The best skills in Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead

Summary

• Prioritize Dodge, Health Care, and Melee Weapon skills to improve survivability and combat skills. Choose wisely!
• The Tailoring skill helps long-term characters craft powerful armor, while the Equipment skill allows unlocking doors and disarming traps.
• Health care increases healing speed after treating wounds, which is crucial for survival in the early game.

Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead (CDDA) is a turn-based survival horror game similar to a roguelike. Released in 2013, CDDA it receives regular community updates to this day and is freely downloadable from GitHub. The game sees players drawn into a world destroyed by simultaneous apocalypses. From aliens to hordes of zombies to eldritch horrors, all kinds of monsters can be found in this terrifying world. The only goal is survival and death is guaranteed.

Skills are essential to help players stay alive in the apocalypse, increasing their combat prowess, building know-how and the ability to interact with the world. Choose carefully when creating your character. It really can be the difference between life and death.

8 Dodging

No hits, no damage

• Increases dodge chance.

A character's Dodge ability determines their ability to avoid incoming damage, whether from enemy attacks, traps, or environmental hazards. This skill also increases the success and effectiveness of acrobatic actions such as parkour.

Starting with several levels in Dodge is a must. Even basic zombies pose a significant survival threat to new characters, as most have poor weapons and little or no armor. Remember that pain can quickly knock you out! Dodging will allow new characters to withstand many simple enemies by greatly reducing incoming damage. High dodging in the late game will allow players to stand toe-to-toe with evolved monsters, helping them avoid their deadly hits.

7 Food handling

Food efficiency, now and always

• Gives more and better crafting recipes.

Manipulating food increases the number and complexity of fill recipes that players can make. It also makes butchering more efficient and allows for food preservation at higher levels.

While not vital to new characters, assigning a level or two to it at character creation will help streamline early game exploration and allow players to craft more nutritious and hearty food from looted resources. In longer games, almost all naturally spawning food rots, so this is an important skill. Food preservation is also essential to help players stave off starvation during the winter when natural food is scarce.

6 Melee Weapon Skill

Kill them first

• Increases skill with a specific weapon type.

In character generation, players have three different melee weapon skills to choose from: Thrust, Slash, and Pierce. Each weapon type has its own strengths and weaknesses, and increasing these skills will increase the accuracy and damage of a character with the corresponding weapon type.

It is recommended to start with a few levels in one of these skills, as new players are weak and struggle to hit, especially when using makeshift weapons like kitchen knives. In the long run, having high skill in your chosen weapon type will dramatically improve a player's survivability – especially against evolved enemies.

5 Health care

Heal faster, survive longer

• Increases the speed of healing after wound treatment.
• Reduced failure rate of medical procedures.

Health Care increases the effectiveness of medical treatments such as dressings and antiseptics and reduces the failure rate of procedures such as the insertion of a compact bionic module (CBM).

At the beginning of the game, levels in Health Care will allow you to heal wounds faster even when using poorly healing items. For poorly equipped and armored new characters who often take a beating, the increased healing greatly increases their chances of survival. It also allows players to stockpile high-quality healing items for when they really need them. Long-term high health care will allow players to quickly return to action. CBM experimentation is also much less lethal.

4 Device

Optimize survival

• Increases lock extraction speed.
• Better chance of successfully disarming the trap.

The Device skill determines the speed and success with which the player can interact with security devices and traps, including picking locks and disarming traps. While not necessary for early game survival, high gear levels will improve a new character's chances of survival and give players access to higher quality loot found behind locked doors, display cases, and more.

Behind these locks can be a variety of powerful weapons and armor. Being able to reliably disarm traps is also a huge asset, whether it's the first or fifth year of a character's survival. Riches are often hidden behind such traps, and failure to disarm the trap often results in death.

3 Computers

Robots are not (like) deadly

• Greater access to terminals.
• Higher chances of successful hacking.

Computer Proficiency measures a character's ability to navigate computers and technology, allowing players to hack terminals and even robots at higher levels. Like the Equipment skill, the Computer skill is optional for survival in new or long-term characters. However, it does offer significant survival support.

For new characters, successfully hacking a terminal can allow access to otherwise impenetrable metal doors and the rich loot inside. Long-term, reliable terminal hacking allows players to disable security systems, making access to bot-infested science facilities significantly less dangerous. High level characters can even hack bots!

2 Tailoring

Survival through craft

• Gives access to more and better clothing recipes.

Tailoring is a skill that measures a character's ability to make and repair various clothing and textiles. A higher tailoring ability directly correlates to the amount and variety of clothing a character can make, although they will need separate skills to craft high-level items.

At the start of the game, characters should have several levels in Tailoring to ensure they keep their clothing and armor in good condition. Breaking armor, especially during battle, can quickly lead to death. For longer games, high customization is vital to crafting and maintaining defensive armor in a world full of evolved monsters. Heavy armor can be looted, but is often lethal.

1 Weapon or rifle skill

Get a head start on the Apocalypse

• Increases skill with a specific weapon type.

The Handgun and Rifle skills give players greater accuracy, faster aiming, and better weapon customization. Based on availability, location, and enemy type, it is recommended that players specialize in one weapon type at the beginning of the game.

While not vital to survival, starting or training a few levels in handguns or rifles in the first weeks of the apocalypse is useful – doubly so if players intend to rely on such weapons in combat. New characters can die quickly if left to fight enemies up close and personal because the guns are poor melee weapons. In the long run, handguns and rifles are vital tools to help players fight increasingly powerful evolutions.