Skills

Skills denote a character's areas of expertise. Each character has 5 skills, 2 of which are unique to his/her class. Furthermore, to differentiate marines belonging to the same class, each has 1 specialized skill, except for Techs, who have 2. Specialized skills are not unique to any marine or class; they merely serve to make marines of the same class attractive to different playstyles.

Skills are purely passive and never need to be activated. As long as you use a weapon or item or perform an action that falls within a skill's domain, you receive that skill's bonus. For example, if you are playing a character with the Damage Bonus skill, firing an Assault Rifle will automatically do more damage depending on the skill's level. Normally, skill levels are fixed for each character and cannot be increased or decreased, but there is a console command that lets you modify them (as in Alien Swarm 2K4) if used in the lobby before other players connect:

asw_custom_skill_points 1

Keep in mind that using the above command is considered "cheating" by the game, so that you won't earn Experience Points. It's also not very balanced or useful.

Altogether, there are 15 different skills currently in the game.

Skills by specification

Class-specific	Not class-specific
Officer: Leadership Vindicator Damage Special Weapons: Autogun Damage Piercing Bullets Medic: Healing Bonus Infestation Curing Tech: Scanner Engineering	Damage Bonus (6) Reload Speed Bonus (6) Health Bonus (4) Explosives Bonus (3) Melee Damage Bonus (2) Speed Bonus (2) Combat Drugs (1)

The number of characters sharing a skill not specific to a class is indicated in parentheses.

Skills by class

Officer

• Leadership – Boosts the damage dealt and the damage resistance of nearby squad mates.
• Vindicator Damage – Increases damage dealt by the Vindicator.
• Explosives Bonus – Increases the effectiveness of all explosives.
• Health Bonus – Increases a marine's health.
• Damage Bonus – Sarge's specialized skill. Increase the damage dealt by most standard weapons.
• Melee Damage Bonus – Jaeger's specialized skill. Increases the damage dealt by the marine's melee atacks and melee weapons, and the speed of melee attacks.

Special Weapons

• Autogun Damage – Increase damage dealt by the Autogun and the Minigun.
• Piercing Bullets – Provides a chance for bullets to pierce through enemies.
• Damage Bonus – Increase the damage dealt by most standard weapons.
• Reload Speed Bonus – Decreases the reload time of all weapons.
• Speed Bonus – Wildcat's specialized skill. Increase the marine's movement speed.
• Health Bonus – Wolfe's specialized skill. Increases a marine's health.

Medic

• Healing Bonus – Increases the healing power of healing items and the total amount carried.
• Infestation Curing – Allows the medic to heal infested marines, reducing the duration of the infestation.
• Damage Bonus – Increase the damage dealt by most standard weapons.
• Reload Speed Bonus – Decreases the reload time of all weapons.
• Speed Bonus – Faith's specialized skill. Increase the marine's movement speed.
• Combat Drugs – Bastille's specialized skill. Boosts effectiveness of adrenaline when used by your squad.

Tech

• Scanner – Increases the range and rate of the movement scanner.
• Engineering – Speeds up welding and Sentry Gun setup for all nearby teammates.
• Reload Speed Bonus – Decreases the reload time of all weapons.
• Damage Bonus – Crash's first specialized skill. Increase the damage dealt by most standard weapons.
• Explosives Bonus – Crash's second specialized skill. Increases the effectiveness of all explosives.
• Health Bonus – Vegas's first specialized skill. Increases a marine's health.
• Melee Damage Bonus – Vegas's second specialized skill. Increases the amount of damage dealt by the marine's melee atacks and melee weapons, and the speed of melee attacks.

Synthesis

See Playable Characters#Characteristics and skills synthesis.