Wait with 2nd skill assignment?

[Kruk]

It seems levelling uses XP for both skills.
If i do not assign a secondary skill, does that mean my primary skill levels faster?

If so,it could be wise to e.g.not assign the 2nd pilot skill, as he then quicker is at maxlevel.

Anyone has experience with this tactic?

[shde2e]

From what I've seen, the 2nd skill does not seem to affect the speed at which the first one levels.
I think all skills are just awarded a certain amount of XP at the end of the mission.

[PJ]

I had (incidentally) performed an experiment about this and I've arrived at the conclusion and secondary skills actually DO affect primary skill XP gain.

So, recently I've started a new playthrough and in it I have a cohesive constant crew with a flight history of 60 or so missions. All crewmembers started at lvl 1. To 3 or them I assigned Medic as secondary skills, the others got other skills (Gunner, Engineer, Navigator, etc.). Now, you all know that Medic skill caps at level 4, while all other level up to 12
.
What I noticed is that while at first everyone leveled up evenly, but after all the Medics got their secondary skill at max (level 4), they started gaining levels faster than non-Medic personell. To illustrate, I'll say that my Engineer and two Gunners (who are Medics) are already level 12 in their primary "profession", while everyone else is lagging behind: Pilot at 9 nearing 10, Navigator at 10, Radio operator at 10, Bomb aimer is at 9, and obviously, their secondary skill levels are still growing and are 1-2 levels behind.

Now, for a pure experiment I would have to start a new game and have some crewmembers pick a non-medic profession, some pick Medic and some pick none at all - and see if it has any difference on who gets to 12 in their primary field first. (And for the experiment to be perfectly pure one would have to modify the savefile so that all his crewmembers start at level 1 with EXACTLY 0 exp poines, but I think that's a bit redundant) Maybe someone would get to that and clear this issue up once and for all.

[David]

As OP said. I tested this a long time ago, pretty easy to see if you don't cross-train, if you train a medic, or even just by looking at the bomber who can cross-train earlier.

It can be beneficial to stick with your primary jobs and not set a secondary skill until much later.

I can save you the experiment, already done:
If they have one job, they gain 100% xp into that job until it is maxed.
If they have two jobs, they gain 50% xp into both, until one is maxed, then 100% into the remaining.

If you tried your experiment, you would see this:
Single jobs hit 12 primary first, followed by single/medics, then everyone else. Everyone maxes double jobs at about the same time.