This is something I always consider when making a new character: At what point on the starting professions list do you draw the line of “anything above this point threshold is too easy”?
There is the obvious line that most people probably think of: Bionic assassin / sniper and black belt, but I’ve always thought a few other classes like traceur make this list for being able to start with 8 dodge from just choosing the “fled the riots” scenario, turning them into a melee monster from the very beginning.
What are other peoples thoughts on starting professions, and what do you personally like to choose / not choose?
If I’m just starting a new game for fun I always pick the ‘Out of Town’ start with the ‘backpacker’ profession. I like it because it’s pretty basic as far as starts go, but it begins with a backpack.
If I’m trying to challenge myself I’ll start in town somewhere with a random profession.
When I was first learning the game, I always played as a Bionic Prepper, which is a ridiculously powerful starting character.
I feel like as long as the profession has properties that make staying alive trivially easy (like good combat abilities or utilities like cooking materials and morale boosters), the game becomes bland since you don’t have anything you feel you need. Even if you have very high crafting skills, you will still need materials, which will be hard to get from zombie infested places, and you will still need to make sure you have food so that you can keep working on your deathmobile. On the other hand, a combat-based starting character can massacre small towns of unevolved zombies for all the supplies they will need to stay alive and train their other skills. A wilderness survival start can skip out on fighting entirely, living in the forests and going on profitable night raids. I feel like both of these starts remove the problematic situations that make a player think, improvise, and become more invested in the game.
Backpacker is probably the best average character starting out. So past that, it starts becoming easier. I’d say the point when you manage to blaze your way into town and get your first bag of loot is about when the profession is too easy.
Plenty of profession starting from cost of (1) point are VERY strong if you know what you are doing.
I.e. roller skater can be basically untouchable on the roads and just raid the cities for supplies during the day faster and safer than bionic assassin.
I would really just rate each profession as having the following qualities:
tools in starting equipment (from ++ from having a mutiltool all the way to ++++ for having toolset CBM)
escape/mobility options (from + for having a speed boosting consumable to +++ for having something like roller-skates)
having a starting weapon (+ or +++ depending on damage and utility with extra +/- for weapon being silent/loud and - for weapon having limited rare ammo).
utility CMB’s
rare recipes
The cutoff would ultimately depend of your world setting, as even a profession with many +'s may be hard in a world with scarce resources.
Never tried anything with a positive point cost
The defautl survivor start is good enough for “easy” start, and all the messed up scenario seems better for fun.
To me the fun part is reaching the point where you have everything to survive forever and overcoming all the handicap you start with. I tend to loose focus and stop playing when I reach the phase of lab raiding