How do you increase NPC skills?

Hi. I’m trying to make a faction camp and I have plenty of NPC’s but I’d like to increase their skills. How do I go about that?

I’m not sure if splitting skills into theoretical and practical broke their training aspect or I’m just missing something. But I’ve tried reading with them a skill book and hosting a training seminar, both don’t increase their skill at all.

Is grinding crafting with them helping the only solution?

Reading books increases the theoretical skill, but the UI displays the practical skill, which remains at zero until used, although a higher theoretical skill is indicated by the skill being displayed in a different (pinkish) color. You can see the theoretical skill value by tabbing to the skills section and then scrolling down to the skill of interest.

Once the theoretical skill is sufficient you can then train the skill practically with a reasonable chance of success. I haven’t yet started a faction camp, but my companion was able to dismantle vehicles once he’d read up sufficiently on (theoretical) skills and has then caught up with the practical skill by on-the-job training.

Logically, a sufficient theoretical skill should be sufficient for faction camp construction, but I don’t know if that’s the way it’s implemented. If the practical skill is required to be at the specified level, you’d have to grind it through whatever practice you can get (foraging, crafting, etc.).

Note that much crafting require proficiencies, and any such crafting divides the training received between the skill and the proficiencies, lowering the skill increase rate considerably, so you should aim for skill training on tasks that don’t require any proficiency you haven’t mastered, and proficiency training on tasks that you have all other proficiencies as well as the skill level for. Of course, the production of something you actually have some use for may rank higher than the maximum proficiency/skill gain rate, and the availability of the resources used for crafting factors in as well.

I have my companion read books on his own to train theoretical skills (I want you to do something->Talk about the current task (that’s the meaning, but worded differently)->I want you to read a book. I give the companion the book beforehand by trading, although you can sometimes get the companion to read a book that’s nearby. The companion will read until gaining a level or until interrupted (e.g. by darkness), and that task will have to be restarted every day (gaining the first level doesn’t take long, but higher levels can take many day).