Best Payday 3 Stealth Build: Weapons, Skills & Equipment

For players of Payday 3 who prefer a more subtle approach to heists, a strong stealth build is essential. To achieve the best possible stealth build in the game, these are the skills that should be prioritized.

The ability for players to have flexibility in Payday 3 is highly cherished in both the game and the overall franchise. You have the option to either have an intense, action-packed gameplay by going in guns blazing or to remain quiet and obtain the goods without raising any alarms.

To successfully remain undetected, your build will play a significant role. The greater your proficiency in stealth-based abilities, the greater your likelihood of completing the mission without detection.

Top 3 Weapons for Stealth in Payday 3

When it comes to weapons and equipment, it would be beneficial to bring something lightweight to ensure swift movement. Therefore, it is recommended to equip the Standard Lining vest (unlocks at level 18) as it may decrease your armor but enhance your mobility.

payday 3 best stealth build pistol — Starbreeze Studios

In this game, unlike Payday 2, concealment is not a crucial factor when selecting weapons. As long as they are suppressed, it does not matter which weapons we choose. We recommend using the starter weapons, the CAR-4 and Signature 40 pistol, and equipping them with silencers to avoid alerting enemies. Overkill Weapons are not useful for stealth, so there is no need to select one. Be sure to also unlock and attach silencers to them so you can shoot at things without alerting the entire map.

For your remaining slots, it is recommended to have an Ammo Bag in your deployable slot and a Throwing Knife (unlocks at level 16) in your throwable slot.

In your tool slot, these items are highly beneficial for stealth builds. If you’re completing most of the objectives, it is advised to equip an ECM Jammer (available at level 20) to delay cameras and radios in situations where you need to move quickly. However, if you are taking a more cautious approach and gathering information, a MicroCam or Motion Sensor (available at level 30) may be a better choice.

Best Payday 3 Stealth Skills

After that, we can proceed to focusing on skills. Upon reaching the level cap, you will have a total of 28 skill points.

For those seeking the most effective stealth build to successfully complete a major heist, we suggest investing your skill points into the following abilities:

Infiltrator tree
- Infiltrator (basic): Whenever you successfully pick a lock, kill an enemy with a throwing knife, or pick up loose cash, gain or refresh RUSH.
Manipulator tree
- Manipulator (basic): You tie up and trade hostages 50% faster.
Grifter tree
- Grifter (basic): As long as you are masked off, if you are within 1 meter of a civilian or employee, gain RUSH.
- Walk The Walk: As long as you’re unmasked and have RUSH, cameras can’t detect you trespassing in private areas. (They will still detect you performing an illegal action.)
- Social Engineering: As long as you’re unmasked and have RUSH, employees will ignore you performing illegal actions.
- Slippery: After getting cuffed by a guard, you can break free by lockpicking the cuffs.
Hacker tree
- Hacker (basic): You can hack cameras to gain access to the area’s CCTV system. This functions as though you had accessed the heist’s security room. You gain one Runtime.
- Hacker (aced): You can overload a device that already has an active Runtime. This will cause an electrical explosion that will stun anyone within range and destroy the device. You gain one additional Runtime.
- Secure Loop: You can use one Runtime to make the security camera you’re controlling loop its footage. Cameras looping their footage cannot detect you or anything out of the ordinary. If the camera is destroyed, you regain your Runtime use. If you apply a new Runtime when you’re at max Runtimes, your oldest active one is removed.
- Appliance Breach: You can activate lures from a distance, as long as you have a clear line of sight.
- Routed Ping: You can spend a Runtime to make the hacked camera automatically mark any guards or law enforcement within its range. Targets stay marked for 5 seconds after leaving the camera’s view and do not count towards your maximum number of marked targets
- Glitch Protocol: You can hack a guard’s radio to cause a disturbance, stopping and distracting them, pausing any action they are doing. You must have a line of sight to the guard to hack them. The guard is distracted for 5 seconds, after which they will go back to their previous action. If the guard was escorting a player, the guard will go back to patrolling. If the guard was about to detain a player, the guard will go into Search mode instead. Using this ability has a cooldown of 60 seconds.
- Signal Catch: You can answer radios remotely if you have a line of sight to the guard’s body.
Strategist tree
- Strategist (Basic): You can mark 1 additional target. Your marks last 20% longer.
- Strategist (Aced): You can mark 1 additional target. Your marks last 20% longer.
CQC Specialist tree
- CQC Specialist (Basic): Whenever you grab a human shield, gain or refresh RUSH.
- Groundskeeper: You perform takedowns 60% faster.
- Cover-Up: Taking down a guard will automatically answer their radio if it wasn’t already answered.
Transporter tree
- Catapult: You throw bags 30% farther.
Scrambler tree
- Scrambler (basic): You can hack drones by spending one runtime. Stealth drones stop moving and are unable to detect you or your crewmates for 7 seconds, after which the stealth drone will continue working as normal and your runtime will be refunded to you. Combat drones will become indestructible for 6 seconds and fight on your side, after which they will self-destruct and your runtime will be refunded to you. You gain one runtime.
- Extra Pockets: If you have a tool in your loadout, you start the heist with 50% more tools of that type, rounded up (minimum one additional tool).
- Cam Distortion: Cameras within 0.5 meter of ECM Jammers you own are disabled. This effect starts when the ECM Jammer is placed and lasts until the ECM Jammer is removed or used up. Disabled cameras can’t be hacked and all active runtimes on them are refunded.
- Full Recall: You can interact with placed gadgets you own to put them back in your inventory. Consumable gadgets can only be picked back up if they haven’t been used.
Assassin tree
- Assassin (basic): Whenever you kill an enemy with a suppressed weapon, gain RUSH.
- Assassin (aced): Whenever you manually mark a guard or law enforcement, refresh RUSH.
- Skimming the Ground: As long as you are wielding a suppressed weapon, your crouching movement speed is increased by 20%. This can’t let you move faster than your current armor speed penalty allows.

Obtaining all of the aforementioned skills requires a total of 26 points, leaving you with two remaining points. These can be allocated towards a bonus, such as the Speed Aim from the Sharpshooter tree, which enhances your aim-down-sight speed.

In addition, there are two other skills available in the CQC Specialist deck that you may want to consider based on your individual playstyle. One of these is Savage Takedown, which will intimidate any nearby civilians when performing a takedown within 5 meters. This skill may be more useful if you are also responsible for crowd control, but if your focus is on remaining undetected, it may not be necessary to acquire.

payday 3 best stealth build skills — Starbreeze Studios

The skill Pressure Points is another optional choice, which involves having civilians and guards inspect corpses before realizing they are deceased. This skill adds a few seconds before someone tries to alert the authorities, but it may end up being a wasted skill point if you are already effectively hiding the bodies.