Fox Gaden
Immortal Guides
1145
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Posted - 2013.09.30 14:51:00 -
[1] - Quote
DonGÇÖt Panic.
You can play with the free suits and no skills and still have fun. Plus the free suits donGÇÖt cost you anything. So donGÇÖt feel pressured to figure everything out at once. Of course if you are reading this, you are doing your research, so I should probably get on with it.
I would like to say there are no wasted skills in DUST, but Dropsuit Command, levels 4 and 5 would prove me wrong. With no bonuses and all dropsuit trees unlocked by level 3, maxing out Dropsuit Command wonGÇÖt do anything for you. On the other hand, with a 1x training time modifier, if you did made that mistake, it didnGÇÖt take a lot of skill points, so donGÇÖt worry about it.
Other than Dropsuit Command, there are no wasted skill points, as anything you skill into will likely be useful to you at some point. However, as a new player with few skill points, your best bet to be effective when fighting against veteran players with over 10 million skill points is to use your early skill points effectively.
Phase 1: Focus on skills that benefit all Dropsuits.
Phase 2: Experiment using as few skill points as possible to find your favourite style of play.
Phase 3: Focus your skill plan to specialise in your favourite style of play. (You can diversify later.)
Phase 1, Skills that Benefit all Dropsuits:
Start with Dropsuit Upgrades. Level up your shield and armour skills to increase the shields and armour for every suit, including the free starter fits.
- Dropsuit Shield Upgrades: 5% Shields per level
- Dropsuit Armour Upgrades: 5% Armour per level
Get these skills up to 3 or 4 before moving on to other stuff. Come back to these and max them out as soon as you can spare the skill points.
If you are a good shot:
Go into Weaponry and skill up Handheld Weapon Upgrades, in order to equip these modules in your high slots to make your weapons do more damage. Make sure you get the module that matches your weapon size. (If you are not a good shot, donGÇÖt bother with Weapon Upgrades until much much later.)
Dropsuit Core Upgrades:
Electronics gives you more CPU, and Engineering gives you more Power Grid. These are important skills, but they have a high training time modifier, so it is best to training them as needed, when you need more Power Grid or CPU to make your fitting work.
The rest of the skills under Dropsuit Core Upgrades unlock equipment. There are militia variants of most of these that you can try, but it is usually worth skilling to level 1 to use the standard equipment. Train these when there is a piece of equipment you want to use.
Phase 2, Experiment until you find you calling:
Weapons & Equipment:
Most (but not all) weapons and equipment have Militia versions which don't require a skill to use. Go to the Market and look for the Militia section. (You wonGÇÖt find Militia stuff in the Weapons or Equipment sections of the market.) Buy weapons or equipment that look interesting. Then in your Dropsuit Fittings screen, use the Duplicat option on a starter fit, and Edit the new fit. Then use Replace to equip the weapon or equipment you want to try out.
If there is not a Militia variant of the weapon you want to try, then just skill to level 1 in that weapon and get the Standard variety in the weapon section of the market. (To try the HMG or Forge Gun you will have to get Militia Heavy Suit from the Militia section of the Market.)
Suits:
Your Starter suits are Medium Frame dropsuits of whatever race you chose for your character. They are similar to Assault suits of your race, except without the suit bonuses. (Note that GÇ£Racial BonusGÇ¥ refers to the racial suit you have skilled into, not your characterGÇÖs race.) You can use suits from another race if you skill into that raceGÇÖs suits. Only skill to level 1 for now.
If you want to try being a Scout or a Heavy, then you can buy a Militia Light Frame suit or Militia Heavy Frame suit. The Light Frame will be Gallente, and the Heavy Frame will be Amarr. The Standard suits are a bit better than the Militia suits, so if you seem to like it, try skilling into level 1 to get a better feel for it. This is necessary if you want to try the Minmatar Light Frame suit, as the Militia version is Gallente.
A Logistics suit requires you to skill a Medium Frame suit to 3, before you can skill the Logi suit of that race to 1. It is better to make multiple Starter suit fits, each with a different piece of equipment, to try the equipment out. If you really like using equipment and want more equipment slots, then you may want to specialize in Logistics. Do some research before selecting which Logi to skill into, as it is more of a skill point commitment.
When fitting your suits, keep in mind that the only difference between Militia modules and standard modules are the fitting requirements. So fit Militia modules to save ISK, unless you run out of Power Grid or CPU. (Standard is better than Militia for Suits, Weapons, and Equipment however.)
Phase 3, Specialize:
Once you have tried out various suits, weapons, and equipment to get a feel for what role you like to play, then focus your skill training on that role until it is fully developed.
Level the Operation skill for your weapon of choice to 5, and work on a few levels of Proficiency. Whether you should level Rapid Reload, or Ammo Capacity as well at this stage depends on the weapon you chose.
If your primary weapon is not good in Close Quarter Combat against Infantry, then level a sidearm Operation skill as well. If you are a good shot you may consider the Scrambler Pistol, otherwise go with the SMG.
Keep in mind that putting Proto modules on a cheep suit is much less expensive than running a Proto suit with cheep modules.
Read guides for your chosen area of specialization for more information. |