outdoorsman or Perception, as I recall.

The shrine in Los Angeles that has to be put on my map, it wouldn't be the one activated by using the display screen in Playa del Rey, would it? I think I've got that covered. Don't have the rad suits to get down to it yet, but I'm sure it'll work out.

[SnapSlav]

Originally posted by Gillsing:

I tested the Arizona shrines and hidden caches with a quest-ignoring team[...] and they found all the shrines and caches when they went to the correct locations, without Outdoorsman or Perception

My experiences were quite the opposite of your test... Didn't matter that I knew the exact spot to stand on, some locations just didn't show up to me until they were triggered by some other event... or until I got World Traveler. I specifically remember starting one of my runs, trying to get my preferred "best possible start", and I could not get the first shrine directly North of Ranger Citadel to pop up. Granted, the vast majority of my testing was a year or more ago, so the details are not as fresh in my mind as they could be. But bottom line, my take-away was that Perception/Outdoorsman mattered, even if they could be mitigated by fierce abuse of save scumming, sans exploitation they made a difference.

[Gillsing]

I had only one hidden cache (north west corner) that wouldn't appear, and it wouldn't appear no matter what levels of Perception and Outdoorsman I tried. Only an Outdoorsman perk made it appear. I'm still not sure why my real team got that one, while the test team did not. At this point I'm willing to chalk it up to random randomness of RNG procedurality. Unless it was brought to my real team's map by something they did in some area, which my quest-ignoring test team did not do.