Skills play a crucial role in Payday 3. They help develop your character stats in certain abilities.
Skills are what help you in the success of your heist with your preferred method.
This article will discuss how to research and unlock skills in Payday 3 to optimize your character build.
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What Are Skills In Payday 3?
Payday 3 has 17 different Skill Trees that contain a total of 105 individual skills.
Each skill tree focuses on improving a certain playstyle such as stealth, combat abilities, hacking skills, or engineering.
Within each tree are nodes that can be unlocked by spending skill points.
The first node in a tree is always free to unlock, while subsequent nodes may require you to unlock the previous node first.
At the end of each tree is a “Mastered” node that provides powerful bonuses but requires you to unlock the entire tree to access it.
Skills take one skill point to unlock with a few exceptions.
You earn skill points by leveling up your character up to level 150 currently.
This means there is a limited number of skills you can unlock.
Therefore, you must choose carefully which trees to focus on to create a specialized build.
Let’s discuss how to begin researching and unlocking skills.
Major Skill Trees In Payday 3
Here’s a breakdown of some of the most useful skill trees based on common playstyles:
- Infiltrator – Focuses on stealth skills like lockpicking, throwing knives, and silent takedowns. Great for ghost play.
- Hacker – Provides abilities for hacking cameras, radios, and computers. Invaluable for stealth or support roles.
- Medic – Unlocks doctor bag upgrades, revives, and health regeneration. Essential for any team-based loadout.
- Gunslinger – Boosts damage, accuracy, and reload speed for pistol weapons. Strong for Dodge builds.
- Sharpshooter – Increases ranged damage, stability, and ammo pickups for sniper rifles. Effective at range.
- Enforcer – Grants armor, damage reduction, and shotgun buffs. Well-suited for tank-style close combat.
- Engineer – Offers throwable upgrades, deployable turrets, and repair tools. Provides utility and area control.
- Tactician – Focuses on team buffs, marking enemies, and consumable upgrades. Excellent support-oriented tree.
Experimenting with combinations of trees can create hybrid builds.
For example, pairing Infiltrator with Hacker makes a great stealth-focused foundation.
Understanding the core trees will help optimize your skills for any situation.
Researching And Unlocking Skills In Payday 3
The first step to accessing skills is researching the skill trees.
This can be done automatically in the background as you complete missions and gain experience.
You do not need to spend any skill points to research trees.
Alternatively, you can manually research trees one at a time from the skills menu.
Once a tree is researched, you will see its name and be able to spend one skill point to unlock the first node.
Subsequent nodes can then be unlocked in order.
It’s a good idea to fully research one tree before moving to another to see the full layout and benefits.
Remember that to continue gaining experience for a tree, you must have at least one point invested in it.
This allows you to progress multiple trees simultaneously over time.
You can also refund all spent points to re-spec your build as needed.
Tips For Researching Skills In Payday 3
Here are some tips for efficiently researching skills in Payday 3:
- Focus on one tree at a time to fully understand its synergies before moving on.
- Prioritize trees that suit your preferred playstyle such as stealth, combat, or support roles.
- Consider unlocking skills that provide utility like camera hacking, before damage boosts.
- Check the mastered nodes to ensure trees fit your long-term goals.
- Research passively during missions for optimal skill point usage later.
- Re-spec often early on to test different builds cheaply before committing.
- Consult online guides and the Payday 3 wiki to evaluate all tree options.
- Unlock at least one node in multiple trees to gain experience across them.
Following these tips will help you unlock beneficial skills strategically and avoid wasting points on underpowered abilities.
The Bottom Line
A properly researched skills loadout is crucial for succeeding in Payday 3’s challenging heists.
Unlocking beneficial passive abilities, deployable weapon buffs, and playstyle-enhancing perks allows you to customize your character to your playstyle.
Understanding each tree fully and strategically investing points allows you to create a specialized build.
With the right skills, you’ll be ready to take on any mission as the ultimate criminal mastermind.
Happy Heisting!