Best and worst skills in A16

[XeoNovaDan]

Just inserting my 10p into this discussion here...

Shooting - The skill we all know and somewhat love, shooting bears some relevance in lower levels. However, with the way it's set up; momentum slows down past level 6, and the gains seen from shooting skill increase slow to a crawl past level 10 because of the way the post-process curve is currently set up. For instance, a healthy level 20 shooter isn't even as accurate as a scyther, and level 20 shooting requires serious investment in neurotrainers, and probably a passion and high starting skill to begin with. Furthermore, a level 1 'careful shooter' will already be more accurate than a godlike marksman which you probably invested a lot in. The only factors that bear true weight at the moment are health factors and traits.

Melee - Melee skill bears some weight in the lower levels (similar to shooting), pretty much determining whether you give somebody say a gladius, or a longsword. However: accuracy gains suffer from severe diminishing returns past level 6, and the accuracy improvement from level 6 to level 11 melee is only 5%. As many other people have pointed out, this skill really doesn't bear significant enough relevance.

Social - A good socialite feels like they have some validity when it comes to prisoner recruitment and trade price negotiation. Positive traits indeed helping with the former case.

Animals - Somebody good with handling does see a slight improvement in taming and training, but I haven't really observed the differential that much. I usually go with canines and grizzly bears anyway.

Medicine - Great trait to have early-game, as a decent medic can make or break one's survival of a disease such as the plague. Wounds are less of an issue, but I tend to assign high level doctors to those bleeding out rapidly and with many wounds. As for surgery, I usually only use Glitterworld Medicine since the nerf, so skill bears little weight there.

Cooking - Great improvement through the lower levels, but loses its momentum in the higher levels. I still aim for good cooks though for the speed improvement mainly.

Construction - I feel that Construction is good in its current form: low level constructors are terrible, godlikes generally come out with a great deal of excellent+ quality things.

Growing - Along with other skills, growing gets significant improvement through the low levels, but returns diminish hard through the higher levels - with the exception of plant work speed. Also the fact that certain lucrative products are gated behind higher growing skills is a motivation to get higher level growers. I generally look for at least a level 6 or 7 grower with interest when doing crashlanded.

Mining - Mining skill honestly bears little weight overall, with the exception of speed. Due to this, I tend to put most people on some sort of mining priority due to the complete lack of consequences for lower skills other than slower mining.

Artistic - Same story as Construction. Not something I look for immediately as essentials come first, but I do eventually look for a strong artist to give everybody large sculptures for their bedrooms, and grand for the dining room.

Crafting - Similar story to artistic: I don't look for top-notch crafters immediately, but I do once established. I find it useful to eventually be able to manufacture high-quality weapons, clothing, and armour.

Research - Excellent gains throughout, but is completely redundant once all research is over and done with.

[b0rsuk]

Very good post, XeoNovaDan.

The growing job seems to be a major source of out of control wealth:
* selling simple meals
* parkas
* joints
* furniture (wooden plus armchairs)
* beer (used to be profitable)
* infinite wooden sculptures from tree farming

I think it's because in many biomes you can plant as much as you wish, and plants have no upkeep cost. You only plant and harvest. You literally make something out of nothing, then sell it. Mining has finite resources on the map. Loot comes from raiders. You get some plasteel from mechanoids. Leather and meat from hunting are finite.

[XeoNovaDan]

And don't forget flake

Flake's the most profitable drug you can make, even more so than smokeleaf and yayo. Mass isn't a factor as they all have zero mass.

[Trylobyte]

In my playthroughs...

Critical

Construction - This is the king skill.  Having someone with a high Construction means less build failures on expensive or critical projects, higher-quality furniture (sometimes with bonus art) that improves the room just by being in it, and quicker deployment of floors, sturdier walls, and other such things.  When my pawns start getting constant mood bonuses from having nice rooms my Construction pawn is almost always the one getting the credit.

Growing - The queen skill.  As someone earlier in the thread cited, this is a recurring job that will never, ever be finished.  Maximizing the output and minimizing the time spent on any infinitely-recurring job is important for me, since that's more time my pawns can spend doing something else.  I wish it had more to it, but this is ranking by importance, not by excitement.

Medicine - The prince skill.  You only need one pawn good at it but you'll want two or three.  Higher Medicine skill means faster, better treatment, bionics, and pawns with greater uptime and fewer health issues.  All in all, this skill is the oil that keeps your colony flowing and keeps you safe from the minor mishaps of day to day life.

Important

Cooking - Just good enough to be useful.  As with Growing, it's one of those tasks that'll never, ever be finished, so doing it quickly and properly is important.  Fine meals are a direct benefit and avoiding food poisoning is also a plus, since that means less work for your cleaners.

Crafting - This is where my money comes from.  Additionally, better weapons means better accuracy and better armor is much more resistant to harm.  If my colonists get nice clothes out of the deal, too, more power to 'em.

Shooting - Pew, pew!  Guns just work better for defense than melee weapons do.  Having a sniper who can cull the horde before they get close to my base is always lovely and a higher skill seems to mean they're less likely to shoot their fellow colonists instead of the raider.

Useful

Mining - It's good to be able to do it quickly (especially with plasteel) but you can generally find or train a decent miner or two and it's a labor almost anyone can do.  It's a job that eventually finishes (unless you literally never stop building) and so efficiency isn't a huge concern.  It's also a job with no quality modifiers.

Research - Will generally train up on its own, especially if you find Research interest on a pawn who doesn't do much else.  Disable everything but Research and watch them become an all-star.  Like Mining, it's another job that will eventually finish completely, at which point Research becomes useless.

Useless

Social - I like having at least one pawn with good Social so that if I see a prisoner I want I can recruit them sometime before the heat death of the universe.  That said, recruitment chance seems to be really arbitrary (and eventually becomes nigh impossible as colonist numbers increase) so even then it's not all that useful.  I haven't really noticed any difference in trade prices, either.

Animal - They don't seem as useful or as desirable as they should be, and it's a shame because I love animal handling.  Animals are okay for hauling, but eventually I have enough idle colonists that hauling isn't a concern.  They're okay as ablative armor in raids, but if a bonded one dies I get a depressed colonist and if their handler dies I may have a lot of manhunters running around.  They're also constantly eating my meals (regardless of kibble/hay) and dirtying up the place, making more work for my cooks and cleaners.  I really want this skill to be good, but it's not - Animals generate more work than they save.

Melee - It simply gets too dangerous as time goes on since Shields aren't craftable and eventually won't survive long enough anyway.  Raids get far too large for a melee fighter to risk engaging.  Additionally, it seems to be one of those skills where a high skill doesn't matter.

Art - Mostly used as a way to turn excess resources into money, but that's something my Construction guy can do just as well.  Beauty improvements are also generally handled by Construction.  I'm not out to build a palace, after all.

[TheMeInTeam]

Very good post, XeoNovaDan.

The growing job seems to be a major source of out of control wealth:
* selling simple meals
* parkas
* joints
* furniture (wooden plus armchairs)
* beer (used to be profitable)
* infinite wooden sculptures from tree farming

I think it's because in many biomes you can plant as much as you wish, and plants have no upkeep cost. You only plant and harvest. You literally make something out of nothing, then sell it. Mining has finite resources on the map. Loot comes from raiders. You get some plasteel from mechanoids. Leather and meat from hunting are finite.

Raids (offensive and defensive) also let you make something out of nothing.  The main difference is that for defending raids, you're rate limited by event proc.  Growing is rate-limited by the pawn(s) doing it and only marginally constrained by space on most biomes (with sea ice, ice sheet, and to a lesser extent extreme desert being exceptions).

Even for skills that let you add enough value to material to turn a profit buying --> constructing, crafting or sculpting --> selling you wind up rate-limited on trader supply of the good.  For growing you instead cap out on what useful items are available for trade (trader resource offers are finite).

However while growing is lucrative, the main case against it is that it is only a piece of the puzzle in early-mid game survival.  You CAN live without growing anything at all, but you can't live without keeping pawns alive by definition.  Growing is (a little) down the totem pole in that regard, though its contribution to food is the most straightforward way to get it.

[b0rsuk]

Don't forget you can request trade caravans. I've never used it so far so I don't know if there are any limits other than silver to how often you can do it.

Another idea for Social: rework discounts. Instead of a pitiful 0.5% / level discount for everything, there would be a larger discount but only for some randomly chosen items. Some kind of hash function would be used to select which. For example in one caravan you might talk the trader into lowering the price of stone mace, military helmet and chemfuel. Another time it would be alphabeavers, t-shirts, beer, wool and granite. It would give an impression of bargain hunting, and would provoke players to experiment with different items. Higher Social skill would give you discount for more items.

[SpaceDorf]

What should also account for position of the skill is how time consuming they are ..
so how much sense does it make to double on skills.

I divided them in Trade Skill and Occasional Skill

Trade Skills - the pawn works at those, he has no time to something else but becoming a master is only a matter of time.

Crafter, Cook, Builder and Grower, Research( until everything is done ), Artist ( if you are into it )
Mining ( mountainous )

Occasional Skill
Medic ( except if you have him crafting medicine ), social , animals ( depends on the number )
Mining ( anywhere else ) Shooting for Hunting

and Combat Skills .. well .. you know when you need those ..

I think adept social Colonists also make friends faster and are less likely to insult others or start a social fight ..

[TheMeInTeam]

Don't forget you can request trade caravans. I've never used it so far so I don't know if there are any limits other than silver to how often you can do it.

Another idea for Social: rework discounts. Instead of a pitiful 0.5% / level discount for everything, there would be a larger discount but only for some randomly chosen items. Some kind of hash function would be used to select which. For example in one caravan you might talk the trader into lowering the price of stone mace, military helmet and chemfuel. Another time it would be alphabeavers, t-shirts, beer, wool and granite. It would give an impression of bargain hunting, and would provoke players to experiment with different items. Higher Social skill would give you discount for more items.

You have to wait several days in between requests.  It is possible in late game colonies that your production --> purchasing power outstrips trader good availability, even more so for useful goods.  The game's kind of "over" at that point but it can happen.

Incidentally on standard sea ice (not the extreme challenge where it is literally always too cold to call caravans) it should be among your top priorities, definitely a first build after shelter/power and higher priority than hydroponics.

[Stormfox]

Don't forget you can request trade caravans. I've never used it so far so I don't know if there are any limits other than silver to how often you can do it.

4 days cooldown per friendly faction, 600 silver each time. This should not be made any harsher, because it is crucial and expensive enough in the early game and harsher settings. The problem with "we have to much stuff" is the speed and ease with which it is aquired over time and the lack of money sinks, not that our vendors are too good nowadays.

Another idea for Social: rework discounts. Instead of a pitiful 0.5% / level discount for everything, there would be a larger discount but only for some randomly chosen items. Some kind of hash function would be used to select which. For example in one caravan you might talk the trader into lowering the price of stone mace, military helmet and chemfuel. Another time it would be alphabeavers, t-shirts, beer, wool and granite. It would give an impression of bargain hunting, and would provoke players to experiment with different items. Higher Social skill would give you discount for more items.

I love that idea. Discount is always, say, 35% off, and for [level] articles on normal traders, half of that on those "has a few items" guys.

[b0rsuk]

Incidentally on standard sea ice (not the extreme challenge where it is literally always too cold to call caravans) it should be among your top priorities, definitely a first build after shelter/power and higher priority than hydroponics.

The strategy reminds me of this scene:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=aNaXdLWt17A

By all means, DON'T choose the simpler solution and don't migrate to a more hospitable land. No, make a caravan come to you.

Another idea for Social: rework discounts. Instead of a pitiful 0.5% / level discount for everything, there would be a larger discount but only for some randomly chosen items. Some kind of hash function would be used to select which. For example in one caravan you might talk the trader into lowering the price of stone mace, military helmet and chemfuel. Another time it would be alphabeavers, t-shirts, beer, wool and granite. It would give an impression of bargain hunting, and would provoke players to experiment with different items. Higher Social skill would give you discount for more items.

I love that idea. Discount is always, say, 35% off, and for [level] articles on normal traders, half of that on those "has a few items" guys.

Something like that. Another possibility would be that with high Social you get a wider selection of goods. "I'm really not supposed to sell those spare parts for our trade ship, but...". Or even you gain the ability to sell some goods the trader doesn't actually want, such as sell some kibble to a weapon supplier.

[Perq]

Cooking - [...] since that means less work for your cleaners.

Social - [...] That said, recruitment chance seems to be really arbitrary (and eventually becomes nigh impossible as colonist numbers increase) so even then it's not all that useful.  I haven't really noticed any difference in trade prices, either.

Melee - [...] Additionally, it seems to be one of those skills where a high skill doesn't matter.

Food poisoning also causes a -50% debuff to consciousnesses, which in turn makes your pawns work much slower. :v Because of that, having a good cook is pretty crucial - otherwise you'll have your colonists work way slower, which may turn into a death scenario.

There is a difference in prices, but they are small. Still, they are big enough to make a difference. Think of it that way - getting 7% more silver for your sold stuff means that, indirectly, your trader just produced 7% extra goods. Sold 3000 rice? You just got ~196 extra (if you have 7% bonus, I assume). Buying? Same thing.
It might be hard to notice, but these things add up pretty quickly if you are trading a lot. If this bonus was much bigger, it would be wayyyyy overpowered.

Melee skill increases damage with melee weapons. :@ A level 19 melee with plasteel sword can output 16 damage per second (hits for 32 every 2 seconds - high chance to severe limbs, since it is focused damage. It is very frequent for raider to lose their arms and drop their weapons - unless they simply get killed by 2 hits in the torso. :V). For scale, Charge Rifle can output 14 DPS (assuming you hit everything). I feel like hitting in melee is pretty easy, too.
Melee cannot hit your own guys, no matter how many and how close your enemies are. Melee cannot be locked by enemy melee charge. YOU can lock enemies in melee.
I mean, it is not perfect, but honestly I think people underestimate melee.

[keylocke]

i just recruit only colonists who are incapable of nothing.

as for passion/interest. i prioritize people with passion/interest for shooting or melee + 1 other skill at random.

i let pawns specialize based on their passions and i keep an eye out on balance so that at least 1 pawn is specialized on each task. though at start, my skill priority is construction. i always start with at least 1 passionate builder with high skills.

[TheMeInTeam]

By all means, DON'T choose the simpler solution and don't migrate to a more hospitable land. No, make a caravan come to you.

If you're going to play there at all, you might as well take advantage of the options provided.  For whatever reason, those caravans can reach you much faster than you can travel to other bases.  Since you don't have starting resources to set up enough power for sun lamp + hydroponics and still cover other needs comm console is much stronger.

Migration turns it into a tundra or boreal start with a delay, but you have enough starting food to cover ground and can raid pirates for even more stuff along the way.  Without trade, you just don't get resources to grow, excepting cargo drops + occasional slag chunk to smelt.

[Trylobyte]

Food poisoning also causes a -50% debuff to consciousnesses, which in turn makes your pawns work much slower. :v Because of that, having a good cook is pretty crucial - otherwise you'll have your colonists work way slower, which may turn into a death scenario.

But that only needs Cooking 5 to more or less negate.  Fine Meals only need Cooking 6.  Anything higher than that is just speed at that point.  I don't really need a good chef, I just need someone who isn't terrible.

There is a difference in prices, but they are small. Still, they are big enough to make a difference. Think of it that way - getting 7% more silver for your sold stuff means that, indirectly, your trader just produced 7% extra goods. Sold 3000 rice? You just got ~196 extra (if you have 7% bonus, I assume). Buying? Same thing.
It might be hard to notice, but these things add up pretty quickly if you are trading a lot. If this bonus was much bigger, it would be wayyyyy overpowered.

I suppose I don't notice it because I don't do a lot of trading, and by the time I do get around to it I'm usually cleaning out caravans with merchandise to spare.  Even a 10% bonus becomes somewhat trivial at that point.  Even without that, though, it's only a good skill for a colony that absolutely depends on trade to survive (Sea Ice for instance) and is merely a bonus in other settings.

Melee skill increases damage with melee weapons. :@ A level 19 melee with plasteel sword can output 16 damage per second (hits for 32 every 2 seconds - high chance to severe limbs, since it is focused damage. It is very frequent for raider to lose their arms and drop their weapons - unless they simply get killed by 2 hits in the torso. :V). For scale, Charge Rifle can output 14 DPS (assuming you hit everything). I feel like hitting in melee is pretty easy, too.
Melee cannot hit your own guys, no matter how many and how close your enemies are. Melee cannot be locked by enemy melee charge. YOU can lock enemies in melee.
I mean, it is not perfect, but honestly I think people underestimate melee.

Melee skill increases DPS only because melee skill affects hit chance.  It doesn't affect damage or attack speed, which are determined by the weapon.  As for melee vs. ranged, that's a different debate, but I'm firmly in the ranged camp - Enemies that can't get close enough to hit me do zero DPS after all.  It's got its uses, surely, but I don't rate it as high as Shooting because simply being at range is an advantage in and of itself.  If I'm going to tie enemies up in melee I'd rather grab someone with good Animal and tame a bunch of dogs/boars/attack chickens and let those loose to bog down a raid while my shooters mow everything down with charge rifles.  No more worries about friendly fire -and- a delicious dinner.  More easily-replaced than colonists.

[Perq]

Melee skill increases DPS only because melee skill affects hit chance.  It doesn't affect damage or attack speed, which are determined by the weapon.

Noooope. While it doesn't affect attack speed (which is determined by the weapon), damage IS increased by the skill of the wielder.
If you are at your computer (I'm sadly not atm, could just make some screenshots), check the details on equipped melee weapon and then click on damage. You'll get a detailed list of what affects it. Skill level is sure on that list.

Weird you are arguing that melee is bad without even fully understanding how it works, eh?

Seems I didn't understood melee myself, being silly here. Well shit. D: