Barter Lv 7 or Lv 10

[Maximilian17]

I just did a google search. Someone said that barter Lv 7 is enough, as long as we unlock the Lv 7 perk. I overlooked this perk until my character is level 12 and already sold my junk before unlocking this perk.

Others said that Lv 10 barter should be a priority and don't sell any unwanted gear until barter has reached Lv 10.

According to the internet, we can have Lv 10 barter character and just leave it at the base. At the moment I assign Lv 7 to Lucia and haven't recruit anymore ranger. So just the 6 of us.

What about from your experience? Is your barter Lv 7 or 10?

[Cursed Life]

7 is more than enough, its a filler ability, late game you dont need much money anyway.

[Radiac]

If you pay the skill points to get Barter to level 7, you can wear the Monocle and read the skill book to get you two more levels. It's also possible, at random, to get a +1 Barter buff from the Tarjan machine in The Bizarre. It isn't permanent, but it lasts a pretty long time. I don't remember there being any Barter dialogue checks that do anything besides get you some money or loot, so all of those are skippable, and I don't think there are any level 10 Barter checks at all, IIRC.

[Heau]

Fast 7, slower 10. I'd generally agree with Charmed life. Especially with DLCs now, 7 should be ample enough to carry you through the game unless you respec at every sauce and buy every tiny sidegrade you come accross all game.

Mostly the reason behind slower 10 is because the 4th skill I basically always fill with explosives or weird science for late game scaling with modded weapons and the game isn't so hard that I'd rather catch 2-3 extra levels of the filler if it meant I might need to be cautious with money again like I was in early vanilla.

[Maximilian17]

Originally posted by Charmed Life:

7 is more than enough, its a filler ability, late game you dont need much money anyway.

I see. Thanks.

[Maximilian17]

Originally posted by Heau:

Fast 7, slower 10. I'd generally agree with Charmed life. Especially with DLCs now, 7 should be ample enough to carry you through the game unless you respec at every sauce and buy every tiny sidegrade you come accross all game.

Mostly the reason behind slower 10 is because the 4th skill I basically always fill with explosives or weird science for late game scaling with modded weapons and the game isn't so hard that I'd rather catch 2-3 extra levels of the filler if it meant I might need to be cautious with money again like I was in early vanilla.

I haven't respec any character, although I feel that sneaky sh1t on Kwon and survivalist on Lucia is not that useful. Because I use sneaky sh1t on my sniper anyway.

Don't have dlc here.

[SCARaw]

i have special character with barter 10 and toaster, we trade near base ;)

[valium]

You dont need barter on any of your actual core squad members, you can use one of the characters milling around your base as your barter/crafting mule, use them, then send them back to twittling their thumbs.

[Radiac]

Originally posted by valium:

You dont need barter on any of your actual core squad members, you can use one of the characters milling around your base as your barter/crafting mule, use them, then send them back to twittling their thumbs.

Just as a counterpoint to this idea, not that "barter mule" is a bad thing to have, per se, but you don't actually need to resort to that, if you allocate skill points very carefully.

Without any DLC to get you extra XP, you will most likely get to about level 25 by the time you have to go to Yuma County Speedway and start the "home stretch" of the base game. I made two Charisma 10 guys as my first two rangers, and they got to level 26 by the time I was talking to The Mechanic to start that part.

26 levels, at 3 skill points per level, plus 10 more from maxxing Intelligence (eventually) gives you 88 skill points to play with on each character. Now, if you save the skill book for a given skill and use it to get from level 9 to level 10 in that skill, buying up the first 9 skill levels the hard way costs 22 skill points. Therefore, it's possible to get a given team member responsibility for 4 different skills and get them maxxed by the time you need them at level 10. I should point out that there are level 10 Lockpicking and Explosives Checks in places like Aspen, but there are also alternative ways to handle those skill checks (some safes have keys you can get, not all mines actually need to be defused, you can just avoid them or shoot them, etc).

And that's just assuming you have the skill books. There are also Utility Items that give a static +1 bonus to a skill when worn (e.g. the Modder's Kit, the Leader's Banner, etc), and a few armor pieces that can get you a +1 to a skill as well (the Scrap Helmet, the Machinist's Hat, and the Bardic Tights).

What all this boils down to is, you can give each travel team person responsibility for one combat skill (counting only Sniper, Big Guns, Automatics, Small Arms, Brawling, and Melee Weapons as "Combat Skills" as the game itself defines that term) and three other skills, and you will be able to cover all of your bases with points to spare. In fact, with a six-person team, you have 18 non-combat "skill slots" that you have room for, and there are only 17 non-combat skills in the game, including the secret unlockable one, Combat Shooting.

I did all this on a spreadsheet accounting for the skills Lucia and Jodie come equipped with, and was able to cover all of the skills in the game with points to spare by the time everyone is level 26, despite my assumption that I'd never actually find the Weird Science skill book, or the the Weird Science Utility item, or the Armor Modding book, since those are all gated behind choices I didn't want to make. I was also able to devote all 28 points into Sniper on Jodie (since my other sniper reads that book) and get her a few extra ranks in First Aid, in addition to making her my Armor Modder. My first ranger, who did Automatic Weapons, Leadership, Explosives, and Lockpicking also had enough points to play with that I was able to give him 4 ranks in Mechanics, so that I had someone to do that before Jodie became available, and he had a few ranks in First Aid as well. I was also able to give two different people full ranks in Weird Science (the hard way) getting their 10th rank in that at level 25, and both of THEM had a few ranks left over for light First Aid dip too.

This is all, of course, with perfect hindsight. I've played through the game multiple times. But it is possible to do a 6-person team with no seventh man mule character at all, and cover every skill, including Barter, Survival, and Animal Whisperer.

[3quarks]

Originally posted by valium:

You dont need barter on any of your actual core squad members, you can use one of the characters milling around your base as your barter/crafting mule, use them, then send them back to twittling their thumbs.

this is more or less ok for mod weapon/armor, but barter.. It's too much fuss to haul around a dedicated character. Not to mention random encs. There are enough SPs across your team to spare some for Barter (+monocle +skill book) on some char.