Starfield Best Starting Skills: Initial Picks

Starfield Best Starting Skills: A Beginner’s Guide

So, you’re ready to jump into the vast universe of Starfield! That’s awesome! But before you zoom off into the stars, you need to pick your starting skills. These choices are super important because they help you shape your character and how you play the game early on. Picking the right ones makes your journey a lot smoother and more fun. We’re here to break it all down for you and help you select the best skills to start with in Starfield.

Understanding Starfield’s Skill System

Before diving into the best choices, let’s take a quick look at how skills work in Starfield. Think of them as special abilities or talents that your character has. These abilities can help you in fights, exploration, and even when you’re talking to other people. The skills are organized into five main categories: Physical, Social, Combat, Science, and Tech.

Each category has a bunch of different skills, and each skill has multiple ranks. When you use a skill, you earn experience towards it. Once you have enough experience, you can improve it, making it more effective. For example, a skill that helps you carry more items will let you carry even more after you increase its rank. You will select three starting skills from these categories to start your adventure in the stars. Remember, there is no best all-around selection, but there are some skills that provide a better boost early in the game. So, let’s explore which of these skills are the best for your character.

Best Physical Skills to Start With

The Physical skills are all about your character’s raw power and health. They are perfect for those who prefer to be up close and personal with danger. Here are some top picks for starting skills in the Physical category:

Weight Lifting

This is one of the most important skills to select early on, and here is why. In Starfield, you will encounter a vast amount of items, weapons, armor, resources, etc. In other words, your pockets will quickly be full. Now, you have a limited carry capacity. If you’re over this limit, you will move slower and can’t fast travel. This skill directly addresses this problem by increasing the amount you can carry at a time, and at each level. This means you can explore longer and pick up more things to sell or use for crafting. This is an especially good pick for new players who are getting into all of the resource and crafting systems in the game.

• Rank 1: Increases your carrying capacity by 10kg.
• Rank 2: Increases your carrying capacity by 25kg.
• Rank 3: Increases your carrying capacity by 50kg.
• Rank 4: Increases your carrying capacity by 100kg.

Fitness

Fitness provides a boost to your character’s endurance which, in turn, allows you to sprint for longer periods of time. You will do a lot of exploring and sometimes you will need to get to your destination quicker. Fitness allows you to do this with ease, and you can avoid having your character slowed down by a lack of oxygen. This helps with both combat and exploring. If you need to quickly retreat or move quickly to an enemy you will be happy to have points in Fitness.

• Rank 1: Increases your maximum Oxygen by 10%.
• Rank 2: Increases your maximum Oxygen by 20%.
• Rank 3: Increases your maximum Oxygen by 30%.
• Rank 4: Increases your maximum Oxygen by 40%

Stealth

If you like sneaking around and avoiding fights, then Stealth is a great choice. This ability makes you harder to detect while moving, which is really useful when you want to avoid conflict, or get the jump on enemies. Stealth is not only great for avoiding detection, but also for delivering sneak attacks. Each time you move up in rank, you gain an advantage in how hard you are to see, and a boost to your stealth damage. In many circumstances, this allows you to defeat enemies with one hit.

• Rank 1: Adds a Stealth meter. Increases stealth detection by 25%.
• Rank 2: Increases stealth detection by 50%.
• Rank 3: Increases stealth detection by 75%.
• Rank 4: Increases stealth detection by 100%.

Best Social Skills to Start With

Social skills are all about how well your character interacts with other people. They can be useful when talking to characters, buying or selling items, or even persuading others to do what you want them to. Here are a few solid picks from the Social skill tree:

Persuasion

This is a very useful skill to have. Many quests in the game can be solved through persuasion, bypassing combat and earning you better rewards. Persuasion gives you more options when talking to non-player characters (NPCs), which can help you get what you want without always having to fight. It can also help you talk your way out of sticky situations. If you love a good conversation in RPGs, pick this skill early on!

• Rank 1: Increases the success rate of Persuasion.
• Rank 2: Increases the success rate of Persuasion more.
• Rank 3: Increases the success rate of Persuasion even more.
• Rank 4: Increases the success rate of Persuasion significantly.

Commerce

Commerce directly affects the prices you get when buying and selling items. This is a huge benefit, especially early in the game when you need as much money as possible. With the commerce skill, you can buy things for cheaper and sell items for more money. This makes it easier to get the gear and resources that you need. Over time, this will save you a lot of money and you can get better gear sooner.

• Rank 1: Buy items for 5% less and sell items for 10% more.
• Rank 2: Buy items for 10% less and sell items for 20% more.
• Rank 3: Buy items for 15% less and sell items for 30% more.
• Rank 4: Buy items for 20% less and sell items for 40% more.

Scavenging

Scavenging is another fantastic skill that will benefit you early and throughout the game. When you have points in this skill, you will find more items, and also credits (the in-game currency) when looting items. In most RPGs, looting is an extremely important aspect to the game, and having an early boost will be extremely useful to you as you progress throughout the game. The ability to find more items is always a benefit, but the increased chance to find credits is game-changing. This skill is particularly useful if you’re going to explore a lot of locations and loot a lot of containers.

• Rank 1: You have a better chance of finding extra credits when looting.
• Rank 2: You have a better chance of finding more items when looting.
• Rank 3: You have a great chance of finding extra credits and items when looting.
• Rank 4: You have an extreme chance of finding extra credits and items when looting.

Best Combat Skills to Start With

For those who like to jump right into action, the Combat skills are a must. These skills improve your fighting ability, making you deadlier with weapons. Here are some of the top skills to pick when you first start:

Ballistics

Ballistics is a straightforward and useful skill to have for a variety of reasons. As you’re exploring and engaging in combat, you will encounter a variety of weapons, and many will use ballistic rounds. This skill will improve the damage that your weapons do, making fights much easier and quicker to complete. There are four levels that increase the damage of these weapons. With each additional rank, your weapons will start doing significantly more damage.

• Rank 1: Ballistic weapons do 10% more damage.
• Rank 2: Ballistic weapons do 20% more damage.
• Rank 3: Ballistic weapons do 30% more damage.
• Rank 4: Ballistic weapons do 40% more damage.

Pistols

If you like to use pistols, this is a must-have skill. Not only does it increase your pistol damage at every level, but also increases your rate of fire. Pistols are a common weapon you will find throughout the game. Having this skill can make you a force to be reckoned with when you engage in combat using these types of weapons. Having additional levels in this skill is extremely useful, as it increases the damage and makes you a faster shooter with pistols.

• Rank 1: Pistols do 10% more damage.
• Rank 2: Pistols do 25% more damage.
• Rank 3: Pistols do 25% more damage and fire 15% faster.
• Rank 4: Pistols do 40% more damage and fire 30% faster.

Rifle Certification

This skill is useful, as the rifle class of weapons is common throughout Starfield. This certification increases your damage with rifles. With this, you can increase your damage with various kinds of rifles, all at different ranges. Rifles are also extremely versatile, as some are effective at long and medium ranges. With this skill, you will be an extremely dangerous threat in the galaxy.

• Rank 1: Rifles do 10% more damage.
• Rank 2: Rifles do 20% more damage.
• Rank 3: Rifles do 30% more damage.
• Rank 4: Rifles do 40% more damage.

Best Science Skills to Start With

The Science skills are all about making use of the world around you. These skills help you with crafting, research, and understanding the resources you find. Here are some great ones to select at the start:

Medicine

Medicine will help you in a variety of ways. As you play you will acquire health packs and other consumables that will restore your health. Medicine improves the effects of these healing items, making them more effective. Furthermore, at rank 3, Medicine will help you identify unknown medical items. If you are going to engage in combat, you will take damage, and this skill will greatly improve the rate at which you recover health.

• Rank 1: Health packs restore 10% more health.
• Rank 2: Health packs restore 20% more health.
• Rank 3: Health packs restore 20% more health, and you can sometimes identify unknown medicine.
• Rank 4: Health packs restore 30% more health and you identify all unknown medicine.

Surveying

Surveying is essential for anyone who wants to explore planets and collect resources effectively. This skill helps you find the locations of resource points on planets and provides you with information that is key to exploring them. When scanning planets, you will know which flora and fauna are on the surface and which resources you can obtain. With this skill, you will be well on your way to understanding all aspects of the planets you visit.

• Rank 1: Adds a survey meter.
• Rank 2: Adds the ability to scan more things on planets.
• Rank 3: Greatly increases scan distance.
• Rank 4: Greatly increases scan distance, and you get data from a greater area of the planet.

Research Methods

Research plays a big part in Starfield. By completing research projects you can craft new items, develop weapon modifications, and learn to make new resources. Research Methods reduces the number of resources you need to finish projects, saving you time and effort in the long run. Having this skill will help you to progress your research, meaning more modifications and items sooner.

• Rank 1: Reduces the required resources by 10%.
• Rank 2: Reduces the required resources by 20%.
• Rank 3: Reduces the required resources by 30%.
• Rank 4: Reduces the required resources by 40%.

Best Tech Skills to Start With

The Tech skills are all about your ship and technology. These skills help you with ship repairs, upgrades, and overall efficiency. Here are some solid options for the beginning of your journey:

Piloting

Piloting is a critical skill for ship combat. This skill increases your ship’s maneuverability and allows you to use more powerful thrust maneuvers. Having this skill makes space battles much easier as your ship is better at dodging enemy fire and you can more easily line up shots on other ships. When combined with other skills, this will make your ship much more dangerous in the vastness of space.

• Rank 1: Your ship is 20% more maneuverable.
• Rank 2: Your ship is 20% more maneuverable, and can use boosted thrust.
• Rank 3: Your ship is 30% more maneuverable and can use boosted thrust.
• Rank 4: Your ship is 40% more maneuverable and can use boosted thrust.

Targeting Control Systems

This skill helps you lock onto and target enemies easier in combat. Not only does this improve the effectiveness of your lasers and ballistics weapons, but also your missile systems. Having an easier time locking onto enemies makes battles go much more smoothly. The more levels you put into this skill, the easier your time in space will be.

• Rank 1: Improved targeting.
• Rank 2: Improved targeting, and enemy ships lose targeting on you easier.
• Rank 3: Improved targeting and more effective missile systems.
• Rank 4: Improved targeting, and more effective lasers, ballistic weapons, and missile systems.

Security

There are many places in Starfield that will have locked doors, containers, and computers. With security, you can pick locks and access restricted areas. This is a great skill if you plan on exploring and looting as much as possible. The more ranks you put into this skill the more difficult locks you can pick, which can lead to some incredible rewards that would not otherwise be possible.

• Rank 1: Adds a digipick meter. You can attempt to pick basic locks.
• Rank 2: You can attempt to pick advanced locks.
• Rank 3: You can attempt to pick expert locks.
• Rank 4: You can attempt to pick master locks.

Making Your Choice

When picking your starting skills, it’s important to think about how you want to play the game. Do you want to be a tough fighter? A sneaky explorer? Or maybe a smooth-talking space trader? There is no “best” combination as it will depend on your preferred playstyle. Here are a few combinations to get you started:

• The Fighter: Ballistics, Fitness, Piloting. This combination will ensure you are more effective with weapon types you will find regularly, that you can run longer, and that you are a more effective pilot.
• The Explorer: Weight Lifting, Surveying, Stealth. With this setup, you can explore for extended amounts of time, get your bearings on a planet more quickly, and avoid unnecessary conflicts.
• The Socializer: Persuasion, Commerce, Scavenging. If you love to talk your way through problems, and earn extra resources along the way, this is a good combination for you.
• The Tech Expert: Security, Targeting Control Systems, Research Methods. If you want to be a master of tech and lockpicking, this combination is perfect for you.

You’re not locked into these choices, you can earn experience and increase these skills over time. These are simply there to provide a boost at the beginning, which will greatly help your character. Don’t be afraid to experiment and see what works best for you! The most important thing is to have fun exploring all that the Starfield universe has to offer.

Starting with the right skills in Starfield can make your adventure smoother and more enjoyable. Remember to think about how you want to play, choose skills that match your playstyle, and don’t be afraid to try different combinations. With a little planning, you’ll be well on your way to making your mark in the galaxy! The best thing to do is jump into the game and start earning levels. Happy travels among the stars!