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16

Builds / "Ghost" - triple-psi sniper build

« on: October 04, 2023, 07:17:06 am »

Only after i figured out this build, i realized that it really reminds me of Ghost units in classic Starcraft - stealthy snipers who are also able to cast "spells". Hence the name. And, this build is the most powerful sniper build, and possibly the most powerful build of them all, which i know of.

TL;DR: get Strafe, Interloper, Ambush, Tranquility, Psycho-neural Flexibility, Premeditation and the usual sniper feats; innervate Thermodynamic Destabilization, Telekinetic Proxy, Electrokinetic Imprint, Psycho-temporal Contraction, and any 2 of: Cryostasis / Limited Temporal Increment / Stasis. Use Dragunov and later high-quality crafted Spearheads for 0% Move and Shoot precision penalty, and some 8.6 / 12.7 rifle for hard-hitting while Focused. Use said psi abilities to make huge explosions whenever there's a pack of enemies, and then crowd control and set up Ambush targets if/when needed.


Now in some detail.

Main idea is simple: to fix three main weaknesses, which sniper builds usually have, via psi abilities which do not require high/maxed psi skills. Namely:

#1: snipers got no AoE damage potential (other than things like frag grenades, which are available to any build) - unlike pure psi / AR / SMG / shotgun builds, which all come with strong AoE damage features. Thus, snipers often get in trouble against large packs of enemies. This build solves it by using Thermodynamic Destabilization on highest-health target in the pack, which at 140 effective Metathermics skill - deals 100% of that target's health as an explosion upon its death. With Tranquility, it's just 5 AP to cast, and has range of 10; and with Premeditation it's 0 AP and range of 13 - almost as far as a sniper rifle shot. This gets to 11 / 14 range with a certain late-game outside-levelling feat, too. If some targets survive the explosion, usually they are so weak a single grenade and/or few shots with a side arm finishes them all.

#2: snipers do high bursts of damage (Spree / Snipe / Aimed Shot) and then spend a turn or two being not-so-deadly. This build solves it by controlling any remaining enemies with Imprint, Cryostasis and/or self-cast Stasis. Having at least two of these innervated, and if need be all three, allows huge amount of crowd control. I.e., whenever needed, fall back behind some corner and have incoming enemies stunned / frozen, and/or Stasis ourselves, to get Aimed Shot and/or Snipe available again. For the latter - Snipe - having any single remaining tough enemy frozen allows to reenter Stealth easily. Very convinient. Most of the time, none of it is needed - but it's exactly longer / harder fights, which are few, which sniper builds struggle with; but not this build.

#3: sniper rifles come with high move-and-shoot precision penalty, which usually makes it impossible to have full accuracy whenever there's a need to hide behind some corner during any prolonged battle (e.g. expedition camp defense battles). Using Strafe feat (and having stats required for it) with 7.62 sniper rifles solves it completely, while freezing / stunning enemies and using Stasis on oneself often allows to avoid the need to hide behind a corner to begin with. The latter allows to use heavier sniper rifle for its full potential for more than just 1st turn of combat, while the former serves as "plan B" whenever enemies are too many, or would shoot with crossbows / sniper rifles from out of line of sight, or simply unknown number / location, so it's safer to just hide behind something and peek out each next turn to hit them.


Stats:

STR 4 - sniper rifles require 5, yet this build gets +1 Str from Rathound Regalia armor (i go for it right after Depot A and use it ever after), thus no need to get 5 Str with hard points;

DEX 5 - for Strafe feat. Not negotiable: being able to have full accuracy after hiding behind some corner and peaking out to shoot - is just too good. Also, gives bonus points to some useful skills;

AGI 7 - for Interloper and Sprint feats. And extra Stealth effective skill points, which improve Ambush crit chance, Snipe damage, and simply allow to sneak around better / easier.

CON 3

PER 10 > 18 - for sniper feats and maximum damage from maximum possible Guns skill. OP detection and overpowering enemies' Evasion are the usual QoL things too, ofc;

WILL 3 - synergies between 3 different psi schools nearly cancel -10% penalty for effective skill points, and we're not maxing any psi school, too - only need specific, not so high, values;

INT 8 - for 6 psi slots. Wish it could be 7, but not enough stat points to go Int 10 with all the above. Also, 8 is required for Psycho-neural Flexibility, and gives good amount of bonus effective skill points to many useful skills.



Feats:

lvl 1 - Aimed Shot + Sprint

lvl 2 - Tranquility
// this early in the game, Cryokinesis with its native 100% to hit and long range is pretty useful even at 3 Will, and Tranquility much improves it; and 5 AP Cryostasis for emergencies is nice

lvl 4 - Strafe
// sniper rifles get good a while later - not at level 4 - but there are other important feats to take at lvl 6+, so get it now

lvl 6 - Ambush

lvl 8 - Snipe

lvl 10 - Shooting Spree
// should be going to grab Dragunov sniper rifle before or near lvl 12, at which point proper Sniper times start

lvl 12 - Premeditation
// 0 AP for any psi ability, halved psi cost and +3 range, all together - is just too good to skip

lvl 14 - Blindsiding

lvl 16 - Critical Power

Feat specializations:
- i think it's best to get Shooting Spree 1/1 1st, then 10/10 Critical Power by lvl 26;
- remaining 4 specialization points at lvls 27...30 - personal preference; good choices are:
-- 4 spec points into Interloper, which means 24% stealth speed penalty instead of 30%, and more importantly - 23 movement points in stealth instead of 15, which MPs are real handy when peeking outta some corner in re-entered Stealth to make another Snipe hit; or into
-- Aimed Shot - extra 20% crit damage bonus of it gets multiplied by both high Guns skill and +special-attack bonuses from Goggles and Smart Module in our crafted sniper rifles; or into
-- Shooting Spree cooldown reduction, if really bothered by its rather long cooldown.

lvl 18, 20, 22 - Interloper, Psycho-temporal Acceleration and Psycho-neural Flexibility in any preferred order (i prefer this one);

lvl 24 - anything desired, e.g. Pack Rathound

lvl 26 - Increased Perception

lvl 28 - Advanced Psi Empathy
// this feat is usually not available for sniper builds, but this build got 100+ hard-pt Metathermics. -20% psi costs is really big, and by lvl 28 extremely strong crafted shield emitter should be in use, plus health pool is quite high despite Con 3, because of being this high level - so health reduction is of very little concern

lvl 30 - anything desired, e.g. Sharpshooter
// note that Sharpshooter does not work whenever we shoot after we've moved during any given turn, which is why it's optional and least priority for a Strafe-based sniper build


Essential skills

Guns max

Stealth max

Metathermics > 140 effective ASAP
// including synergy points from other psi skills. This means 142...143 hard points invested in Metathermics;

Psychokinesis > 55 hard-pt ASAP
// required for Telekinetic Proxy, which is absurdly good to promptly light up targets for Ambush shots; and 45 hard-pt required for Imprint, which beats often-praised Quick Tinkering feat fair and square: much shorter cooldown, much lower AP cost, and is a ranged ability unlike traps which require being next to the tile being trapped;

Temporal Manipulation > 70 hard-pt after getting 55 in Psychokinesis
// 70 needed for Stasis, and lower amounts for other useful TM abilities

Mechanics > ~90 hard-pt eventually
// exact amount depends on how convinient one wants to be about crafting high-end (150sh...160sh) guns: whether to use Hypercerebrix to do it or not, Jon's Special or not, waiting for Your House +15% bonus or not

Electronics > ~100...110sh hard-pt eventually
// same reasoning as for Mechanics. Crafting high-quality goggles with high damage bonus for ranged weapons special attacks - is a must have. Plus, high-end dual-emitter energy shields require 180sh effective skill, and highest i remember i made - even required 203 effective Electronics. Yet we can get +10 from Phreak glove and +10 from Lemurian Engineer suit, which bonuses then become +23 to effective skill value with +15% bonus from Your House bench. And this build gets +51% to hard-pt Electronics when buffed by Hypercerebrix (so 10 Int). E.g., if having 100 hard points in Electronics, with Hypercerebrix, Your House bench bonus, +3 from food buff, and +20 from said items equipped, effective Electronics will be: ( (100 * 151%) + 20 + 3 ) * 115% = 200.1, i.e. exactly 200 effective skill. A bit higher than 100 hard-pt - is just convinience and/or not willing to murder Phreak for the glove and/or not waiting for Lemurian Engineer suit.

Skill points remaining for non-essential skills by lvl 30: 1200 - 2x160 - 143 - 55 - 70 - 90 - 100 = 442. This is a lot to get plenty other good skills for quality of life / extra combat utility. One of possible setups:

- Throwing effective ~100: hard-pt 92...93 with Dex 5. This allows to do 90% accuracy grenades at ~5 tiles;

- Hacking effective 130, for passing all Hacking checks in the game: hard-pt 65, then Hypercerebrix (130 skill checks are real few), with +20 from items, +10 synergy and +3 food;

- Lockpicking effective 130, for passing all Lockpicking checks in the game: hard-pt 67, multiplied by 134% with All-in food buff (thus 8 Dex), with +32 from items and +9 synergy on top;

- Mercantile effective 105, for unlocking all special vendor inventories and price reduction in shops: hard-pt 68, multipied by 134% (usual 8 Int), with +15 from Large Waist Pack;

- Biology ~40 hard-pt: allows to craft Hypercerebrix with all the obtainable bonuses - needs 70 effective, on top of crafting Toxic Gas Grenades, Adrenaline Shots, etc;

- Chemistry ~30 hard-pt: effective 50 to craft W2C ammo, 45 to craft Cryo Gas grenades, 40 to craft mk2 Incendiary grenades (light-weight, great to light up large areas for Ambush shots), 20 to craft Toxic Gas grenades;

- Tailoring / Persuasion / Pickpocketing: 80 remaining hard points can be spent into one or more of these, whichever is liked most. Maybe even some points into Traps if enjoying using them (alas, this build does just fine with very little trap use - other than staple bear trap abuse in select few battles, like Expedition Camp defenses). Tailoring is of little use for this build: a bit higher-quality Ninja tabis can be crafted than what Constantine sells (he sells up to 2400 durability, which is roughly ~142 quality Black Cloth), while all other item slots are non-tailoring gear. Or, if to squeeze an extra hard point somewhere else - these last 81 hard points can go Pickpocketing if going for an Oddity run, which with 5 base Dex + All-in + Supersoldier buffs will even be enough to see Ethan get old: 82x151% = 122, and that's exactly how much Pickpocketing is needed to steal his thing.


Couple ending notes which may come handy.

This build is also able to do easy silent assasination of any - however tough - single target, even ones like Balor, by doing this: sneak in, start combat manually, cast 3 Cryokinesis (noise = 5, practically silent) and then Crystasis, this freezes 'em for 5 turns; then drop Toxic Gas at their feet same or next turn and wait for them to get +200% damage taken debuff; once they unfreeze, finish them off with either more Cryokinesis hits or burst fire from silenced 5mm SMG. The latter, with highest Guns skill plus W2C or Shock ammo depending on target's resists, becomes extremely deadly with +200 damage taken debuff, wildly exceeding damage tresholds of even heavy armor - even without any SMG-specific feats.

This build, late-game, much enjoys using AKX as "smaller sniper rifle". The gun's indestructibility is sure nice; it can hit anything within usual sight rage, has very low single fire AP cost in compare to any proper sniper rifle, and then, with most feats taken, Guns skill at 300+ and ~100% crit chance for Ambush shots - does some 200...300 damage per crit against most foes. Excellent for dealing with survivors after Thermodynamic Destabilization explosion, if there are any.

17

General / An area in Core City sewers i never seen before

« on: September 27, 2023, 05:32:03 pm »

This is 1st time i see it, it's a full map in Core City sewers, which seem to exist instead of the map with a mutie camp and several roaming mutie workers sorting through piles of junk. In this one, there's a crane which can move few piles of junk, controlled from the only working console, and some siphoners here and there - no muties at all.

And there's what looks like a door in the northern wall, but it ain't interactive nor highlighted as a door (visible in the screenshot's upper part). That made me curious and i went to wiki hoping to learn more - whether that door is just scenery or not - but to my surprise i can't find this area's page in the wiki, at all.

Is this some kind of secret event or am i just being dumb about failing to find it in wiki? %)

18

Bugs / Toxic Gas grenade debuff does not increase physical part of Cryokinesis damage

« on: September 27, 2023, 01:40:08 am »

It looks like only Cold damage part of Cryokinesis hits is increased by Toxic Gas grenade's debuff. Noticed it during Black Crawler fight, playing lvl 16 MT+PK pure psi character, while having Black Crawler under 9 (iirc) stacks of the debuff - which should almost double all damage taken.

Attached is a screenshot with combat log showing numbers for last Cryokinesis hit, where physical damage remains in damage range displayed by pop-up window for Cryokinesis (if to sum up displayed resisted and inflicted parts of physical damage of this Cryokinesis hit), so it's not anyhow buffed by Toxic Gas); while cold damage of the same Cryokinesis hit - is properly being doubled.

P.S. Hella good fight with a level 16 glass cannon psi char on Dominating; actually ended it with just 4 hit points remaining, and it was 5th try. It'd definitely help if this bug would not be present, yep.

19

Builds / Max skill points - a build idea

« on: September 15, 2023, 09:19:18 pm »

This is a sort of a challenge build idea: beating Dominating with it may prove difficult, or tedious, or both. Yet it also brings much novelty for experienced players, by having certain "usually essential" skills at zero.

The main idea of this build - is simple: obtain as many (effective!) skill points as humanly possible. No matter what. Interestingly, this simple goal produces both generally viable, yet in the same time unusual, build. So, here goes.


Base abilities

Str 8
Dex 3
Agi 3
Con 3
Per 10
Will 3
Int 10 (gets to 18 hard-pt with levelling)

Skills

Guns, Hacking, Mechanics, Electronics, Tailoring, Biology, Chemistry, Mercantile - max hard point investment every level. Other skills: 0 hard point everywhere else; 80% of effective Guns skill in Melee and Crossbows with Versatile feat with full specialization.

Here's why.

Max Int: there are seven Intelligence-based skills, while 2nd-best in this regard base ability - Will - powers up only 6 skills. This means, we must max out these 7 Int-based skills, at every level - no matter whether desired or useful, just gotta do it. Meaning, we'll have hard-pt skill points enough to max out only ONE other skill.

Per 10: And, of all the possibilities for the "8th skill", Guns are a natural choice. Two reasons: 1st, it gotta be either Guns, Crossbows or Melee, because we must get and fully specialize Versatility feat, which gives a crapton more effective skill points. It's a must-have for this build, naturally. And 2nd reason, out of these 3 possible skills, Guns is the best because we are going nuts with hit Int: with High-Technicalities feat (which requres hard points in Guns skill to get!) and its specialization (5 specialization points), we'll be doing +10% damage with energy weapons for every 1 Int point above 5. Which is, by level 26, 13 such points - for a whopping +130% energy pistol damage, applied multiplicatively. And we'll get this feat by level 4 - very early in the game - at which point it will already be providing +48% damage to energy pistols. With 10 Perception from the start and always-maxed Guns skill, our chance to hit will be excellent, too. Further, high Perception allows to detect hidden enemies much better. Further still, since we're not putting a single point into Traps skill, we'll want high Perception to spot traps and mines. Not being able to see 'em is really irritating, yep. Last and the least, but still good - high perception allows to spot all the hidden passages, cashes and mini areas, which, given our zero Lockpicking, is especially useful.

Str 8: since we're not going to put a _single_ hard skill point into any agility-based, dexterity-based nor will-based skills (as we need all our skill points for the above) - we're going to be once stealthless character with no psi skills, who can't even use a multi-tool nor huxkey to open any air vents, since we have 0 hard-pt Lockpicking! But comes Strength, which: allows to break air vents with a crowbar; allows to effectively wear our finely-crafted user-made heavy armors (Metal Armor requires exactly 8 Str) to protect us in places where usually we'd sneak or quickly run-in-combat through; increases our carry capacity; and should we want it, allows to use Melee weapons with good chance to hit and damage once we get Versatility feat. The only remotely as useful alternative is to go 8 Agi (with 3 Str), for high movement points plus Sprint and Hit and Run feats, yet the price of having no option to properly use heavy armor and being unable to go through air vents - is too harsh. Heck, can't even complete Black Eels quest line without going through air vents. So yeah, Str 8 it is. Besides, one usual obstacle to using heavy armors being that high armor penalty nearly nulifies Stealth skill - does not matter for this build, since there ain't no Stealth to be nulified to begin with.


And a few factors which, together, would provide above mentioned novelty and replaying value. These are:

- no psi whatsoever. This, i feel, is unusual: lots of great builds use at least some psi abilities to complement weaknesses and increase overall firepower and survivalability;

- no lockpicking whatsoever is probably quite rare, and will force the player to do lots of areas a different way. And we'll never run out of lockpicks. Yet maxed out Hacking will still provide good amount of bonus loot from electronically locked containers, and still allow certain easier routes in many areas / quests;

- all crafting skills always maxed out, at every level, allowing to fully use all sorts of crafting as early as possible: on top of highly unusual, this also completely removes any need to plan-ahead for which values of which crafting skills one would want to get at any given level, hence simplifying one of most complex systems in the game;

- available "combat" feats are limited due to minimum Dex, Agi, Con and Willpower, thus freeing feat points for usually skipped crafting feats, which can shine earliest and fullest due to all crafting skills being maxed out at all times;

- no hard-points in Persuasion nor Intimidation means nearly no quests solvable by using these skills, thus overall making a playthrough harder yet also being a novelty for players who usually prefer to have at least some points in one of both;

- no Stealth, no Evasion and no Psi abilities combined means this build lacks defenses / panic buttons badly, and minimum Constitution means it's a glass cannon. Yet crafted heavy armors and no health penalty from getting Psi Empathy feat - allows to survive surprisingly well, especially when using an appropriate armor for any given battle. Further still, maxed out Biology allows to craft and use all kinds of powerful drugs, further customizing and increasing survivalability whenever and however needed.

So, again, each above factor alone is not oh too rare on its own, but combining them into a single character - i think is really unusual way to play the game.

P.S. This build is, overall, a sort of "fragile egghead in a shell" sorta tank. High-tech weaponry - energy pistols - fits this kind of a character, too. Funny how this all came outta a simple idea of just maxing out effective skill points. It almost feels like this is meant to be so... Is it, Styg?

P.P.S. If my math is correct, total amount of effective skill points this build will have at level 30 - is 2450 + 241 + 386 = 3077. This is with fully specced Versatility, and without any skill bonuses from gear, consumables nor locations like skill benches in Your House. Considering we have only 40x30 = 1200 hard skill points, this build's skill point multiplier equals 3077 / 1200 * 100% = 256%, rounded down. 256.41(6), if to be exact. And 256, as a number - equals 2^8, which, in a word, is known as "byte". Which is "a unit of digital information", which whole IT and electronics industry and built on. Another mighty inspiring coincedence... Or is it fate? Welp. A mystery!

20

General / No turn-based mode in EOS complex boss fight: intentional or bug?

« on: September 15, 2023, 11:25:02 am »

The "Strange Ice" boss / apparition on top of the EOS complex tower attacks the player, but the game's overwise universal rule of forcing turn-based mode whenever someone damages player character - is not in effect. Further, it is impossible to enter turn-based mode manually, for the whole duration of the encounter, as turn-based "cooldown" indicator in the bottom-right corner continuously resets to nearly full.

I recon this is intentional to make the fight harder, but not 100% sure. Could be some strange bug?

Anyhow, i find this absense of turn-based mode wrong and something to be fixed, for two significant reasons:

- Underrail is a game with turn-based combat, allowing to take one's time planning one's moves, think and take optimal course of action. We choose to play a turn-based game largely because of this feature, and it's most needed exactly in most complex and difficult fights. If we'd want to play real-time combat or arcade game, we wouldn't be playing Underrail - we'd go play some Quake or Pacman. This is why majority of Underrail players are likely irritated by this real-time encounter _forced_ upon them (since it's not even possible to enter turn-based mode manually);

- some builds have massively easier time doing this boss fight than others. E.g., properly built melee character will easily break ice and have much easier time about moving around and surviving Cryokinesis hits than a pure psi build with its lower armor and mobility feats / gear; way more complex damage-dealing mechanics of pure psi (multiple abilities, cooldowns, psi points to manage) will further stress pure psi character while melee character will simply chain-attack ice chunks with a single button. Etc.

And i think we have enough difficulty in this boss fight from being unable to save the game anywhere in level 5 of the tower, of which the boss fight is the 3rd, and furthest from level 4, sub-area. This alone should already suffice as "special difficulty" this boss fight would have, imho.

Due to all the above, whether bug or intended, i request this "no turn-based mode" restriction be removed from EOS complex boss fight.

21

General / Drag'n'Drop bar: how to reach patrons / gamblers which are blocked by others

« on: September 13, 2023, 10:21:13 pm »

During certain events in Drag'n'Drop bar, some patrons can not be approached to pickpocket them, as there is no path - a barrel in the middle and other patrons block any possible path to ones standing closer to eastern / southern walls of the bar.

Is there a way to pickpocket these "blocked" patrons? Obviously, violence is not an option - don't wanna kill the bartender and stop her getting more drinks in the future.

I tried all sorts of stuff, and so far found one method of doing it. Unfortunately, this method only allows me "in" into some unoccupied tile between 'em patrons - then, sure, i can pickpocket one or two more guys, but then i can't get out! Here's how it looks like when i get through: ht tps://i.postimg.cc/jjZpbkh6/Dn-D-puzzle.jpg . The combat mode and marker for possible movement - is the amount of movement i am able to do though, as the barrel and patrons block any way out.

So, is there any way to actually reach these "near walls" patrons, pickpocket them, and then get out safely?

22

General / Questions about Rathound King's conversation

« on: September 12, 2023, 04:02:29 pm »

When speaking with Rathound King, there's that line asking him to teach player character what he knows about traps. I never got anything outta it - he always declines. But then i never kidnap Sarine (is that the name?) to become Rathound Queen. Maybe that's why? And anyhow, what exactly can he teach and what exactly should be done for him to teach anything at all? Or is it just some leftover dialog line which never does anything?

23

General / Palladium leglets

« on: September 09, 2023, 02:54:23 am »

Wiki lists only one https://www.stygiansoftware.com/wiki/index.php?title=Palladium_Leglet . However, there is yet another - and it's in Living Quarters level (level 5) of South Gate Station. Just two rooms to the west from player character's room.

The door is to be hacked, and it's a "red hand" door. Problem is, a nearby camera keeps spotting me however i try to hack the door sneakily. I recon no amount of Stealth skill would help, since cameras ignore Stealth skill altogether. Tried to destroy it from 12 tiles range, but then a guy from the security room near the elevator runs in to check what's going on. Avoiding him gets him back to his room, but then player character is flagged as a criminal and SGS gets hostile, starting with the other camera right near player character room.

Is there some other entrance to that fancy room with the thing? I don't see any. What do i miss here? %)

24

Builds / Question about killing Tchort

« on: September 05, 2023, 05:42:28 pm »

Hi everyone!

I have a simple question: has anyone / any build managed to kill Tchort on Dominating difficulty in a single turn, and without weakening him by doing mutagen puzzle?

If this was ever done, please point me towards what build it is and where i can find details (post / video / story) about it, if such exist.

P.S. My 1st post. Please be kind to me if there's anything wrong with it, ok?

P.P.S. Thing is, i got me a build which i think could do it, if i properly prepare and buff up; using just regular gear (which i used for late game most of the time) and just couple simple buffs, i am able to bring Tchort just 1 hit short of dying, in 1 turn. So i wonder whether my build is just good, or perhaps super good. Never know it for sure without comparing to other players' experience, me thinks.