Where to put skill points

[netchayev]

Hi there.
First time player, 34 shaman.

During my travels and levels i accumulated well over 100 skill points and I have no idea where to put them.

Am I suppose to spend them somewhere im not clever enough to figure out, or should I save them for later ? In that case, for what ?

Thank you in advance!

[tkelly5]

I think spending a bunch in alchemy is generally advised, since alchemy is very expensive to level

[Polixa]

No reason to hoard them. I put 15 into each tradeskill and 1 into every language.

[ScaringChildren]

Well there are certain skills that will just not level up until you put at least 1 point into them.

I don't know what those skills are exactly. I forgot.

I think they might be Swimming, Sense Heading, maybe weapon skills?

I also use my skill points to boost my Specialization magic, but it's not necessary. Just personal preference.

Some people save them from tradeskills. But you can only put like 21 points into each, and it's fairly easy to grind your way to 21 by doing tradeskills.

[loramin]

Originally Posted by Polixa [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

I put 15 into each tradeskill and 1 into every language.

This is the correct answer ... except I think you can go as far as 20 on tradeskills.

The thing to understand about skills is that most are trivial to raise without points. Want to raise your one-hand slashing? Equip an axe and go hit some light blue or higher mob for awhile, and you'll get your skill up. Want to raise your Divination skill? Cast True North a bunch. Easy

Tradeskills

However, tradeskills cost money (albeit not much for the lowest levels) and also are a pain in the butt to raise (buy/collect tons of stuff, do lots and lots of clicking, repeat), so if you ever plan to do them it makes sense to spend the max (again I think this is 20) points on them.

Languages

Similarly you can learn any language by just sitting in a group with someone who spams that language. But, if you sit there like a bump on a log while someone else spams Elder Draconic at you, it's a little rude, so the polite thing is to spam some other language back at them so you both learn. To do that you need at least one in whatever language you want to teach, so there's a good case for putting one into every language (and then using spam to get the other 99 points).

Situationally Hard Skills

Other good uses include skills that should be easy, but aren't. For instance, if you use a two-handed weapon for 30 levels, then get a cool one-handed slashing weapon and your 1HS skill is at 2. You can equip a 1HS and try to get skill-ups that way, but if you're soloing the mob may well kill you first, so that's another case where you might want to spend some skill points.

Spellcasting Specialization

Another option is the specialization skills, if you want to make sure you specialize in the right one. Statistically speaking though by default you'll specialize in whatever you cast the most, which is probably the one you want to specialize in, so most likely you don't need skill points for them either.

Stupid Stuff

Oh, and then there's always stuff like Swimming and Sense Heading, which are super easy to raise (swim in circles for awhile or bind Sense Heading to a movement key), but some people just don't like doing it for whatever reason, and for them spending points makes sense.

EDIT: And I almost forgot one of the best reasons: class skills!

Originally Posted by ScaringChildren [You must be logged in to view images. Log in or Register.]

Well there are certain skills that will just not level up until you put at least 1 point into them.

As ScaringChildren mentioned most class skills (eg. Kick for melee types) require that you spend one point before you can raise them.

But really the true answer here is that skill points aren't necessary for anything except class skills (and most classes only have a handful or two), and are only marginally useful for everything else, so it's not like there's a wrong way to spend them.