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« Last post by Troubleprone on December 08, 2025, 11:24:56 pm »
Greetings fellow programs.
I'm new to this forum and Underrail in general but I hope that the following can stand as my small contribution to an amazing game and forum of players.
underrail.info/build/?HgMKCgMJAwjCoFAAADwAwqBaSzIAX3NVKF8AAAAAaQBGOScxAVlORxkowppLJEHChcK1wqQm4qKhAuKjugTipYoB4qeXA-K0lAXfvg
First of all, please read my post completely before you jump to conclusions. Many will click into the character builder and notice something different fairly quickly which may cause them to discount my build outright. But there are reasons behind my choices and the build is more than viable. The first thing is the stat distribution.
STATS
Starting Ending
STR- 3 STR- 3
DEX- 8 DEX- 10
AGI- 8 AGI- 10
CON- 3 CON- 3
PER- 8 PER- 11
WIL- 3 WIL- 3
INT- 7 INT- 8
While in most cases a generalist build is not recommended for higher difficulties, (and that is certainly true for the vast majority of builds), because of the unique nature of energy weapons there are good reasons for the more evenly spread stat distribution. Let's address the elephant in the room...10 DEX on a pistol build. The meta has DEX maxed out for all applicable weapons because of the reduced AP it provides. This makes sense and I completely agree, but for energy pistols the breakpoints are less forgiving. The humble Laser pistol costs 15 AP to fire, the Electroshock pistol jumps to 30 AP and the Plasma pistol clocks in at a whopping 40 AP. The Dexterity breakpoints are:
DEX LASER ELECTRO PLASMA
10 12 25 34
12 11 23 31
14 10 21 29
16 10 20 26
17 9 19 25
The first thing you'll notice is that 10, 14, and 17 are the best breakpoints. You get too little return for your investment at 12 and 16. At 10 Dex you can fire the Laser pistol 4 times. At 14 Dex it fires 5X. At 17 Dex...the same 5 times, albeit you have a few AP leftover. So really you are capped(without Adrenaline) at a paltry 4 or 5 shots per round. Less so if you fire your Electroshock pistol as a crowd softener. You really need the ability to fire more times to be able to keep up in some engagements, especially on higher levels. Once you have access to Adrenaline, the AP woes become less problematic, however it still doesn't solve the problem...you need a larger pool of AP. At level 10, the Sprint feat and 10 AGI gives you 75 movement points which the BLITZ feat translates into 25 more AP during your Alpha-strike turn. Add Adrenaline into the mix(and one specialization point into Sprint) and you now have 96 AP. This is one of the primary strengths of this build. Now at 10 DEX you can shoot your Laser pistol 8 times and throw in a 12-AP Electroshock bolt with Point shot if needed. Or you could open with a 25-AP 'Aimed Shot' Electroshock bolt, followed by a 12-AP 'Point Shot' Electroshock bolt or a 15-AP grenade and then pick off the smoking stragglers with four shots from your Laser gun. If anyone is left standing you have the mobility to displace out of line of sight. Or if you've had terrible RNG, throw a Vanishing Powder Grenade and move away to re-evaluate.
True, you could go 14 DEX to hit the 10 AP sweetspot, however you give up too much. In this case you drop PER by 3 and INT by 1. On Normal difficulty this would be fine, but on higher difficulties you need PER not only for its increased base damage but to actually hit things without being within 2 squares of your target. You could drop PER to 8 and get by, but your hit percentage would suffer immensely and you give up an additional ~24% damage increase. The lost point from INT hurts your DPS as well (High Technicalities), although it's not as huge loss in this case (10%). At 14 DEX you can fire your Laser pistol 10 times (9 regular shots and one Point Shot) but you'd be missing more often and hitting for noticeably less damage. In addition, it's better to have a build that has access to decent skill point pool, especially in the early game where you'll be using a humble Hawker pistol and crafted frag grenades to level the playing field.
Essentially, this build is designed to be agile, mobile, and eliminate all of the enemy combatants in two turns, preferably one. Outside of a good energy shield, it doesn't have the ability to tank anything really. It also relies heavily on batteries for ammo, which unlike bullets are not craftable. The build's strengths are it's high stealth to scope out the situation and choose the best vector of engagement, high initiative to go first, and high critical chance for powerful crits to eliminate the field before they have a chance to respond. In the few engagements where mobility matters, you can kite or close the distance. Hit and Run will allow you to displace after each kill. Aimed and Point shot are early picks for priority targets and AP efficiency. Recklessness is another early pick because it is an essential piece. Paranoia gets us to 30 initiative(for Carnifex), it counteracts Recklessness's negative modifier, and provides a QOL enhancement in higher detection...which is nice for detecting traps(we have no traps skill) and Death Stalkers. High Technicalities gives us a nice 30% boost to base damage and Nimble lets us use rudimentary armor without penalizing Movement points. Uncanny Dodge, Blindsiding, and Opportunist are all niche but icing nonetheless. Swapping Opportunist for Ambush is definitely a good play, however I'd keep Blindsiding as a nice 15% boost for most engagements. Despite having a high CHEM investment, we don't choose Grenadier because once again, either they won't be around or we won't be around by turn 3. One Frag and one Flashbang per engagement will have to suffice. You could also swap in Power Management for QOL but I would stay away from Practical Physicist because the 25% is only additive and not worth the feat when you can increase Critical Damage significantly with a good Circular Wave Amplifier.
Equipment should include the highest quality Seeker goggles w/Night Vision we can get our hands on or craft. A set of Infused Rathound Leather Armor w/immunity to freeze. The best shield emitter money can buy (or craft). And Infused (Greater) Siphoner leather Tabi's for immunity to slows. With somewhat good luck you can get Seeker's with plus 18% and Rathound armor with plus 10-12% crit chance. These combined with Recklessness's 11% (4 specialization points), the gun's innate 4%, and Scrutinous's 7% puts us over 50% critical chance. Add focus stims(+20%) when and where needed.
We equip our best Laser pistol (efficient, amplified) in one hand, and our best crowd destroyer...I mean Electroshock pistol (smart, amplified) in the other. Waist pack for the nice addition to carry weight and bonus to mercantile. (I love having 230 carry capacity with only 3 STR.)
Also, I recommend you play this build as a female named Svetlana. She is the only child of a renowned scientist and socialite from Northern Underrail. Her mother died during childbirth and despite being completely heart-broken, her father raised her the best he could and loved his daughter as the most precious thing he had. He would often bring her to work with him, and soon she learned how to craft and work with many highly complex instruments and components. In her teenage years, she filled her time reading old texts and maps of the South and lower Underrail. Unfortunately, her father's work began to take it's toll. The company he worked for had assigned him to study recently discovered artifacts that at times emitted unhealthy doses of radiation. A few of his colleagues had already succumbed, but such is the price of progress. Unfortunately, his number had been drawn and despite his pleadings, he was reassigned to work on the unstable artifacts. Svetlana was devastated when she learned the news. Now unable to join her father in the lab, she turned to other, unhealthy coping mechanisms. Driven by anger, she began to dabble in pickpocketing and burglary. Then one day she received a cryptic message. It turned out to be an offer from her father's rival firm. They wanted trade secrets and they would pay well for them. This was her chance to get revenge on the company that was killing her father. She enthusiastically signed up. It was small jobs at first...pictures, project names, floorplans, security details; these were easy. It soon became more complex...passwords, downloads, midnight drops. On the morning her father died she received her final job: to acquire the complete file on her father's last project, the deadly artifacts. With a bit of quick planning and some luck, she made her way to her father's office under the guise of cleaning out his personal effects, quickly copied the information onto a single data drive and then made her escape. To her utter surprise, as soon as her handler took the package he informed her that she had been betrayed by their employer and that both corporations had placed a bounty on her head. The first wanted retribution and the other no loose ends, he explained. Her eyes moistened as she realized that she wouldn't be attending her father's funeral. Placing his hand on her shoulder, he told her that although his company had placed a bounty on her head he felt sorry for what she had been through. He then handed her two tickets, one for Core City and a second for South Gate Station. It was far outside of everyone's reach. There she could leave behind her old identity and forge a new life. Lastly he gave her a name...Hadrian Tanner. "Tell him Caesar sent you. Perhaps the fates will be kinder to you in this new life." Numbed, she walked resolutely to the nearest Rail Station, dropped her ID, her northern money, and any other identifiable possessions she owned into the trash bin and boarded the train south. The only thing she would take with her on that dark journey was the clothes she was wearing and her memories. At least they can't take those away, she thought as she watched the grey walls fade into darkness.
Hopefully this explains the low STR, CON, and WIL and the decent DEX, AGI, PER, and INT. She's an under-age, tech-savvy girl who's suffered a recent loss and is looking to start a new life. She's intelligent but not super book-smart(she's young), but she is fast, dexterous and has trained herself to spot important details. She has learned basic mechanics, electronics, and chemistry from working in her father's lab but also has rudimentary skills in stealth, lockpicking, and hacking.
I hope you like the build.
Also, I'm always open to suggestions and you are most certainly welcome to your opinions, but please provide details and logic in your feedback. I'd much prefer that to "Your build sucks. Because I said so."
Good hunting.