Which skills should you upgrade first in Citizen Sleeper?

Citizen Sleeper starts by having you choose a class, but after that, it’s up to you to decide how to upgrade your character. Every quest you complete earns you an upgrade point, which you can use to boost the game’s five skills: Engineer, Interface, Endure, Intuit, and Engage. These range from -1 to +2 in terms of bonuses they offer, and each has two associated perks. By the end of the game, you’ll have gained enough experience to unlock just about every perk, but below you’ll find our recommendations for some of the best ones.

Fix Your Negatives

Before you really start souping up your Sleeper, you should bump up any negative score you have. Every class starts with a -1 to something, and it can seriously hamper your progress on certain quests and tasks. It only costs a single point to fix that deficit, so do it ASAP.

Predictive Reasoning

This is the first skill on the Intuit tree, and no starting class gets it by default. It’s crucial to doing your tasks efficiently, so make it a priority — it shows you all possible rewards and penalties for task. These are otherwise hidden, and it’s important to know exactly what you stand to gain and lose with every dice roll.

Photosynthetic Skin

The Extractor’s starting perk (the first on the Endure tree) is one of the best. By spending a single die, you can recover energy at your home base. The amount varies, but you’re guaranteed to recover at least something. Compare that to the Thrill Seeker perk in the Engage tree (which no class begins with), which merely gives you a chance to recover energy on Engage tasks. Photosynthetic Skin is a great, safe use a of even a single-pip die when you need an extra boost.

Self Repair

This is the second perk on the Engineer tree, and it’s a biggie. Self Repair lets you use Scrap to repair your condition at home, something you can normally only improve with a Stabilizer. Those are expensive, so being able to do it with Scrap is helpful in a pinch. Furthermore, the Efficient Extractor perk is a prerequisite for this one, and that already gives you a chance to earn Scrap from Engineer tasks. That’s a win-win.

Instant Karma

This is incredibly useful no matter what you’re prioritizing. Instant Karma lets you re-roll all your dice once per cycle, which comes in clutch if you’re dealt a bad hand. It’s the final perk on the Intuit tree, and since no class starts with a bonus there, it will take you a while to unlock. For the sake of having better odds overall, it’s totally worth the investment. Plus, you’ll get the aforementioned Predictive Reasoning perk along the way.