Deus Ex: Human Revolution Hacking Guide

You can invest a total of 16 points into hacking-related augmentations, which should give you an idea of how much emphasis the game places on the hacking mini-game.

- Hacking: Capture (8 points) [Capture 1-5, Camera Domination, Turret Domination, Robot Domination]
The Hacking: Capture set of upgrades simply dictate what you can and cannot do, they have no effect on your effectiveness of the mini-game. Each point you put into Capture allows you to hack devices of the corresponding level. If you have Capture upgraded to 4/5, you can hack devices of a security level 4, but not 5.
Similarly, the domination points simply dictate whether or not you can interact with cameras, turrets or robots in the areas. These are useful in certain situations, but have zero impact on the hacking mini-game. Please refer to our detailed Augmentations Guide for more information on these. - Hacking: Analyze (2 points) [Detection Feedback, Analyze all DataStores]
This is the most useless upgrade. If I have two spare Praxis points and you have upgraded everything else, I still wouldn’t invest in these. Avoid this set of upgrades like the biblical plague. - Hacking: Fortify (3 points) [Fortify 1-3]
This augmentation is debatable. You start the game with Fortify at level 1, and I have finished the game, having hacked everything I ever came across, without ever needing to upgrade Fortify. Feel free to invest points in Fortify 2 and 3 if you have absolutely run out of every other augmentation to put praxis points into. Each point added increases the fortification by +1. So if you have Fortify at 3/3, and you fortify a node with a +2 rating, you will give it a net +5 security rating. The chance for detection when fortifying a node does not vary with how many points you have in Fortify. - Hacking: Stealth (3 points) [Stealth 1-3]
This is absolutely critical. You should have all three points invested in Stealth. Each point decreases the detection of a node by 15%, for a total of 45%. This is the absolute, must-have upgrade for any serious hacker.
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