Saints Row: Best Skills To Give You The Upper Hand

In order to reach the top of the pecking order in Santo Ileso, you’ll need to be at the top of your game, and that means equipping the best skills to ensure your survival at all costs. Fortunately for you, Saints Row lets players run wild with a variety of combat skills and abilities that’ll help you take over the entire city. In even better news, we’re going to help you select the best ones. Here’s everything you need to know about the best skills you can use in Saints Row.

 

What Are Skills In Saints Row?

Skills are equippable moves and abilities that are activated by holding RB/R1 and pressing one of the face buttons. You can equip up to four skills at a time, and you can have multiple skills active at any one time, allowing you to create a build that works for your specific playstyle. There are also passive skills, which increase your maximum health and Flow (the resource which lets you perform skills), and these will be active as soon as you unlock them.

 

How Do You Unlock Skills In Saints Row?

Unlocking skills comes as a natural result of leveling up, as each new level unlocks a new skill, be it active or passive. You can check which skills you’ve unlocked in the Skills menu on your in-game phone. There’s one notable exception to this unlocking rule, which we’ll discuss later.

 

Saints Row: Best Skills

We’ve listed the best skills in Saints Row in the order you’ll unlock them.

Pineapple Express – Grab an enemy, drop a grenade down their pants, and throw them.

The first skill you unlock, Pineapple Express will likely be a key part of your skill loadout for the majority of the key, because there’s always an excellent use for it. Turning an enemy into a live, explosive projectile is great for crowd control, as you can easily waste a few goons with just one well timed usage. It’s also cheap to use, making it a reliable workhouse of your skill arsenal.

 

Proximity Mine – Place a sticky mine that explodes when enemies are near. Damage increases shortly after placement.

A good early skill, but one that might fall out of your rotation once your access to RPGs becomes more plentiful, the Proximity Mine is a great way to have access to explosives early on in the game. Plus, being able to lay traps for dumb AI never gets old. The Frag Grenade skill later on offers some stronger damage, but the Proximity Mine allows for better utility.

 

Tough Mother – Gain a temporary health boost to absorb damage from enemies and negate staggers.

Sometimes, firefights will become a little bit too much for The Boss, so it’s important to have some kind of defensive skill to even the odds in an impossible situation. The temporary health can be enough to get you through tough fights, but the stagger negation is a real godsend, particularly against Idol grenadiers who launch explosives that can knock you around. Taking that tool away from your enemies can make fights so much easier.

 

Flaming Punch – Ignite your fist for an explosive punch.

You light your fist on fire and punch people with it. That’s probably all the convincing you need to equip the Flaming Fist as soon as it unlocks. The ability itself is handy to have in a pinch, as the skill has an area of effect close to the point of impact, meaning multiple goons can feel the power of your fire fist. You can fist multiple people at once.

 

Transfusion – While active, heal yourself and your friends by hurting your enemies.

If you like your skills to be somewhat vampiric in nature, Transfusion is going to be your first port of call as soon as it unlocks. A basic life steal ability, you’ll heal a small amount of health for each bit of damage you inflict on any enemies. Your allies will also receive the healing benefits, which means it pairs up well with the next skill, though it’s worth noting that using Transfusion won’t make you invincible. Take enough damage, and your life steal won’t mean anything.

 

Intercession – Call in some Saints to help you fight.

Sometimes it’s just nice to have friends you can rely on, so being able to call on some Saints to deal with your enemies is always a great option. As mentioned, Transfusion is an amazing skill to pair Intercession with, but there’s also a Major perk called “Nihil Obstat” that can make your AI allies much more lethal. If you want to rely on your mates to do the lion’s share of the work, Intercession with the Nihil Obstat perk will do wonders for you.

 

D4th Blossom – Spin around and fire bullets in every direction.

If you’re surrounded by enemies on all sides, sometimes it’s best to go all guns blazing, and the D4th Blossom ability is that personified. The Boss pulls out twin D4th Blossom SMGs and begins an acrobatic ballet of bullets that’ll wipe out anything in the immediate vicinity. Most basic enemies will be killed by this move, while tougher enemies will take some decent damage. As far as crowd control goes, this is the ultimate move.

 

Quantum Aperture – Create a window that lets you see and shoot through walls. Applies a damage boost.

So, you want to break the game entirely? The Quantum Aperture is a skill that can only be obtained by completing the second mission of the Eurekabator! venture questline. There, you’re invited to try out a new technology that’ll allow you to shoot through walls, which gives you a ridiculous advantage over the AI enemies you encounter.

Even if you don’t use it to shoot through walls, the Quantum Aperture provides a damage boost to all bullets fired through the window, allowing you to absolutely destroy anything in front of you. It even has the ability to kill tank drivers through the vehicle itself, which will net you the Armor Piercing achievement/trophy. If you want the most useful skill in all of Saints Row, this is it.

Saints Row is available on PC, PS4, PS5, Xbox One and Xbox Series X & S.

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