Level Up Your Skills
There are a total of seven Skills that you will level up as you play The Long Dark, and some are far more important than others.
The seven Skills in The Long Dark are as follows.
- Carcass Harvesting
- Cooking
- Fire Starting
- Ice Fishing
- Rifle Firearm
- Archery
- Mending
Carcass Harvesting, Cooking, and Fire Starting would be our picks for the three most important Skills, with the bottom four rounding out as Archery, Ice Fishing, Rifle Firearm, and Mending. That’s a subjective list, but it’s likely pretty close to most experienced player’s preferences.
Every time you start a fire, harvest a carcass, or cook food, you’re leveling up one of those crucial Skills. As you level them up, you become more efficient and get more benefit. However, you can level them up faster by being smart about your approach.
For example, you might not want to eat Bear or Wolf meat because of the risk of parasites, but there's no reason you can't cook the meat, right? Each time you cook a piece of meat, or can of food, you are going to level your Cooking Skill. The same goes for coffee, and the various types of tea in the game. Cook everything that you can, even if you don't plan to eat it right away. This will help you level your Cooking Skill up much faster than you would normally.
The same goes for Fire Starting. If you have a fire, take a Brand from it, then use the Brand to start another fire. This will give you two fires started instead of one, which helps for your Badge grinding, but it also helps level your Fire Starting Skill on that play through, something you will be thankful for when you find yourself in a tough spot.