Here are some quick tips for the COMPLETE newbie. This is NOT for the Master Bounty Hunter whose holo said Brawler- your bleeds should more than carry you through. This is for the complete newbie who doesn't have bleeds, who doesn't have 80% resist, who doesn't have a rancor to tank or a doctor friend to buff/heal him. With THAT IN MIND, feel free to discuss.
The basic routine is: use berserk with the basic weapon to get to skill 1. Now you can use the hit1 special move; weapons will vary.
Here's the order I recommend you do.
Start with unarmed, because it doesn't require a lot of money in weapons. If you HAVE money, spend it as soon as possible on a pair of vibroknucklers, sliced for speed. Pop a speed bonus powerup on it; you want to get the attack speed as close to 1.0 as possible.
Now go outside the starport and fight bunnies or whatnot, using berserk, until you get skillbox 1. Now you've got unarmed hit 1. Experiment with either berserking with vibroknucklers, or spamming unarmed hit1. See which stat you're taking hits in, and adjust your stats for it.
It's fairly simple to get to unarmed 2, at which point you'll get your unarmed stun move. You can also get unarmed 3 for the unarmed blind special move too, but it's not strictly necessary. If you're into unarmed, keep going- as you get unarmed3 and 4 your ability to actually HIT and take damage will increase visibly.
Be aware that unarmed 4 is considered one of the longest grinds in the game. Feel free to leave it be for now- come back to it later.
Now, one-handed xp- of the four trees, the easiest and most useful. Buy a curved sword (make sure it's ONE-HANDED, there's a two-handed curved sword too), preferably sliced for speed. You can also buy the basic one-handed sword to start with if you like; or else you can just wield the curved sword (despite not yet being certified) and use berserk.
Here's the trick: you can now use your unarmed stun to first "stun" the enemy, and then equip your sword and whack away. To do this, drag your vibroknucklers and sword onto the toolbar (along with unarmed stun and other moves you use).
When you first attack, equip the vibroknucklers. Stun the enemy, and then switch to your sword. USE YOUR SWORD TO DO MOST OF THE DAMAGE- damage translates directly into xp, so if you do most of the damage using unarmed moves, you will get unarmed xp.
With this technique, grind up to one-handed 3. The onehanded bodyhit move is not very useful, while dizzy is extremely useful for fighting NPCs.
Once you get one-handed 3, you've reached a milestone. Congratulate yourself, and then start on two-handed sword. Buy a heavy axe (the starter weapon), a two-handed axe, and a two-handed curved sword (you'll end up sticking with this one). Get the curved sword sliced for speed, and put speed powerups on them. At this point, you want speed ove damage- because you're simply not accurate enough, so you need more chances to land small shots, instead of missing all the time to land a big shot.
Now, try to find NPCs to fight. Open up with your one-handed sword, and use the 1handed dizzy move. Once the enemy is dizzy, if you can lunge at him to make him kneel, he'll fall over when he tries to stand. This is extremely useful, so experiment with easy NPCs. Try to make them dizzy, and then try to lunge and make them kneel or fall. If it's not working, switched to knucklers and stun them real fast, and then whack away with whatever you're trying to level.
Once you get to two-handed 3, you'll get the 2handed sweep move- a more powerful version of the lunge. Now, you want to do the following to NPCs you fight: 1handed dizzy, 2handed sweep, and then just whack away. This will be your main attack from now on, until you master Brawler.
Two-handed xp is easier than the others (because you generally do more damage), so get two-handed 4.
Finally, it's time for polearms, which look cool but are hard to use. Buy a metal staff (and a basic staff if you want), and a lance. Slice the lance for speed.
Again, open up with the above technique, and then once the enemy is down and dizzy, switch to your polearm and whack away with berserk (or polearm hit1). At polearm 3, you'll get the polearm stun move. Not very useful. Stay far far away from the long vibro axe- it has a -50 to your accuracy.
From here, you can finish up however you want.
Master Brawler gives you some very, very useful skills. Once you reach Master, you're a self-sufficient NPC-killing machine: open up with 1handed dizzy (you should be good at this by now), unarmed or 1handed lunge2- this will throw them down and KEEP them down. Now tack on a warcry2 (which delays them from even getting up fro 20 seconds), and whack away.
Knockdown has a 30 second timer- it will not work until 30 seconds have passed from the last successful knockdown. Warcry has a 20 second timer.
This means you can lunge2, warcry2, and they'll be down on the ground for 20 seconds. Once they climb up, they'll get in a shot or two, and then you can repeat. 1handed dizzy makes it virtually impossible for them to climb back up.
I hope this has been a useful thread for you. Please bump if you find it helpful, discuss otherwise.
Agoo- Master Bounty Hunter/Master Rifleman
Smith-N-Weston Master Artisian/Master Smuggler for hire
Smuggler Spices Swoops and more -1562 266 Talus and 2812 4235 Tatooine