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View Full Version : New Player Guide: Picking Your Profession and Class



BradSTL
18-03-05, 20:52
The descriptions in the game really don't give you a feel for what it's going to be like to be any combination of profession and class in this game. There is no one best choice, they all have their trade-offs. That's why I wrote this, where (having tried a little bit of everything, and talked to lots of people), I try to give you a feeling for what you'll really like about any of the professions, what you'll really hate about them, and how your choice of class will affect your character's profession.

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Assassin (aka Rifle Spy, Rifle PE):

What You'll Love: Leveling up is so smooth and easy it's like being on rails. You'll make money hand over fist from hunting in the Wastelands, even solo.

What You'll Hate: Your trade-off for long range is a lot less damage per minute, so in any close quarters fight, you're handicapped compared to everybody else. And unfortunately, most PvP in this game happens at close range. At close range between two players of equal level and equal skill, you lose.

Private Eye or Spy? As a PE, you're best off sticking to low-tech weapons like shotguns and assault rifles; the good news is that you get better armor, resistances, and defensive psi. As a Spy, you'll get three very cool things that PEs don't get: invisibility, sniper rifles, and energy weapons. The price you pay for these cool things is that you're very fragile; you'll be using that invisibility to run away a lot.

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Driver:

What You'll Love: At the upper levels, a combat team with big vehicles pretty much owns the Wastelands, at least until someone shows up with anti-vehicle rocket launchers. There is an interesting variety of vehicles to operate, too, and more being added.

What You'll Hate: First of all, do not become a driver if you have a low frustration threshold, because this is the buggiest part of the game. Secondly, until you get to the mid level, there is no way to get XP for driving, so what you really are until then is a soldier or an infiltrator. (In fact, for PE, starting as a soldier makes a lot of sense. See below.)

Private Eye, Spy, or Tank? As a Tank, you lack the intelligence to drive anything more complicated than a jeep. Be a soldier instead, and be a gunner for the real drivers; if you want a jeep or a motorcycle, you can spend the Vehicle Combat skill points later. As a Private Eye, you can only operate ground vehicles, but you have the potential to be a gunner for those vehicles as well. Since gunners need the same skills as soldiers, it may actually make more sense for a PE driver to start as a soldier and pick up the Vehicle Combat points when they have dexterity points to spare. As a Spy, you can operate any vehicle in the game, including flying vehicles ... but can't gun almost any of them. Outside your vehicle, you're halfway helpess (especially if you're a pilot), and that limits leveling opportunities a lot.

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Engineer (aka Constructor):

What You'll Love: You actually make things for people. What's more, you hardly ever have to leave the total safety of your faction headquarters unless you want to; you can level up at HQ, and take jobs in any safe zone, and get paid and gain experience points with no risk. What's more, when people need new weapons, you're indespensible, because except for drones (and maybe most psi weapons), store-bought weapons suck, on purpose.

What You'll Hate: It's practically another job working for Reakktor, only one where you pay them instead of them paying you. What's more, a certain part of the quality of manufactured weapons is random, and some people get really rude, cranky, and reluctant to pay if they don't like the quality of the resulting weapon.

Private Eye, Psi Monk, or Spy? Private eyes and psi monks gain no useful advantage to offset the fact that they can't reach the 100 Dexterity and 100 Intelligence it takes to truly master construction. Be a spy.

- - - - -

Field Medic (aka PPU Monk):

What You'll Love: It's the ultimate "people person" job. You don't concentrate primarily on the enemy or the targets, you concentrate mostly on your friends and team mates. You're indespensible to teams. Teams with field medics level up three or four times as fast as teams without; if a team without a field medic (or two) fights a team that has field medics, the team with no medics loses. What's more, if you manage your spells properly, you are nearly invulnerable.

What You'll Hate: This is a very complicated profession, with a steep learning curve. Further, without a team to attach yourself to, your opportunities to level up are almost nil. What's more, because you will never be the one who does the most damage to the target in a hunting situation, you will never get any loot unless you're teamed with generous people. And if you join one of the Neocron City factions, then like all psi monks all of your mid-level and high-level equipment has to be smuggled down from hostile people in the Dome of York.

Monk Only: Only psi monks can become field medics.

- - - - -

Hacker:

What You'll Love: Using your electronic lockpick to get free or extra loot from all kinds of interesting places. A whole cool-looking cyberspace realm, HackNet, where you're the master and nobody else can threaten you. And you're absolutely indespensible to any clan that intends to capture and hold Wastelands outposts.

What You'll Hate: Right this minute (patch 130), it's buggy as hell, but being worked on. However, even when the bugs get fixed, the biggest drawback is that it's very repetitive. HackNet looks cool at first, but all the HackNet sectors look pretty much the same, and so do pretty much all of the software viruses and other players that you'll be fighting against. And on top of that, you're going to be spending a lot of your time working the same repetitive logic puzzle over and over again.

Private Eye, Psi Monk, or Spy? HackNet belongs to the hacker spy. Hacker PEs have the chance to be a lot safer or stronger on the outside, though. Hacker monks can do OK outside, but lack the dexterity to be effective at hacknet combat.

- - - - -

Infiltrator (aka Pistol PE or Pistol Spy):

What You'll Love: You have the potential to absolutely rule at PvP in close quarters, and most PvP in this game is fought in close quarters. You're fast, hard to hit, and deal out more damage per minute than anybody else in the game except maybe for inquisitors.

What You'll Hate: Early leveling up is a bear, because you have to get close to hostile targets to get decent accuracy on the lower-level pistols.

Private Eye or Spy? Private Eyes get much more defense, especially psi defense, including the damage boost spell, but are pretty nearly limited to low-tech pistols and SMGs. Spies are more fragile, but gain invisibility and a wider variety of weapons. Most solo raids deep into enemy cities are conducted by infiltrator spies.

- - - - -

Inquisitor (aka APU Monk):

What You'll Love: A wide variety of psi weapons, all of which do major damage, gives you incredible combat power and flexibility. This includes some high-level spells specifically designed to negate other professions' advantages. And if you're teamed with a Field Medic, the two of you are a two-man nearly-unstoppable killing machine.

What You'll Hate: You are the only combat class in the game that has no significant self-healing abilities at all, and you're almost as fragile as a pistol spy. Unless you have a field medic following you around, you're going to level up slowly in the mid to upper levels and be pretty helpless in PvP. As with all psi monks, if you join with the Neocron City factions, you'll have a hard time getting your middle to high level equipment smuggled out of the Dome of York.

Monk Only: Only Psi Monks can be Inquisitors.

- - - - -

Preacher (aka Hybrid Monk):

What You'll Love: You're the ultimate solo, able to do a little bit of almost everything, able to take care of yourself and dish out damage. You've also got a lot of flexibility in deciding just how much to put into offense and how much into defense.

What You'll Hate: You're going to go through psi booster injectors like candy. You get no high-level armor and few cybernetic implants. What's more, the complexity of this profession is mind-bogglingly insane, as it requires you to master two entire separate professions, each of them fairly complex on their own. As with all psi monks, if you join with the Neocron City factions, you'll have a hard time getting your middle to high level equipment smuggled out of the Dome of York.

Monk Only: Only Psi Monks can be Preachers.

- - - - -

Rigger (aka Droner Spy)

What You'll Love: Flying a combat drone is just about the single most fun thing in the entire game. You cover vast distances, kill things faster than almost anybody else, and do it all without exposing yourself to any risk, so you level up super-fast. What's more, you're almost the only combat profession in the game that can get by with store-bought, as opposed to player-built, equipment, which is a real time saver. Your weapons are cheap, too. Your highest level weapons, the Revenge (flying bomb), Raptor (flying machine gun with poison bullets), and Punisher (mobile missile turret) scare the crap out of most people in PvP.

What You'll Hate: When hunting, you will almost never get to loot your kills, so you will be broke most of the time. Outdoor hunting teams hate you, because you can't run along with them; you slow everybody down because you have to stand still while fighting and then run to retrieve your drone. And in PvP, since your body is blind and motionless, you only last until someone finds your "meat sack," then you're (a) insta-dead, and (b) lose twice as much equipment as anybody else.

Private Eye or Spy? I don't even know why they offer private eye as a choice, private eyes just don't have the dexterity to master drones. Maybe they were thinking that the extra strength and defenses would help you survive when you get found, but the problem is that in the end game, only the spy-only drones are worth using. Be a spy.

- - - - -

Scientist (aka Researcher):

What You'll Love: You're an indespensible part of the weapon-building process. What's more, because the top-level weapons are built from multiple "rare parts" that drop as loot and are useless until a scientist scans them, you've got much steadier work than an engineer does. You also get all the same advantages of an engineer: you can choose to do all of your leveling and all of your business in safe zones, at no risk. Further, there's an almost Pokemon-like (or Magic: The Gathering-like) appeal to blueprint collecting and rare parts collecting.

What You'll Hate: It's an even slower, more repetitive, more boring job than constructing is. And when you unavoidably break a certain percentage of rare parts, or give people back a rare part other than one of the ones they were hoping it would be, a certain percentage of your customers are going to rudely suspect you of being dishonest.

Private Eye, Psi Monk, or Spy? Private Eyes make lousy scientists, not enough intelligence points to spend to become a top scientist and still have any left for the combat skills that would be the PE's only advantage, if there was one. Psi Monks level up intelligence much slower than spies, which can be frustrating as all heck, but if they double as field medics they have the potential to be even better scientists than spies do. Spy scientists level up the fastest, and still have the points left to be competent, if not first-rate, with a pistol.

- - - - -

Smuggler (aka Barter Specialist):

What You'll Love: Every level of barter skill lowers your operating costs, buy letting you buy things from non-player character vendors and stores for one quarter of a percent less. It also earns you one quarter of a percent more in profit for things you sell to a non-player character vendor or store. So if you get, say, 200 points in barter, you'll save 50% on your costs and gain 50% on your profits. You can actually earn pretty good tips buying things for other players: parts in bulk for engineers, research chemicals in bulk for scientists, and for almost everybody power armor, real estate, furniture, and vehicles.

What You'll Hate: Most people don't need a barter specialist very often, and when they do, it's because they're feeling cheap. In between opportunities to use your barter skill, you're nothing but an infiltrator or inquisitor with a lower rate of fire and shorter range.

Private Eye, Psi Monk, or Spy? Look over all of the other professions except for engineer, rigger, or scientist, and pick the combination of that profession and class. That's what you're going to suck at (relatively) until you're needed as a barterer.

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Soldier (aka H-C Tank or H-C Private Eye):

What You'll Love: Really Big Guns. Also, you have more hit points and armor than some buildings.

What You'll Hate: You suck at everything but combat, which leaves you almost completely dependent on others for support roles. So you better really, really like combat, because that's almost all you're ever going to do.

Private Eye or Tank? Private eye soldiers don't get to use the best weapons, but they have the potential to have enough intelligence or psi to have some actual alternatives to straight combat. Only tank soldiers can operate the highest level weapons, including aircraft bomb/gun positions.

- - - - -

Street Samurai (aka M-C Tank or M-C Private Eye):

What You'll Love: At point-blank range, your attacks are almost undodgeable, because your weapon is fast and requires no aiming.

What You'll Hate: While leveling up, you are extremely dependent on field medics, because you have to get so close to your target that nothing ever misses you. What's more, your team mates hate you, because you get in the way, spoil their aim, and thereby create friendly-fire problems. Worse, there's almost no way to get good at this without your character becoming a total drug addict.

Private Eye or Tank? Melee Combat leaves all of your Intelligence points free, which offers a M-C PE the opportunity to pursue an INT-based skill like barter or hacking or installing cybernetic implants; like all PEs, they also get defensive psi. Tanks, on the other hand, get much deadlier weapons, much better armor, and they level up much faster.

Mr Kot
18-03-05, 22:52
Wow, great guide. :cool:

One thing that's worth mentioning here is that Private Eyes do have the ability to use the high-tec (energy based) pistols and rifles. They won't be able to get the maximum damage % out of them as easily as spies, well not without sacrificing defences or other skills.

Private eyes that devote themselves purely to lowtech (ballistic based) pistols and rifles have oodles of DEX points to spare in agility amongst other things, so can be lightning fast in combat.

Sniper rifles are also available to Private Eyes too, but the two best sniper rifles in the game require over 110 DEX so are only available to fully capped PEs with access to the best (and rarest) implants in game. A PE that is setup for using these rifles will have to sacrifice defences amongst other things.



For totally new players, how about a link to this thread on the launcher? I don't think every newbie checks out these forums.

Capt. Rik
18-03-05, 23:07
Excellent thread, I agree with Mr Kot on his points.

Maybe you were a little harsh on the Construction and Research characters? What I would suggest is that players choose these as a second (or third or fourth :p) character and not as a main

BradSTL
19-03-05, 00:36
What I said was that private eyes are "best off" sticking to low-tech weapons, and from what I hear you saying neither of you disagree with me about this, at least not entirely. Yes, it is possible to create a high-tech pistol or high-tech rifle private eye -- but it's a bear, and you sacrifice a lot of advantages to do it for not a lot of compensation. So especially for people reading this guide because they need it, I really really don't recommend it.

The Liberator (rare SMG) using or Pain Easer (rare assault rifle) using private eye is a cookie cutter design, I readily grant you. But it is for a reason; that's what private eye characters were really designed to do best. Those are very attainable setups.

Look, you can do all kinds of things in this game. One of my in-game friends is, for crying out loud, a heavy-combat using spy; his primary weapon is a tech level 34 Defender Rocket Launcher. I kid thee not. And I once saw someone get killed by a drone-using tank; I also kid thee not. (People were running all around Pepper Park sector 3 trying to find the meatsack, and everybody ignored the tank in power armor who was just standing there and not moving, because "everybody knew" that tanks couldn't use drones.) I once knew a PPU monk whose primary weapon was a shotgun; the same guy also had over 200 levels in recycling.

But this was intended to be a beginner's guide, a guide to picking your first character, the one you're going to use to learn the game.

Ground_Round
22-03-05, 13:49
All of your guides are very nice, would you consider doing one
for item locations ?

One of the hardest parts of the game, for me, has been
locating the next level above the available items in the NC
stores.

Tostino
03-04-05, 21:14
For the most part the guide is good. But you make it out like Spy's suck ass all the time. You can make a 1 drug spy that has very good xray and energy and can Shelter and then you can also make a 2 drug spy with good fire energy xray and Shelter. So let's sum it up, you get 115-120 energy and fire 160-175 xray 350-400 HP and shelter and you can use all pistols or rifles, that is not bad in my eyes.

Rabiator
09-04-05, 20:56
I once knew a PPU monk whose primary weapon was a shotgun; the same guy also had over 200 levels in recycling.


The idea of a firearm-wielding PPU has some merit:
he does not need to sacrifice PSI points on APU skills, and avoids having his offensive skills gimped by the PPU power armor, which reduces APU. With the Level 3 combat boosters as self-buff, he would be better at using his weapon than one might imagine (of course, the max. DEX of only lvl 35 would limit him to the smaller guns).

But the lvl 200 recycling on that monk must be a hoax or a bug in NC:
if you dump ALL DEX points into REC, you would get REC lvl 100 before implants and buffs. Subtract some points for AGL and R-C, and i don't think there is a way to get much more than 100 REC on a monk.

Maybe it was possible in some really old patch level of NC 1, where things were different.

BradSTL
09-04-05, 21:58
No, the R-C and the REC weren't at the same time, he LOMed from rifle to recycling. He kept a tiny handful of points in agility and dumped everything else into Recycling, just to see what would happen. He found a couple of salvaging recipes that were worth the trouble at that level, used them to make money. He never told me what they were, and for all I know they may not even work any more. He was a weird guy.

DIABLO666
20-04-05, 14:34
If you are this much of a noob you should just go out and fight stuff. i mean i had almost no help but i turned into a brilliant productive member of neocron. hell my PE can pk most ppl in seconds.


PS if u acctually need advice from this page you should try playing for yourself 1st. most ppl dont make their dream character 1st time around. experiment.
:angel:

Bugs Gunny
20-04-05, 14:41
I mean i had almost no help but i turned into a brilliant productive member of neocron. hell my PE can pk most ppl in seconds.

Oh boy..... :D

ArgieD
20-04-05, 15:04
That was some effort! 5 stars mate!

Tostino
20-04-05, 21:28
If you are this much of a noob you should just go out and fight stuff. i mean i had almost no help but i turned into a brilliant productive member of neocron. hell my PE can pk most ppl in seconds.


PS if u acctually need advice from this page you should try playing for yourself 1st. most ppl dont make their dream character 1st time around. experiment.
:angel:
You know how much more fun it is to have a good PVP char when you cap and not find out that you hate the one you made as a noob? I find noobs all the time that spec Pistol and Rifle at the same time. It is nice to have a guide that can make the choice of making a char a bit easyer.

khemikal
01-05-05, 22:36
Hey my first character is an assasin PE. So far I have 61 Rifle combat, 50 hitech combat, and 25-30 athletics. I didnt read this guide until now and I hope I didnt watse too many points on Hitech combat.

Dribble Joy
02-05-05, 01:20
High tech for PEs is primarily needed as you probably know, for the use of high tech weapons. The most you will ever need as a PE is about 86 total.

There are a variety of sites that will shown you what TC and other reqs you need to use the weapons. You probably won't need much more TC for a bit, but your RC could be a bit higher.

khemikal
03-05-05, 21:53
[Should I put some points into resistance? So far my endurance is level 17 and I have yet to put any points into any resistance.]

Oops I meant to say my Con was level 17. My endurance is 10, athletics is either 25 or 35, and body health is 50 maybe a little over. So far I have no points in any resistance. Also I only have 10 meelee combat, 53 resist force, 49 transport in strength . In dex I have 10 Vehicle use and, 75 rifle combat, 45 agility, and 13 recyle. Like I was saying is resistance important and what resistances should I get if they are. Also is vehile use and recyle worth putting points into? My overall level is 18.

Tostino
03-05-05, 21:57
Should I put some points into resistance? So far my endurance is level 17 and I have yet to put any points into any resistance.
put 3 more points in endurance and then go to the lom shop and buy 4 end loms :p. You will need resistances as a PE. look here (http://forum.neocron.com/showthread.php?t=124415&page=2) at my post about half way down for a PE setup for when you cap.

khemikal
03-05-05, 23:25
I dont know what the setup means; sorry total newb. I know I should obviously focus on my rifle and combat skills. I hear PEs can specialize( wear tank armor, wield lasers, drive awesome vehicles and so on). What do you think I should go for? I want to be able to do PvP at higher levels. Also want resistances should I sink points into?

Khanden
31-05-05, 08:47
It's been sooo long since I played this game (played Beta only). I missed it enough to come back. Good write-up on the professions! (Check out my join date - Same as Brad's)

Dribble Joy
31-05-05, 13:18
I dont know what the setup means; sorry total newb. I know I should obviously focus on my rifle and combat skills. I hear PEs can specialize( wear tank armor, wield lasers, drive awesome vehicles and so on). What do you think I should go for? I want to be able to do PvP at higher levels. Also want resistances should I sink points into?
PEs have to draw from all their skills in order to effective in PvP and compete with the other classes. Strength for higher lvl armour, int for belts, psi for spells, etc. But you can't use the high end stuff the other classes can.

You should focus on one particular combat type, which seems to be rifle currently and ditch the others.
Resistances and defence setups are a bit complicated and they can be a bit mind numbing at first.
The basic jist of it is to get an even spread between the main armour types, fire, energy and xray (force and piercing are affected by FOR under STR, which a PE can cap easily).
Damage taken is affected by the total armour value you have, resists ADD to armour (the relataionship being a bit odd), so try to combine different armour with your CON values to reach an equal amount.

For leveling, you can of course swap armour for the mobs you are fighting.

Destino
09-11-05, 17:57
Congratulations for the guide.
Sorry for replying to an old thread but i have a question: is there any change to the situation since this guide seems to refer to the game at patch 130 ? Like some bugfix that enhance some profession (bugs for Vehicle driving, hacknet and so on)

CMaster
09-11-05, 19:24
Vehicles are a little better, hacknet is the same.