Texas Chain Saw Massacre: Best Cook Build Guide

This guide talks about the best attribute, ability, and perk builds for Cook in TCM.

By Dave Acuñaon
Texas Chain Saw Massacre Cook cover

Cook is one of the killers in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre. He runs the Gas Station and knows every bit of their property, so much so that he can tell that someone is in one spot just by sound alone. Read ahead as we talk more about how to get the best build for Cook in The Texas Chain Saw Massacre.

Best Cook Attributes

Cook has a very high base Savagery stat despite his old age, but he also suffers from being slow and getting easily tired out due to his low Endurance.

Here are Cook’s starting attributes:

  • Savagery: 35
  • Blood Harvesting: 25
  • Endurance: 10

It’s best to allocate points to maximize Cook’s Savagery, then put the rest on Endurance to help him last longer in chases. Cook’s strong point is his ability to put locks on doors to create potential kill zones and funnel points, which would require players to really learn the layout of the maps, just like him. For a more passive blood harvester build, you can opt to put more points into Blood Harvesting instead while still allocating some to Endurance.

Because of how slow Cook is, he best fills in the support role for Sissy and Hitchhiker. He can be paired with Johnny as well, but Johnny’s speed has to be boosted with a perk to compensate, as they are both slow.

Best Cook Ability Modifiers

Cook’s main ability is Seek, which allows him to listen for noisy victims, highlighting and pinpointing their location for a short period of time. It can be further modified to become more useful, depending on the play style.

  • Level 1 to 2
    • Reduce Ability Drain: Reduces ability drain by 30%/70%.
    • Increase Detection Range: Victim detection range increased by 10%/20%.
    • Quicker Recharge Rate: Increases ability bar recharge rate by 21%/45%.
  • Level 3
    • Increase Focus Speed: Focusing in on a Victim takes half as long.
    • Increase Highly Duration: Successfully highlighted Victims stay marked twice as long.
    • All Family See Noise: Highlighted Victims are marked for the entire Family.

Take note that you will need to level up Cook’s ability to level 3 to be able to unlock all three slots for its modifiers. Also, the same modifiers’ effects do not stack up, and only the modifier placed on the higher level will take effect.

To make Cook’s ability become more useful, not only to him, but for the rest of the family, go for these modifiers:

  • Level 1: Reduce Ability Drain
  • Level 2: Increase Detection Range
  • Level 3: All Family See Noise

Best Cook Perks

Depending on your Cook playstyle, you can either go for the perk loadout that will allow you to focus more on scouting and trapping victims or become a better blood harvester for Grandpa.

Scout and Trap build:

  • Security Pins: Locks that you add are 10%/30%/50% harder to unlock for victims.
  • Tracker Tagged: Hitting a victim highlights them for all family members for 2/3/5 seconds.
  • Prey Drive: Spotting a victim increases stamina recharge by 20%/30%/40% for 5/10/15 seconds.

Blood Harvester build:

  • Universal Donor: Blood collected from buckets is worth 20%/30%/40% more for you.
  • Siphon: Your Blood Harvesting is increased by 3/5/7.
  • Blood Runner: Your maximum blood storage capacity is increased by 10%/20%/30%.

Other perks that you might want to consider while working on leveling up your main perks:

  • Ding Dong: Bell on barbwire rings out 20%/50%/100% louder and highlight range is increased by 10%/30%/50%.
  • Dinner Bell: When a victim is caught in a trap, they are highlighted to you and your maximum stamina is increased by 20/40/60 points for 15 seconds. Soup’s on!
  • Down the Rabbit Hole: When a victim goes down a well, they are highlighted for you for 7/12/17 seconds.
  • Hurt Pride: After recovering from being stunned, your stamina recharges 30%/50/80% faster for 5/10/15 seconds.

As for the Grandpa Abilities, Cook can choose from the following:

  • Excited Grandpa: Delay between Grandpa’s Sonar ability is reduced by 20% at each level.
  • Windoom: Victims take 50% more damage when jumping out of windows.
  • Nobody Escapes Hell: Door Unlock Minigames are 40% harder for all Victims.
  • Well Well Well: Victims that jump down wells take 50% more damage.