Overview
This guide will give you an overview of the different races and their subraces that inhabit the world of Kenshi, discussing their merits, disadvantages, niches, recommended uses and other curiosities as well as my personal opinions on them.WARNING: THERE WILL BE SPOILERS AHEAD! If you want to keep yourself in the dark about just what sort of folk live in the more dangerous parts of the world, please avoid the sections for Recruitable & Unplayable Races.
The People of Kenshi
A myriad of people live in the world of Kenshi, ranging from the mundane humans to the malformed beasts and broken machines that inhabit the three corners of the continent. These people are divided into several different groups and then into even more subraces, and they all tend to play quite differently from each other from both gameplay and lore viewpoint.
For ease of reading I’ve divided these races into three different categories: Playable Races, Recruitable Races and Unplayable races. I will go through these groups in the aforementioned order, introducing new groups and subraces as they appear in each category.
PLAYABLE RACES
The playable races come in four groups, with seven different subraces. These races are available in the character creation, and they are also the most common recruits you can find in the world (with Skeletons really stretching the common part). 90% of the time your party, associates and opponents will consist of these races, so you will eventually find yourself quite familiar with them.
Humans
Humans are, somewhat unsurprisingly, the most common group in Kenshi. From gameplay point of view, they, especially the Greenlander subrace, serve as the baseline for all other races in the game: If some other race is said to eat 20% more or heal three times faster, that number is always reflected to the basic human stats.
Humans are generally the simplest race in the game to play, having no particularly severe flaws or quirks. They can interact with most factions without problems, can use any equipment without restrictions and have no particularly gameplay-changing features – that is, of course, as long as you’re not the demonic spawn of Narko herself: A woman.
Human Pros in General:
+ Generally balanced
+ No problems in interacting with most notable factions (as long as you are a man)
+ Able to equip all types of armour, apart from the few race-specific ones
+ Show most visual improvement with increased stats: Your character will become extremely ripped
+ Only group with access to beards (very important)
Human Cons in General:
– No protection from hostile environment, requires specialized gear to survive
– Considered a delicacy and/or an item of clothing by certain factions and animals
Humans come in two different subraces:
Greenlander:
Body: 100 for all bodyparts
Blood: 75-150
Bleed Rate: 1
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: 16-27 mph
Experience Multipliers:
Farming +20 %
Cooking +20 %
Science +20 %
As mentioned before Greenlanders are the most bog-standard and mundane of peoples, whether it comes to gameplay, looks or stats. They have no particular flaws, but their bonuses aren’t that impressive either.
Greenlander Pros:
+ Balanced, can be used for anything
+ Nice multipliers for settlement work without any penalties
+ Most character customization options
Greenlander Cons:
– Don’t particularly excel at anything, with other races being equal or better options when specializing
– No resistance against blood loss, unlike almost every other race
Greenlanders are found where there is civilization, and two of the three main factions of the game have them as significant majorities. They can be found as civilians, bandits, heroes and kings, and there are only a very few places out there where they don’t have some sort of presence.
Personal Opinion: Greenlanders offer a solid, balanced choice from both game- and roleplaying viewpoint. Not much else to say here. These guys are probably your best choice (alongside the next subrace) for your first playthrough, as they offer a fairly soft landing to the game while being quite vulnerable to the more dangerous parts of the world.
Recommended For: General all-rounders, Settlement Work
Scorchlander:
Body: 100 for all bodyparts
Blood: 75-150
Bleed Rate: 0,9
Hunger Rate: 0,9
Heal Rate: 1,1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: 16-27 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+10 % Dexterity
+20 % Stealth
+20 % Athletics
+20 % Armor Smith
+20 % Weapon Smith
+20 % Dodge
-10 % Strength
-20 % Labouring
-20 % Farming
-20 % Cooking
Scorchlanders are a human subrace that is far more adjusted to the hostile environment of the world of Kenshi. Compared to their more mundane cousins, these dark-skinned and glowy-eyed people are well suited for a life of adventure.
Scorchlander Pros:
+ Excellent stat multipliers to several important skills
+ Rare smithing bonuses make arming and equipping your forces with high-quality items much quicker
+ Heal faster, bleed slower, and eat less than Greenlanders, making them much more survivable
+ Can consume raw food
+ Most penalties are negligible, expect for…
Scorchlander Cons:
– …Horrible, horrible strength penalty
– Mediocre at running basic settlement functions
– Notably lower water avoidance than other playable races, may cause pathfinding issues and suicidal tendencies near acidic bodies of water
Scorchlanders are often found where there are Greenlanders, but due to their more adventurous nature they are more commonly found as ninjas or bandits instead of farmers or city-dwellers.
Personal opinion: Scorchlanders make for excellent adventurers, owing to their great stats boosts and general robustness, though the negative multiplier to strength is always a bit irritating. They make for a great backbone for your forces, whether as agile fighters, sneak-thieves or smiths, often all three in one nice package. Plus, they do have pretty cool-looking aesthetics in general. Heartily recommended for all your wandering ronin-ninja-whatnot needs.
The +20% experience modifier to both types of smithing is an extremely useful quality, as the increased experience gain means that you will reach the levels required to manufacture higher-quality goods much quicker and with less resources. High levels of armoursmithing can be reached even in very early game (for example by manufacturing armour plates in a relatively safe NPC-owned city such as the Hub or Black Desert City, as they only require raw ore and thus require no settlement to be built, only a player-owned house) meaning that you can be churning out masterwork equipment within your first month. While other races could do the same “trick”, the combination of the increased multipliers and reduced food costs makes this particularly easy and effective for Scorchlanders to pull off.
Recommended For: General adventuring, Smithing, Sneaking, Dexterity-based combat, Trading & Smuggling
Scorchlanders are born survivors.
Survival is not always dignified, but it beats dying.
Sheks
Body: 125 for all bodyparts
Blood: 75-150
Bleed Rate: 0,9
Hunger Rate: 1,25
Heal Rate: 0,8, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+10 % Strength
+20 % Melee Attack
+20 % Toughness
-20 % Dexterity
-20 % Robotics
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Athletics
-20 % Science
-20 % Labouring
-20 % Farming
-20 % Dodge
A bunch of literal boneheads hailing from a warrior society, Sheks are the only group without any separate subraces (though there’s an exclusive, uh, horn-style only available to NPC:s and certain recruits). Sheks are good at one thing only (beating & being beaten) but they’re very, very good at it.
Shek Pros:
+ Meanest, biggest and toughest (organic) beatsticks out there, with excellent boosts to fighting-related stats
+ Rare and extremely useful Strength multiplier
+ Hard to down and even harder to kill due to their high body HP and lowered bleed rate
+ “Warrior” Sheks have excellent dialogue (and a few unique dialogue options)
+ Can wear all types of armour apart from a few (frankly terrible) hats
+ Very high water avoidance, moves efficiently in watery areas
Shek Cons:
– Penalties to dexterity and dodging hamper an otherwise great statline
– Worthless at anything that seems vaguely dishonorable, aka basic labor and sneaky stuff
– Slowest playable organic race (can alleviate this with shoes)
– Eat a lot of food
– Slow healing rate combined with high limb health can keep a Shek out of a fight for a long time, especially at low toughness
– It’s literally illegal to be a Shek in the Holy Nation lands, and others may hold some prejudice
– Suffer from the same environmental hazards as humans and likewise require specialized protective gear, also at risk from being eaten by wildlife and/or cannibals
Sheks are mainly found in the Shek Kingdom and its neighbouring zones, and though minorities live in both United Cities and as members of certain adventurer and bandit groups they don’t have a major presence outside their native lands.
Personal opinion: Personally? Not a big fan, an opinion that will probably raise a lot of ire. Sheks are a bit too clunky in the early game for me to use them that often. This doesn’t obviously mean they’re terrible, far from it in fact.
Sheks have three notable things going for them: Their increased health and reduced blood loss, ability to wear almost all armours in the game and excellent multipliers to several important combat skills. A Shek will stay fighting longer than most organics, and is also harder to knock out and kill while being able to ditch out severe punishment due to generally having excellent offensive statlines because of the aforementioned multipliers. The high durability and offensive potential allows Sheks to excel in all roles in the battlefield, ranging from glass cannon builds (increased durability allows them to shrug off damage that would be crippling or lethal to other races in similar setups) to heavy-duty tanking (extremely hard to kill when hiding behind several layers of high-quality armour while still being able to ditch out notable damage with a tanking weapon). Compared to Skeletons, which are even more durable, Sheks have the advantage of being able to wear hats, shirts and shoes to further augment their playstyle, giving them things like additional armour, damage multipliers and stat boosts while also not taking additional damage from anti-robot weapons.
The greatest flaw that the Sheks have is that they need a notable amount of food which makes them (alongside their mediocre multipliers) very poorly suited for domestic life in a base. The already high food requirements will further increase when either performing heavy labour or by just walking around while being encumbered. This will become much less of a problem once you can reliably make high-end food for your guys, but filling the squad with Sheks in the early game will turn your experience into Hungry Hungry Hornheads instead as you scour the local countryside of anything edible for your ever-starving wannabe warriors. (On a completely unrelated note, Holy Nation caravans contain notable amount of high-end food: You know what to do).
When I do use Sheks a suicidal, attack everything on sight party comprising purely of Sheks is a blast to play, and the constant hunger kind of forces the desperate raider playstyle upon you. Plus, I usually end up dragging at least one Shek with me just to gain access to the Shek Warrior dialogue, which might be one of my favourite dialogue packs in the game. This dialogue pack is assigned to most Sheks who hail from the Shek Kingdom. You can’t begin the game with Sheks that have the package, and you have to recruit them from elsewhere: Most recruits from Shek cities, some of the Shek slaves in Rebirth and UC territory, as well as members of the Shek factions that you may be able to rescue in certain situations have it. Sheks that have this dialogue pack can be identified by their short, terse language and dialogue referring to all sort of honourable stuff, bloodlust, combat and disdain for lesser cultures and their curious ways – and, occasionally, very dry humour.
Some of the best normal recruitables out there are easily accessible Sheks (Ruka from the free recruitables, Rane and Kang from the ones that you need to pay for) So building your personal army of horrible horned death machines is a fairly simple process right from the get-go – at least as long as you can afford to feed them. Many of the slaves in Rebirth are also Sheks, and with lucky randomization and recruitment they make for some of the best, if not the best recruits in vanilla game.
Recommended For: Heavy-duty frontline combat, Strength-based weapons, Maximum potential damage builds, fighting against enemies armed with blunt and anti-robot weapons, Emptying your food supply.
Hive (Part 1)
Hivers are an interesting group to say the least, being the closest thing Kenshi has to a dedicated hard mode. These flimsy bug-people come with a whole lot of flaws, problems, prejudice and other guaranteed hilarity.
Hive Pros in General:
+ The fastest group in the game, both in and out of combat
+ Immune to all forms of environmental acid
+ Eat a lot less than anyone else, capable of eating food usually reserved for animals
+ Extremely low bleed rate
+ Low food requirements and general ubiquity as recruits and slaves makes them easily spammable in combat
+ Adorable
Hive Cons in General:
– Limited choices of armour, can’t use shoes and normal shirts
– Hated, loathed and/or hunted by multiple major and minor factions, including the main source of the hive-only shirts
– Requires environmental protection from gas, dust and lasers, something which the limited access to armour may make harder or even impossible to get
– Blood fixed at measly 50, can’t be increased with strength
-Very vulnerable to turrets and crossbows due to heavy and instant blood loss, lack of harpoon-resistant armour and/or low limb health
– At risk of being eaten by wildlife and/or cannibals, low limb health and blood makes rescue operations much harder as they also get eaten much faster
Hive comes in three different subraces, each of which varies quite wildly from each other:
Hive Prince:
Body: 80 for all bodyparts
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,3
Hunger Rate: 0,5
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1,2
Movement Speed: 16-31 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Dexterity
+20 % Toughness
+20 % Perception
+20 % Stealth
+20 % Science
+20 % Thieving
+20 % Athletics
+20 % Medic
+20 % Lockpicking
-20 % Strength
-20 % Labouring
Princes are the brains of the hive, (at least compared to the other hivers) functioning as merchants and machinists. When exiled, they become superb scientists and sneaky types. Or corpses.
This subrace can be recognized by being the tallest and most human-looking of the hivers.
Prince Pros:
+ Nice stat multipliers, excels at sneaking around and stealing stuff as well as archery
+ Rare perception multiplier
+ Consumes very little food, which combined with bonuses to “sciency” skills makes for an excellent craftsman (or just spammable fodder)
+ Combination of low durability and toughness boost means your toughness skyrockets very quickly if you get repeatedly beaten up (and survive)
+ One of the fastest races in the game with athletics boost, shared highest max speed and combat speed bonus
+ Loses limbs easily, giving you easy access to superior cybernetic replacements
+ Can be made to look AMAZING with customization
Prince Cons:
– Feeble due to low body health and blood, even with high toughness
– Limited armour selection, though the best among hive subraces
– Negative strength multiplier hnghh
– Loses limbs easily, and you probably don’t have access to superior cybernetic replacements
– Low torso and head health can mean instant death when faced with harpoons, large animals and heavy weapons even for more trained characters
-Can’t eat foul meat unlike other hivers
Hive Princes are most commonly found as traders and leaders in the hive communities, though exiled ones often end up as merchants, soldiers or scavengers across the world.
Personal Opinion: I love hivers in general, and princes are just amazing fun to play in the masochistic losing is fun-fashion. Your life will be struggle, and you will probably die and/or be enslaved a lot. Until one day, one day you will be badass enough to waltz into the Emperor’s throne room and beat his bloated arse – though then again you already stole his equipment two months back: You are, after all, playing the best thief in the game.
Princes are fun solo characters if you seek challenge, and they’re pretty easy to spam too due to their low upkeep as long as you can find recruits. Negative strength hurts in the long run, but let’s be real, you can just lose the arms and replace them with the setting equivalent of forklifts to boost your strength that way. The combination of dexterity boost and high combat speed can also make them horrifically oppressive with fast and/or long weapons like polearms, katanas and, if you’re feeling cocky, martial arts.
If there is one aspect of warfare where Princes excel, it’s ranged combat: Combination of Dexterity and Perception boost married to high movement speed makes Princes some of the best ranged units in the game, and staying away from the melee can keep their frail bodies from being mulched. Unlike the other competing ranged-oriented races they can wear hats, which can offer notable boosts to perception. The stat multipliers, combined with their low food consumption, also makes them viable turret gunners.
If this skill set sounds fun to you, go on ahead, these are a personal favourite of mine. On the other hand, if this is still too easy for you, don’t worry, there are even more horrible options in the hive family down below.
Recommended For: Sneaking, Breaking and entering, Dexterity-based combat, Ranged combat, Turret gunnery, Padding your army with meat shields, Specialized settlement work, Trading and Smuggling, Challenge
Hive Soldier Drone:
Body: Head 200, other parts 100
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,3
Hunger Rate: 0,6
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1,1
Movement Speed: 16-29 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Toughness
+20 % Melee Attack
-20 % Science
-20 % Robotics
-20 % Engineering
-20 % Weapon Smithing
-20 % Armour Smithing
-20 % Medic
-20 % Farming
-20 % Cooking
-20 % Perception
Soldiers Drones are exactly what says on the tin. Soldiers. Also drones. It’s, uh, not a particularly great combination.
Soldiers are easily recognizable by their hammerhead-style noggins, and their general unusability.
Soldier Drone Pros:
+ The most durable hiver, with whopping 200 health for the head
+ Fast, but not as fast as the other hivers
+ Doesn’t eat much, but more than the other hivers
+ Cost-effective bulk soldiers if you can’t access or maintain an army of other, more competent races
+ Hammerheads are universally agreed to be cool as hell
Soldier Drone Cons:
– Terrible, terrible multipliers, worthless out of combat
– Can’t wear hats
– Lack of hats means no protection from environment, enjoy choking on gas and getting burned by lasers
– No armour on head + poorly armoured limbs + 50 blood = gets knocked out by anything that causes bleed very easily despite having more body HP than the other hivers
Hive Soldiers are found protecting the Western hives as well as their caravans. Exiled ones end up joining militaries, bandit groups or other meatheads out there.
Personal Opinion: Let’s not beat around the bush, Soldier Drones are pretty terrible. And not terrible in the amusing way the other hivers are, as the lack of environmental protection means that one of these fellas won’t be heading anywhere near certain zones of the map any time soon. While the other problems can be worked on, this fact does mean I’m always a bit queasy about using Soldiers.
And then, after much deliberation I still usually end having these hammerhead hivers in my squad anyway because I simply like how they look. Also, because I’m probably a big idiot.
All in all, these guys are pretty bulky and they still consume 40% less than average human, meaning they can be put to use as bootleg Sheks pretty easily, and they’re better suited for general labor due to their lesser food requirements and lack of labouring penalty.
Recommended For: Padding your army with meat shields, Guarding a settlement, Challenge
Hive (Part 2)
Hive Worker Drone:
Body: Head 125, other parts 75
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,3
Hunger Rate: 0,5
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1,2
Movement Speed: 18-31 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Dexterity
+20 % Toughness
+20 % Labouring
+20 % Engineering
+20 % Thieving
+20 % Athletics
+20 % Stealth
+20 % Farming
+20 % Turrets
-20 % Strength
-20 % Cooking
Worker Drones are, once again, exactly that. They excel at menial work, skulking and dying. Worker drones are recognizable by their weird, long and flat heads.
Worker Drone Pros:
+ The fastest playable race in the game
+ Boosts to utility skills and low food consumption makes workers excellent and cheap base-runners
+ Though comparatively garbage at combat, can be used as turret gunners
+ Toughness boost and being even more flimsy compared to the Prince makes training toughness even more of a cakewalk (as long as you survive)
+ Very commonly found as recruits and sold as slaves, makes for excellent cannon fodder
+ Almost guaranteed to lose limbs in fights
+ Beep
Worker Drone Cons:
– The least durable playable race in the game
– Ability to wear hats greatly limited (up to and including the excellent Crab Helmet)
– Negative strength is still a terrible thing
– Almost guaranteed to lose limbs in fights
– Low torso health can mean instant death when faced with harpoons, large animals and heavy weapons even for more trained characters. Look out for friendly fire!
Worker drones are a common sight in the hives, living in huge swarms handling menial work. Exiled ones end up wandering the world until perishing, being enslaved or ending up as peasants, though rarely they can be found in more martial jobs.
Personal Opinion: These guys are like a lite version of a Prince that has been optimized to farm and build, and most of the stuff I said of the Prince applies here too. Their settlement-related experience multipliers, very low food consumption and extremely quick movement speed makes Workers possibly the best base-runners in the entire game, being able to accomplish whatever task they’ve been given very quickly, efficiently and cheaply. They suffer somewhat from lack of wearable headgear, though apart from the Crab Helmet they can wear most high-end and utility hats (Samurai Helmet, Armoured Hood, Gas Masks and perception-boosting hats).
They are commonly sold as slaves and eat very little, so just buying every single drone you can find and then equipping them with polearms or quick weapons (or martial arts, you madlad) is a surprisingly viable way to pad your squad (and to train your first aid skill, as their low body health makes them extremely easy to knock out). They can become a downright oppressive force due to their increased combat speed and dex boosts, though most will not survive the initial battles. Such is life in Kenshiland. Prepare to spend a lot of money on robotics.
Workers are extremely quick even with fairly low athletics and make for the best errand boys and drug runners in the game, perfect for making quick, solo trade runs from your base, though their low Strength gain might hamper carrying capacity somewhat. Slapping scout legs on one gives them the ability to outrun even elder beak things with high enough athletics, while also making the aforementioned polearm spam strategy even more horrifying (also, very expensive). If you want an extremely rapid trade convoys pair them with older pack Garrus which are similarly quick, and just outrun anything that might want to challenge you. Who needs caravan guards anyway?
Recommended For: Menial settlement work, padding your army with meat shields, Turret gunnery, Sneaking, Breaking and entering, Trading and smuggling, Dying as acceptable sacrifices, Challenge.
Skeletons
You might have noticed a disclaimer about some things being the best organics at something. How it’s really nice that hives don’t eat that much and there’s little upkeep and not dying in acid sounds fun. Rapid healing and little bleeding are neat things to have too. Sheks sure are tough, huh?
And then we have Skeletons, who are here to put all other groups to the ground.
Skeletons are by far the largest group in the game, though only the base model is playable from the beginning.
Skeleton:
Body: 200 for all bodyparts
Blood: 100 (Called oil but functions identically to blood)
Bleed Rate: 0,1
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 2, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Heavy Weapons
+20 % Turrets
+20 % Robotics
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
Skeletons are better than you. They don’t eat, sleep, get burned or eaten by cannibals. When they get beaten up, they just repair themselves and then come after you again. ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥.
Most of the below information applies to all Skeleton subraces, which will be discussed in later sections.
Skeleton Pros:
+ Insanely durable and heals twice as fast as humans
+ Lowest bleed rate in the game (though blood is fixed at 100)
+ Cutting damage is repaired instantly with kits without needing to wait for natural healing
+ Doesn’t eat, reducing necessary upkeep, clearing inventory space and opening up more hazardous base locations
+ Completely immune to any and all environmental hazards, up to and including hungry wildlife
+ Doesn’t suffer self-damage from using martial arts due to being made of metal, and their unarmed “weapon” has better scaling, blood loss and anti-robot damage than that of the organics’
+ Walks on the bottom of the water instead of swimming, which is much faster (around 9-11 mph) and isn’t affected by cybernetics (and makes for nice stealthy approaches)
+ Unique dialogue regarding the history of the world, can befriend certain otherwise hostile factions
+ Very useful experience multipliers
+ Many common weapons deal reduced damage to robots
Skeleton Cons:
– Taken blunt damage can’t be repaired and will take a long time to heal
– Broken limbs can’t be splinted
– Accrues cumulative max health penalty when taking damage that must be repaired at a dedicated skeleton repair bed (which tends to be much more expensive than using a normal bed)
– Robotics kits are much more expensive than medkits, and cheaper ones run out very quickly
– Barely any NPC:s carry repair kits with them, meaning that if you are captured or imprisoned while unconscious it’s quite possible to bleed out in the meanwhile
– Lowest healing rate of all skeleton subraces (though still far higher than any organic)
– Can only wear pants and body armour, leaving most of the body unprotected
– Slow, can’t wear shoes to alleviate this
– Low max speed, negative multipliers and inability to wear certain items make stealth-based gameplay somewhat challenging
– Extremely rare, with only two guaranteed recruits, three uncommon ones, very rare randomized recruits and one type of naturally spawning NPC that can be recruited in rare circumstances
– Several already deadly weapons deal massively increased damage against robots
– Most of the world hates and/or fears you
– Suffers from depression
Skeletons mostly keep to themselves, living in their own secluded settlement in the Deadlands, though some join other societies or become wanderers that can be found in basically all corners of the world. They are a rare sight nonetheless.
Personal Opinion: Hoo boy. Skeletons are really ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ good at basically everything they do, apart from the fact that aren’t particularly fast (and even then, you can just waltz to the nearest acid lake and laugh your puny organic pursuers off). Their lack of need for sustenance and ability to ignore hazardous environment opens up playstyles and base locations that would be hard or impossible to utilize by other races. Their ability to repair themselves can mean that they will be no worse to wear after a battle and can re-engage whatever knocked them out previously almost instantly, at least as long as they haven’t received crippling amounts of blunt damage. They make for surprisingly passable thieves as they can keep their skill levels from dropping down due to suffered injuries, though the negative multipliers, low top speed (meaning low stealth speed cap too) and inability to wear Dark Leather Shirts and Swamp Ninja Masks makes it certainly more challenging and less viable, especially at low skill levels.
Another notable difference between Skeletons and organics is that they are counted as robotic creatures, meaning that certain weapons have radically different damage potential against them: Skeletons laugh off most Katanas and other weapons that deal reduced anti-robot damage, allowing them to waltz through waves of ninjas and United Cities Samurais without barely more than a scratch (which can be then quickly repaired due to the almost pure cutting damage done by such weapons). On the other hand some weapons are specialized or otherwise excel in dealing with robots: A Paladin’s cross wielded against a Skeleton will deal higher damage than any other melee weapon in the game, meaning that high-ranking Holy Nation warriors can dispatch their usually durable robotic foes with ease, and blunt damage in general can’t be repaired with kits: A Skeleton that has had its limbs broken by blunt damage can’t be splinted unlike organics, meaning that the Skeleton will simply have to wait until he has healed the damage instead.
Skeletons are really fun to play, but they can sometimes make the game a wee bit too easy and streamlined if you’re looking for the sort of skin-of-my-teeth survival horror. Of course, their rarity makes their power far less exploitable, but even the guaranteed two skeleton recruits can do enough work to put an army of hivers into shame, and you could begin the game with six of them. Only your early game poses a particular challenge, as you need to secure access to skeleton repair kits (which are rare in the starting areas, not to mention hella expensive) before you can even begin to consider getting into scraps with the local banditry, and the various sticks and clubs wielded by low-end mobs are surprisingly effective against Skeletons due to their blunt damage. Fighting the Holy Nation will also be more challenging as all members of the faction employ weapons that are highly effective against skellies, though on the other hand Skeletons resist almost all weapons employed by the United Cities.
Anyhow, Skeletons make for great solo characters, or lore-filled squad members, or simply automated base functions. Even when doing a themed or an otherwise skeletonless run it might be a good idea to have a skeleton whose main purpose is to simply idle at some hut in a city doing research or farming some veggies for you when the rest of the squad is doing random heroics somewhere. Plus, as they don’t eat, you can just leave them to man turrets indefinitely.
Recommended For: Everything, specializing in all forms of combat (though at a disadvantage against blunt and anti-robot weapons), martial arts, completely self-sufficient settlement work, turret gunnery, adventuring in extremely hazardous environments.
RECRUITABLE RACES
The next category is also the smallest, featuring only five more subraces, three of which are basically nothing more than a change of paintjob.
These races can’t be played from the beginning of the game, but it is possible to recruit at least one of their kind under certain conditions.
Southern Hive
Southern Hive Prince: Bleed Rate 0.2, no multiplier to Perception, toughness & lockpicking, multiplier to the hidden stat “Hivemedic” (hivers are statted to be healed using this skill, no idea if it functions at all)
Southern Hive Soldier: No negative multiplier to perception, negative multiplier to hidden stat “Vet”
Southern Hive Drone: Bleed rate 0.4, no multiplier to toughness
They also belong to a different, unique group, and thus the game doesn’t consider them regular hivers. This means that you can use them to trade with the Western hive and other factions that ostracize normal hivers, though they seem to have some problems with lack of dialogue and the like, possibly due to their lack of gender.
Also, none of the Southern Hivers can eat human teeth, unlike Western Hivers. If this will somehow pose a problem to you seriously consider re-arranging your supply train.
Southern hive recruits are possibly the rarest finds in the entire game, as the only way to recruit them (with one exception mentioned below) is to have them spawn as slaves in the United Cities with an extremely low chance: When an UC slave spawns it is randomly chosen from six different types of slave. Three of these have a chance of spawning as a Southern Hiver with a very low chance that is even lower for a Southern Prince. (The odds are around 5,7% chance for a slave that has a 0,2% chance to be a Southern hiver to spawn and a 3,4% chance for a slave that has a 1,1% chance to be one. Only one in five of these will be a Prince, otherwise it’s a 50-50 chance for a Worker or a Soldier).
Even when you might find one there’s no guarantee it will join your party due to how buying and freeing slaves works. I’ve seen two in around 900 hours of gameplay, and only one of them joined my squad. You could try savescumming to get one to generate, as available slaves are randomized the first time you approach a slave market or shop. They can spawn as part of a noble hunter entourage, so there is technically a replenishable supply out there. They can’t spawn as escaped slaves (a type of NPC that spawns in Howler’s Maze and some parts of the northern desert regions, typically in pairs), as those generate from a separate race list.
In addition, one recruitable Southern Worker Drone, Espher, can be found imprisoned in Tengu’s Vault. If you’re planning on breaking him out, please ensure that all of the guards are dead before starting to break locks, as he has a habit for dying in the middle of the escape otherwise. He seems to be hard-coded to join you if you manage to break him out. Beware that there seems to be a bug that may cause him to not appear in the vault, though this one has only happened to me once (might have something to do with the excessive save importing I tried on that run).
Unplayable Southern Hivers can be found across their own lands in the Southern reaches of the world.
Personal Opinion: Like normal hivers, but even cooler. Lack of toughness bonus hurts a lot for Prince and Drone, but the Soldier is a direct upgrade. Bit clunky when it comes to faction interaction, and waltzing into a Holy Nation city as a hiver always feels weird.
Recommended For: The same things as their Western cousins, with the addition of being even better traders due to not suffering from the same prejudice as them, opening more possible trade routes.
Recruitable Skeletons
Two more subraces of Skeletons can be acquired during gameplay, one being a unique recruit and the other being an extremely rare random recruit spawn. Everything that applied to the base model skeleton applies to the other subraces, unless separately mentioned.
Soldierbot:
Body: 200 for all bodyparts
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,1
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Perception
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Martial Arts
-20 % Medic
(Hidden -20 % to Strength, probably a nonfunctional code remnant)
A Skeleton with a log-shaped head and a really odd stat spread.
Soldierbot Pros:
+ Even higher heal rate than normal skeleton
+ Perception bonuses and an increased vision range (which might not do anything under player control?) Make these guys superior archers and turret gunners
Soldierbot Cons:
– Questionable stat boosts compared to normal skellies, penalty to MA is a really low blow
– Only one character available in the entire game
The only way to recruit a Soldierbot is to find the unique recruit, Agnu, in the Tower of Abuse. He comes with a few advantages: Firstly, he is the third guaranteed Skeleton in the game, with all the perks that it entails. Secondly, despite being a fresh recruit, he comes with meaty 50 strength right from the get-go. Thirdly, he is one of the few playable characters in the game to have his own colour scheme, meaning that if you equip a “coloured” item on him it will gain a paintcoat, in this case a nice navy-blue colour scheme used by the Second Empire police forces (which may point to his origins). Of course, being a skeleton, you can’t use him to colour hats.
Unplayable Soldierbots can be found in various ruins across the world. Some might be even willing to help you.
Personal Opinion: Hey, it’s a free skeleton, and I’ve always liked how the logheads look like. Plus, this guy comes with some amusing, uh, dialogue? Anyhow, go grab him, at least if you can actually survive Venge in the first place.
Recommended For: Everything, specializing in ranged combat and turret gunnery
P4 Unit:
Body: 150 for the head, 200 for other bodyparts
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,1
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Science
+20 % Engineering
+20 % Robotics
+20 % Weapon Smithing
+20 % Armour Smithing
+20 % Medic
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Katanas
(Hidden -20 % Dexterity, probably nonfunctional code remnant)
Big brain skelly, basically a hybrid between a Hive Prince, a Scorchlander and a normal skeleton who is an even better stay-at-home-doing-science-and-swords guy than the rest of them.
P4 Pros:
+ Excellent utility skill spread combined with the lack of upkeep? Yes please
+ Heals faster than the normal skeleton
+ Personal favourite when it comes to Skeleton aesthetics
P4 Cons:
– A little less durable than a normal Skeleton, though still tougher than anything living
– No positive combat multipliers, lacks the useful multipliers of the basic Skeleton
– Extremely rare
P4 units are extremely rare spawns in the very common Drifter-faction (1 out of every 141, or 0,7% of all drifters will be one), more than twice as rare as normal skeletons (and unlike regular skeletons there are no guaranteed or uncommon recruits available). You simply have to scrounge through the world and hope one spawns as a generic recruit. Theoretically, at least if my understanding of the FCS is correct, you could find one from anywhere expect from Shek, Holy Nation and Flotsam Ninja cities and from Mongrel, which use their own recruit tables. Good luck!
Unrecruitable ones appear in some deadland workshops, as well as members of a certain southeastern bandit faction. They can also be found fairly often as shopkeepers, mechanics and librarians.
Personal Opinion: P4:s come with a lot of utility, they look neat and they’re skeletons, what’s not to love? Oh yeah, that horrific spawn rate. In my around 900 hours of Kenshi I’ve seen two as random recruits, and the questionably functioning random seeds of Kenshi don’t exactly help the matter. (Plus many, many more as random, non-recruitable Drifters. Hnghhh) There was a reason why they were one of the first things I modded to be playable from the start.
Just like Scorchlanders, P4:s come with the same smithing boosts and the addition of needing no food or protection whatsoever, thus being an even better option for mass production of arms and armour – especially when you wish to set up completely autonomous and safe armoursmithing operations, which can be pulled off using the solitary player-ownable house in Black Desert City. (You’ll need hydroponics for the manufacture of cloth first though).
Recommended For: Everything, specializing in self-sufficient settlement work, smithing and functioning as an all-around excellent medic/mechanic.
UNPLAYABLE RACES
The third category consists of the various races that exist in the world, but are completely unplayable in the vanilla game. There are no recruits, slaves or other ways to acquire them. You will mostly be facing these guys as your opponents, so it might still be good to know a bit more of them. Plus, it’s extremely easy to mod them to be playable and/or recruitable in the FCS, so if any of these lot catch your eye you know what to do. I certainly did.
A few caveats before we begin: Firstly, technically all of the different animal races belong to this category (apart from the ones you can buy, of course) but I won’t be going over them in this guide. Secondly, there are a few races hidden in the FCS that don’t appear in the normal gameplay at all, and I won’t be going over them as they are a pain in the ass to test if not completely non-functional to begin with.
Most of these races are not assigned to any of the aforementioned groups at all, in which case the game will treat them as humans or as humans with skeleton limbs when it comes to faction interaction, similarly to the southern hivers. This may cause some problems with interacting with certain factions due to missing dialogue and the like.
Human-Like Races
Body: 100 for all bodyparts
Blood: 75-150
Bleed Rate: 1
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: 16-27 mph
Experience Multipliers:
Cooking +20 %
Farming -20 %
The larger members of the painted tribes of the northwest, these guys are almost completely identical to their (relatively) saner Greenlander cousins.
Cannibal Pros:
+ Same balanced statline as Greenlanders with minor multiplier changes
+ Immune to all forms of acid
+ Can wear almost all forms of armour
Cannibal Cons:
– No customization beyond sliders, all cannibals look identical
– Jack of all trades (apart from farming), master of none
– Very low water avoidance, will go out of his way to screw your pathfinding
– Player-controlled cannibals become boring, respectable members of society
These guys are found all across the cannibal country, inhabiting various gruesome settlements and kidnapping local passersby. Middling combatants at best, they’re only dangerous due to their numbers and their ability to kidnap and eat unconscious and sleeping organics.
Personal Opinion: A reasonable alternative to a Greenlander if you seek a more exotic party I suppose. Can’t actually practice cannibalism without mods under your control which is a bit unfortunate. They don’t even eat human teeth unlike hivers, the bloody snobs.
Recommended For: General all-rounders that can function in harsh environments
Cannibal Skav:
Body: Head 100, 80 for other bodyparts
Blood: 75-150
Bleed Rate: 1
Hunger Rate: 0,6
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: 16-27 mph
Experience Multipliers:
Cooking +20 %
Farming -20 %
Weird dwarf-like (the chromosome-challenged ones, not the bearded, brawny, beer-chugging ones) maneaters also found meandering about in the cannibal country.
Skav Pros:
+ Immune to acid
+ Eat only as much as a hive soldier, a reasonable option as base workers
+ While otherwise flimsy, they can wear almost all forms of armour
Skav Cons:
– About as durable as hivers in combat without the speed and dex boosts and lessened bleed rate
– No customization beyond sliders
– Still no player-controlled cannibalism
The bastard lovechildren of cannibals, hive princes and hungry bandits, these guys are found in the same places as the regular cannibals are. They are even worse combatants armed only with sticks. They still want to eat you, which may pose a problem.
Personal Opinion: If you’ve ever looked at a hive prince and been like “Man, these guys would be nice but don’t they seem a bit too easy to play?” you could always play one of these green goblins instead. They’re really, really terrible at everything dangerous, being flimsy enough not to survive trouble and not fast enough to run away from it either. They’re, at least in my opinion, even worse combatants than the worker drones due to lacking any real combat-related multipliers and increased speed, though they at least have an easier time compensating with armour. They could easily be the worst race out there if the hivers wouldn’t be rising up to the challenge with the following few subraces. At least these guys are functional…
Recommended For: Alternative to hivers, Challenge
Hive-Like Races (Part 1)
Hive Queen
Body: 75 for all bodyparts
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,2
Hunger Rate: 3
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using repair kits (but apparently still uses first aid skill)
Combat Speed: 1,2
Movement Speed: around 5-9 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Stealth
+20 % Science
+20 % Medic
-20 % Strength
-20 % Dexterity
-20 % Labouring
The leaders as well as mothers of the hives, just like one you’d find in a beehive. About as dangerous too to boot. Weird cybernetic creatures boasting the worst of both organic and mechanical worlds.
Hive Queen Pros:
+ Very low bleed rate
+ Repaired instead of healed like Skeletons are
+ Combat speed boost
+ Immune to all forms of acid
Hive Queen Cons:
– Comes with all the problems normal hivers have without almost any of the boons
– Terrible, terrible stat penalties
– As durable as a hive worker
– Slowest creature in the entire game, moves at a brisk walking pace
– Requires the same amount of food as three humans
– Can’t actually eat, will starve in captivity
Only two of these creatures are found in the entire game, both serving as the queens of the two hives of the world. They both have ok combat stats, but they’re terrible combatants as the aforementioned shows: Only their guards pose a real problem. If you can beat their guards they will be easy prey, but do prepare yourself for the unforeseen consequences.
Personal Opinion: Unlike the other races in this category these ones are literally unplayable, as they will shortly starve to death under player control (and in captivity, in case you wanted to keep one as a trophy). You will require further modding to make them capable of even basic survival, and even then they have multiple huge problems with how they work due to their mismatched attributes and atrocious maximum running (actually walking) speed. Using one in combat transcends difficulty and becomes masochism. They do make for great centrepieces for hive-only bases if you seek that sort of themed run.
Unfortunately, there is no dedicated queen race for the Southern Hive, they use the same, Western-looking model as the other hive.
Recommended For: Extended Masochism, Roleplaying
Deadhive:
The third type of the basic hiver trinity, Deadhive is not a mere reskin of the Western hivers unlike the Southern ones are, being more of a weird side- or downgrade with their own quirks and multipliers. Also known as Fogmen, these parasite-controlled blue hivers infest the aptly named Fog Islands and its surroundings and will spread further into the world when the power of major and certain minor factions starts to weaken. They also practice cannibalism, though theirs seems to be of a more ritualistic sort than that of the painted tribes.
All of the pros and cons given for the basic hiver subraces apply to their fogman cousins unless separately mentioned, and they will be mostly compared to them. They will sometimes be treated as humans, though some Holy Nation dialogue recognizes them as, well, cannibalistic affronts that they are.
General Deadhive Pros:
+ More offence-focused skillset compared to regular hivers
+ Reduced bleed rate compared to normal hivers
General Deadhive Cons:
– No toughness multiplier
– Require just as much food as normal humans
– Reduced health compared to normal hivers, which were terrible to begin with
– Not immune to acid, and can’t wear shoes to block acid ground
– Can’t eat foul and raw meat
– Zero water avoidance, horrid pathfinding issues, will plunge into acid lakes like madmen
Deadhive Prince:
Body: 75 for all bodyparts
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,2
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1,2
Movement Speed: 16-31 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Dexterity
+20 % Labouring
+20 % Engineering
+20 % Thieving
+20 % Athletics
+20 % Stealth
+20 % Farming
+20 % Melee Attack
-20 % Strength
The parasite has turned these princes into sickly, hungry and angry versions of themselves.
Deadhive Princes Pros:
+ Excellent multiplier spread suitable for a more aggressive gamestyle
Deadhive Prince Cons:
– Even less health than the regular princes, lack of toughness multiplier doesn’t help
– Negative strength
– No Perception multiplier
Fog princes can be found leading the elite (for the lack of a better word) squads of the Fogmen. Each and every one of them has a price on their head quite literally, and if you can beat one and chop it off you can sell it for a hefty price.
Personal Opinion: Prince with worker level durability and added hunger? Eh. Melee attack bonus is quite nice though, but that’s about it. Makes for a nice change of pace but not much else. Sell its head and employ six slaves with the money you got instead.
Recommended For: Challenge, Sneaking, Breaking and Entering, Dexterity-based glass cannon builds
Hive-Like Races (Part 2)
Deadhive Soldier:
Body: 100 for all bodyparts
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,2
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1,1
Movement Speed: 16-29 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+10 % Strength
+20 % Melee Attack
-20 % Science
-20 % Robotics
-20 % Engineering
-20 % Armour Smithing
-20 % Weapon Smithing
-20 % Medic
-20 % Farming
-20 % Cooking
(-20 % to Vet, an unused skill)
A hive soldier that has been turned from a bulky, tanky warrior into a rabid glass cannon.
Deadhive Soldier Pros:
+ Rare positive strength multiplier
+ No Perception penalty
Deadhive Soldier Cons:
– Less head health than regular soldiers, still unable to wear a hat
– No toughness multiplier
– Worthless out of combat
– Can only gain the required 90% acid rain protection with very specific loadouts
– Can’t be made immune to gas, lasers and dust
These degraded soldiers are only found as the members of the aforementioned fogman squads. They’re the only fairly bulky member of the whole faction, which isn’t saying much.
Personal Opinion: Fog Soldiers, despite being about as terrible at most things as the regular hive soldiers, do at least have a completely unique niche for themselves: They’re the second race in the game with a strength boost. If you could keep one alive long enough you could probably turn it into a heavy weapon-toting death machine with some work. While a well-trained Shek or skeleton would beat one in the durability front, the increased combat speed, much higher running speed and very low bleed rate makes Fog Soldiers a very unique race indeed.
Barely functional in most hostile terrain (also known as most of the map) which can be a downright pain in the keister. Replace legs with cybernetic augments ASAP. Drifter’s Leather Pants + Long- or Dust Coat is the only combo that can protect you from acid rain.
I’ve been playing a solo Fog Soldier in my latest save, and it has been a surprisingly fun experience, if a challenging one. Heartily recommended if you’re growing bored with the vanilla races.
Recommended For: Strength-based skirmishing, Glass cannon builds, Challenge
Deadhive Worker
Body: 50 for all bodyparts
Blood: 50
Bleed Rate: 0,2
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1,2
Movement Speed: 16-31 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Dexterity
+20 % Labouring
+20 % Engineering
+20 % Thieving
+20 % Athletics
+20 % Stealth
+20 % Farming
+20 % Turrets
-20 % Strength
If the parasite turned the princes and soldiers of the Fog Islands into even less durable versions of themselves, it won’t take much guessing to figure out what happened to the already shoddy workers.
Deadhive Worker Pros:
+ Has a slightly better version of the already nice utility skillset of the hive worker
Deadhive Worker Cons:
– Weakest creature in the game (only rivalled by baby goats), basically guaranteed to die instantly to a single harpoon shot, martial artist or heavy weapon swing, lack of toughness boost doesn’t help
– Having same food consumption as a human greatly decreases the main selling point of the Worker
– Gains running speed slightly slower than the regular worker, at the same rate as Princes do
Pure mooks, designed to swarm poorly trained characters and serve as fodder and fun pastime to experienced ones. They are found at the Fog Islands, dying in droves at the gates of Mongrel.
Personal Opinion: One of the worst subraces in the entire game due to their abysmally low health. Could be technically used as an alternative to Greenlanders when it comes to working in a settlement, though they will die en masse when the local banditry decides to visit, not even mentioning something like Shek Kingdom knocking on your door.
Modding a game where you start with 50 of these guys with zero stats and no gear is a “fun” challenge at the very least.
Recommended for: Masochism, Being the world’s flimsiest sneak-thief, Farming Simulator 2020 Osteoporosis Edition
Skeletons & Skeleton-Likes (Part 1)
The Unplayable category holds several more Skeleton variants, some correctly added under the larger Skeleton group and some left ungrouped. It also holds a sort of a sub-subrace of the more common Skeletons, the mark II-variants.
Mark II:s feature a completely different chassis compared to the bulky MK I:s, a light, stripped down, well, skeleton with clearly visible internals and little armour to speak of. Accordingly the MK II:s are considerably less durable than their original counterparts, featuring 150 body health compared to the 200 of MK I:s, though this still makes them tougher than Sheks. All of the MK I Skeletons have a MK II counterpart apart from the basic playable Skeleton, though the two types have completely different experience multipliers and other stats and are only visually related by gameplay standards.
All pros and cons from the basic Skeleton apply unless otherwise mentioned.
Screamer Mk I
Body: 200 for all bodyparts
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,1
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Engineering
+20 % Turrets
+20 % Robotics
+20 % Assassination
+20 % Melee Attack
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Katanas
The last and the only unplayable MK I, these uncanny-looking skeletons seem to be more geared towards combat than their normal cousins.
Screamer Mk I Pros:
+ Possibly the best race in melee combat in the entire game due to being a MKI Skeleton with a melee attack boost
+ Heals faster than the regular skeleton
+ Only race with a very useful assassination multiplier
Screamer MK I Cons:
– Boost to assassination doesn’t sync particularly well with the penalty to stealth
– Lacks the heavy weapon boost of the regular Skeleton
MK I variant of the Screamer are found here and there across the world, mostly as members of a certain infamous bandit group in the southeast. Be extremely cautious when meeting one of these, as every single one in the entire game is a dangerous combatant, though most are at the very least poorly armoured.
Personal Opinion: Skeletons are great, these guys are even better. Possibly the best melee unit in the entire game in my opinion due to excellent multipliers and staying power, with the only downsides being negative multipliers for niche combat skills. Only other Skeletons, Sheks and Alpha Fishmen (Yes, really, they are an actual race. See for yourself down below) can compete for the spot. Unlike Sheks they are also useful in your settlement just like regular skellies are. A solid upgrade to an already excellent race.
Recommended For: Everything, specializing in all forms of melee combat and turret gunnery.
Skeleton MKII Screamer (Not grouped under the Skeleton group)
Body: 150 for all bodyparts
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,4
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Blunt
+20 % Heavy Weapons
+20 % Robotics
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Katanas
(Hidden -20 % Dexterity, probably nonfunctional code remnant)
The MK II counterpart of the Screamer, a less durable model with a far less interesting statline. On a quick glance it’s easy to see the difference in power between the two models.
Screamer MK II Pros:
+ Multipliers for two excellent weapon types
+ Heals faster than the normal Skeleton
Screamer MK II Cons:
– Less durable than MK I Skeletons
– Shared highest bleed rate of all the Skeleton models
These alternate Screamer models are only found in the Ashlands, either as extremely rare specialist patrols or guarding one of the domes there. Rare and deadly, treat with care, just like all things in the Ashlands.
Personal Opinion: As you can see the MK II:s are quite a downgrade from their original counterparts, though they’re still tougher than a Shek and come with all the other Skeleton-related perks. Not the best choice out there, but far, far from terrible, having little to no downsides. Interestingly, they are not considered members of the group for whatever reason.
Recommended For: Everything you’d use a normal Skeleton for.
Skeleton Log-Head MKII
Body: Head 200, 150 for other bodyparts
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,4
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Perception
+20 % Precision Shooting
+20 % Robotics
+20 % Crossbows
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Katanas
(Hidden -20 % Dexterity, probably nonfunctional code remnant)
The MK II counterpart of the Soldierbot, these guys are the finest archers in the entire game. No other race comes even close to the range and accuracy these steel snipers can bring to the battlefield.
Log-Head MKII Pros:
+ Excellent and unique boosts to almost all archery-related skills
+ Toughest MK II Skeleton due to having the same amount of head health as a MK I
+ Increased healing rate compared to basic Skeletons
+ Comes with the same extended view range as the Soldierbot, if that actually matters under player control (It certainly does under the enemy’s!)
Log-Head MK II Cons:
– No positive melee weapon multipliers
– Tough, but not as tough as MK I:s
– Shared highest bleed rate amongst Skeletons
– Can’t wear perception-boosting hats which would be a godsend to the ranged mastery
– Low speed is a bit unwelcome to a ranged unit, running away from tough melee units may pose a problem
Logheads are found in the southeast, being comparatively rare finds. All are powerful combatants, and the ones with ranged weapons will see you before you see them. Sniper Valley is a very aptly named place indeed…
Personal Opinion: Combination of aesthetics and unique utility, these guys are another very common member of my armies when playing around with modded skeletons. They make for excellent skirmishers and base protectors alongside the typical Skeleton utility while still being very much a threat in close combat. Give one an Eagle’s Cross and look at him sniping across the dunes with impunity.
Recommended For: Everything, specializing in ranged combat and turret gunnery.
Skeletons & Skeleton-Likes (Part 2)
Skeleton P4MKII
Body: 150 for all bodyparts
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,2
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Blunt
+20 % Heavy Weapons
+20 % Robotics
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Katanas
(Hidden -20 % Dexterity, probably nonfunctional code remnant)
The MK II model of the P4, with none of the benefits the older model had. More closely related to the Screamer MK II, with almost identical stats.
P4MKII Pros:
+ Lowest bleed rate amongst MK II:s
+ Heals faster than the regular Skeleton
+ Boost to two nice weapon skills
P4MKII Cons:
– Comes with none of the utility of the MKI P4
– Less durable than MK I:s
– The head and the body are coloured differently, and that’s terrible
The second rarest race in the entire game, only five examples of this type of Skeleton exist in the world, all unique, named characters. All are strong combatants, one of them being possibly the single most dangerous person in the entire game, surrounded by a literal army of minions. Consider yourself warned.
Personal Opinion: A subrace reserved only for unique, strong leader types and it comes with such a boring multiplier set compared to the other Skeletons? Kind of a letdown, isn’t it? Still, it’s not like you can complain about one, as they’re still just as excellent as all other skellies. Get one as a centrepiece for your Skeleton-only run.
Recommended for: Everything, works as a similar themed centrepiece as the hive queen while being actually functional.
Skeleton No-Head MKII (Not grouped as a Skeleton)
Body: 120 for all bodyparts, has no head
Blood: 100
Bleed Rate: 0,2
Hunger Rate: 0
Heal Rate: 3, Heals using robotics
Combat Speed: 0,9
Movement Speed: 16-25 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Blunt
+20 % Heavy Weapons
+20 % Robotics
+20 % Melee Attack
-20 % Thieving
-20 % Stealth
-20 % Dodge
-20 % Katanas
(Hidden -20 % Dexterity, probably nonfunctional code remnant)
These guys are basically skeletal slaves who have had their heads removed in a process known as thralling. They are the cannon fodder of the remnants of the Skeleton civilizations. Only a MK II version exists in the game.
No-Head Mk II Pros:
+ Lack of Head removes one of the weak points Skeletons have due to being unable to wear headwear
+ Increased healing rate, once again
+ Nice melee skill multipliers
No-Head Mk II Cons:
– Lack of head is counted as an injury, giving permanent penalty to crafting, labour and turret gunnery skills
– The weakest Skeleton variant out there, and the only one who is less tough than a Shek
These thralls are often found under the servitude of more unscrupulous skeletons, essentially serving as a slave army.
Personal Opinion: A very unique subrace, as the lack of a head opens up some interesting combat options. I’ve personally employed them in mobs, armed with body-covering armour and polearms. They are quite a tough nut to crack hiding behind masterwork unholy plate. The massive (-33%, IIRC) penalty to most skills is a far worse thing than negative experience multipliers, so you should really use these guys only in the most menial jobs in your settlement. Never, ever use them for any jobs that produce items with a quality level or for farming. They serve as an excellent mook army in a skeleton-only run, being quite literally faceless minions.
Recommended For: Frontline tanking, padding out an army, menial work in a settlement.
Mistakes of Nature
The last two races are quite unique, having no counterpart in the five groups introduced before. They are the fishmen, a species of some sort of fish-crab amalgams. Okay, maybe they’re related to the hivers. Or they’re yet another type of a failed clone. Who knows? Who really cares? All in all, they’re tough, mean and ugly, but what would you expect from a combination of a fish and a crustacean?
Fishmen Pros in General:
+ Toughest organics out there
+ Immune to all forms of acid as well as gas
+ (Apparently) the fastest swim speeds in the game, both races also have a multiplier
+ Generalists
+ All the ingredients of Frutti di Mare in one convenient package
Fishmen Cons in General:
– Can only wear pants and body armour
– Vulnerable to burning and duststorms, with no way to fully protect them from either
– Very low top running speed barely surpassing other races at their lowest possible point, can’t wear shoes to alleviate this
– Negative water avoidance, prefers pathfinding through water
– Useless multipliers
– What even are these seriously
Fishmen are found across the coastal areas in the South and East. They apparently smell quite terrible. This is an important fact.
Fishman
Body: 200 for legs, 150 for other bodyparts
Blood: 75-125
Bleed Rate: 1
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: about 15-17 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Swimming
+20 % Athletics
-20 % Dodge
The basic fishmen, tougher than Sheks and twice as ugly. Even naked and armed with only their claws these guys are force (farce?) to be reckoned with.
Fishman Pros:
+ Very tough, landing between MK II and MK I Skeletons
+ Generalist stats with no real penalties
Fishman Cons:
– A bit lower amount of blood than most other organics
– Less head health than a hive soldier, still completely exposed
– Alpha Fishmen exist
These guys are found as the basic mooks in the fishman army, if it could be called such.
Personal Opinion: A mix between a Hive Soldier and a Skeleton, with all the potential and some of the problems that implies. They do need to eat and aren’t completely immune to all weather conditions, but that’s about it. Excellent combatants, though exposed flesh can be bit of a problem when faced with bleed and katanas. Terrible in long-range adventuring due to their very low running speed, it might be a good idea to carry them around instead. They fall somewhere between Sheks, Soldiers and Skeletons in combat utility, eating less and being tougher than Sheks while having the same vulnerabilities as Skeletons apart from the vulnerability to blunt and anti-robot weapons. An exotic and quite viable option, but overshadowed by their even bigger brothers, the Alpha Fishmen.
Recommended For: Combat, Jack-of-all-trades tasks that don’t require you to move long distances, Living in a watery environment
Alpha Fishman
Body: 400 for legs, 300 for other bodyparts
Blood: 140-250
Bleed Rate: 1
Hunger Rate: 1
Heal Rate: 1, Heals using medkits
Combat Speed: 1
Movement Speed: about 15-17 mph
Experience Multipliers:
+20 % Swimming
+20 % Athletics
-20 % Dodge
Alpha fishmen are even tougher members of the Fishman packs. Their size and durability puts even the toughest skellies to shame.
Alpha Fishman Pros:
+ Absolutely toughest non-animal race in the entire game by a large margin
+ Insane amount of blood, very hard to put down even with turrets and the like
Alpha Fishman Cons:
– No combat multipliers to really exploit the massive bulk of these absolute units
– Cybernetic limbs are massive downgrades in HP, so you have to make a choice between stats and bulk
Alpha fishmen are found scattered among the fishmen packs. An even larger version functions as a sort of a faction leader for the entire race.
Personal Opinion: Mamma mia! Look at the size of these lads! Alpha Fishman is basically two skeletons slapped together, being thrice as tough as any other organic sapient out there, having more resemblance to elder animals than people. They can give and take insane punishment even as their naked, unarmed selves when you meet them in the wild: Imagine facing one armed and trained for proper combat!
Their extreme bulk combined with no real multiplier-related weaknesses makes them a very viable contender for the throne of the best combatant in the game: Sheks can only boast having much better multipliers and more armour available, and Skeletons, especially Screamers, come with more utility, ability to repair themselves and less upkeep (if you ignore supplying robotics kits and repair beds, of course). Both races are also much faster than fishmen, though you could always use a Worker Drone as a carrier. Plus, they make for just as good workers as Greenlanders, unlike certain “muh warrior culture” boneheads.
Recommended For: Combat, tanking, living in a watery area, venturing into dangerous lands and beating the local occupants senseless, flexing on lesser peoples.
CLOSING WORDS
And that’s it, a more-or-less comprehensive list of all the races in the game. Hope you’ve found it interesting, educational or at the very least somewhat amusing. I’m open for suggestions and rectifications to potentially erroneous information, as well as questions should I actually be reading this thread. Please don’t hesitate to comment, and thank you for reading this guide!
Appendix 1: The numbers, what do they mean? (Part 1)
It may not be readily apparent how or why this or that stat or other attribute is important to note, or even what it does to begin with, especially if you’re new to the game. In this appendix I’ll give a quick rundown on all the different characteristics each race has or can have.
Taking damage will reduce your body part’s health bar. Taking damage from an attack will hurt a random bodypart (with certain chances for each part – hitting the left arm is more common than hitting the right arm, for instance). Certain environmental effects may also damage your character, and they will be covered later in this appendix.
The importance of body health cannot be understated, as taking damage will reduce your stats and skills, and will eventually result in either dismemberment or death. Notable problem is taking damage to your torso, (aka chest and stomach) which will reduce your Strength and Dexterity, making you a worse combatant and often causing problems with weapon Strength requirements. Hits to other places may cause other problems, such as leg-wounds reducing movement speed, and hits to head causing skill reductions.
When the health of a body part is reduced below zero, further problems will rise: If your torso or head is hit and the hit reduces you to negative hit points, you will be knocked out. The time spent knocked out depends on how much damage you’ve taken, your Toughness and whether or not you’ve taken hits to the head. If you pass the knock-out point specified by your toughness, you will go to a recovery coma, where you won’t wake up until the health of your chest, stomach and/or head has regenerated back to at least 0. Suffice to say, if you’re bleeding out while in a coma and no one can bandage your wounds you are in trouble. If your health on these parts is reduced to the negative equivalent of your maximum health (for example, -100 for humans or -200 for a hive soldier’s head) you will die.
When your arms go to negative health they will break, and you will no longer be able to use a weapon with the broken limb. You always wield your weapon in your right hand, but certain weapons will require both hands to wield. Notably, most martial arts manoeuvres use your left hand (or legs) instead, so you have something to defend yourself with if your arm breaks. When your legs go to negative hit points, you are first forced to move at a slow walking pace and after that forced to crawl on the ground, where you are unable to block attacks and can only perform weak stabs with your weapon. When your limbs go to negative starting hit points they are cut off (if playing on frequent dismemberment, which you should be doing) and you will lose them permanently – You will have to find a cybernetic replacement.
From this lengthy introduction we can draw the following conclusions: Lots of body health good, not lots of body health bad. For health, that is. Races that have higher amounts of health will not only lose less stats from received damage (A skeleton taking 75 damage to torso would be above the halfway mark with stat losses, but a Hive Worker would be instantly knocked out) they also die less easily (A Hive Worker dies at -75 health, a Skeleton at -200 – a marked difference.) from both direct damage and degrading wounds.
Skeletons and robotic limbs slowly degrade when taking damage, reducing the maximum hit points of the damaged parts. To fix this damage you need to use a skeleton repair bed, found in many high-tech cities and in every hive village (or build your own if you have the tech).
Heal Rate increases or decreases your natural healing speed, so a Scorchlander with his 1,1 heal rate heals 10 % faster than Greenlanders for example, whereas a Shek would heal 20 % slower. Skeletons, with their notable 2 and 3 heal rate multipliers can often regenerate wounds in prolonged combat. Staying in bedroll or bed will also multiply healing speed for organic races (4x and 8x speed, respectively)
Blood & Bleed Rate: In addition to your limbs you also need to keep whatever life-providing liquids you contain inside of you in combat. The amount of blood varies by each race: Some races, such as Hivers and Skeletons have fixed amount of blood. Others, such as Humans and Sheks, have a variable amount, and they can further increase their maximum amount with Strength. (For example, humans have 75-150 blood, so they have 75 blood at level 1 and 150 at level 100.) You lose blood when taking damage, when your wounds degrade and when you lose a limb. The type of weapon or wound greatly affects the amount lost, for example Katanas and Crossbows excel at bleeding the enemy while most Blunt weapons cause almost no bleeding at all. Similarly to torso and head damage, when your blood goes to negative you are knocked out, and when it goes negative of your starting amount you bleed out and die. You can’t rise out from a knocked-out state if you have negative amount of blood regardless of your other injuries, meaning that causing as much blood loss as possible in combat can be a viable strategy.
Bleed Rate is an additional multiplier. If you, for example, have a 0.9 bleed rate multiplier you will simply bleed at only a 90% rate compared to some other, more blood-lossy-dude in a similar situation.
Hunger & Hunger Rate: Living things require food to survive. If you haven’t eaten recently, your hunger bar will be constantly dropping, affected by any Hunger Rate multipliers you might have (a hive worker starves 50 % slower than a Greenlander, as an example.) Other activities might increase (f.ex. mining) or decrease (f.ex. sitting around) the amount. If you go under your starting hunger bar you will start to starve, taking penalties to all skills. This will be followed by random knockouts from hunger, followed by death.
All characters are smart enough to eat on their own and need no further micromanaging to force them to eat: A character will automatically eat (when hungry) from his own inventory, from any equipped backpack in your squad (so you can have a dedicated food guy and not bother splitting food into everyone’s inventory) or from dedicated food storages in your base. Skeletons, being even smarter, don’t need to eat and have no hunger bar at all.
Combat Speed: This is actually the Combat movement Speed, a separate stat from the how-fast-grug-swing-sword-stat which is affected by approximately a metric crapton of other things that I may one day cover in another guide. Combat Movement Speed is a stat that can only be affected by choosing a race with a multiplier to it. It only affects the speed at which the character moves around while in combat. In a mixed party this often means that the frail Hivers will reach the combat much faster than the bulky Sheks and Skeletons, with predictable results.
Movement Speed: How quickly the character runs, with the lowest number being the speed at Athletics 1 and the highest at Athletics 100. Also affects your maximum Stealth Narutorunning speed cap. Races with high maximum speed can gain much higher results from speed-boosting items, especially Scout Legs.
There’s also a separate Swimming Speed stat for each race. Why hasn’t it been included in this guide? BECAUSE EVERYONE IS A TERRIBLE SWIMMER, THAT’S WHY. If you’re interested on a swim speed of a particular race, the answer is always “very slowly.”
Appendix 1: The numbers, what do they mean? (Part 2)
Experience Multiplier: A flat increase or decrease to the amount of experience gained in the particular skill. It doesn’t raise the level cap (which is 100, by the way: You can temporarily go higher with stat-boosting items, and some NPC:s might spawn with higher amounts) or anything, it just makes leveling faster or slower. The main reason why I harp about the importance of Strength multipliers across the guide is because training Strength is slow, tedious and tremendously important for almost all forms of high-end combat and general utility. At 100 Strength a Shek and a Hiver will be equals in damage, carrying capacity and ability to wield heavier weapons, but the Shek will get there much, much faster under a similar training regime.
Hidden/Unused Multipliers: Certain races seem have hidden negative modifiers to either Dexterity or Strength in the FCS. I’ve mentioned these as “nonfunctional code remnants”, as they are applied differently from actual, visible modifiers to these attributes and at least in my experience and very limited testing do not function in any way. They are mentioned only for the sake of completion and in the small case they actually apply or if they will be fixed in a future patch.
A few races (Read: Southern Hive) also have modifiers to several unused skills, notably “Hivemedic” and “Vet”, which seem to be a remnant from a time when different lifeforms required different healing skills which is still retained somewhat in the distinction between Field Medic and Robotics. To my understanding these multipliers do absolutely nothing, though interestingly all Hivers are still statted to be healed using Hivemedic instead of Field Medic in the files. There are a few other, hidden skills in the FCS that are not used in-game and don’t appear on the character sheet, and no race has multipliers in them.
Environment & Immunities: There are three types of environmental damage in Kenshi: Acid, (light and heavy acid rain, common in all across the continent with certain areas being constantly rained upon, acidic bodies of water which are found in a few zones, and acid ground which can be found in the Deadlands and Iron Valleys) Gas (found in The Black Desert and Ashlands in the form of drifting clouds) and Burning, better known as orbital weapon-and-or-terraforming-system-lasers (Found in Venge during the day). Acid rain and water slowly damages your entire body on exposure, whereas acid ground damages your legs and gas damages your chest. Venge-lasers cause very rapid damage to your whole body if they hit you and can open wounds unlike the other types of environmental damage (though if you play with frequent dismemberment you may still bleed from limb loss caused by such effect).
Duststorms are the fourth environmental effect present in most arid zones, but they are harmless and only reduce your melee attack, perception, precision shooting and martial arts while fighting within them while also making you harder to detect.
If you don’t want to get hurt or hampered by the environment when crossing these zones, you need protection, which certain types of clothing can provide. A resistance of 90 % is enough to remove the negative effects, though the character may still complain about them. Acid resistance only removes the damage from acid rain: Any kind of shoes or cybernetic leg replacements are enough to block damage from acid ground, but you can’t make yourself immune to acidic bodies of water. Certain races are immune to some or all environmental effects.
While gas and lasers are fairly rare effects, only present in three zones (both can also be theoretically dodged by micromanaging your squad and the latter can be fully avoided by simply traveling at night), acid effects, especially rain, are extremely common across the world. Many zones have at least a small chance for acid rain every now and then, and you should make sure you have some sort of protection against it before venturing to the outlands. It may not be a bad idea to always carry protective equipment with you in case you’re unsure of the weather in the region you’re about to enter. Gas masks, rice hats and longcoats are all fairly light and can be easily stored in a backpack, should you have one. The quality of the clothing does not affect its protective qualities against environment, so a shoddy coat will work just as fine as a masterwork.
Predators, cannibals and skin-thieves could also be considered environmental hazards. If you’re a Skeleton, animals and man-eaters will leave you alone – that is, leave your unconscious body alone after roughing you up instead of devouring you.
Water Avoidance: Not listed in the guide proper, but mentioned a few times, this stat makes the pathfinding go haywire near liquids. In short, Sheks avoid water like crazy, Hivers, Skeletons and Greenlanders try to avoid it, Scorchlanders will often try swimming, and certain non-player races like Fogmen and Fishmen will either have no distinction between dry land and water or will rather swim than walk. This stat can and will cause most of your pathfinding issues when guiding mixed race group through watery areas. When navigating Floodlands or the Swamp carrying any Scorchlanders in your party will help you preserve your sanity.
Racism: Certain people don’t like people of other colours, or people with no colours to begin with. Or flesh, for that matter.
In short, Holy Nation hates all non-human people as well as women: They will attack Skeletons or people with skeletal limb replacements on sight, will attempt to peacefully reincarnate hivers and Sheks through slavery-induced death and will tell women to head to the kitchen post-haste. Even as a male human it’s best to carry a copy of the Holy Flame around in their lands, so that they will give you free food instead of free beatings. A male human with Holy flame can sometimes manage to convince that any Hivers, Sheks and women in your squad are actually slaves and thus totally A-OK too. They also should hold tech in general illegal, but are missing related dialogue and aren’t actually bothered by any research benches and skin-peelers in your home.
United Cities doesn’t care about race that much but Noble hunters will sometimes try to hunt more exotic things like robots and women for sport. They also consider poverty a criminal offence, so make sure you have some dosh on you while on their lands, though they tend to only target malnourished people so Skeletons can get away scot free. In addition, the racist power rangers known as City Heroes will try to harry non-humans in UC lands, though this will usually result in them being beaten up by the Samurai and being sold to slavery.
Sheks make snide comments towards people who aren’t real warriors, which is terrible. If you have a Shek with the Shek Warrior dialogue pack in your party (for example Kang and Rane) you can skip their smuggling checkups by exlaiming that rummaging through a warrior’s backpack is not a cool thing to do.
Western hive doesn’t like exiled hivers and will shout at them if they try to approach their mud(?) hut towns, which can be inconvenient as they’re one of the few sources of Hive-suitable shirts and cheap prosthetics, both of which are a necessity to the flimsy Hivers. Use a member of another race to trade with them while keeping any exiles out of the shop. Their caravans don’t mind talking to exiled Hivers though and will trade freely outside their towns.
Skeleton and Skin bandits can be more easily befriended by a Skeleton. The latter don’t care about Sheks or hivers, but really enjoy the company of humans and you should visit them at some point.
Due to an apparent oversight Southern hivers are in a weird place where they’re basically treated as bog-standard humans, meaning that they can deal with both the Western Hive and the Holy Nation without any problems, apart from some missing dialogue for the latter faction.
Appendix 2: Should I never use certain races for certain tasks?
Some races are clearly meant or otherwise better for this or that role, but does that mean you should only ever use this race for the job? Certainly not! Kenshi is, after all, all about your choices and living with them and their repercussions.
While certain races are better than other races at certain tasks, in general skill level is much more important than mere multipliers. A worker drone, while still suffering from his innately low durability, becomes an unholy terror with high combat skills and great equipment, and can mow down hordes or lesser Sheks and Skeletons, for example. A Shek with similar levels of melee combat abilities would certainly be better, but not necessarily by some overwhelming margin.
Multipliers should not necessarily dissuade you from going down a certain path, or to only focus on strengths of the character. It just means that higher levels of that skill will be harder or easier to reach, but anyone can get there with enough time. Innate features like low running speed or lack of durability might hamper whatever task you want to accomplish, but they rarely should make it wholly impossible. I have had successful runs with utter meme builds, like a faction consisting only of Hive martial artists, and that bunch managed to destroy every main faction in the game despite being very poorly suitable for the task at hand. It had its own problems, like the fact that I had to spend basically all of my money to buy prosthetics as hivers excel at losing limbs, but that just added to the challenge.
All in all, the only thing you should avoid is trying to use races for things that are impossible for them, such as trying to co-exist with the Holy Nation using only non-human races, or attempting to conquer the Ashlands with an army of Hive Soldiers that can’t be made immune to gas clouds. Modding in unplayable races to be playable might raise further problems, like the god-awful running speed of Fishmen.
Also, I’d recommend avoiding using races with relevant negative multipliers at tasks that produce items with quality levels (any type of smithing & robotics when making prosthetics) or produce less or nothing on a failed attempt (farming) as this will in general result wasted time and materials. Tasks that merely take more time at low levels (labouring, cooking, etc.) aren’t nearly as noticeable and can more often than not be performed adequately enough by races with negative multipliers.
But, in short, don’t let this guide deter you from committing tactical suicide: After all, experimenting and challenging yourself with utterly daft builds and ideas, or simply roleplaying some sort of themed faction, are some of the most fun parts of the game.
Appendix 3: Shouldn’t there be a tier list here somewhere?
I’ll give you a hint: The S in S-tier stands for Skeleton.