Talents and character level: how to learn them and what each one does
Your character has a level from 0 to 7 that is separate from the 13 skills. Levels come from kills and unlock talents, which you buy with credits. This guide covers how experience works, what your department decides, and what each of the 21 talents costs and does.
The short version
- Kills give character experience. The total for the run is added when it ends, whether you extracted or died. Reaching level 7 takes 70,000 experience.
- Pick your department when you create the character. You can only learn talents that list your department (Operations, Support or R&D); the breakthrough below is the one exception.
- A talent needs a minimum level and credits. Prices run from 10,000 to 360,000 credits. Each talent is learned once.
- One breakthrough gives one extra talent. At level 7 you can pay 490,000 credits, once, for a breakthrough: the game text says it lets you learn an extra ability from any department. No talent has a second, stronger effect yet.
- The other guides describe a character with no talents. Talents change the Handcraft grid, carry weight, search speed and more; the table below says which.
Character level and experience
A new character starts at level 0. Every kill adds the enemy's character experience, shown as Character experience for a kill on the enemy's page. When the run ends the game adds the total and raises your level for every threshold you pass. Skill experience is separate and works as described in Skills and experience.
| Level reached | Experience needed from the previous level | Total experience |
|---|---|---|
| 1 | 1,000 | 1,000 |
| 2 | 2,000 | 3,000 |
| 3 | 4,000 | 7,000 |
| 4 | 7,000 | 14,000 |
| 5 | 12,000 | 26,000 |
| 6 | 18,000 | 44,000 |
| 7 | 26,000 | 70,000 |
Most enemies are worth little. These are examples of what one kill gives:
| Enemy | Experience per kill |
|---|---|
| Fungal Stalker | 1 |
| Fungal Stalker, spiky variant | 1 |
| Fungal Stalker, smoky variant | 1 |
| Zombie | 1 |
| Corrupted Deer | 2 |
| Corrupted Soldier | 3 |
| Fungal Matriarch | 3 |
| The Fish | 5 |
| Corrupted Officer | 15 |
| Puppet | 20 |
| Arson Doctor | 25 |
| Samurai | 30 |
| Fogman | 35 |
| Scary Highlander | 45 |
| Cookie Crumbs placed in the Forest Region camps | 1 |
| Randomly spawned Cookie Crumbs | 2 (lowest tier) to 10 (highest tier) |
| "Rusty Teeth" | 15 |
| "Iron Scab" | 25 |
| Fallen Leaf Shooting Guard | 25 |
| Fallen Leaf Small Forward | 20 |
Departments
The recruitment form asks you to pick one of three departments. A talent can only be learned if your department is one of the departments listed for it. Some talents are shared between two departments.
| Department | Talents | Cost of all of them |
|---|---|---|
| Operations Department | Combat Expert, Athelete, Runner, Dragon Tiger Spirit, Melee Combat, Precision Firepower, Spec Ops Vet, Warp Esacper | 1,020,000 |
| Support Department | Eagle Eyes, Nimble Hands, Athelete, Runner, Secret Base, Generalist, Stealthy, Wormhole Science, Motorized Infantry | 1,120,000 |
| Research and Development Department | "Can Build This In A Cave With a Box of Scraps", Professional Emergency Handling, Fine Industry, Mystic, Apothecary Expert, Generalist, Stealthy, High-Dimensional Apothecary | 1,070,000 |
Every talent
Talents are listed by the level they need. The cost is in credits.
| Talent | Departments | Level | Cost | What it does |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| "Can Build This In A Cave With a Box of Scraps" | R&D | 1 | 10,000 | Handcraft grid grows from 2×2 to 3×3. |
| Combat Expert | Operations | 1 | 10,000 | Weapon damage +3%, weapon switch time −5%, movement speed +0.05. |
| Eagle Eyes | Support | 1 | 10,000 | Search points that still hold loot, and dropped items, are marked on the minimap, and search points and items highlight from farther away. |
| Nimble Hands | Support | 1 | 10,000 | Search speed +30%. This adds to the Dexterity skill bonus. |
| Athelete | Operations, Support | 2 | 40,000 | Carry-weight penalties are smaller: the stamina cost penalty is 25 points lower and the movement penalty 15 points lower. You can roll while at Burdened March, and at Overloaded you can sprint and your stamina is no longer held at zero. |
| Professional Emergency Handling | R&D | 2 | 40,000 | Status effects on you last 20% shorter. |
| Runner | Operations, Support | 2 | 40,000 | You can use consumables while sprinting. |
| Dragon Tiger Spirit | Operations | 3 | 90,000 | Movement speed +0.1 for 5 seconds after a roll. |
| Fine Industry | R&D | 3 | 90,000 | Crafting needs 25% fewer materials (each amount is rounded up, so a recipe never drops below 1). |
| Mystic | R&D | 3 | 90,000 | Effects that items add to your gear, such as Corruption traits, are 10% stronger, and you gain +5 Phase Shift. |
| Secret Base | Support | 3 | 90,000 | Each map keeps one Storage Box that only characters with this talent can see; see details. |
| Apothecary Expert | R&D | 4 | 160,000 | Healing +10% and the duration of buffs from medicine +15%. |
| Generalist | Support, R&D | 4 | 160,000 | Tactical items you craft are 25% stronger. |
| Melee Combat | Operations | 4 | 160,000 | Melee attack speed +5%, charge time −20%, movement speed while charging +30%. |
| Precision Firepower | Operations | 4 | 160,000 | Damage +5% with the long-weapon slot and +7.5% with the short-weapon slot. |
| Spec Ops Vet | Operations | 4 | 160,000 | Firearms: movement speed +0.1 while aiming, reload time −8%, initial spread −3%. |
| Stealthy | Support, R&D | 4 | 160,000 | The sound range of everything you do is 30% smaller, from footsteps to weapon noise. |
| Wormhole Science | Support | 5 | 250,000 | When you flush a toilet outside the Safe House, each unit of each item has a 25% chance to arrive in the Safe House toilet instead of being destroyed; details. |
| High-Dimensional Apothecary | R&D | 6 | 360,000 | Medicines you craft have no negative side effects. The game marks this talent as work in progress. |
| Motorized Infantry | Support | 6 | 360,000 | Worn gear no longer counts toward your carry weight. |
| Warp Esacper | Operations | 6 | 360,000 | When a hit would kill you, you survive with half your health and take no damage for 5 seconds. It has a 1-hour cooldown (3,600 seconds). |
Wormhole Science and Secret Base in detail
Wormhole Science: flushing outside the Safe House
Without the talent, pressing Flush on any toilet destroys everything in it. With Wormhole Science, flushing a toilet in a map you are exploring gives every unit of every item a separate 25% chance to be sent to the Safe House toilet instead. The units that miss are destroyed.
- Each unit is rolled separately. A stack of 4 bullets can send 0 to 4 of them; on average one in four. A single item either arrives or does not.
- Where it works. Any toilet outside the Safe House. The Forest Region has 24, The Forest 16 and 88 Whitegate Avenue 1.
- Where it does not. Flushing the Safe House toilet itself always destroys its contents, including anything the wormhole delivered earlier. Take delivered items out of the Safe House toilet before you flush it.
- No room means no delivery. A unit the Safe House toilet has no space for is destroyed like the others.
It is a way to throw away weight mid-run and keep a quarter of it, not a way to move your loot. For safe storage use the safe box.
Secret Base: the hidden storage box
The Support Department's "exclusive hiding spots" are the Storage Box objects placed around the maps that have them. When a map is generated, the game keeps one of that map's Storage Boxes and removes all the others. If any of them holds items, it keeps one of those; otherwise it keeps one at random. The box that stays is shown only to characters who have learned Secret Base. A character without the talent sees none of them, so those spots are empty for everyone else. The Safe House is not affected.
- Which box you get changes with each generated map. The one that is kept is picked at random, so you cannot rely on a fixed spot.
- What is in it. The placed Storage Boxes use the supporting box loot group (2 to 3 items drawn from weapons, ammo, attachments, medicine, food and equipment), or are empty on a few spots.
- How many are placed. The Forest 4 stocked boxes plus 1 empty, Forest Region 12 stocked boxes plus 1 empty, Burning Grove 2, 88 Whitegate Avenue 44 and Grey Birch Mountain 15:35 15. Only one of these survives in each map.
Where talents change the rest of the game
- Carry weight: Athelete shrinks the penalties of Weighted Trek, Burdened March and Overloaded, and Motorized Infantry removes worn gear from your load.
- Search speed: Nimble Hands adds 30% to the Dexterity bonus.
- Crafting: the Handcraft grid, material costs and tactical items change as described in Crafting ammo and weapons.
- Toilets: Wormhole Science saves items you flush outside the Safe House, as described in Safe House objects.
Breakthrough
Once your character is level 7, you can pay 490,000 credits for a breakthrough. It works once per character and gives you one extra talent, chosen from any department (the game describes it as learning an extra ability from any department, except the last ability of each department). The talent then works as if you had learned it. If you pick a talent you have already learned, the game text says you unlock its breakthrough effect instead, but no talent has such an effect in this version, so that choice adds nothing.