OverviewOne video to capture the essence of this build: youtube dot com / watch?v=0Z6LwBz3vow
The entire build revolves around one ability: Pistol Burst. This ability is only present on the Gluck 17 unique pistol, effectively turning this into a Gluck 17 build.
Pistol Burst: Rapidly fires 3 bullets (5 bullets once Gluck 17 is refurbished) with reduced precision. This is an unconditional special attack.
Important notes about its mechanics:
- Pistol Burst does not benefit from Commando, Full Auto or Suppressive Fire feat (haven't tested it personally though, feel free to prove me wrong)
- Pistol Burst is an unconditional special attack which does not benefit from Smart goggles
- The action point cost to fire it is the greater of 30 AP or 200% of active weapon's AP. As such, enough Dex and/or Gunslinger feat to reduce the AP cost of the Gluck 17 from 21 to 15 would be enough to lower the AP cost of Pistol Burst to its minimum.
Assuming enough Dex and/or Gunslinger feat to reduce the AP cost of firing the Gluck 17 to 15, a typical attack rotation is like this:
- Turn 1, 50 AP: Pistol Burst (30 AP), eat meds/do whatever (10 AP), save up 10 AP for next turn
- Turn 2, 60 AP: Pistol Burst x2 (30 AP x2)
- Turn 3 onwards: repeat
With adrenaline shot, the attack rotation can be like this:
- Turn 1, 70 AP: Pistol Burst x2 (30 AP x2), eat meds/do whatever (10AP)
- Turn 2, 70 AP: Pistol Burst x2 (30 AP x2), eat meds/do whatever (10AP)
- Turn 3, 70 AP: Pistol Burst x2 (30 AP x2), eat meds/do whatever (10AP)
- Turn 4, fatigued, 35 AP: Pistol Burst (30 AP), 5 AP left over
- Turn 5, fatigued, 35 AP: Pistol Burst (30 AP), 5 AP left over
- Turn 6: repeat
AP cost of 30 means Pistol Burst is still possible once per turn even when dazed.
Comparison to other burst builds:
- Vs SMGs:
- Gluck 17's damage is inferior to late game SMGs
- Late game, with enough Dex reduction, Spec Ops and Commando feats, SMGs can output far more bullets per turn than the Gluck 17 ever will
- Vs assault rifles:
- Gluck 17's damage is far inferior to late game assault rifles, especially when combined with Full Auto and Concentrated Fire feats
- On average, performs less bursts per turn than assault rifles. Assault Rifles can consistently burst twice per turn with the Commando Feat, maybe even more if using a crafted low AP assault rifle with rapid reloader.
The only advantage the Gluck 17 has, is that it ignores up to 40% of the target's evasion at close range.
In conclusion, Gluck 17 is a bad weapon for burst.
So what's the point of this build if the Gluck 17 is so bad? Man... what the hell? Have you learned nothing so far? Why do you live if not for the journey of life itself? Do you stare at a lovely butt so that you can just say that you saw it, or to, like, appreciate the curves and the firmness, man. Do you swear at passers-by just to see them walk away, or to find amusement in their confused and agitated expressions. Do you drink just to get drunk, or to become a better man? The point is not what you should care or even think about. What do you want? Some abstract thing that will make you feel like you've accomplished something? You don't need that - you need to absorb yourself in the journey and enjoy it while it lasts, man. That's life, man.
Build considerationsI played on Hard Oddity.
- Pretty bad to build the Gluck 17 for crit, since its base critical bonus is only 90%. => Aimed Shot (6 Per), Sharpshooter (10 Per) and Scrutinous (11 Per) can be omitted
- Since most AP will be spent on Pistol Bursts, very little AP left to perform other pistol feats => Kneecap shot (7 Per), Point shot (6 Per), Rapid Fire, and Execute can be omitted
- Since all the Perception related feats are omitted, the only purpose of Perception is to boost Guns skill, which is quite the waste of attribute points. Instead, all the points can be moved from Perception to Dexterity, and turn this into a Versatility build.
- Since not building for crit, and the Gluck 17's damage is low by late game, and up to 10 bullets can be fired in a single turn, Expertise would be greatly beneficial. 10 bullets * 20 damage at level 20 = 200 damage
This means only 1 feat and 1 weapon is essential for this build: Expertise, and the Gluck 17 pistol. Everything else can be customized to fit one's own playstyle. This is my build: underrail.info/build/?HgMQBgoDAwUoNwDCoMKgwqBkfTw8PAAAAA_CggAAAAAAAFNPY07CowgkYVANwrMoDsORFhdAEuKopgXita4K378
Build explanation- Attributes
- 3 str – strength not needed to hold a pistol
- 18 dex – used to boost melee skill as high as possible, so that guns skill can remain high after the penalty from versatility. Dex also increases 4 useful skills: throwing, lockpicking, pickpocketing and traps, and at 18 dex it is a more than 2x multiplier on these skills, saving me many skill points.
- 6 agi – Originally took 6 agi to take the Sprint feat, but in the end made do without the Sprint feat. Could have dropped this to 5 agi for only the Sure Step feat.
- 10 con – All of my builds have 10 Con and Thick Skull. 10 con offers a good amount of health not to die in 1 hit from all the bullshit that Underrail throws at you.
- 3 per – No need for perception since this is a versatility build, and guns skill scale off melee skill and Dex instead.
- 3 wil – No PSI here
- 5 int – Originally intended to do some crafting, but in the end just used all non-crafted equipment.
- Feats
- Expertise – great for this build. Explained above in build considerations.
- Thick Skull – all of my builds have 10 Con and Thick Skull. Getting stunned in this game is a death sentence, and I don't like using bullheads because my fights typically last longer than 3 turns, and crafting them requires fishing. I rather be killing than fishing.
- Nimble - more dodge and evasion when wearing light armor. Also negates the armor penalty from light armor.
- Conditioning - many would say this is useless because the damage reduction is applied after DT/DR, but this is one of my favorite optional feats. At 10 con, Conditioning provides 15% damage reduction of the most common types of damage, effectively extending my HP bar by (100% / (100%-15%)) - 100% = 17.6471%. I have won many fights with just a sliver of health left, and would have been dead without this feat.
- Sure Step - I take on my almost all of my builds. Caltrops is a very good tool that I constantly abuse, and Sure Step saves me the headache from having to traverse my own caltrop filled corridor after winning a fight, or traversing through the caltrop corridor to chase down an enemy. Sure Feet also lets me survive Depot A, with its mutants spilling huge puddles of acid everywhere during and after a fight.
- Fast Metabolism - another QoL feat. Heal more = heal up faster, because the cooldown on health hypos on hard difficulty is equivalent to watching paint dry. And thanks to pickpocketing I have too many health hypos to use. This feat stacks with the Tchortist Bioscrubber too.
- Dirty Kick - a very good CC move that uses up no utility slot. Lasts 2 turns on human males, which occurs more often than not, because a huge chunk of enemies in the game are human males. Also, I always use this feat to cheese the arena. The arena consists of only human males for the gladiator fights, and a 2 turn stun is a guaranteed death sentence for all of them, including the last one. (The last one still took me an additional flashbang though.)
- Gun-Fu - perfect fit for versatility build because melee skill is already maxed out. However, in hindsight, the damage bonus is not significantly noticeable.
- Grenadier - clutch for hard difficulty and above
- Gunslinger - more initiative and less AP cost for Gluck 17's regular shots. Why not?
- Trap Expert - another QoL feat. Saves me time planting fields of bear traps before a fight, and disarming the remaining traps after the fight.
- Expose Weakness - Apply onto armoured enemy, immediately followed by Pistol Burst. Works great for armoured enemies, saves some W2C ammo.
- Doctor - another QoL feat. I could always heal up faster after a fight. I thought of substituting this with Trigger Happy, which coupled with Gunslinger and Paranoia and 18 Dex would result in insanely high initiative.
- Paranoia - a QoL feat that some people swear by, but I picked this because I have no idea what else to pick.
- Specialization points
- Its straight forward, simply invest fully into the two feats crucial for this build.
- Versatility 10/10
- Expertise 5/5
EquipmentThis build is very flexible in equipment, because nothing synergizes with Gluck 17, so you can wear anything. This is my equipment:
- Head: Tchortist Bioscrubber
- Very good Bio protection, bonus health, bonus healing, 0% armor penalty and the penalty to perception does not affect this build, as the Guns skill scale off Dexterity thanks to Versatility
- I wanted to try a Unprojector since not building for crit, but unable to find one
- Armor: anything, I'm wearing Spec Ops Gray Armor because it looks cool and has decent protections against bullets
- Also switch out to a random Galvanic vest looted from somewhere for fighting spiders
- Belt: Commando Belt/Bullet Strap Belt
- Commando Belt before level 20. Before both getting very high Dex (16 to 18) and investing many specialization points into Versatility Guns skill is quite low and needs the boost from Commando Belt. After level 20 can switch to Bullet Strap belt to reduce AP cost of reloading, which can be quite frequent in prolonged fights.
- Feet: anything, I'm wearing durability 2400+ antithermic tabi boots bought from Oculus
- Shield Emitter: I didn't use one for the entire game.
- Hands 1: Gluck 17
- Hands 2: anything, I'm using Kukri
- Mainly using it for the passive Expose Weakness feat on the weapon. Sometimes when fighting armoured enemies and my own Expose Weakness feat is on cooldown, I would stab until it triggers Expose Weakness then blasting the enemy point blank with Pistol Burst
- Another idea is to use Wicked Hook + Cutthroat feat for a 25 AP 3 turn stun?
Build reviewI tried this build expecting it to be a meme build, but it's surprisingly decent and fun. The low feat requirements (only 1 Expertise is sort of mandatory) mean I can take as many QoL feats as I want (e.g. Dirty kick to cheese the arena, Trap Expert for faster spamming of bear traps on the battlefield, etc.). Versatiliy builds also free up many attribute points, which I invested entirely into dex to save many skill points in throwing, lockpicking, pickpocketing and traps.
Early game, from start until the completion of Depot A, is played as a mediocre knife user. After Depot A, I immediately went to Panacea Lab to acquire the Gluck 17 pistol. At level 10+, guns skill is so low that the pistol is still quite useless. I used it to take pot shots at enemies when my knife cannot reach them, but is never used as the main killing weapon.
Only after refurbishment and getting to level 16 or so, and equipping the Commando Belt does the Gluck 17's Pistol Burst becomes potent enough to kill at melee range. And potent it is, since pistols ignore 40% of the target's evasion at point blank, enemies tend to get hit by all 5 bullets at point blank range, which is enough to kill most enemies with 1 Pistol Burst. Except for Sormirbaeren Skaerders, they take 2 Pistol Bursts to take down.
Pistol burst is not good at range. At more than 4 tiles away its precision drops to below 20% and is a waste of bullets, unless it is used to spray a group of mobs in which case the 5 bullets will hit everyone else but the intended target.
However, Gluck 17 is surprisingly decent when performing regular shots at range, thanks to its inherent +10% precision. At higher character levels it precision can hover around 90% even when shooting at targets 10 tiles away. When this character reached higher levels and the AP cost of Gluck 17 dropped to 12 and below, I find myself doing regular shots at targets at range, usually killing them in 1 turn with 3 or 4 shots, then blasting enemies with Pistol Burst at point blank once they got too close.
Have already completed all content in the base game up to DC, and already performed genocide in Expedition. Again, I played this on Hard Oddity.
