Underrail Forum
Underrail => General => Topic started by: haze1103 on September 29, 2023, 02:59:41 pm
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Are grenade launchers going to be the new meta, or a useless gimmick for people who already invest in Throwing regardless?
Post your expected character builds for your November 1rst playthrough
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With no cooldowns involved they should be very powerful... no idea how that is balanced except maybe scarcity of 40mm grenades.
I also suspect they might get moved to Heavy Guns, as it is the Guns skill has way too much stuff in it.
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There are some other ways to balance it other than scarcity, for sure:
- changing enemies' Evasion skill. Even now, certain enemies have so high evasion that it's far too useless and way too expensive to try and kill them with grenades, e.g. the boss pig in Hunting Grounds which can absorb literally many dozens of even tier 3 HE / frag grenades, if not over a hundred;
- certain enemies having sufficiently high tresholds and / or resists to types of damage some or all grenade types do, while sufficiently low tresholds / resists to some other damage types;
- having sufficiently many situations where using any kind of AoE is unacceptable, like mixing enemies and friendlies / neutrals in a single melee fight;
- durability and repair cost of grenade launchers (which allows to after specifically grenade launcher's overall viability vs hand-thrown grenades);
- AP costs of using and/or reloading grenade launchers;
- possible character debuffs for having one equipped / in use. For example, the 12.7 unique sniper rifle we have in the game applies quite a debuff whenever using it, so we know this can be done for a weapon, if need be.
Etc.
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It is a new skill.
I made this terminator AR build a long time ago but never actually played it. I'll be adapting it on Nov 1st.
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I am wondering what build to create to have a grenade launcher specialist. Would it required strength? Or Dex + Per?
Excited to replay/restream the game with this DLC day one (hopefully, the content of the DLC will be quickly accessible from the beginning.
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in the announcement its said grenade launcher is in guns, so an easy assumption is per and it takes 7 strength to wield at least one type of them from what we can see in the trailer, plus there is several variants of grenade shells for different encounters presumably, one of which i've seen is a cluster bomb but also consider that the weapon is AP intensive.
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Every gun I thought was never-ever going to be in the game, all in one DLC. While that is the star of the show, I wonder what exactly the new feats will be.
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Every gun I thought was never-ever going to be in the game, all in one DLC. While that is the star of the show, I wonder what exactly the new feats will be.
Well there's definitely one that procs with every shot of a minigun. I'm kind of hoping for one that lets you entrench in one spot and just let them come to you, firing up all morphines if that's what it takes.
I'm curious about the grenade launcher feats, it seems like it would be hard to crit with the GL, but a lot of crits were shown in the trailer.
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Since grenade launchers are weapons and can crit, and most of them are just one big damage, it seems like flashbang + lgrenade is a great combo.
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Will there be max level increase? New skill and all, i'd quite enjoy it.
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I seriously doubt it. Level 30 is already too much for the game.
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What I am most interested in are the new feats involving these guns. Feats were always the bread and butter for me when it comes to this game.
As for their actual use, I can suspect they will cost a lot of AP and ammo, have a huge weight and high STR requirement - potentially involving Armor Penalty too, reducing MP. So mostly for Metal Armor or Riot Gear users.
Minigun will be most effective in corridors as it sounds like a long range burst weapon with minimal spread. It will be devastating with Expertise (does that count with the burst of an SMG or AR?)
Grenade Launcher should definitely belong to Heavy Guns skill. They should only be compatible with HE or Frag Grenades to give them some edge at least as they are kinda mediocre in the game, especially compared to Plasma. Throwing is useful with just 80 effective points and the Gas, Incendiary and Flashbangs all seem to be vastly better.
I will probably begin a new playthrough just to see enemies using these, but like being a Sniper so much, that I will probably play with the same build again:)
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It ain't nothing to "suspect" - they will cost a lot of AP and ammo, it's clearly visible in the trailer. Besides, how couldn't they, it'd be way too OP.
Expertise, i recently made a character with, 5mm SMG user - all the proper feats, and lemme tell ya, on Normal it'd be just fine, but on Dominating, it's not too fancy - lots of bullets each dealing couple dozens extra damage looks powerful on paper, but when you meet enemies with high mechanical resist or extra high treshold, it ain't. This won't change for miniguns any much, even with 12.7 caliber; and as usual, spraying W2C ammo on every corner always ends up way too expensive.
Why grenade launchers "heavy" guns though? Depending on model, they can be both heavy but also very lighweight, in real life. Mk47 Striker, full-auto, weighs ~18kg - but there's also the famous M79 (single-fire, same 40mm grenade) which was used in Terminator 2, which weighs ~2.7 kg empty. Ain't "heavy" by no means - some SMGs and most assault rifles are heavier that that.
P.S. And about enjoying playing a Sniper build - man, you and me both! I played quite a few variations, and i think i ended up figuring no less than the most powerful build the game can possibly have. I mean, more powerful than all the Psi, melee, AR, energy pistol and all kinds of hybrids i am aware of. I was thinking to post it - my sniper build - in the "builds" subforum, but so far i saw little welcome for longer posts i do, so now i'm in doubt if i should. What you think? Should i?
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I think grenade launchers and miniguns will be mediocre, while the LMG might be pretty good. From the trailer it looks like the grenade launcher deals about half as much damage as a shotgun split between mechanical damage and heat damage, so I imagine that it will generally be worse than just throwing a high tier grenade in most combat encounters and will be absolutely dogshit against robots. Minigun looks like it needs an extremely high strength requirement just to function as a worse assault rifle, getting more shots with every burst means you only reach full potential after 2-3 turns. LMG doesn't need a few bursts to be good, looks like it has a quite manageable strength requirement, and looks like it costs much less AP to burst while also having decent damage. The spread angle on both the minigun and LMG though leave me worried that they might just end up as worst auto-shotguns, we'll have to see if the feats make up for it.
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I hope LMG/Minigun will allow us to control burst somehow, to spread it in an angle across several enemies. If I shoot 15-20 bullets at a single person it will be 99% waste. Unless it does SMG numbers ...
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There could easily be a feat ability that changes the LMG/minigun's spread angle for the current turn.
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That would make it a shotgun basically. I was more hoping for multiple targets selection, where you could (for example) select up to 5 targets in a cone, and each target would get 3-4 bullets at them, with some bullets from the burst lost in transition between targets. This would be more deterministic than shotgun random spread.
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That could work. I remember old games like Laser Squad working like this, you could sweep machinegun fire between 2 arbitrary points on the map and fire an arbitrary amount of rounds. Things are rarely as granular these days.
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P.S. And about enjoying playing a Sniper build - man, you and me both! I played quite a few variations, and i think i ended up figuring no less than the most powerful build the game can possibly have. I mean, more powerful than all the Psi, melee, AR, energy pistol and all kinds of hybrids i am aware of. I was thinking to post it - my sniper build - in the "builds" subforum, but so far i saw little welcome for longer posts i do, so now i'm in doubt if i should. What you think? Should i?
Bit off topic about me logging in just for this, but please do. I also have a perfected build myself, but definitely open - actually hoping to see something new that I didn't think of.
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All burst has spread. It doesn't need to be added because its already in. Just shoot at a target in the back.
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Cone is quite small for current burst and its very random/unreliable. Works fine for like 5-7 bullets. But if we approach 15-20 teritory you want to spread them out more.
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It could have a high AP cost on the first Burst of the turn, with a very low cost for subsequent Bursts. This way, you can adjust the target mid-turn.
Keep the Burst low on bullet count, but expect 3-5 bursts per turns
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Anybody else see the high tech soldiers with the armor and the robo-dog? I wonder who they are and what their deal is...
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Probably another remnant of old Biocorp. Robo-dog reminds me of Laser - which is one dog greeting the player upon 1st entry into Free Drones base when doing their quest line, and iirc it's said by Laser's master that the dog was artificially created kind of combat unit of some sort with heightened intelligence (sorry, can't remember exact wording about it). Then there's K2 in Junkyard, too. So we already know breeding / genetically designing dogs for combat is a part of game lore in Underrail. Further enhancing 'em with some cybernetics would thus be quite expected. Besides, the theme is quite staple thing in Fallout games, which, i recon, is one major inspiration to Underrail.
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If heavy weapons requires a lot of strength, I hope the skill and feats scale with strength and not perception, that would be a serious faux pas in game design that the new weapons in a new dlc called Heavy Duty requires a lot of strength but only scales with perception. If you did this mistake Styg, you get a couple week to fix it.
Hoping the heavy weapons craft and unique weapons aren't locked to super late stuff and some can be acquired early enough, like around Junkyard (like energy pistol and chemical pistol) if you know where to look ; a skill you can choose to boost starting level 1 and you can't use till level 16+ is stupid, kinda like energy weapons and heavy weapons in the first two Fallout (sure you could cheese some if you knew where to go, but even as a french I can feel tired of cheese).
I guess there's some new additions to all build besides the new weapons types, with new feats and uniques. Please let that dlc be as refreshing as Expedition and see you next month everyone.
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If heavy weapons requires a lot of strength, I hope the skill and feats scale with strength and not perception, that would be a serious faux pas in game design that the new weapons in a new dlc called Heavy Duty requires a lot of strength but only scales with perception. If you did this mistake Styg, you get a couple week to fix it.
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It's nice when there exists builds that are not just about maxing one stat.
I get your point when it comes to High-Technicalities, which always seemed to me like a poor excuse for investing in Int with guns.
But Strength checks are usually like, 10 at most. You can get that at level 1, and still max Perception after that without compromising anything. Your dex, agi, and will are probably gonna be at 3 anyway.
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I get your point when it comes to High-Technicalities, which always seemed to me like a poor excuse for investing in Int with guns.
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"Poor"? Math says otherwise. Late-game, High Technicalities beats extra effective Guns skill points from extra Perception, and dramatically so. Here's the numbers.
Consider this probable example: lvl 26 energy pistol build, Guns skill maxed at 140 hard points at the time. 16 perception, 10 Int before taking +2 stat feat. Now let's see which +2 stat gives more damage - Int or Per:
- +2 Per means: before gear / consumales, effective Guns skill gets increased from (140 + 12*8.5% =) 282.8 to (140 + 14*8.5%) = 306.6. The skill increases damage by this calc: 1 + 0.7 * Effective Guns Skill / 100. So, with 282.8 Guns skill, we do 1 + 0.7 * 2.828 = x2.9797 damage over base weapon damage stat. And this is our "100% damage dealt" before taking the feat. With +2 Per, we then do 1 + 0.7 * 3.066 = x3.1462 damage, which means +2 Per increased our damage by 3.1462 / 2.9796 - 100% = +5.591% damage by taking +2 Per. Damage bonus from High Technicalities remain the same, so no need to factor it in. +5.6% damage - is significant, but not oh too big increase, see?
- +2 Int instead - means: with 10 Int we had +40% bonus damage from High Technicalities, meaning our "pre-feat 100%" damage regarding the feat - was 140% of "everything else factored in" dealt. With +2 Int feat taken, this becomes +56%. Meaning, our damage, by taking +2 Int with HT present, increased by 156% / 140% - 100% = +11.428% damage by taking +2 Int. And that's even without any spec points spent into High Technicalities - with full 5/5 specced, it's 170% / 150% - 100% = +13.333% damage.
Conclusion: depending on how high Per and Int are at any given time, whether or not High Technicalities are specced, and whether Guns skill is maxed or not - extra points into Int can provide much higher, at times even more than twice higher, increase to energy pistol damage than same stat points spent into Per.
P.S. This is due to diminishing returns in Guns skill damage calculation: the higher it gets, the smaller and smaller relative gain it gives relative to already-existing level of skill. In fact, if to properly min-max Per / Int for High Technicalities build, significantly higher than 12 Int and much lower than 18 Per are the optimum, as obvious from the above; much depends at which level the player wants to arrive to "optimal" combination of damage bonuses in action, whether to spec High Technicalities, even how often / much +Perception / +Int consumables are being used in combat (so related to how high Biology skill is - whether crafting consumables or not), etc.
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STR could lower AP required to shoot, in similar way how light weapons use DEX. That would be interesting. You would still need PER to hit/increase damage. Or go versatility ;)
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STR could lower AP required to shoot, in similar way how light weapons use DEX. That would be interesting. You would still need PER to hit/increase damage. Or go versatility ;)
It'd be a bit weird though - minigun's barrels take time to spin up to full, and it be same time no matter how strong the user is. Dex is meant to reduce AP via user's higher speed in aiming and pulling the trigger of small weapons, i guess - but big things like LMGs, you just don't wave around aiming at multiple targets in quick succession...
Say, maybe Str could instead reduce armor penalty (from both armors and, if there's any, from heavy weaponry as well) for each point of Str above item's Str requirement? Higher Strength naturally means that user is less encumbered by all the iron. Ain't saying maxed Str should allow as much mobility as 0 armor pentalty maxed Agility build, but something like 50...60% of it? Could be nice. It also would make heavily armored Str-based melee builds not a pain to play - they could actually chase things somewhat well.
And to me it just feels right if extra-strong guy is able to move around with ease despite wearing half a ton of armor and using some big and bulky gun. He might not be fastest to pull the trigger, but his mobility barely suffers despite wearing / handling lots of weight - for him, these things are "light" alright.
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It seems like a missed opportunity to make an expansion adding big meaty weapons and not add craftable power armor (i know about drill dozer) to improve build variety or maybe they did but didnt advertise it for some reason
combing through the trailer makes it seem like in order to use miniguns or LMGs you need to dump everything into strength perception and constitution to be viable since that example minigun takes a total of 11 strength to wield without I assume obscene accuracy penalties
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I'm a bit puzzled with the requirement of a new "heavy weapon" skill requirement, considering those new weapons seem super expensive to buy and use, are we supposed to invest into guns first for early game and then transition to heavy weapon ? Or use the versatility feat ?
I also wonder how LMG and miniguns will compete with assault rifles
Can't really speculate about builds possibilities without knowing the new feats
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A normal player should probably just play guns at first, but others could invest in Psi first and coast off that + utilities.
Edit: Or maybe the worst LMG on earth could be available at SGS just like the Shoddy Shotgun.
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I do hope there is a way to acquire large quantities of ammo so that I am not walking around with half a belt everywhere and burning through half my entire stock after a single engagement
If not I guess there will be a good use for the disassemble feat to poach the metal plates off your enemies's weapons and metal armor to make bullets
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I think it's safe to say the availability of 44 and 12.7 rounds will change, otherwise most types of LMG and minigun will be unusable. Even then you will probably be trying to save those types of rounds for the right fights.
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Dunno how "safe to say" it is, actually - given, say, the fact that explosive .44 rounds are such a rare loot that it's quite common to find less than a dozen of these from a full playthrough. I mean, that much is sure inadequate already, especially given existance of guns like the Tommy Gun, you know? So, maybe it'll be too few in the DLC, also. Happened once, can happen again.
Talking of which, explosive rounds + LMG / minigun should be a big thing about these new weapons - and contaminating 12.7, also. Both are extremely expensive to spray, but results vs non-robot foes should worth the price, me thinks. So, yeah, disassemble feat to get all the metal for ammo - i bet will become quite popular. Though getting enough casings would still be a grind - or at least, a major side activity (like using .44 sidearm as much as possible whenever it's not worth it to use the big gun).
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I just want Repair Unit 7 as a companion.