Skills & Progression

Your character grows stronger through a skill system that rewards active play. Every crew role has an associated skill, and levelling these skills directly improves your ship's performance.

Crew Roles & Skills

Every ship has crew positions. As a solo player, you fill all roles. In a multi-crew ship, each player takes one:

Role	Skill	What It Improves
Commander	Command	Required to pilot larger ship classes
Pilot	Piloting	Ship speed and handling
Engineer	Engineering	Max hull, max shield, and repair rate
Gunner	Gunnery	Damage, range, tracking, and accuracy
Security	Security	Defensive capabilities

Skill Range

All skills range from 0 to 255 and scale linearly — level 0 gives no bonus, level 255 gives the full bonus, and you sit proportionally between those two endpoints at every level in between.

What Each Skill Affects

Piloting scales your ship's speed and handling with your pilot skill level. A maxed pilot is noticeably faster and much harder to hit.

Engineering scales your maximum hull and shield, and your passive repair rate. A maxed engineer keeps the ship alive much longer and recovers faster between fights.

Gunnery scales weapon damage, range, and tracking. The damage bonus is the largest single combat modifier in the game — a maxed gunner roughly doubles your output, and extended range and tracking mean you hit more often from further away.

Tip: The exact coefficients are deliberately left out of this guide. What matters is knowing which stats each skill touches — fitting and crew decisions should be driven by the direction of the bonus, not by memorising the curve.

Gaining Experience

You earn XP through combat:

Activity	XP Awarded
NPC kills	Fixed XP based on NPC tier
Player kills	Scales with the target's rank, ship size, and faction tier — bigger, more senior pilots in more powerful factions are worth much more

XP is awarded to both the crew member (personal skill) and the ship (ship-specific skills). Higher-value targets give more XP.

Levelling Up

XP required for each level grows exponentially — each level costs noticeably more than the last. Early levels come quickly; later ones require serious commitment:

Level Range	Difficulty
0–50	Fast. A few hours of active play
50–100	Moderate. Regular engagement needed
100–175	Slow. Weeks of consistent play
175–255	Very slow. Long-term dedication

Ship Skills

Ships also have their own skill levels, separate from crew skills:

• Ship Piloting — improves that specific ship's speed and handling
• Ship Engineering — improves that ship's hull and repair
• Ship Gunnery — improves that ship's damage and accuracy

Ship skills are gained from combat while piloting that ship. If you lose the ship, those ship skills are lost with it.

Tip: Your personal crew skills carry over to any ship you fly. Ship skills are tied to the hull. Invest personal XP first.

Multi-Crew Skill Stacking

When multiple players crew the same ship, their skills combine:

• The pilot's piloting skill determines speed bonuses
• The gunner's gunnery skill determines damage bonuses
• The engineer's engineering skill determines hull and repair bonuses

A well-crewed ship with skilled specialists will significantly outperform a solo player in the same hull. This is one of the strongest advantages in the game.

Progression Tips

• Focus on one or two skills early — spreading XP thin means no meaningful bonuses
• Gunnery is king for combat — it directly doubles your damage at max level
• Engineering keeps you alive — more hull and faster repair means more time in the fight
• Piloting for scouts — speed is survival when you can't fight back
• Find a crew — multi-crew ships with specialists are far more powerful than solo play