These Are the 5 Absolute Best Traits to Pick in Starfield

Starfield is a game filled with choices and possibilities, giving you immense amounts of freedom in how you want to explore its universe. Of course, before you get your own starship you’ll need to craft your character, and there are a wealth of options to pick between the various backgrounds and traits. The trait system can drastically change your playthrough depending on what you pick.

In typical Bethesda fashion, some of the traits are more fun than functional, but others can give you a serious leg-up. We’ve put together a list of the best traits you’ll want to pick for your Starfield playthrough.

Best Traits In Starfield

Before we dive into the best traits, it’s important to point out that you don’t actually have to pick any at all. If you’d rather play Starfield trait-free that’s perfectly viable, or you can only pick one or two traits instead of three. It all depends on how you want to play, and if you don’t want traits influencing any parts of the experience, that’s totally viable.

That being said, there are a few traits that can really help give you a boost, especially in the early parts of the game. While there are others that aren’t necessarily “good,” but provide some fun options, chiefly the “Kid Stuff” trait that gives you two parents alive and well that you can visit, but sends 2 percent of your credits home each week. While Starfield has a New Game Plus feature, you can’t choose new traits on your next game, meaning the three you pick are what you’re locked into. With that in mind, here are our picks for the best traits. That said, certain in-game choices will allow you to remove certain affinities.

Extrovert

Traveling with a companion is usually a good idea in Starfield, as they not only help in battle but can function like a packhorse, giving extra storage space. There’s quite literally no downside to having a companion, and Extrovert makes the whole system even more useful. This trait will let you use less oxygen when you have a companion, meaning you can run for longer distances, jump more, and generally just not have to worry as much about your character getting out of breath.

Hero Worshipped

Anyone who played The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion will instantly be familiar with the Adoring Fan, and his agonizing antics. He’s made a full comeback in Starfield, yet again, as an adoring fan who quite literally worships the ground you walk on. He’s fun to have around, for a while, but in Starfield he’s actually quite useful.

Adoring Fan is exceptionally skilled in Weight Lifting, meaning he can carry a ton of items for you, and he’ll always be there no matter what you do. He’s also an extra follower that you can bring along for missions, or assign to ships and outposts. There’s really no downside to choosing this trait.

Wanted

Wanted is an interesting trait, as the bonus seemingly hugely outweighs the downside. By picking this trait you’ll occasionally have mercenaries show up to try and claim the bounty on your head, and you can get rid of them by either paying them off or taking them out. The bonus is that you do extra damage whenever your health is low, which can be hugely useful in some tougher fights, or ones with multiple enemies. In our experience, mercenaries would only appear every once in a while, so don’t expect to be constantly stopped.

Raised Enlightened or Raised Universal

These two traits make it so that your character grew up in one of the two major religions of Starfield, and it can change your dialogue choices accordingly. The real benefit, however, is the chest filled with goodies that both provide you with in their corresponding building, either the House of the Enlightened or Sanctum Universum in New Atlantis. You never want to say no to free stuff, and the only downside is you lose out on the chest for the other religion.

All Three Faction Traits

There are three different faction traits that change where your character “grew up.” These are Freestar Collective Settler, Neon Street Rat, and United Colonies Native. All three will provide unique dialogue options throughout the story, but interestingly each one can also boost the rewards for some missions from specific factions. The catch is that you can only pick one, and the other two factions will then issue bigger bounties (which is only a problem if you plan on committing crimes).

Pick whichever faction you think sounds the most interesting, and then enjoy expanding options and rewards for completing their quests. For example, in our playthrough, we chose Neon Street Rat, which opened up a lot of dialogue options for our character who “understood” how the entertainment city worked, and how ruthless it could be. You can, of course, still complete the quests from other factions.

Starfield launches on October 6 for Xbox and PC.