The following notes are intended to help explain what each skill does, how it is used, and some potential hints for getting started with them.

An important note: all skills are affected by your character’s stats. Stats are affected based on your character’s condition, encumbrance, and injury, and consequently your skill values will change accordingly. Curious what stats affect your skills? Use ‘@gov*erning <skill name>‘ to see the detail. Can’t remember your specialty skill-based commands? Use ‘@skills‘ for the full list.

Combat

Wondering how to get the most of your combat character? Read the descriptions below for some detail on each skill type.

Looking for work? Start with `@hints‘, and then try the HeadHunters building to pick up some bounty contracts. Once you’ve picked up a few levels, you can start thinking about maybe joining the NTPD or even Trauma Team if you’ve got what it takes.

Hint: Your ‘@mode‘ is akin to your stance and can yield very different results in a multitude of combat situations and general awareness.

• Dodge
  • Many of you have likely heard the joke “should’ve put more points in dodge”, generally in meme format with a picture of a skeleton. The moral of the story holds true on Neural Net, Dodge is the metric by which you are able to avoid incoming attacks. For combat characters, it is generally recommended to max your skill in this area ASAP. Stay light and healthy!
• Shock
  • Shock and awe, in the sense of “holy cow, how are they still standing”, Shock is the metric for how well your character can take punishment. It is also used when determining your natural healing ability, to an extent.
• Martial Arts/Brawling
  • These skills are directed towards hand-to-hand combat, although there are weapons available for and specific to each type. When empty-handed, your combat prowess is based on these skills, and your damage output is generally a combination of your skill and strength.
• Firearms
  • Pistols, Rifles/SMG’s, Shotguns… the possibilities are nearly endless, but each require a specific skillset tailored to the type of firearm.
• Blades
  • Knives and Swords are the name of the game, two separate skills for two distinct styles. You’ll need to be agile and fast to make the most out of this fighting approach.
• Melee
  • When brute force is your M.O., Melee is the way to go. Blunt objects, severed limbs, almost any junk can be a weapon in the hands of an experienced street fighter.
• Gunnery
  • Manning emplacements, or vehicle fire control systems, your Gunnery skill determines how adept you are with these heavy weapons.

Technical

Technical skills are rarely as glory-filled as those menaces spilling blood in the streets, but they are essential roles when it comes to keeping the lifeblood of the city afloat. Nomads smashed your ride in the wasteland? Better see a Mechanic. Burned your deck scanning a hot new node on the matrix? Only someone with in-depth knowledge in Electronics can help you now.

Technical skills generally require that you have your own place to work out of, whether it’s a gun shop, garage, or whatever is required to get the job done.

• GunTech
  • It’s not that your aim sucks, it’s just the sights are off on your pistol. So when you want to install the latest smartlink or best optics on the market… you’ll need a GunTech.
• Mechanic
  • More than just the people who fix your flat tire when you drive over yet another curb, Mechanics can beef up your ride, whether that’s installing turret-mounted weaponry or strengthening the body with armor.
  • Coming someday: detailed vehicle modifications
• Electronics
  • Need to upgrade your obsolete cyberdeck? Forgot your car keys? Implant CPU got fried? Someone that knows Electronics will be your saving grace.
• Programming – TBD
• Decking
  • So someone’s blackmailing you for that thing you definitely didn’t do? What better way to prove you’re innocent than to hire a Decker to dig up dirt on them! Or maybe a rival corp is really cutting into your market share… why not send a Decker in to fudge some reports, skew their R&D results, or shut down their production line?
  • NOTE: Decking is currently being revamped
• Armorer – TBD (not armor crafting)

Vehicles

Need to make a fast escape? You better know someone with one of these skills and a fast ride…

Note: vehicle skills are only used in combat situations – if you want to risk navigating the streets of NeoTokyo without one, you’ll likely be fine. Most of the time.

• Driving
  • Anything with four (or more) wheels is the name of your game. You can wheel just about anything out there with the best of them, shaking a tail, dodging an RPG, or going head-to-head against another vehicle.
• Biker
  • Love the open air and that feeling of freedom when you twist the throttle on an open road? Want to be able to squeeze through that tiny gap? Ever wonder what it’s like to swallow a bug going 80mph? Biker is where it’s at.
• Pilot
  • All those poor ground-based peasants will have no idea what hit them. Soar the open skies, get where you’re going faster, and flex that expensive aerodyne when you rock up to the club. Just make sure to lock the doors.
• Navigator – TBD

Medical

If you’re looking for work in the medical field, check out the NeoTokyo General Hospital. You can work as a temp nurse or fully-fledged Surgeon, as long as you can keep up with the flow of never-ending injuries spawned by the streets of NeoTokyo.

• First Aid
  • When you just can’t stop bleeding everywhere, you’d better hope you know someone with First Aid before there’s more of your blood outside than inside. People versed in First Aid can help you survive in combat situations, and receive bonuses to using healing items.
• Surgeon
  • When problems escalate beyond an extra hole or three in your body, you likely need a Surgeon. Serious injuries require medical facilities, but those facilities are useless without a talented Surgeon. Maybe you want the latest and greatest cybernetics installed? You’ve come to the right place.

Business

These are skills specifically oriented towards making connections and sales. In the end, whether or not you succeed in these endeavors is up to you.

• Fixer
  • Kissing hands and shaking babies, the Fixer can butter up just about anyone for a quick sale. Need something on the low? Need a job done but can’t go asking every Joe on the street? Talk to a Fixer.
  • Hint: It might be worth checking out the black market.
• Scavenger
  • Scavengers are usually nomads, finding treasure amongst the trash as they travel through the wastelands. And hey, they’re more than just human raccoons.
  • Hint: It might be worth checking out the black market.

Streetwise

Don’t mind being hated by everyone, disowned by your own parents? You might want to consider some of these highly useful yet disreputable skills.

• Stealth
  • Don’t want to be seen? Want to get up close and personal before you engage a target? Giving someone a surprise gift? Stealth is the way.
• Thief
  • Do you resent that other people have things you don’t? Does it disgust you to your core? You obviously deserve it more than they do, so why not steal it? The stickiest of hand, the bendiest of joints, the Thief can retrieve just about anything, whether it be relieving you of your hard-earned cash or contortionisting their way into a vending machine to get what’s yours. Theirs.
• Lockpick
  • What’s behind door #1? What’s inside that vehicle? Want to find out? Lockpicks can get you through to what is surely your next big treasure trove. Do they sometimes get fried playing with an advanced security system? What’s life without a few lost eyebrows.