Character
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Your character, @, is made up of a combination of Stats, Traits and Skills. All of which are very important to the game. While Skills can be trained and some Traits altered by mutations Stats never change, although there are some temporary effects that affect them. Things such as weather, diseases and medication may change you Stats and Traits temporarily. Bear in mind Cataclysm is a rogue-like in which permadeath is always on. There are only a few items that can actually change your Stats and Traits, but they are quite rare and they can go wrong!
Stats
You can modify a total of four Stats, each one of them is unique and will help change certain aspects such as player HP, damage, maximum weight that he/she can carry etc.
For all stats, minimal values are 4 and increasing values above 12 will cost 2 points instead of 1! 14 is considered to be very high, the max human value. Players can go higher, but those values should be considered exceptionally high.
At the default value of 8 the bonuses are the following:
| Strength 8 | Dexterity 8 | Intelligence 8 | Perception 8 |
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| Note that the starting values are 8. Below that the points you receive may not follow the formulas below. | |||
| Strength | Dexterity | Intelligence | Perception |
Strength also makes you more resistant to many diseases and poisons, and makes actions which require brute force (pushing heavy stuff, bashing down furniture and walls) more effective. |
Dexterity also enhances many actions which require finesse, such as dodging, martial arts special attacks, and bonus attacks granted by mutations. |
Intelligence is also used in determining crafting failure, installing bionics, and interacting with NPCs. Advanced books also have intelligence requirements. Not meeting these requirements significantly increases reading time. |
Perception is also used for detecting traps and other things of interest. |
Hit points (HP)
The Player's strength value and any hit point reducing or increasing starting trait you picked determine how many hit points each body part has. The default strength of 8 is equivalent to 84 hit points for each body part without modifiers.
Normally the exact remaining hit point value of each body part is hidden, unless you have the Self-aware trait. If your torso or head ever goes below 1 hit point, you die. If any other body part is reduced to zero hit points or lower, it gets broken; this can be a bit hard to heal.
Lost hit points are slowly restored (healed) in time, and healing rate is improved by using healing items, and is also faster when sleeping. Note that you need to be healthy to heal at the full rate.
If the bodypart is red, that body part is bleeding, and will lose hit points over time.
Important to note is that not only can your body parts get damaged, you can also get Infected. This can end the life of your survivor in a different way; read the infection page for more information. You can get infected from deep bite wounds, which turn the body part blue. Over time these bite wounds fester and turn infected, which changes the color of the body part to green.
Stamina
See the Stamina page for more information.
Hidden Stats
There are also various hidden stats, you cannot directly influence them during character creation, but they do have an effect.
See the Hidden stats page for more information.
Traits
Traits are a customization option you can choose at character creation. In-game, they work like and share user interface space with mutations. Several traits can be gained from mutagen and other typical methods of mutating, while others can only be picked at character creation.
Traits are split between positive ones, which cost points and help your character, and negative ones, which give you points and hinder your character. However, neither all positive nor all negative traits are created equal. Some negative traits have positive effects that outweigh their negative effects (and vice versa) and many traits have negligible effects. The right selection of traits can mean the difference between a living survivor and a rotting corpse.
Several starting professions also grant you special profession traits, which are based on the characters' career before the Cataclysm and represent the expertise, training, special permissions, or other effects you've gained from that. They are unobtainable in-game, and some of them are only available by picking that profession.
Skills
Skills are raised upon practice (combat, crafting, tool usage). Practice is multiplied by your current focus / 100; therefore focus pool level above 100 provides a bonus to the amount of skill gained, while amounts below 100 provide a penalty. The focus pool is not capped, but it requires higher morale to increase to higher levels, every few turns your focus is increased or decreased depending on your current morale. You can increase the speed at which you gain focus by increasing your morale.
As of 0.C (Cooper) (and still in 0.G), performing a crafting or construction task of certain difficulty can only bring your skill to (difficulty*1.25)+1, rounded down. For example, boiling water and crafting washboards (skill 0) will only bring cooking and fabrication to 1. Even the easiest task will still stop skill rust.
| Craft Difficulty | Maximum skill level |
|---|---|
| 0 | 1 |
| 1 | 2 |
| 2 | 3 |
| 3 | 4 |
| 4 | 6 |
| 5 | 7 |
| 6 | 8 |
| 7 | 9 |
| 8 | 11 |
| 9 | 12 |
| 10 | 13 |
You can also increase (theoretical) skill levels by reading books or being taught by NPCs. Note that reading skill books costs focus, but being trained does not.
The Melee and Firearms skill will improve both accuracy and damage of their respective weapons, but not as much as the weapon's main skill (handguns, cutting weapons etc.)
Stats will also affect a player's skills by making them more/less effective depending on the value of the stat. Dexterity will affect the accuracy and effectiveness for most attacks. Strength will affect the damage of all melee attacks. Intelligence can improve certain skills, increase the rate of learning, and reduce the time needed to read a book. Perception can increase a player's accuracy for ranged attacks, and increases trap detection.
Removed skills
These skills were removed, renamed or reworked in previous versions of the game. There are mentions of them in outdated articles.
Trapping
Replaced by devices, which also affects other security systems and lockpicking.
Swimming
Replaced by Athletics, which also affects other cardio activities.
Construction
In 0.D (Danny) the construction skill has been removed, the various constructions now have different skill requirements, related to the type of construction. Such as cloth related constructions are now Tailoring, food constructions are now a Cooking skill, and the general ones are now part of Fabrication, etc.
Cooking
Renamed to Food handling. Cooking also was important for making chemicals and drugs before Applied Science was added.
First Aid
Renamed to Health Care
Bartering
Bartering and Speaking were fused into Social in 0.F (Frank). Bartering was focused on trading prices.
Speaking
See above. Speaking was focused on deceiving, intimidating and other forms of persuasion. (todo: versions in which changes were made)