Instead of skill trees, characters are built by assigning skill cards. These cards can be found all over the game and might drop from zombies. The cards fall into four categories and augment several facets of your slayer. While there’s no guarantee when you’ll find any of these, we still want you to know the best ones to equip when you collect them. Here’s our list of the best skill cards of each type in Dead Island 2.
Best Abilities Skill Cards in Dead Island 2
Dodge
Dodge is the better option over Block due to the fact that the best choice is also gaining a little distance. This lets you either step back to throw a Curveball or charge up a heavy attack without a zombie still right in your face. Blocking doesn’t exactly work against certain special zombie types, but a good dodge is always useful.
Flying Kick
The Flying Kick is better than the Drop Kick, considering the latter leaves you vulnerable on the ground. This is simply a jump kick, so you can just knock the zombie back and still end the attack on your feet. You might not do as much damage, but you at least get to stay mobile.
Ground Pound
While War Cry and Dash Strike are reasonable choices, the stability drain of the Ground Pound is the greatest. It gives you a crowd-control attack, making it easier to knock down the surrounding zombies. The worst part of the game is when a screamer or car alarm calls all surrounding zombies, and the Ground Pound gives you a way to make the big groups slightly more manageable.
Street Brawler
Street Brawler might add to your Autophage progress (up to you if that’s a good thing or not), but it also massively augments Fury gain. Many cards help Fury buildup, but they also have a condition where you can just as easily lose it. With this card, if you build it up to max, you can’t lose it.
Spitting Cobra
Very few zombies are immune to caustic damage, which makes this your best weapon. The main time we used Fury was to wipe out a crusher zombie, and none of them ever have any sort of caustic resistance. This does kill some of your Fury time, but the damage over time aspect is completely worth it when you just let it spray everywhere.
Best Survivor Skill Cards in Dead Island 2
Ravenous
As said, Fury is one of your best methods of attacking harder enemies. But once they are gone, killing weaker zombies in Fury is simple. This card is best for getting the absolute most out of a Fury usage. If you’d like to max out your Autophage, this will pair nicely with the Fury duration boost that it gives.
Safe Space
If you’re in a bad enough spot that you need a medkit, chances are you don’t have any time to spare. This card makes it so a shockwave will push enemies back when you use a medkit, giving you room to retreat a little bit and then reengage when ready.
Safety First
As Dodge is the best card of its type, you’re already probably utilizing it in almost every single fight. Medkits are sometimes a precious resource, so anything you can do to get some health back is terrific. Thankfully, the timing is pretty generous, so it shouldn’t be hard to trigger this skill.
Pain Threshold
This card provides an amazing synergy with Safety First. Not only are you getting health back on a well-timed dodge, but you get to hit back harder. This combo is definitely one you’ll want in your arsenal, especially if you constantly find yourself lacking medkits.
Best Slayer Skill Cards in Dead Island 2
The Limb Reaper
Similar to Safety First, getting health back in the middle of a fight is a big deal. As certain weapon types require you to go for limbs anyway, maiming should be second nature. Plus, many guns do instant maim damage to any limb you shoot, so use this card.
Deadeye
Out of all your weaponry, the Curveballs are consistently the best thing you have. Early on, you really only have the shuriken, but it’s still a terrific weapon. While the cooldown on certain Curveballs can be rather tough, this lets you cancel some of it out simply by using the Curveball.
Janus Rage
This card reaches maximum potential when coupled with Street Brawler. While a damage boost should be overlooked, Street Brawler almost completely assures the Fury Meter will stay full. This means you will be given an almost permanent Toughness boost.
Corpse Bomb
With Ravenous keeping Fury going for kills, Corpse Bomb is here to guarantee a constant string of zombie deaths. Each zombie will become a bomb, thus damaging any other nearby zombies. This really terrific chain effect will keep Fury going as long as the zombies keep coming.
Best Numen Skill Cards in Dead Island 2
Corpse Blossom
Elemental damage is your best friend in Dead Island 2. However, there aren’t many attacks (save for combining electricity and water) that let you spread elemental damage between several enemies. Corpse Blossom means that if you kill a zombie with fire damage, it will explode into fire damage and deal that to surrounding undead. This is an invaluable card and should immediately be equipped.
Born Survivor
Dying isn’t fun in Dead Island 2. While there’s not really any penalty for it, it’s hard not to feel disappointed about falling to one of the weakest zombies around. Luckily, the Born Survivor card gives you one last chance if you’re about to get wiped out, and it even gives you a short stint of health regen to stay upright.
There are some terrific cards to be found in Dead Island 2, but these are all the skill cards we think are the best. For more guides to help in zombie slaying and apocalypse surviving, check out our links below.
