Wasteland 3 Best Skills Guide

Read our Wasteland 3 Skills guide to learn about all of the different skill types and their effects on your squad of Rangers.

Character Development is an important prospect in Wasteland 3 as the story progresses further. Character’s active and passive actions both depend on the skills and perks that you have leveled up into.

Wasteland 3 Skills

The skills in Wasteland 3 are divided into four categories; Exploration Skills, Combat Skills, Social Skills, and General Skills.

Each skill type focuses on a certain area of knowledge that your Ranger can improve in.

Each skill can be upgraded up to Level 10 to increase its effectiveness. Every character has skills at Level 0 when you start.

Skill Points are required to purchase additional ranks of a skill. You get +3 Skill Points each time you level up.

To advance a certain skill to Level 10, you’ll need to get 28 Skill Points. Other than that, you can use Skill Books to increase the Skill Ranks.

Be careful where you spend your skill points and perk points as there is no respec option in the game. To enable perks, you need to spend enough points in a skill to unlock specific perks.

Below are the four Skill Categories with all the skills listed along with their effects:

Explorations Skills

This Skill Tree focuses on your Ranger’s awareness and potency of his surroundings.

Armor Modding

With this Skill, you can install an armor mod of a given rank.

Perks

Tender Loving Care (Rank 10) – +5 armor to your squad members when you are around them.

Lockpicking

Allows you to pick locks and crack safes. XP is awarded on successfully picking a lock or cracking a safe.

Nerd Stuff

Allows you to hack robots and computers that become your allies and fight for you. Turned robots automatically self destruct at the end of the fight. Enemies will not attack your robots until you reach Rank 3 of this skill.

Perks

Targeting Override (Rank 3) – Hacked robots will now get attacked by enemies.
Electric Leakage (Rank 5) – Hacked robots now deal electric damage to your enemies at every turn.
Overclock (Rank 7) – +2 AP gained by hacked robots.

Mechanics

Increase the damage given to robots, synths, and vehicles. Rangers can now fix generators and the effectiveness of repair kits is improved by +3% per rank.

Perks

Structural Weakness (Rank 3) – Robots and vehicles now take a bonus of 20% damage.
Handy (Rank 4) – +25% CON and damage gained by deployables.
Reinforced Plating (Rank 5) – Max CON of the target is increased by 25% for 3 turns after repairing vehicles and robots.
Fortify (Rank 7) – +5 armor after repairing friendly vehicles and robots.

Weapon Modding

Allows you to install weapon mods and improves scrap return when you disassemble a weapon.

Perks

Expert Disassembler (Rank 3) – Increases scrap return by 15% when you disassemble a weapon.
Powder Packer (Rank 5) – +25% bonus ammo found by your squad when looting at a minimum of +1.
Scrounger’s Touch (Rank 7) – You have a chance to find a weapon mod when you field strip a weapon.

Toaster Repair

Allows you to repair toasters.

Perks

Toaster Exper (Rank 3) – You can now find a bonus loot when you fix a broken toaster.
Breakfast Bandit (Rank 5) – You can get a Toast when you fix a broken toaster.
Heating Element (Rank 7) – +25% increase in Fire damage.
Toasty (Rank 10) – Your attack will now inflict Burning damage after killing an enemy.

Survival

Increase damage given to animals and mutants along with an opportunity to avoid combat encounters.

Perks

Big Game Hunter (Rank 6) – Increase in damage to animals and mutants by 20%.
Explorer (Rank 10) – All the discoverable locations and World map is revealed instantly.

Combat Skills

Your character will be able to get familiar with different weapons and master them by learning these skills.

Melee Combat

Hit chance is increased with bladed and blunt weapons. The cost to use these weapons is increased to 3 and 4 AP respectively but a higher damage is dealt.

Perks

Bleeding Strike (Rank 2) – Burning targets take 100% damage along with +50% damage and bleeding effect.
Stunning Blow (Rank 4) – Stun the target enemy and inflict +50% damage as well as +100% damage to Frozen enemies.
Striking Distance (Rank 5) – Equipping two melee weapons will give you +0.5 combat speed.
Bloodsport (Rank 6) – Critical hit chance on stunned and blinded enemies when you attack with a blunt weapon.
Hack n Slash (Rank 7) – Two consecutive hits with a Bladed weapon gives you a free bonus attack.
Pursuit (Rank 8) – Bladed Weapons gain a +25% critical hit chance when you move more than three spaces.
Shrug it Off (Rank 10) – Gain +2 armor while using a Blunt Weapon.

Big Guns

Increase in the hit chance while using heavy machine guns and flame throwers.

Perks

Move Up (Rank 2) – Big guns give you a +0.5 Combat speed on the first turn of combat.
Suppressing Fire (Rank 3) – Allows you to fire twice the amount of bullets at normal but with -50% damage. Target enemies are slowed by 50% and hit chance is reduced by 50% for them. Full 100% damage is dealt to demoralized targets.
Terrorizer (Rank 4) – Engulf targets have hit chance reduced to -25% when attacked by a flamethrower.
Pressure Cooker (Rank 7) – Vehicles, when hit by a flamethrower, are prevented from taking any action and take 40% Fire damage over 2 turns.
Steady Shot (Rank 8) – Heavy Machine Gun has a chance for a +20% hit and +20% evasion.
Wide Spread (Rank 10) – The firing arc of HMG and flamethrowers is increased by +35%.

Small Arms

Hit chance is improved with pistols, shotguns, and revolvers.

Perks

Shredder Shot (Rank 2) – Shotgun attack deal +100% damage to anyone with Armor Damage and inflict Bleeding.
Opportunist (Rank 3) – Successful pistol attacks give a +5% bonus Strike Rate.
Trick Shot (Rank 5) – A pistol attack if hit on the target gives you +3 AP and full Strike Meter. Marked targets are hit with 100% damage.
Clear Cover (Rank 6) – Enemies behind cover get +100% damage.
Draw! (Rank 7) – No AP cost for firing your first shot after reloading.
Devastation (Rank 8) – +25% damage for a shotgun attack after hitting multiple enemies with the same shot.
Counter-Offensive (Rank 10) – Enemies get +25% damage after they hit you with a melee weapon.

Sniper Rifles

Sniper Attacks cost 6 AP per shot and hit chance is improved.

Perks

Mark Target (Rank 2) – Enemies Evasion chance is reduced by -50% and +50% damage given to Marked targets from Precision Strikes.
Masterful Precision (Rank 5) – A higher chance to inflict Critical hit with Precision Strikes.
Concentration (Rank 7) – +10% hit chance with Sniper Rifle when you don’t move for one turn.
Chain Ambush (Rank 10) – You can use the Ambush Attack with Sniper Rifle without ending the Ambush if you kill the target.

Automatic Weapons

SMGs and Assault Rifles have an improved hit chance.

Perks

Puncturing Shot (Rank 2) – Hits multiple targets and deals +100% damage to Stunned targets.
Gopher Hunter (Rank 3) – 25% less benefit for enemies behind cover.
Spray n Pray (Rank 4) – SMGs fire bullets twice as fast as normal with -25% hit chance.
Reckless (Rank 6) – +15% increase in damage given to enemies not behind cover.
Double Tap (Rank 7) – The second consecutive hit on a target with an Assault Rifle is a critical hit.
Stormer (Rank 8) – SMG attack costs no AP when you move more than five spaces.
Trigger Happy (Rank 10) – Getting a kill with an Assault Rifle or SMG gives you +3 AP.

Social

This list of skills improves your Ranger’s interactions with other characters.

Hard Ass

You can intimidate others in giving you information and to throw them off guard.

Kiss Ass

You can get any information out of other characters by sweet-talking to them.

Barter

Reduces buying price and increases sell price.

Perks

Penny Pincher (Rank 3) – 20% discount when you buy multiple items at once.
Antiques Appraiser (Ran 7) – 5% chance to sell junk items for 5x times their normal value.

Leadership

Provides accuracy bonuses, damage bonuses (when you perform a multi-kill), crit bonus (when you kill a boss), and Max CON bonus (when you revive an ally) to your companions.

Perks

Rally (Rank 3) – +2 AP bonus to your allies in a radius around you for 2 turns.
Demoralize (Rank 5) – Enemy hit chance is reduced by 35% and critical hit chance by 25% for 3 turns.

General

Animal Whisperer

Allows the character to interact with creatures and recruit them to fight alongside you. You can only recruit one companion at a time that can also be killed in combat.

Non-combatant animals provide the characters with passive bonuses. However, hostile animals will get scared if used on them and will give you some XP.

Perks

Animal Training (Rank 3) – Animal Companion gains bonus damage.
Spirit Animal (Rank 5) – Non-combat animals provide better passive bonuses.
Vengeful Bond – Gain +50% Critical Chance and +2 AP when your animal companion CON drops to 25%.

Explosives

Allows you to disarm traps and landmines along with an increase in explosive damage and better resistance.

Perks

Duck and Cover (Rank 2) – +20% Fire and Explosive Resistance.
Bomb Recovery (Rank 3) – 20% chance to drop a grenade while disarming a land mine.
Mine Sweeper (Rank 4) – No land mines are set off when your Rangers steps on them.
Mortar Blast (Rank 5) – Drops a rocket on the area for +50% damage by using a rocket launcher. Requires 4 AP to use this attack.
High Impact (Rank 7) – Direct hits with grenades or rockets are a critical hit.
Blast Radius (Rank 10) – Explosives now affect a larger area up to 40%.

First Aid

CON recovery is improved after reviving an ally as well as your healing effectiveness. Better healing items are unlocked.

Perks

Emergency Response (Rank 1) – Gain +1 combat speed when an ally is downed while in combat.
Overhealing (Rank 5) – Max CON of the enemy target is increased by +25% for 3 turns after using a healing item.
Physical Therapy (Rank 7) – Allies are buffed +3% per First Aid used after reviving them.
Hypocritic Oath (Rank 10) – +100% damage for 2 turns after reviving an ally.

Sneaky Shit

Allows you to disable alarms and increases detection time by 0.3 seconds per rank along with sneak attack damage.

Perks

Second Chance (Rank 4) – Increases detection time by +1 second.
Close Call (Rank 7) – 50% chance of alarms and traps to malfunction when they set off.
Lights Out (Rank 10) – Increases sneak attack damage by +200%.

Weird Science

Weird Science items are unlocked along with an increase in fire and cold damage and critical hits when using energy weapons.

Perks

Atomize (Rank 3) – +1 damage per point of armor to con-conductive targets when using energy weapons.
Overcharge (Rank 6) – Extra damage to your target when you charge your energy weapon. The weapon can be charged 3 times but there is an increase in the chance of a backfire.
Conductive Beams (Rank 9) – 10% chance to electrocute your enemy and anyone standing beside them for 2 turns when using energy attacks.