DUST Search - Noob Proof Guides (Skills and Skill Points)

Sana Rayya wrote:

Aeon Amadi wrote:

(EDIT: Either way, ignoring those skills for whatever reason/excuse is just putting you at a disadvantage among your peers. Fair warning.)

40 HP for 620k SP isn't too bad, particularly if you also use medium frames, but 10 HP for 620k SP is a bit steep. Especially for a new player, where that SP could unlock a proto weapon or three brand new advanced modules.

I use a suit that's got 1/2 to 1/3rd the EHP of my peers. There certainly have been moments where I've survived with 0 armor and 0 shield, but those are few and far between. More likely than not, in the instances where I've died an extra 10 EHP wouldn't have made the difference between life and death.

I will continue to roll my eyes at people who suggest maxing certain core skills before any others. To me, this game is about content, and that means unlocking modules, suits, weapons, and the fitting skills to use them all, all unlocked progressively. You can put points into "stat" skills like armor/shield upgrades along the way, but they shouldn't be your first stop, and you certainly SHOULDN'T level them to 5 before devoting points into other things.

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Aeon Amadi Edimmu Warfighters Gallente Federation 5199	Posted - 2014.03.14 01:20:00 - [1] - Quote Aeon Amadi here. I've been playing Dust 514 for almost two years now and have tried out just about everything this game has to offer. So, here goes a rather long-winded explanation on Skills and Skill Points. Skill Points. These are arguably the most important little bastards you'll ever need in this game and they're amazing to have en masse. From here on they'll be referred to as 'SP'. OBTAINING SKILL POINTS To start off we're going to talk about how these are accumulated. There is Active SP and Passive SP. Passive SP is accumulated whenever you select a character in the character selection screen to obtain it and it basically gives you a single SP every three seconds or so. The speed at which you are given SP can be affected by Passive SP Boosters by 50% and 100% respectively, though the 100% Omega Boosters are only sold intermittently. Active SP is accumulated at the end of each battle that you fight. You are limited to a certain amount every week in a sort of 'Soft Cap' in which you are given 190,400 Active SP in a pool - taking from that pool with every battle. If you do not obtain all the SP available in this pool every week, it is lost forever. This pool can be enhanced with Active SP Boosters by 50% and 100% respectively, again, the 100% being omega boosters that are only sold occasionally. This effect will not show in the pool in the end of match screen, however the bonus will be applied to how much SP you gained from that match. Bear in mind that Boosters are only available to players who pay real money. SKILLS AND SKILL MODIFIERS No matter how you earn it, SP is spent solely on Skills. Skill Books can be bought with ISK and when you have purchased them you can apply SP to those skills. Each skill has a different effect, some unlock items that you can use, some enhance those items and some do both. This is important to note as some skills are very very important, but more on that later. Skills range from Level 1 - 5, each level requiring a proportionately higher amount of SP in order to attain. Each skill has a respective 'Skill Modifier'. This modifier is represented as a multiple which increases the amount of SP investment necessary to get a new level. 1x is your baseline but this can go as high as 12x (or higher). To give you an idea of what this means: A Level One Skill with a 1x Skill Modifier costs 6,220 SP to unlock. A Level One Skill with a 12x Skill Modifier costs 74,640 SP to unlock. This is important to note as you don't want to waste a bunch of SP investing into something that's not going to benefit you when you need it. Some skills are more important for a new player than others and it's sort of senseless to invest in a skill with a high modifier if you're lacking in other areas. Some skills require other skills in order to unlock/invest SP into. For instance, you cannot invest SP into Assault Rifle Proficiency until you've obtained Assault Rifle Operation 5. Likewise, you cannot invest SP into Assault Rifle Fitting Optimization until you've obtained Assault Rifle Proficiency 4. CORE SKILLS What I'm going to discuss next is what is often referred to as your "Core Skills". These skills will drastically enhance your suits performance and they apply to every single suit you will ever use, regardless of your specialization. I CANNOT STRESS THE BELOW SEGMENT ENOUGH Some skills are more important than others, I'd even say they're mandatory. Regardless of what you're running you want to get Dropsuit Armor Upgrades and Dropsuit Shield Upgrades to level 5 (this should actually be your first priority, bar none) because they increase your base HP by 25% in both category at level 5. This will put you at a level playing field with your peers and could very well mean the difference between life and death in a lot of cases. I CANNOT STRESS THE ABOVE SEGMENT ENOUGH Another thing you're going to want to invest in is Dropsuit Electronics, Dropsuit Engineering, and Dropsuit Core Upgrades. These will give you more PG/CPU to play with on your suit and essentially allow you to fit more powerful modules/weapons/equipment on them. This is going to be necessary as the Suit itself is far more expensive than anything you're going to be putting on it with the exception of weapons. It is more financially beneficial (and generally better) to fit a less powerful suit with more powerful modules than it is to fit a more powerful suit with less powerful modules. (If you're still having problems fitting your suits after you max these skills out there are other skills that will reduce the PG/CPU cost of weapons/equipment, but this shouldn't be something you want to worry about early on) Finally you want to invest in Dropsuit Biotic Upgrades because this is ultimately going to increase your maneuverability. This is especially important if you plan on going into Minmatar or Scout suits as this is their hallmark more times than not. This skill will increase you're Movement Speed, Sprint Speed, Maximum Stamina (how long you can run) and your Stamina Recovery Speed. Regardless of what you specialize in, these skills will help you in all situations. These should be a high priority to any early player. SPECIALIZATION Once you've figured out what you want to do in the game, hallmark on it. This is very important because it's much better to focus on a certain path than to invest in a bunch of different things that you likely aren't going to use very often. Each race has it's own unique feel and playstyle but ultimately it's how you build each suit. Be sure to invest in Skills that compliment your specialization. Useful Links //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=133588 //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=134182
Aeon Amadi Edimmu Warfighters Gallente Federation 5199	Posted - 2014.03.14 01:21:00 - [2] - Quote Feel free to ask questions if you have any. Useful Links //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=133588 //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=134182
Sana Rayya WASTELAND JUNK REMOVAL Top Men. 1017	Posted - 2014.03.14 14:43:00 - [3] - Quote Aeon Amadi wrote: Some skills are more important than others, I'd even say they're mandatory. Regardless of what you're running you want to get Dropsuit Armor Upgrades and Dropsuit Shield Upgrades to level 5 (this should actually be your first priority, bar none) because they increase your base HP by 25% in both category at level 5. This will put you at a level playing field with your peers and could very well mean the difference between life and death in a lot of cases. Why do people always say this... Although it's nice to have them at 5, it's not necessary unless you have nothing else to spend 620k SP on that would yield a greater benefit. For a Scout, this bonus is only 8-10 EHP. For a medium frame it might be 14-18 EHP. For a heavy, it's probably worth it, but for the other suits, that's a lot of points for a very small gain. I'm at 32.5 mil and my shield/armor are both at Lvl 4. As a scout I can't see 10EHP as being worth 620k SP until I've skilled up every module, weapon, or suit that I'd ever want.
Spectral Clone Dust2Dust. Top Men. 1694	Posted - 2014.03.14 14:52:00 - [4] - Quote Dropsuit armor and shield upgrades are only useful for heavy suits. For mediums and light it just gives u a few extra HP, so might as well keep them at lvl 1 just for the unlocks. Those skills are not a must. Put those points in biotics instead, that will help you more if you are a med or light suit. Drop it like its hat.
Aeon Amadi Edimmu Warfighters Gallente Federation 5201	Posted - 2014.03.14 16:34:00 - [5] - Quote It's even more important on a scout suit BECAUSE they don't have that much HP. Don't pretend like there hasn't been cases where you've gotten down to the single digits in armor because I have and I can guarantee that if I didn't have those skills I would have died in those situations. The benefit might not be crazy amazing but you're talking about an additional 50 EHP on a Gallente Scout with both of those skills at level 5. Just as well, those two skills apply to -all- suits, not just Scouts; so the benefit might not be amazing to the suit you're using right now but it will help if you ever decide to use anything else. On a side note, I'd argue that you get less of a bonus from Biotics than Armor/Shield Upgrades. You're talking about a whole .05 meters/second faster on the Gallente Scout, so if you're being stingy on SP that's probably not much better of an alternative. (EDIT: Either way, ignoring those skills for whatever reason/excuse is just putting you at a disadvantage among your peers. Fair warning.) Useful Links //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=133588 //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=134182
Sana Rayya WASTELAND JUNK REMOVAL Top Men. 1021	Posted - 2014.03.14 17:40:00 - [6] - Quote Aeon Amadi wrote: (EDIT: Either way, ignoring those skills for whatever reason/excuse is just putting you at a disadvantage among your peers. Fair warning.) 40 HP for 620k SP isn't too bad, particularly if you also use medium frames, but 10 HP for 620k SP is a bit steep. Especially for a new player, where that SP could unlock a proto weapon or three brand new advanced modules. I use a suit that's got 1/2 to 1/3rd the EHP of my peers. There certainly have been moments where I've survived with 0 armor and 0 shield, but those are few and far between. More likely than not, in the instances where I've died an extra 10 EHP wouldn't have made the difference between life and death. I will continue to roll my eyes at people who suggest maxing certain core skills before any others. To me, this game is about content, and that means unlocking modules, suits, weapons, and the fitting skills to use them all, all unlocked progressively. You can put points into "stat" skills like armor/shield upgrades along the way, but they shouldn't be your first stop, and you certainly SHOULDN'T level them to 5 before devoting points into other things.
Aeon Amadi Edimmu Warfighters Gallente Federation 5202	Posted - 2014.03.14 17:44:00 - [7] - Quote Sana Rayya wrote: Aeon Amadi wrote: (EDIT: Either way, ignoring those skills for whatever reason/excuse is just putting you at a disadvantage among your peers. Fair warning.) 40 HP for 620k SP isn't too bad, particularly if you also use medium frames, but 10 HP for 620k SP is a bit steep. Especially for a new player, where that SP could unlock a proto weapon or three brand new advanced modules. I use a suit that's got 1/2 to 1/3rd the EHP of my peers. There certainly have been moments where I've survived with 0 armor and 0 shield, but those are few and far between. More likely than not, in the instances where I've died an extra 10 EHP wouldn't have made the difference between life and death. I will continue to roll my eyes at people who suggest maxing certain core skills before any others. To me, this game is about content, and that means unlocking modules, suits, weapons, and the fitting skills to use them all, all unlocked progressively. You can put points into "stat" skills like armor/shield upgrades along the way, but they shouldn't be your first stop, and you certainly SHOULDN'T level them to 5 before devoting points into other things. And I will continue to roll my eyes at players who forego obvious broad-spectrum benefits Useful Links //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=133588 //forums.dust514.com/default.aspx?g=posts&t=134182
Sana Rayya WASTELAND JUNK REMOVAL Top Men. 1024	Posted - 2014.03.14 18:22:00 - [8] - Quote Aeon Amadi wrote: And I will continue to roll my eyes at players who forego obvious broad-spectrum benefits When you are a noob, there are better things you can spend your limited SP on than armor/shield upgrades to Lv5. You don't agree?
ALPHA DECRIPTER Dragon-Empire 836	Posted - 2014.03.16 08:16:00 - [9] - Quote Armor and shield skills are the only reason I am able to escape with 0/0 over and over again. Sure the buff is small but I would rather have 0 EHP remaining and survive then 0 and terminated. Scout Tactician Dance puppets, DANCE!


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