Cyberpunk 2077 gives you a lot of options in terms of how you can approach its world through gameplay. While you’ll have to make your way through plenty of hostile territories throughout the course of the game, there are many choices for how you do so, whether you’re fighting enemies, hacking their systems, or sneaking by. Those options are determined by the stats you assign to V, your protagonist, and these decisions will shape your path through Night City.
Especially if you’re new to the game, you might be at a loss as to where to spend your points and which perks you want to snag. Cyberpunk 2077 has no traditional RPG “classes,” or character archetypes–you’re able to freely mix and match abilities based on how you play and what you want to do. But if that gives you a bit of choice paralysis, we’ve broken down the character-building process to show you how it all works and help guide your decisions so you can get the most out of trying to build yourself into a living legend.
Check out the rest of our Cyberpunk 2077 coverage while you’re at it. You’ll want to read our full Cyberpunk review and some essential tips you’ll need to know. You might also want a rundown on how romances work, how best to make money in Night City, and where to find Iconic weapons.
Your Character Attributes
As in most RPGs, where your skills lie in Cyberpunk 2077 depends on points you assign to specific attributes. Some of those attributes make you a better melee brawler; others define how you handle firearms or your capabilities as a hacker. Your attribute stats also factor into how you deal with people at specific moments–if you know a lot about engineering, for instance, you might get insight into a conversation about machinery that a hacking-focused V might not. And of course, if your stats are high enough in certain areas, you’ll open up different ways of progressing through levels, like gaining the ability to force open certain doors or talk your way out of bad situations.
You often won’t know what gains your abilities will offer you in specific story moments until you get there, so it can be useful to bank a few attribute points you earn from leveling up to dump into a skill during a key conversation or at a pivotal point in a level. But for the most part, investing your ability points will be how you grow your V into a powerful, capable mercenary. Here’s what you need to know about Attributes and what they do. Each Attribute also has various categories of perks, organized in skill trees, and some of those perks are gated until you have invested enough points into the associated Attribute.
Body
This determines your overall strength. Points in Body increase your melee damage, your overall health pool, your stamina, and your carrying capacity. It also affects movement speed when carrying enemies and bodies or using certain guns, including heavy machine guns.
You’ll find perks in the Body that align with fist-fighting, athletics, and storming the enemy’s gates, focusing on using big weapons like shotguns and machine guns.
- Adds Health points
- Adds Stamina points
- Adds melee damage
- Determines how well you can intimidate people
- Determines whether you can force open some doors
Skill trees: Athletics, Annihilation, Street Brawler
Reflexes
The Reflexes stat generally determines your capability with firearms, your movement speed, and your evasion capabilities. How well you handle swords is also determined by your Reflexes.
Perks for Reflexes are mostly about speed and effectiveness with guns, especially handguns. You’ll also find a whole skill tree of sword perks, and perks that give you benefits for aiming and reloading, as well as bonuses when you kill enemies at range.
- Increases Evasion chance
- Increases Critical Hit chance
- Increases Mantis Blades damage
Skill trees: Handguns, Blades, Assault
Technical Ability
This is essentially your knowledge of machines. It mostly dictates your ability with Tech guns and determines your ability to craft weapons and clothing (both of which you can sell if you’re hard-up for cash), while increasing your armor protection. Technical ability perks also make your grenades more effective and protect you from explosions.
- Increases armor
- Determines Tech gun ability
- Allows for crafting rarer gear
- Allows for opening certain doors
Skill trees: Crafting, Engineering
Intelligence
All your hacking capabilities are based on the Intelligence stat, and your points here will determine whether you can even attempt to hack certain computer systems. It also controls the capabilities of your Cyberdeck and the effectiveness of your quickhacks.
- Increases Quickhack RAM
- Increases Quickhack duration
- Increases Quickhack damage
- Determines whether computers are hackable
Skill trees: Breaching Protocol, Quickhacking
Cool
This stat is all about your stealth abilities and composure under pressure. Cool determines how much damage you do in stealth and with critical hits, affects your Monowire damage, unlocks some dialogue options when you’re threatened, and determines how quickly you’re detected by enemies. Cool also comes with a skill tree that gives you bonuses for being a cold-blooded killer.
- Increases Critical Damage
- Increases all Resistances
- Increases Stealth damage
- Reduces enemy detection speed during Stealth
- Allows you to see through characters’ attempts to intimidate you
- Increases Monowire damage
Skill trees: Stealth, Cold Blood
Skill Progression
In addition to Attributes and Perks, you get one other kind of character progression in Cyberpunk 2077, called Skill Progression. This is a set of points that don’t come from leveling up, but are rather earned by doing specific things in the game. For instance, fighting enemies with handguns will earn you Skill Progression points for the handgun skill tree, unlocking a series of passive bonuses. You’ll find the list of Skill Progression points for each skill tree in the bottom-left corner of each tree’s screen.
Skill Progression is a way you can advance V according to your playstyle just by playing the game. Hacking, running and jumping, crafting gear, slicing through enemies with blades, favoring heavy weapons–all of it gives you points for the applicable Skill Progression bar. Because this all happens as you play, you don’t need to play close attention to Skill Progression, but it’s worth taking a look at the perks you can unlock for each one. Knowing what bonuses you’re getting for how you play can be a useful thing to keep in mind, and knowing what you could earn might incentivize you to play with weapons or abilities you’ve been neglecting if you want to change your approach to the game.
Starting Character Builds
One of the best things about Cyberpunk 2077 is how adaptive your character can be–you’re not restricted to “classes” that make you good at one or two things at the expense of others. Instead, you can drop points into any specialization at just about any time, customizing your V to exactly how you want to play. While you’ll get some big bonuses for specializing, it’s by no means essential to enjoying the game, and dabbling in a little bit of everything is an effective way to work your way through Night City.
That said, if you want to create a character who’s good for a particular playstyle, we’ve got your back. Below, you’ll find some general suggestions for a few class-like character builds, and we’ll highlight some specific perks along the way. Since you have so much flexibility, however, you can freely mix and match parts of our suggestions to create a V all your own.
Solo
In the tabletop RPG, Solo describes a mercenary who can handle anything from protection to assassination–essentially, your one-person-army type. They’re characters who favor combat and resilience over technological capabilities, although stealth can be a component of the Solo approach, since it’s easier to kill a target when they don’t know you’re coming.
We’re prioritizing a guns-blazing approach here so you can survive well in combat, but your Solo might favor blades or hand-to-hand and blunt-weapon combat (which is nonlethal) and stealthier approaches, so adjust accordingly. You might also want to invest a bit into Technical Ability, with perks focusing on powering up your grenades and hardening you against explosions.
Key Attributes: Body, Reflexes, Cool
Perks To Start With
Body – Athletics
- Regeneration (replenishes Health in combat)
- Invincible (increases max health by 10%)
Body – Annihilation
- In Your Face (reduces reload time for shotguns and machine guns)
- Blood Rush (increases movement speed when carrying shotguns or light machine guns)
- Hail of Bullets (shotguns and machine guns deal more damage)
Reflexes – Assault
- Covering Killshot (higher critical chance with rifles and SMGs from behind cover)
- Bullet Jock (Increased damage from SMGs and Rifles)
Cool – Stealth
- Sniper (more damage when sneaking)
- Silent and Deadly (increased damage with silent weapons while sneaking)
Cool – Cold Blood
- Cold Blood (various benefits for killing enemies, but you’ll need to purchase other perks based on what bonuses you want)
- Will to Survive (increased Resistance per stack of Cold Blood).
Netrunner
Netrunners are the traditional hackers of the Cyberpunk world, utilizing Breaching Protocols that can let you weaken the security on all the devices and people in an area, and Quickhacks against specific people and devices to create specific effects. If you want to go the Netrunner path, make sure you upgrade your Cyberdeck early at a ripper doc, as you’ll need the additional RAM and Quickhack slots to be effective. You should also try to drop by Netrunner stores to buy additional, more effective Quickhacks whenever possible.
If you’re relying more on hacking than gunplay, you’ll want to prioritize stealth as a Netrunner. That said, make sure you are at least proficient with a few weapons, as you’ll undoubtedly need to shoot your way out of situations, even if you also are hacking your way out of them. You might also want to put points into Technical Ability, mostly so you can open doors that allow you to take paths that avoid combat.
Key Attributes: Intelligence, Cool, Reflexes
Perks to Start With
Intelligence – Quickhacking
- Biosynergy (increases RAM recharge)
- Weal Link — Reduces RAM required for hacks
- Bloodware — Increases Quickhack damage
Intelligence – Breach Protocol
- Mass Vulnerability (reduces linked enemies’ Physical Resistance)
- Big Sleep (Deactivate linked security cameras)
Cool – Stealth
- Crouching Tiger (Faster movement while sneaking)
- Assassin (increased damage to human enemies)
Assassin
Stealth can be a huge part of Cyberpunk 2077 if you want it to be. While sneaking is a part of just about any build in this game, focusing on it can give you some serious advantages in dealing damage and completing objectives. If you do want to go the full-stealth route, it’s worth investing in some Cyberware that can help, like an enhanced Cyberdeck for hacking security cameras and enemies’ optics, and tendon enhancements for your legs that will allow you to double-jump, and thus reach paths that will allow you to slip past enemies or get the drop on them. You’ll also want to equip suppressors on your weapons, and to prioritize the perks for the types of weapons you can silence.
Key Attributes: Cool, Reflexes
Perks To Start With
Cool – Stealth
- Sniper (more damage when sneaking)
- Silent and Deadly (increased damage with silent weapons while sneaking)
Cool – Cold Blood
- Cold Blood (various benefits for killing enemies, but be sure to buy more perks consistent with your playstyle)
- Will to Survive (increased Resistance per stack of Cold Blood).
Cool – Stealth
- Crouching Tiger (Faster movement while sneaking)
- Assassin (increased damage to human enemies)
Intelligence – Breach Protocol
- Big Sleep (Deactivate linked security cameras)
Mix And Match
These builds are a good place to start, but you can greatly refine your character and playstyle by going after additional perks in any given menu. Here’s a rundown of what each set of perks emphasizes, allowing you to focus on particular approaches–like prioritizing using swords, going fully John Wick with pistols, or punching your way out of every situation.
Body
Athletics: Affects most things linked to Stamina, while also giving you the ability to run, jump, vault, slide, and dodge while fighting.
Annihilation: Perks designed to make it easier for you to go into a straight fight with heavy weapons and to absorb more damage.
Street Brawler: Increased damage and effectiveness fighting barehanded or with blunt weapons.
Reflexes
Assault: Perks for rifles and submachine guns and for fighting while taking cover.
Handguns: Pistol and revolver perks mostly focused on fast fighting and critical hits.
Blades: Sword-focused and Mantis Blade perks that make blades faster and deadlier with a focus on the Bleeding effect, while giving boosts to close-range defensive moves.
Technical Ability
Crafting: Perks that unlock the ability to craft a variety of weapons, clothes, and Quickhacks. They also provide benefits that make crafted items deadlier or more valuable for sale.
Engineering: Perks that improve the usefulness and lethality of tech weapons, offer increased protection against grenades, and make you more effective against robotic enemies.
Intelligence
Breach Protocol: Hacking systems becomes easier and more effective with these perks, allowing you to affect multiple devices at once with daemons and steal more when hacking.
Quickhacking: Improvements to the effectiveness of Quickhacks and which allow you to use them more often. Perks also offer the ability to craft your own Quickhacks.
Cool
Stealth: Perks focused on making you quicker and more effective while in stealth, while increasing the damage you do and offering silent kill abilities.
Cold Blood: Killing enemies in quick succession gives you the Cold Blood status with these perks, which give a number of benefits in the midst of combat to help you keep racking up kills.
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