The Ascent is a cyberpunk world filled with humans, aliens, and monsters eager to kill one another for their own personal gain. Creating the right skill-build will help players survive the constant onslaught of enemies. By allocating skill points in specific ways, players can choose from a variety of playstyles.
The Ascent doesn't have a standard class system. Deciding what skills are important to the player will affect how their character grows. Weapons, armor, and augmentations contribute to a player's load-out, but skills really determine the path of a character.
Best Skills to Obtain First in The Ascent
Starting out, players aren't given much in The Ascent. The first weapon available is a hand cannon (ballistic pistol), with a moderate fire rate and weak accuracy. During the beginning mission, the first type of enemy players will encounter are small, gremlin-like monsters that move fast, aggressively, and persistently. Focusing on skills that increase movement speed, accuracy, and weapon stability is a great way to get a head start. The first mission does have plenty of chests lying around, but depending on RNG, a new weapon might not pop up for quite a while. Here are the best skills to focus on first.
- Aiming - This determines weapon spread recovery rate, and affects the Motorics Attribute. Motorics is like dexterity, and improves augmentations the higher the number. All attributes do. As mentioned before, accuracy is very important early on despite the infinite supply of ammo.
- Weapon Handling - This skill determines reload and weapon swap speed. There's a greater emphasis on motorics early on since the first augmentation players can unlock is dependent upon motorics. The higher the attribute, the more damage/effectiveness there is.
- Evasion - Evasion determines the cooldown speed, and affects the Frame Attribute. Evading is crucial since enemies move quickly, and get up-close and personal, like the first boss encounter.
- Vital Signs - Increases Max Health, and affects the Bio-metrics attribute. Living longer surely never hurt anybody, and doing so allows players to take more hits and compensate for lack of firepower early on in the game.
Fortunately, every level awards a number of skill points rather than a single one, so spreading them out evenly at the start works out pretty well. Players can also respec their skills once they level up, which allows a more specific focus on their builds. Experimenting often with skills is the best way to find the right balance for particular play styles.
The Ascent is available on Xbox and PC.