Which are the most useful skills? Is stealth useless?

[harrumph]

I'm about 30 hours into the game, and the way the skills have shaken out has really surprised me. My character's a rogue, and I decided to roll with the stealth/mechanics focus—classic!

 

Turns out, as far as I can tell, that stealth is completely pointless. All of my party members, even those with no stealth skill at all, can sneak well enough to position themselves properly for a strong opening salvo when combat starts. All of them can sneak well enough to avoid unwanted combat during overland travel. None of them can sneak well enough to avoid combat in tight spaces indoors.

 

My general impression is that you want exactly one character with high mechanics, at least one with high lore, at least one with high athletics, and then you can put everybody's leftover points in athletics and survival. Athletics (surprisingly for somebody who's played a lot of CRPGs) seems to be the king of skills; it clearly gets checked very often in events, and investing a few points for all characters keeps everybody on their feet longer.

 

I'm playing without metagame information in conversations/events, though, so I might be missing out on lots of opportunities to put other skills to work. There also might be some skill stuff I just don't know about—is the chance of finding hidden loot (purple-highlighted containers) connected to stealth? I figured it was a perception thing, but my stealthy PC, with middling perception, seems to find them all.

 

What have other people found?

[falchen]

Yup you are pretty much right in your assesments, expect that finding those purple hidden containers is actually tied to mechanics, but you only find them if you are sneaking.

[termokanden]

True, but your don't need more than 0 sneak to scout for hidden items.

 

I was hoping at least that if you invested heavily in it, you'd be able to get in some juice backstabs with a melee weapon. So far, sneaking just doesn't seem good enough for that, so I don't see the point.

[RunningWolf]

Its usefull for stealing, and for backstabs if pc is rogue.

[LastSoloer]

So only usefull for rogue so far? Kinda dissapointing.

[Voss]

I find a few ranks of stealth on everyone is useful for positioning, (just like a few ranks in athletics is mandatory for everyone to ignore fatigue.  After that, you need mech specialist and a couple lore junkies (but that is easy thanks to the massive lore bonuses in character creation). But overall the skills seem tacked on and underutilized.  

 

As for finding things, it is mechanics.  But it doesn't matter which character has it- the message that pops up in the box will always tell you the pc found it.

[Warwolf]

This is good to know, I'm very early in the game (I always reroll several times until I find the class that fits my play style best) and wasn't sure what skills to boost and what skills to just put a few points in.

 

Thanks

[lucid1222]

I find stealth useful on my second liners (polearm users)  if i have low stealth on the tank i can keep the secondliners closer behind them at the start of a combat without having to worry as much about my secondliners getting targeted and allowing the tank to pick up the engages without having to wait to bring in the second line damage.  However, yes athletics is neccessary for not having to rest so often, and I think survival is very strong if you are making food recipies.

[Arctic]

You need 1 with full mecanics.. I have all my chars at lvl 3 stealth and lvl 3 atletics(at least) so they dont have to rest so much after traveling ...

 

In combat lore is the most usefull one. alowing you to use spells from scrolls.   you can get an armor scroll in your tank .. a revival scroll in your chanter ... ect

Edited March 30, 2015 by Arctic

[redviiper]

Is lore needed on the main character for story line? I am thinking one lore heavy cipher main character and then a created rogue mechanic companion.  

[Magrusaod]

I have at least 3 mechanics and stealth and athletics on everyone but the person I dumped 7 lore on. One with 5 Mechanics. Level 4 party atm. We can sneak as a group, find and break into nearly anything we need to, and if need be, I have a character that can use high level scrolls.

[Arctic]

Is lore needed on the main character for story line? I am thinking one lore heavy cipher main character and then a created rogue mechanic companion.  

 

 

yo dont need lore, dont worry. I have my cypher with the full mechanics ... i think lore is best in the rogue than in the cypher since cypher already has his powers

[Katarack21]

A high lore skill is somewhat useful for *everybody* because scrolls are awesome--non-healing characters casting heals and such, it's pretty elite.

I find stealth to be mad useful. I use it constantly--and I don't find my non-stealth characters are any good at stealthing into position, really, they get seen almost instantly.

[sean10mm]

Stealth is handy for positioning in combat, and rogues trying to backstab (not just sneak attack) without using Shadowing Beyond or some other invisibility thing.

[Mungri]

I have at least 3 mechanics and stealth and athletics on everyone but the person I dumped 7 lore on. One with 5 Mechanics. Level 4 party atm. We can sneak as a group, find and break into nearly anything we need to, and if need be, I have a character that can use high level scrolls.

You don't need mechanics on everyone, just on one character.

[Viperswhip]

Well, you only get backstab on rogues as far as I know, and a rogue getting stuck means game over, I mean, you can go invis, but if you are surrounded, well, enjoy your 2 seconds of dread. So, ranged plink, I refuse to use guns, but a mighty crossbow bolt from stealth will gank plenty of folks and give you room to move.

 

Edit, oh and stealth is aweome, for stealing and scouting, which is very important to plan combat.

Edited March 30, 2015 by Viperswhip

[cctobias]

Stealth is useful in general for positioning and scouting.

 

But high stealth seems to be mostly useful for rogues mostly due to backstab.  Backstab is pretty powerful when done right so this is non-trivial.

 

I am not really sure whether to you high stealth for stealing, you can probably do a lot with a medium amount and smart positioning.

 

 

For the most part there is little reason not to put 1 or 2 points in all skill for all characters, it is only for high skill levels it matters much and that is where stacking skill bonuses +2 or higher really gets important.

 

I made my rogue as a character with +2 in mechanics and +2 in stealth.  I don't really know if that will work out ok.  Even though rogues are the best mechanics they are also the only class that actually  pretty much needs high stealth and both are things that want to get real high.  Its probably ok but really I think from an optimality perspective you should never make your rogue your mechanic and that the skill bonuses are misleading in this way.  Especially since there is no stealth/mechanic background.  If you want a rogue with +2 stealth he will not have +3 mechanics and some other custom adventurer can get +2 mechancis via background.  That way each guy has more room for medium levels of survival and athletics, which all characters can benefit from.

[Magrusaod]

 

I have at least 3 mechanics and stealth and athletics on everyone but the person I dumped 7 lore on. One with 5 Mechanics. Level 4 party atm. We can sneak as a group, find and break into nearly anything we need to, and if need be, I have a character that can use high level scrolls.

You don't need mechanics on everyone, just on one character.

 

 

Only if you keep that one person in front at all times. Having a moderate amount on everyone helps me sweep rooms in a spread formation quickly. I spread out my formation and the whole room lights up without me needing to scout slowly in a circle all through it. 

[redviiper]

Yeah I wish there was a burglar background. You spent your nights breaking locks and stealthing around as you stole everything you could.

[Bryy]

So, what is the ideal Athletics number?

[Crucis]

So, what is the ideal Athletics number?

 

For your average character, 3 is enough.  But it doesn't hurt to have at least one with a higher level of Athletics, for those occasional instances where there's an Athletics check.  It's worth noting that one or two of the Companions may start with fairly high Athletics scores for their level, so this may not be an issue.

 

 

[Kaigen42]

So, what is the ideal Athletics number?

 

It really depends on a lot of things, such as how quickly you burn through spells, how much you travel, and how rapidly you lose health. My current group is fine at 3 or 4 Athletics, but I have a two-handed fighter that takes damage at a steady rate, so there's not a whole lot of time between rests. If nobody takes much damage in your party thanks to good tanking and ranged characters, and if you are parsimonious with spells, I suppose you could go higher, but I think you'd be better off with more Lore, Survival, or Stealth.

 

Of course, there's really not much in the game limiting you from resting a lot, so if you don't mind doing that you could probably leave it at 2 just to reduce the combat fatigue.

[Manty5]

* A moderate amount of stealth(2-3) on all chars lets you avoid some pointless fights and pre-position on others.

* High stealth on your lockpicking char lets you send him to loot entire areas, especially friendly areas where stealing in the open would provoke a fight.

* Moderate survival (2-5) is important on all your chars.  I'd recommend 3 on casters and 5 on frontliners.

* Most chars should have 2 lore.  That's enough for level 1 scrolls, and level 1 scrolls can be quite powerful.

* Have a mix of high-survival chars and high-lore chars so that you can give the potions to the former and the highest-level scrolls to the latter.

* Interestingly, the best results come from giving high survival to casters (especially cyphers) and high lore to frontline tanks.  Many of the really damaging scrolls cause friendly fire, so frontliners can use them with impunity, and casters can chug an accuracy potion and start critting with spells.  There are several focus-based consumables that a cypher should have for tough fights.

 

EDIT:  I just read that mechanics skill affects trap spells, so if you don't have a rogue, making your priest into your Mechanics/Stealth char sounds like a very good idea.

Edited May 1, 2015 by Manty5

[Climhazzard]

Every character in the front of my formation gets at least 5 points in stealth, I sneak around as a party a lot and that means i can start every fight on my own terms.  Characters in the backrow get 3 points in stealth.  Wizards and Druids get additional points in stealth so they can begin a battle with powerful spells.  Everyone gets 3 points in athletics.  Everyone else except for my mechanics character splits their remaining points between lore and survival.

[Atchod]

My next PC Rogue will have 9-10 Survival , 3 Athletics , 2 Mechanics , and Rest in Stealth , every playtrough ends with ton of unused potions will make it a habiit on this one to use 3 every fight ! Also one of the companions will have max mechanics .