Welcome to our Dune: Awakening section. In this guide, we’ll be going over our personal recommendations – and the BEST starting class in Dune: Awakening. It is important to know what’s worth your while starting out in Arrakis, and we’re here to help.
Starting out in Dune: Awakening
In the opening cutscene, after creating your character, you’ll be met by the Reverend Mother. During this time, you’ll eventually reach a menu in which you have to select your starting class. However, in Dune: Awakening, picking a class isn’t as black and white as other games can be.
How The Class System Works
While it’s important to select a class that works for you and performs well, it’s also important to know how classes work in the game. Selecting a class does NOT lock you in to a single path in Dune: Awakening. Instead, it’s more of a “starting point” – allowing you to expand further in the game. Essentially, you’re able to dip into multiple class’s aspects and be very flexible. Utilizing multiple Class Skill Trees, you can mix and match Abilities and Techniques to create the ultimate class for you.
However, there is a way to use this to your advantage from the first moments of the game – to create the best starting class set-up in Dune: Awakening.
The BEST Starting Class in Dune: Awakening
We highly recommend starting off as the Swordmaster class. The Swordmaster comes with a lot of self-sufficiency and high melee damage – which is perfect for clearing out the early areas of the game. Classes like Planetologist are a non-combat class, as a result, they’d never be as powerful to start with like the Swordmaster is.
The key to the Swordmaster being the BEST starting class in the game actually brings us back to our previous mention – you are not locked to a single class. Because you can unlock every class tree in the game and dip into each of them, this means we can find ways to compliment the Swordmaster starting choice. This is done through the Class Trainers.
Class Trainers
Class Trainers in Dune: Awakening serve as a gateway to unlocking a particular Class Skill Tree and even furthering that Class as you progress. These Trainers can be found throughout the game, however, some Trainers make their first appearance much sooner than others. Below, we’ll go over the two earliest Trainers you can come across – one of them being ESSENTIAL to grab as soon as possible – it’ll complete your best starting class set-up.
Trooper
The Trooper Trainer:
Is your first Trainer you’re likely to encounter in the game. This is highly important for the best starting class set-up as you’ll need both the Swordmaster and Trooper Skill Trees. Ghavouri can be found in the Griffin’s Tradepost in Hagga Basin.
After talking to Ghavouri, he’ll send you on the Contract:
Upon completion, you’ll unlock the Trooper Skill Tree.
Now, within moments of starting the game (and not even having to complete the first Story Trial) – you’ll have access to both the Swordmaster AND Trooper Class Trees. As a result, you’re able to put together some serious power early, not to mention mobility. Mobility assists with moving through the early map quickly, before making your first vehicle. Even if you’re low on ammo for weapons, both of these classes combined have a lot of damage to easily take out T1 enemies. We personally recommend taking the “Knee Charge” from Swordmaster and the “Shigawire Claw” from Trooper at first.
Planetologist
The Planetologist Trainer:
Can be found near and above Imperial Testing Station No. 2.
After accepting the Contract:
After you meet Derek, you’ll head inside the Imperial Testing Station No. 2 to complete Assistance Required and “Minimic Film Recovery”. Upon completion, you’ll unlock the Planetologist Skill Tree too!
Planetologist is a non-combat class, as a result, it’s not ESSENTIAL to having the best starting class set-up. However, as it’s nearby and early, you can pick it up!
The BEST Way to Start Dune: Awakening
As a result of the above, within 30 or so minutes of playing, you have:
- Picked Swordmaster as your starting class (the best option).
- Unlocked the Trooper class Skill Tree (also the best option).
- Unlocked the Planetologist class Skill Tree (non-combat, but free to pick-up).
- Selected the early Abilities “Knee Charge” and “Shigawire Claw”.
Trooper is without a doubt the best overall starting class in the game, even compared to Swordmaster, due to the incredible early firepower it provides from the get-to. However, we intentionally do not have to pick Trooper, despite it being the best. Due to the method above and the fact the Trooper Trainer is very early on, we can afford to pick Swordmaster AND gain all the benefits of Trooper, thus creating the BEST starting class in Dune: Awakening.
Make sure to use “Knee Charge” to close the gap on enemies and quickly take them out, and use “Shigawire Claw” to traverse terrain very quickly and pick up “Explosive Grenade” to increase lethality.
Have fun out there in Arrakis with this highly destructive combination. See our main page for more Dune: Awakening content.
