Messages

676

General / Re: No-crafting exploration build?

« on: January 08, 2018, 12:15:07 am »

Your first build will work fine, but you might want to change your stats a bit.  If you don't want to craft, you only need just enough Int for premeditation, so take one point out of Int.  Take one out of Agi as well (6 is the min for Sprint), since you're only playing on Normal and don't need to worry about extremely perceptive enemies.  Put both those points into Dex, whicxh will improve your lockpicking and traps.  If you're willing to carry around a few little extra items, then I'd say take two points out of Perception and put those also into Dex, so you'll be able to use Quick Tinkering.  With Snooping, you only need 5 base Perception to find everything in the game, assuming you're willing to carry around Junkyard Surprise and some goggles (which gets your perception to 8 if you save and use the JS until it boosts your perception).  See destroyor's post below, I'm wrong about Perception.  Put all your level-up stat points into Will if you plan to use Psi as your principal offensive skill; the scaling is so high for Psi that you really won't get as much benefit from anything else.  If you're just going to use Psi as support, then you won't need to pump it as much and will have a few more points to throw into your base abilities as you see fit.

677

Suggestions / A feat for using carapace in crafting

« on: January 07, 2018, 07:58:30 am »

We've got Skinner and Clothier already, but with the higher quality carapaces from the higher level new enemies, the big armor penalty doesn't seem quite as prohibitive.  Why not a feat for improving carapaces?  I'd take it on a crafter build, for endgame.

Bonesmith  7 Int, 15 mechanics, 15 biology.  The quality of carapaces counts as if 20% higher in all your crafts.

No?

678

Suggestions / Re: My feelings about playing on Normal after build 1.0.3.13 (5.01.2018)

« on: January 05, 2018, 09:30:08 pm »

Te point is this Normal (1.0.3) is much harder than previous Normal.
And the question is - was it intended ?

I think yes.  To some extent, UnderRail doesn't want to be a game where "whatever you do is right".  It wants to be a game where "Whatever choices you make, there will be a right thing that you can do" and that's a big difference.  For example, those rathounds that give you trouble?  You do not describe using the fences to your advantage.  If you are pure psi, then you should have the first, free Thought Control ability that does damage - you can cast it through a closed fence.  Rathounds cannot open fences.  Thus, you can easily move yourself to safety.  Because there is a right thing you can do, but you must find it.

I can see why someone might not want to play a game where they can make wrong decisions, but UnderRail is not a game for "press A to win" players.  Sometimes I like "Press A to win" games (Skyrim, for example), but UnderRail wants you to think about how to succeed with the tools at your disposal.  You don't always have the same tools I have, so your solutions aren't always the same.  But there's always a solution.  You just need to figure it out.

679

General / Re: Returning to the game after a long break, looking for some build suggestions

« on: January 05, 2018, 08:28:35 pm »

This. I think new crawlers might be muchless pain in the ass if you able to see them first.

Gotta tell ya, I *never* see them first, and they're not really a problem.  I have one stun break for accidents, but other than that, the environmental clues let you know that there's trouble around.  Just start lobbing incendiaries all over the place; the sound of the explosions or the light of the fire will attract the Death Stalkers, and they'll try to find a path that doesn't run them through fire.  Leave them one, and either Quick Tinker up some traps to force them to drop into visibility, or start lobbing explosives and when you tag one, switch to incendiaries.

Once you have a Death Stalker or two panicking while on fire, standing in a lake of flame, with your back to a wall and your face all ruddy with kill mania and popping shadows, you'll not wish you had more Perception.  Just more pyro.  =)

680

General / Re: Returning to the game after a long break, looking for some build suggestions

« on: January 01, 2018, 06:18:51 pm »

Is 3 CON a viable option for Hard ?

3 CON is even ok for Dominating.  You just have to make sure that at all times you have CC and many tricks up your sleeve.  You may still die and need to reload very rarely, but if you're quite careful 3 CON is fine.  After all, if you take an Ambush sniper crit, you're going to have to sit down no matter if your CON is 3 or 6 =)

681

General / Re: Post your experiences with the new Dominating difficulty!

« on: December 23, 2017, 01:36:05 am »

Only freshly into DC but boy, those Tchortling spawns are amped up from Hard.  Still, with +~40% move speed I can get from safe haven to safe haven with usually only one fight en route, or none.  This build works fine for Dominating, but it's not perfect; just haven't gotten enough use out of Quick Tinkering to make it worthwhile.  Otherwise, pretty much everything comes into play every combat, which keeps combat varied and interesting.

http://underrail.info.tm/build/?GQMIAwMDEAoPHgAAAAAAUEEARlVVIERfS8KHwoctAEErKBc_FCouFjAhZD1mZyk

On Hard, I tried not to use the (somewhat cheesy) LoC+Bilocation on groups while hiding behind the force field, but on Dominating I have no shame at all   Pretty much every significant fight with Lurkers, Lunatics, Ironheads, Protectorate, et c. has abused the crap out of AoE Bilocation.

682

Development Log / Re: Dev Log #56: Experimental Branch with Version 1.0.3.13

« on: December 19, 2017, 01:31:27 am »

Last time i played Deep Caverns threw ~160 quality components at me.

Yeah but DC is just strange and offputting.  You get all the best quality gear there, but you can't access your housing where your +skill buff is so you probably can't make use of that really high-end stuff.  Basically everything about the design of Deep Caverns sabotages your character build, unless you know in advance what to expect and build to it.  That's Bad Design 101.

You're absolutely right that there's high-quality stuff all over DC.  I just feel like it's not reasonable to expect to rely on that stuff for crafting since only very few builds will have the skill to hit those thresholds without the housing bonus, so ultimately you just end up with a bunch of stuff to play with when you get back from visiting Tchort.  If you do

683

General / Re: Does anyone actually use Extended Magazines in crafting?

« on: December 19, 2017, 01:27:11 am »

A single one sure. Two or more? Be ready to press F9.

a Psi build shouldn't have any problems with any rathounds before opening up the world and meeting Ancient Rathounds.  Even then, as long as you have traps or good mobility you should still have no problems.  All you need is a flare and the normal&Alpha ones go running.  Grab/craft a molotov or two and make good use of the fences and the beginning rathounds are trivial; get to safety while they're scared, then take your time and shock them through closed fences.

You sound like you get hit a lot in combat.  If you're playing a psi build - even one with little investment in the psi skills - you don't need to.  I would encourage you to figure out how to get hit less.  Once you're only slipping up and taking one or two hits of any significance in the larger combats, you may appreciate the bonus health, situationally, from things like the belt, or pig leather attire.  At the very least, belt, food, and two pig leather pieces made enough difference for my psi character that Silent Isle was non-threatening on Dominating. It was very threatening without all that bonus health, and the belt was more than any other part.

684

Development Log / Re: Dev Log #56: Experimental Branch with Version 1.0.3.13

« on: December 17, 2017, 05:29:19 am »

Now, whether or not Death Stalkers are too difficult to beat in general I can't say

The first fight I had with them, three of them in a smallish room, was ridiculous.  I'm trying not to rely on savescumming, so I basically do the same thing every time I get to a door: hit Premeditation, let it tick to 5 seconds, enter turn-based, open the door.  If it looks clear, walk in, select (but don't cast) Force Field, run it around to see if it indicates any occupied squares.  Cancel FF, step back outside, throw molotov just inside, use Premeditation on a fireball of lightning, or if there's a large group of humans instead use the "I win" button (Premed, LoC, Bilocation) and drop the force field to lock them all in while an army of Doppelgangers kicks the crap out of the unfortunate burning souls.  Anyway, barely managed the fight against the Death Stalkers, then forgot about the new debuff and used a health hypo, which immediately killed me 

Tell you what, though, I waste *a lot* of molotovs trying to stay safe

685

General / Re: anti-Carnifex cheese

« on: December 17, 2017, 01:18:06 am »

They have always been immune to stun and flashbang even before the experimental patch. Bear trap is the way to go but if you don't have quick tinkering than try caltrops/toxic gas grenades.

Ah.  The much lower enemy health on Hard (and the substantial rarity of finding Ancient Rathounds) meant I didn't have any strong memories of trouble with them.  I must have forgotten that they weren't stunnable.

I do have Quick Tinkering, indeed.  I'm finding that I have to have a whole lot more combat-relevant feats on Dominating than on Hard.  A crafter build is a little lacking given that it only looks like I'm going to be able to afford two crafting feats.  Still, Dominating is  an enjoyably difficult experience with only very few "Aw, bull@#$%" moments.

686

Development Log / Re: Dev Log #56: Experimental Branch with Version 1.0.3.13

« on: December 17, 2017, 01:07:07 am »

Are you guys having trouble locating high quality crafting components as well?

I'm not quite as far in as you are (you're probably much better than I am so you likely don't die as much =D ) but I'm finding gear in the low-100s range quite often.  Still haven't unlocked the Institute, Oligarch faction, or the Protectorate/Free Drones merchants but it's looking like a few dozen points in merchant might make a big difference.  At least in Foundry, and on Blaine, the unlocked items are often much better than the default inventory.   In the past, it was mostly just "more, not different" for passing Mercantile checks, but with the new stuff it feels like - and this is admittedly a very small sample size - Mercantile unlocks "more, and better" stuff now.  105 effective Mercantile, if that matters.

687

General / Re: anti-Carnifex cheese

« on: December 16, 2017, 11:50:54 pm »

Can fleshbags resist it while taking the damage? As far as I know, it stuns if it deals damage.

Ancient Rathounds definitely resist the electrokinesis stun, at least on Dominating difficulty.  They seem completely immune to stuns, in fact, which makes handling them a bit of a puzzle for low-output builds like mine.  If they would just burn, it would be much simpler but they're implacable and unshakeable.

If immunity is different to resistance here, then I've missed the point.  Sorry, if so ^_^

688

General / Re: Circular Wave Amplifier capacity

« on: December 16, 2017, 09:29:22 am »

Shouldn't Medium modulator be best at medium freq? Currently Low is best at 2 freqs, High at 3 and Medium at 0

OTOH the Medium is much better at the low end, so with medium modulators you have a sort of well-balanced shield that will help against melee and thrown weapons.  High modulators are almost completely ineffectual against the bottom-end of the velocity range.  So you're trading general use for specialization.

I couldn't get a quality match for anything but 129 quality but the difference I just saw was almost 50% at Low and 25% at Very Low for the Medium modulator.  That's quite a difference.  The differences in favor of the High modulator were in the same range.  I do think the High frequency is still better but if you aren't able to carry several around (and with the new EMP effects it might be downright unwise to carry too many spare, charged electronic devices at one time) to swap out from encounter to encounter, a Medium modulator does seem to have its place.  At the very least, it seems to be better to drop a Medium and a High into a shield emitter base than High/High.

689

Development Log / Re: Dev Log #56: Experimental Branch with Version 1.0.3.13

« on: December 16, 2017, 12:55:56 am »

• DC mindreading will now take into account the number of killed Faceless, which will have negative effects of varying degrees depending on that number; however, kills during certain story-related events where combat is unavoidable will not be counted

Meant to ask about this - will Faceless-controlled robots (like those plasma walkers and kamikaze bots south of Rail Crossing) count toward the total of "Faceless killed"?  Or is it just the Faceless people?  Might make a difference as to how certain problems get solved  ;)

690

Bugs / Re: [1.0.3.13] Newton does not survive being saved

« on: December 14, 2017, 12:24:22 am »

Got it. Fixed for the next update. Poor Newton.

Thanks for the patches.  I actually felt so badly for Newton that I went ahead and restarted my Dominating attempt with the same build, just so I could save him.  Feeling badly for an NPC.  What a silly thing to do. ^_^