Best Skills In Cataclysm: Dark Days Ahead

Summary

• Prioritize Dodging, Health Care, and Melee Weapon skills to enhance survival and combat abilities. Choose wisely!
• Tailoring skills help long-term characters craft powerful armor, while the Devices skill allows the unlocking of doors and disarming of traps.
• Health Care increases healing speed following wound treatment, which is crucial for survival in the early game.

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

Skills are essential in helping players stay alive in the apocalypse, enhancing their battle prowess, crafting know-how, and ability to interact with the world. Choose carefully when creating a character. It really can be the difference between life and death.

8 Dodging

No Hits, No Damage

• Increases dodging chance.

A character’s Dodging skill dictates their ability to dodge incoming damage, whether from enemy attacks, traps, or environmental hazards. This skill also increases the success rate and effectiveness of acrobatic actions such as parkour.

Starting with a few levels in Dodging is a must. Even basic zombies pose a significant threat to survival for new characters, as most have poor weapons and little to no armor. Remember, pain can quickly incapacitate! Dodging will allow new characters to endure many simple enemies by significantly reducing incoming damage. Late-game, high Dodging will allow players to stand toe-to-toe with evolved monstrosities, helping them avoid their deadly hits.

7 Food Handling

Food Efficiency, Now And Always

• Gives more and better recipes to craft.

Food Handling increases the number and complexity of satiating food recipes players can make. It also makes butchery more efficient and, at higher levels, allows for food preservation.

While not vital for new characters, assigning a level or two to it in character creation will help make early game exploration more efficient, allowing players to make more nutritional and satiating food from looted resources. In longer games, almost all naturally spawning food will have rotted away, making this an important skill. Food preservation is also vital in helping players stave off starvation during the winter when natural food is scarce.

6 A Melee Weapon Skill

Kill Them First

• Increases skills with a specific weapon type.

In character generation, players have three different melee weapon skills to choose from: Bashing, Cutting, and Piercing. Each weapon type has its strengths and drawbacks, and upping these skills will increase a character’s accuracy and damage with its corresponding weapon type.

Starting with a couple of levels in one of these skills is recommended, as new players are weak and struggle to land hits, especially when using makeshift weapons such as kitchen knives. In the long term, having high skills in a chosen weapon type will dramatically improve player survivability — especially against evolved enemies.

5 Health Care

Heal Faster, Survive Longer

• Increases healing rate following wound treatment.
• Reduced medical procedure failure rate.

Health Care increases the effectiveness of medical treatments such as bandages and antiseptics, and it reduces the failure rate of procedures such as Compact Bionic Module (CBM) insertion.

In the early game, levels in Health Care will give faster wound healing even when using poor healing items. For poorly equipped and armored new characters who frequently take a beating, increased healing significantly boosts their survival chances. It also allows players to stockpile high-quality healing items for when they truly need them. Long-term, high Health Care will allow players to quickly jump back into action. It also makes experimentation with CBMs far less deadly.

4 Devices

Optimize Survival

• Increases lock picking speed.
• Better chance of successful trap disarming.

The Devices skill dictates the speed and success with which a player can interact with security devices and traps, including lock picking and disarming traps. While not vital for survival in the early game, a high Device level will improve a new character’s survival chances, giving players access to higher-quality loot found behind locked doors, display cases, and more.

Behind these locks can be a whole host of powerful weapons and armor. Being able to reliably disarm traps is also a mighty boon, whether it’s the character’s first or fifth year of survival. Behind such traps are often riches, and failure to disarm a trap frequently ends in death.

3 Computers

Robots Aren’t (As) Deadly

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

The Computer skill measures a character’s ability to navigate computers and technology, allowing players to hack terminals and even robots at higher levels. Like the Devices skill, the Computer skill is optional for survival in new or long-term characters. It does, however, offer a significant boost to survivability.

For new characters, successfully hacking a terminal can give access to otherwise impenetrable metal doors and the bountiful loot inside. Long-term, reliably hacking terminals allows players to disable security systems, making access to robot-infested scientific facilities significantly less dangerous. High-level characters can even hack robots!

2 Tailoring

Survival Through Crafting

• Gives access to more and better clothing recipes.

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

In the early game, characters should have a couple of levels in Tailoring to ensure they can keep their clothing and armor in good repair. The breaking of armor, especially during battle, can swiftly lead to death. For longer games, high Tailoring is vital for producing and maintaining defensive armor in a world filled with evolved monstrosities. Strong armor can be looted, but doing so is often deadly.

1 A Handgun Or Rifle Skill

Get An Edge In The Apocalypse

• Increases skill with a specific gun type.

The Handgun and Rifle skills provide players with greater accuracy, faster aiming, and better gun customization. Based on availability, location, and enemy type, it’s recommended that early-game players specialize in a single gun type.

While not vital to survival, starting with or training a couple of levels in either Handguns or Rifles in the first weeks of the apocalypse is helpful — doubly so if players intend to rely on such weapons in combat. New characters can quickly die if left to fight enemies up close and personal, as guns make poor melee weapons. In the long term, handguns and rifles are vital tools in helping players fight ever more powerful evolutions.