Skills are organized into three Primary Skill Areas (PSAs): Military, Technological and Biosocial.
Military skills primarily deal with combat and operating in combat environments.
Technological skills deal with various types of machines as well as various hard sciences.
Biosocial skills deal with the intelligent races and their surroundings including medical skills.
At the start of the game, each character must choose one Primary Skill Area as his career. He will also begin the game with starting experience points with which to buy skills.
Learning Skills
To learn new or higher-level skills, characters must spend experience points. The experience point cost depends on the skill's level and PSA. The table below shows the cost progression of skills. The number in parentheses is the cost of the skill if it is not in your PSA.
 | Base Skill Cost |
| 1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 |
| Level 1 | 1 (2) | 2 (4) | 3 (6) | 4 (8) | 5 (10) |
| Level 2 | 2 (4) | 4 (8) | 6 (12) | 8 (16) | 10 (20) |
| Level 3 | 3 (6) | 6 (12) | 9 (18) | 12 (24) | 15 (30) |
| Level 4 | 4 (8) | 8 (16) | 12 (24) | 16 (32) | 20 (40) |
| Level 5 | 5 (10) | 10 (20) | 15 (30) | 20 (40) | 25 (50) |
| Level 6 | 6 (12) | 12 (24) | 18 (36) | 24 (48) | 30 (60) |
| Level 7 | 7 (14) | 14 (28) | 21 (42) | 28 (56) | 35 (70) |
| Level 8 | 8 (16) | 16 (32) | 24 (48) | 32 (64) | 40 (80) |
A character can learn only one skill level at a time. Skipping levels is not allowed, even if the character has enough experience points to do so.
EXAMPLE: Brango O'Bourke, a Human, has accumulated 10 experience points on adventures. The player decides to spend these experience points to increase Brango's Gyrojet Weapons skill from level 2 to level 3. Brango's Primary Skill Area is Military, so the new level costs him 9 experience points. The player increases Brango's Gyrojet Weapons skill level from 2 to 3 on the character sheet, and subtracts 9 from his experience point total. Brango has 1 experience point left.
Training
When characters learn new skills or increase a skill level, they must be trained somehow. Three methods are described below.
- HYPNO-TRAINING. Hypno-training is a teaching system that involves hypnotism, memorization and the use of drugs that improve the mind's ability to learn. A character with enough experience points can learn a new skill or skill level at a hypno-training center in five days (100 hours) for 100 Cr.
- TEACHERS. A character with enough experience points can learn a new skill or skill level from another character. The teacher's skill level must be at least two levels higher than the pupil's. A character can learn a new skill or skill level from a teacher in one month.
- PRACTICE. Characters with enough experience points can learn new skills or skill levels simply by practicing. This is not always possible, however, especially with skills that require special equipment.
All three of these methods are optional. Some referees may want to ignore this rule, and simply allow players to pick new skills when their characters have earned enough experience points. Training is more realistic, but also more complicated.
Using Skills
Each skill is divided into subskills or tasks. Tasks define exactly what types of things a skill lets a character do. For example, Demolitions skill has two tasks: set charges and defuse charges. This means a character with Demolitions skill can set and defuse explosive charges according to the rules listed under those tasks. When a character learns a skill, he automatically learns all of its tasks.
Success Rates
Each task has a success rate. The success rate consists of a basic chance to succeed, plus modifiers for the character's skill level. If the success rate for a task is "40% + skill level," then the character's chance to use the task successfully is 40% plus 10 x his skill level.
Some success rates have a second modifier, such as "60% + skill level - robot level." A character's chance to use this subskill successfully is 60% plus 10 x his skill level, minus 10 x the level of the robot he is working on.
The success rate of many tasks may also be modified by characteristics. For example, a task may be logic based so the task is modified by logic. In general, if a task is modified by a characteristic, the modifier is equal to the characteristic, minus 40, and then divided by 2. For example, if a particular task is modified by INT, and the character has an INT of 50, he will gain a +5 to his task skill roll (((50 - 40) / 2) = 5).
In some cases, the success rate might be modified by another skill. This is most common with knowledge rolls. Knowledge rolls are usually modified by the character's rank with Education skill. In such cases, the modifier is +3 for each rank of Education skill.
Note that all modifiers are built into the character design of the web application so you do not need to manually compute skill bonuses.
Repair
Computer, Robotics and Technician skills allow characters to repair damaged equipment. The success rates vary depending on what is being repaired, but the procedure is the same for all three skills.
If the damaged equipment is repaired in a shop, there is no chance it will break down again on its own. When a repair is made away from a shop ("in the field") with a personal toolkit. there is a chance that the device will break down again. This chance accumulates from day to day; a device has a 10% chance to break down in the first 20 hours, 20% in the second 20 hours, 30% in the third, and so on. When something breaks down, the referee must decide whether the damage is minor, major or total. A minor repair takes 1d10 minutes, a major repair takes 1d10 hours and a total repair takes 1d10 x 10 hours. |