Best skills and abilities in Rise of the Ronin

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What abilities should you learn first in the Rise of the Ronin stats screen?

Rise of the Ronin skills and abilities
(Image credit: Koei Tecmo)

The Rise of the Ronin best abilities and skills to learn in the Stats menu are those that actively increase your options, rather than just increasing percentiles on talents you already have (with one or two exceptions). So much of Rise of the Ronin is finding solutions to the tasks ahead of you, and having more solutions at your disposal will ensure you the greatest chance of success possible.

With that in mind, I've played ahead and picked out the top ten skills and abilities that players should be looking to achieve, abilities that players should be looking to get as soon as possible once they start playing. Keep in mind that this isn't with a specific optimised build in mind, but the majority of players who want to approach the game organically and have a general wealth of options before them will find this information invaluable. With that in mind, let's get into the best Rise of the Ronin abilities, skills and stats below!

The best abilities and skills in Rise of the Ronin to learn first

Rise of the Ronin skills and abilities

(Image credit: Koei Tecmo)

The best abilities in Rise of the Ronin you want to invest in and learn as soon as possible are listed all below, in rough order we recommend pursuing them. If you need more info about how to level up in Rise of the Ronin, the attached page will help you source skill points.

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  • All Skill Trees
    • Refill Up (Medicinal Pills): This is one thing that pretty much everybody will have to invest in sooner or later; effectively just increasing the amount of medicinal pills you get when auto-refill triggers. It's an efficient way to give yourself a major health boost. All skill trees have one of these skills attached, so invest in whichever one is easiest for you. This one is so essential we actually named-dropped it in our  Rise of the Ronin tips page.
  • Strength
    • Auto-Life Recovery (Out of Battle): Simply just restores you to max health when a fight is over, but means that by tactically dipping out of fights and back into stealth, you can fully heal yourself at no cost.
    • Speechcraft 'Intimidate': Unlocks intimidation-themed dialogue choices, and later levers make enemies cower longer. This is one of several Speechcraft skills, and they're all good, actively providing more options in conversation.
    • Killer Blade: Allows you to exchange your melee critical hits for an instant-kill move that frightens nearby enemies - and there's basically no reason to do a regular critical hit after this.
  • Dexterity
    • Rapid Assassinations: The Breaker - the Best Rise of the Ronin class - will start with this skill, but everybody should get it. The power to stealth-kill two enemies at once makes maintaining stealth much, much easier.
    • Grappling Rope Assassination: This one lets you drag enemies upwards and kill them out of sight. Again, makes staying in stealth far easier as a rule.
    • Quietness Up (Moving): Effectively makes you silent in movement - so you can sprint about and remain very hard to notice if you stay out of sightlines. The benefits of this should be obvious.
  • Charm
    • Speechcraft 'Liar': Unlocks more options in dialogue - by our experience more than any other Speechcraft - and increases enemy panic time.
    • Beast Whisperer: Allows sneaking up on animals to be easier, and you can tame them instead of assassination. This is supposed to make them allies, but frankly they just seem to go completely passive when tamed for me and sit there forever - likely a glitch. Still, animals do tend to spot you easily, so slipping under the radar is worth it on its own terms.
    • Reward Acquisition Up: Further levels in this simply increase your rewards from all manner of activities - grab this one as early as possible to maximise your income of everything, including Rise of the Ronin Karma.
  • Intellect
    • Speechcraft 'Persuade': The final dialogue skill unlocks other unique options, like the others, and also reduces shop prices for the player - a nice bonus.
    • Discernment: This one unlocks new items for sales in stores - the actual items will vary from store to store, but nearly always tends to be very good stuff (look for items marked with a monocle).
    • Revolver Critical Hit: Allows you to use an equipped revolver for a high-damage Critical Hit on enemies who've lost their Ki. Really good for taking a piece out of a boss's health bar.
    • Upgraded Rifle Performance: The rifle remains one of the best Rise of the Ronin weapons, largely in part for its use as a sniper, taking headshots before leaping into a fight. This ability, which boosts projectile speed and headshot damage, takes a great weapon and makes it downright unfair.

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Joel Franey
Joel Franey
Guides Editor, GamesRadar+

Joel Franey is a writer, journalist, podcaster and Very Tired Man with a BA from Brunel University, a Masters from Sussex University and a decade working in games journalism, often focused on guides coverage but also in reviews, features and news. His love of games is strongest when it comes to groundbreaking narratives like Disco Elysium, UnderTale and Baldur's Gate 3, as well as innovative or refined gameplay experiences like XCOM, Sifu, Arkham Asylum or Slay the Spire. He is a firm believer that the vast majority of games would be improved by adding a grappling hook, and if they already have one, they should probably add another just to be safe. You can find old work of his at Eurogamer, Gfinity, USgamer, SFX Magazine, RPS, Dicebreaker, VG247, and more.