Hunter (Xbow/Poison/Traps/Stealth) build help for a new player

[Jokaste]

Hey, I just got the game the other day and after experimenting with various characters up to level 2-3, I've decided that I want to do a hunter themed build, the idea being that my character stalks prey, controls the battlefield with various traps and then assaults their enemies with poisons, hit and run tactics and luring them into traps.

Some notes on my skills:

Crossbow/Stealth - Self explanatory. More Crossbow points means more damage and hit chance right? And then more Stealth means more sneaking and increased damage through feats.

Traps/Lockpicking/Hacking - Traps so I can utilize great bear traps, Lockpicking/Hacking so I can open everything. I'm not how much in these skills I really need. For Traps my goal is to be able to use high quality bear traps with deadly poisons. From my understanding, Traps skill doesn't actually increase damage with traps, just lets you use higher quality ones. Do the higher quality traps do more damage then? I'm also not sure how valuable higher Traps skill would be since I mostly want to focus on bear traps to fit the Hunter fantasy. I was thinking about doing the chemical blob traps or mines if perhaps I had the points necessary to spare but I don't know how effective they are. I'm also not sure how much I need in Lockpicking and Hacking to realistically be able to open every lock.

Mechanics/Electronics/Chemistry/Biology/Tailoring - I'm really not sure how many points I need in any of these either. With Mechanics I want to be able to craft the highest quality crossbows and traps I can. With Electronics, Chemistry and Biology, I'm mostly interested in crafting special bolts and obtaining high quality poisons and chemicals such as acids. For Electronics, I'm mostly interested in the Anatomically Aware Scope and the Electric Bolts but am also interested in making goggles that would benefit the high crit/sneaky/ranged playstyle. I read on the wiki that the strongest poison requires 150 skill to extract (Heartbreaker Poison) so I figured I would want 150 in Biology for that but it seems like a lot of points. For Chemistry I'm not quite sure how much I would need if I want to make high quality Chemical Bolts and how much I would need if I decided that I want to invest in mines and chemical blob traps.

Dodge/Evasion - Not really sure how much I need here either. Someone said in another thread that every character should either have high armor, high dodge/evasion or high stealth with combinations of the three being better. I figured since ideally I'm spending most of an encounter prepping and shooting from range that I wouldn't really need much in these skills, especially since I was thinking about wearing a sneaky tac vest with leather boots rather than just plain leather armor and the tabis.

Persuasion/Intimidation/Mercantile - Nothing here but if I ended up with points to spare, it would be nice to have some social skills. Obviously not that big of a deal since, as with virtually every RPG, murdering everyone is the simplest and most direct approach.

I made the build after doing some research on the wiki so there's very little game experience behind this. Any advice would be appreciated!

[Bruno]

Hi

For hacking/lockpicking, you generally dont need more than to have effective skill (in paranthesis) be at your level, for example, at lvl 6, you could have lockpicking like 32 (40). This saves points gained from synergy with mechanics and traps also.

For traps skill, higher skill means less chance for detection from enemies, and this is a good thing. Animals generally dont care and happily step in your traps, but high level humans with good perception/detection, will avoid and even disarm your traps. I'd put points here until effective skill around 70-100, then put more if enemies start avoiding your traps. Your feat Trap Expert also help here.

[Kiruha]

Poison bolts are not so useful - you better use poison for caltrops. Hearthbreaker poison also is not a gamechanger, 150 biology is too much for it. If you want to use it anyway, you get many poison bolts from tribals in epxedition. You can skip tailiring completely, but for roleplaying it makes sense, also you can craft really cool infused cave hopper leather armor with huge bonus to stealth and moving points. If you want evasion, you should max it or avoid completely. It is a good passive defence. You can check old Mindless crossbow domination build and mine revision of it for expedition if you want.