Ulite: Skills

There are numerous skills that you can build in Ulite - all of them helping you advance in the game in different ways. Some are more important to build than others (depending on what you intend to do!). Some build faster than others.

Generally, as your experience increases in a given area, your skill level will rise. Your skill level rises very quickly at the start - going from 1 to 10 in a very short period of time. Skill levels higher than 10 need many more experience points to gain.

Most skills build from combat; some build by flight, travelling to stations, and trading. Your crew also needs to build their skill - the most senior positions on a multi-crew ship have a skill selector on the Ship -> Crew page, allowing you to select the skill you want that crew member to build. Note that as your crew gets more skilled, they will ask for higher wages - and they may quit if you refuse! Pay your senior crew well - you want to keep hold of them, but be warned: a skilled crew member may demand thousands of credits per day in salary, so ensure you can keep trade and missions lined up, or are bankrolled by a generous alliance!

You must select the skill you want to increase in combat in the Ship -> Crew page: these skills can only be increased one at a time per crew member.

Skills and their relative importance

Engine

• Can be earned by the player and crew
• Increased by combat
• Build this skill to be able to operate bigger engines
• Total skill is taken from the entire active crew

This is probably the most important skill to build if you want to captain a large vessel. Small hyperdrive equipped vessels can be operated with a relatively low engine skill score. If your active crew lacks the skill to operate the ship's engine, you can't launch your ship. For big warp-equipped vessels, you may need a skill score of many hundreds to operate multiple warp cores.

Technics

• Only earned by the player
• Increased by using 'self repair' when your ship takes damage
• Build this skill to improve self repair capability

This skill is one you can take or leave. Small ships aren't expensive to repair in the Market -> Repairs and Maintenance page, and large ships can be repaired much more effectively by a hull auto repair system.

Offensive

• Can be earned by the player and crew
• Increased by combat
• Build this skill to operate bigger guns
• Skill applies to the crew member assigned to the gun's position

This is one skill you'll need to build, but you'll hit the minimums very early - even a Large Plasma Accelerator only needs a skill score of 10. If your ship has multiple gun positions, you'll want to build crew skill for each gun position so you can get more shots in during battle.

Defensive

• Can be earned by the player and crew
• Increased by combat
• Build this skill to operate more shields
• Total skill level of crew is taken into account

You can only operate as many shield generators as the total skill of your active crew, so this one's quite an important one to build (especially if you intend to operate a large ship at some time).

Leadership

• Can be earned by the player and crew
• Increased by combat
• Build this skill to be able to command a larger crew
• Total skill level of crew is taken into account

You need at least twice the total skill level plus one as you have crew members - or you can't launch! If you hire crew members with at least a skill level of 3 for leadership, it's easy to expand your crew without having to build your own leadership skill massively high. However, it's much cheaper in crew wages to get some skill in this area, and hire lower skilled crew to train - so it's worth building this one up a little early on.

Station Admin

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by station building activities

This is a skill you'll only be able to build later on, once you start building stations of your own. The higher your station admin skill, the more stations you can own. You can only build as many stations as your skill level.

Trade

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by trading

This skill allows you to deal better with 'shady characters', get better deals, and figure out whether 'shady characters' are police trying to trap you.

Research

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by researching at a station

Navigation

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by flying to different systems

This skill increases slowly as you fly to different systems - and it does build quite slowly - only a few experience points per jump. As you upgrade ships, they gradually require more navigation skill to accurately fly. If you don't have enough navigation skill for the ship you have, you'll arrive imprecisely at the target system, and may have a longer journey to the station.

Maneuverability

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by docking with a station

This skill increases slowly as you dock with stations, and like Navigation, builds slowly. If you don't have enough Maneuverability skill for the ship you're flying, you'll crash it each time you dock, causing severe hull damage. You can build this skill a little faster by doing 'docking practise' - you can dock up to three times within the system you're in to add a few more points to your score.

Evasion

• Can be earned by the player and crew
• Increased by combat
• Build this skill to avoid being hit by other ships in combat
• Total skill level of crew is taken into account

This skill is very useful - it helps reduce the damage you take during combat - almost like having shield generators that take no space.

Charisma

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by completing missions on time

Increasing this skill allows you to take a wider range of missions. The more types of missions available to you, the quicker you can build other skills through the inevitable combat they bring.

Convoy guidance

• Can only be earned by the player
• Increased by taking other ships along in a convoy

If you ask another ship for a convoy, and they accept, and you fly to another system, this skill increases. The higher your skill, the larger convoy you can lead. The military is a good source of convoys through rescue missions, which will allow you to build this skill.