A Dominating (Ironman) Viable throwing ninja build

[shadynasty]

Posted on the underrail subreddit, figured I'd try here as well.

This has been a dream of mine for a while. First, the build:

http://underrail.info.tm/build/?GQMQCgMDBQYAwocAAADCgn5aLQAyZGRYZXMAAAAAAAAvOR0WMFFcPl4oJhsnJA

With eel sandwich, jackknife, huxkey and infused hopper tabis, there's enough hacking/lockpicking to bypass every obstacle. I want 130 hacking for IRIS, because I don't think I would fare very well with all those bots and that would make it a lot easier.

I wanted to wait for the expansion, but I've been telling myself that since December and I'm playing anyway, so... Might as well get to work on this.

I've been testing this char on hard mode and a few dominating runs just to iron out the tweaks before I really go for it. Ran through junkyard using stealth and high lockpicking/hacking without any trouble, and some power leveling is necessary to keep evasion useful with enemy skill levels. I haven't actually gotten higher than level 10, and that was on hard, but I think this could make it to the end. That being said, I'm hoping some of you lovely folks could offer some suggestions.

With squishy chars in the past, I have foregone evasion completely and been fine. However, since this character is limited to throwing knives, grenades, and traps, damage output it relatively low or staggered (grenade CDs and generally weak knives without poison).
Could I skip evasion and reinvest (some in mercantile for easier gear) to a more optimal setup? Is this as min maxed as I can be?

The alternative is to max evasion (135) and switch a feat around to get evasive maneuvers, which could get me through a lot of the game with only a semi-decent shield. But that begs the question, which feat do I eliminate?

It is perhaps a little feat starved, but I would argue with all the traps and grenades, pack rat is an absolute must. Part of my dream for this character is a sneaky ninja, poisoning and trapping from the shadows, and hypertoxicity just seems to good to pass up for that. The ripper/fatal throw combo also seems too good, though with such a low crit chance I'm not sure I'd see much use outside of that (unless infused rathound affects throwing knives).

The extra 5 initiative from paranoia might not be all that worth it if I plan to stealth initiate most combat, but the detection will surely come in handy as well with such low PER.

Split spare sounds useful in theory, but in practice...? I just don't know.

To boil it down, the feats I'm still on the fence about are Expert Trapper (mostly QoL, probably not necessary), Evasive Maneuvers, and Split Spare. If anyone has any experience with a similar build, let me know what you think! Evasive maneuvers + sprint + tabi boots sounds pretty awesome.

I can't find anything about infused Rathound Leather crit multiplier, and if it applies to throwing knives, but I'd like to think it does. If so, then foregoing evasion would mean a higher crit chance with throwing knives, otherwise I intend to stick to infused siphoner.

The feat order isn't totally correct on there, I tend to take nimble a lot earlier.

Sorry this got a little long and ranty, I just know it's possible to ironman a throwing build and I wanna make sure I get it right from the get go. Any input is greatly appreciated.

[TheAverageGortsby]

Is this as min maxed as I can be?

I don't believe so.  I don't think there's any need to go that deep into Bio unless you plan to cook Super Soldier outside your house.  If you do, then clearly you need just what you've got.  If you're willing to switch around gear, you don't need quite that much in Traps, because with Trapper's Belt and Jackknife plus a good food buff you can easily get up to the minimum you need to place the hardest traps in the game; and where you're at, you won't be able to *disarm* the traps on DOMINATING without switching stuff around anyway, so it's not like you're saving much micro.

You're going to need a lot - really a lot - of Flashbangs and the game economy is fairly stifling on DOMINATING, so you may find some trouble with no Mercantile.  You may also find that with such limited control options, you really wish you'd shuffled things around and at least picked up the bare minimum for Uncanny Dodge - you'd only need to find 40 points, and though your Throwing is high enough that Split Spare will be fairly nice, even at its best it's only just that....fairly nice.  You're going to be playing with very narrow margins in this build, and the uncertainty of Split Spare makes it awfully risky to use in a pinch.

If you're looking for a challenge, you've certainly found a way to make a good one for yourself.  It's possible that Throwing isn't viable for DOMINATING Ironman, and it's certain that it's going to be tough.  Let us know =)

[harperfan7]

You won't need to go to IRIS at all with your mechanics score as high as it is. 

You simply cannot rely on evasion on DOMINATING.  I read about a guy who completely maxed out evasion in every way (almost; he had 14 agility by endgame) and even he could only reliably evade enemies with evasive maneuvers, I wanna say he had an effective evasion of like 1400?

[shadynasty]

Is this as min maxed as I can be?

I don't believe so.  I don't think there's any need to go that deep into Bio unless you plan to cook Super Soldier outside your house.  If you do, then clearly you need just what you've got.  If you're willing to switch around gear, you don't need quite that much in Traps, because with Trapper's Belt and Jackknife plus a good food buff you can easily get up to the minimum you need to place the hardest traps in the game; and where you're at, you won't be able to *disarm* the traps on DOMINATING without switching stuff around anyway, so it's not like you're saving much micro.

I do intend to craft super soldier I just figure with such a low damage output it would really help.

With jackknife, trappers belt, and food I'm at 144 traps, which I still don't think is enough to disarm the absolute hardest traps in dominating, and I really don't mind the micro, which pack rathound makes a lot more bearable.

Is this as min maxed as I can be?

You're going to need a lot - really a lot - of Flashbangs and the game economy is fairly stifling on DOMINATING, so you may find some trouble with no Mercantile.  You may also find that with such limited control options, you really wish you'd shuffled things around and at least picked up the bare minimum for Uncanny Dodge - you'd only need to find 40 points, and though your Throwing is high enough that Split Spare will be fairly nice, even at its best it's only just that....fairly nice.  You're going to be playing with very narrow margins in this build, and the uncertainty of Split Spare makes it awfully risky to use in a pinch.

Absolutely true. I've had a great time on other chars in dominating, but I always invested some into merc. I figure with traps (even with QT nerf) and enough preparation melee won't be too much of a problem, and I'm hoping to avoid as much combat as possible, which was my thinking for abandoning dodge. I'll try another test run with it before I dive in for real.

Thank you for the advice!! That's what I thought about split spare.

[shadynasty]

You won't need to go to IRIS at all with your mechanics score as high as it is. 

You simply cannot rely on evasion on DOMINATING.  I read about a guy who completely maxed out evasion in every way (almost; he had 14 agility by endgame) and even he could only reliably evade enemies with evasive maneuvers, I wanna say he had an effective evasion of like 1400?

THAT is a great point, and could save a lot of points in hacking. Thank you!!

I've seen a lot of mixed info on evasion... But the one I'd like to believe was a thread with some solid math.

https://steamcommunity.com/app/250520/discussions/0/1735468061759968022/

Altos and Qiox go into their stat details on the second page, and the math suggests that evasion of 708 is enough to reduce hit chance of highest level enemies to 40% on dominating, assuming they have line of sight and are in range. On top of that, you get a pretty amazing boost to explosion/AOE resistance, which makes it seem tempting.

In practice, I've had little luck with higher level chars in dominating, but I also wasn't MAXING evasion. On my level ten test runs, I farmed siphoners and got nimble, and found I was taking significantly fewer hits. Hard to say what percentage, but definitely made life a lot easier on such a squishy char.

I guess the alternative to no evasion is... More CC? Psi disciplines? Heavier armor? I don't see a way without sacrificing what I ultimate want to do with this build. It's definitely gonna be a pain in the ass, but I'll keep you all updated.

[destroyor]

Your build won't be able to beat Tchort.

I can't find the STEAM thread but someone else tried a similar build (low CON throwing ninja) on Hard and failed to beat Tchort. With 3 CON you'll be one shot by Tchortling Scanner's Neural Overload. We tried everything and I mean everything we could think of for his char. You can only keep the Tchortling away for so long and you just can't do enough damage to beat Tchort before getting one shot.

It's my opinion dodge and evasion build simply doesn't work on Dominating due to the 30% NPC skill buff + infused leather nerf. I would love to be proven wrong however no one had been able to produce convince result so far.

[harperfan7]

I'm pretty sure Wildan beat tchort with a throwing-only build on hard.

Anyway, Qiox states in a later post on page 2 what I said earlier:  not viable, at least in the endgame.

[newageofpower]

Your build won't be able to beat Tchort.

I can't find the STEAM thread but someone else tried a similar build (low CON throwing ninja) on Hard and failed to beat Tchort. With 3 CON you'll be one shot by Tchortling Scanner's Neural Overload. We tried everything and I mean everything we could think of for his char. You can only keep the Tchortling away for so long and you just can't do enough damage to beat Tchort before getting one shot.

Fascinating. What builds have enough DPS to kill Tchort despite being 3 CON?

[Xothic]

Your build won't be able to beat Tchort.

I can't find the STEAM thread but someone else tried a similar build (low CON throwing ninja) on Hard and failed to beat Tchort. With 3 CON you'll be one shot by Tchortling Scanner's Neural Overload. We tried everything and I mean everything we could think of for his char. You can only keep the Tchortling away for so long and you just can't do enough damage to beat Tchort before getting one shot.

Fascinating. What builds have enough DPS to kill Tchort despite being 3 CON?

Ultra high damage builds like sniper and probably energy pistol i'd expect would be able to take out Tchort in a single turn, meaning CON wouldn't matter.

[Tamior]

Your build won't be able to beat Tchort.

I can't find the STEAM thread but someone else tried a similar build (low CON throwing ninja) on Hard and failed to beat Tchort. With 3 CON you'll be one shot by Tchortling Scanner's Neural Overload. We tried everything and I mean everything we could think of for his char. You can only keep the Tchortling away for so long and you just can't do enough damage to beat Tchort before getting one shot.

Fascinating. What builds have enough DPS to kill Tchort despite being 3 CON?

Ultra high damage builds like sniper and probably energy pistol i'd expect would be able to take out Tchort in a single turn, meaning CON wouldn't matter.

Psions can usually kill Tchort within one turn as well.

[harperfan7]

I don't think every 3 con build dies in one hit to a scanner.  Your resolve (will) and Int matter as well, and whether or not you took psi empathy.

Regardless, my two crossbow runs (hard and DOMINATING) both beat tchort despite 3 con.

[destroyor]

Well I'm giving you guys what I remembered + personal experience, so take it how you will. I'm not saying a 3 CON char can't beat Tchort. I'm saying a 3 CON throwing only char can't defeat Tchort. Tchort have a very high mech resist - a good build usually have one or more ways to get around this (Xbow - special bolt, Guns - green ammo, Melee - expose weakness, etc) and a throwing ninja doesn't have any out like that. We tried maxing poison damage + MKV HE grenade + quick tinker (note: this was back when QT has a 2 turn cool down, since nerfed to 5) MKV HE mine for his char and used fire + caltrop to keep the Tchortlings away but it just wasn't enough.

Edited: I'm going to take back what I said. There *MIGHT* be a way but it's not a guarantee. You'll need foresight (meta knowledge), advance (cheesy) tactic and a bit of luck.

That Steam user had multiple problems:
1) Tchortlings Scanner - I didn't know the following trick at the time so we failed.
SubterminalOptimization came up w/ this very clever tactic:
http://underrail.com/forums/index.php?topic=3388.msg18886#msg18886
You can block the passage using Sower Tentacle wall. I'm not 100% sure but I think there might be times when a Tchortling Sower won't show up during the early part of the fight. Can you survive long enough and kill enough Tchortlings so a Sower spawn? Or will a Tchortling Sower come into play as soon as the fight starts? You are going to need a bit of luck here.

2) Low HP, lacking +HP gear, and not enough bio to craft regenerative mixture
Here's the part about meta - you'll need to craft either infused pig leather armor or regen/sturdy metal armor AND have enough bio to craft regenerative mixture

3) Tentacles - sometimes that Steam user would get lucky and didn't get killed by a Tchortling Scanner. However he just wasn't dealing damage fast enough and eventually the tentacles would spawn back (He took out all remaining tentacles before rushing Tchort) - game over. You will need a lot of luck here as the mutagen puzzle will destroy 4 of 7 Tchort's tentacles. Which four (cross your fingers the mutagen take out the mind control tentacle) will probably determine if the fight is even possible. You are going to need a lot of luck here.

So yeah it *MIGHT* be possible. I'm just not sure. If OP do decided to give this a go please post update(s) as I'm very interested in the final result.

[shadynasty]

Played up to level 14, leveling dodge to 40 for uncanny dodge and didn't find it particularly useful. Careful traps and excessive flashbang along with taser and crawler poison provide enough control of melee enemies. Split Spare definitely comes in handy in big group fights, but for Tchort in particular it's not gonna do anything, so I'm abandoning that. If I sacrifice evasion, I don't have much else to invest in aside from merc for QoL, but I don't mind the grind (loot is life). I love this game.

I'm not good enough to pull off those low level dominating builds, but I think a level 25 3 CON ninja could potentially kill Tchort. As others have mentioned, it is totally possible to take him out very quickly with only 3 CON, but I've only done it with sniper, crossbow, psi monk, pure psi, even a 3 CON dagger build, and all of those have a more respectable damage output. I think it's just gonna take an absurd amount of grenades. I'll keep you all updated.

I died somewhere close to level 15 with the dodge char, so I'm restarting anyway.

[Altos]

Hey, Altos here. Please note that the SMG build I posted in that Steam thread you linked is no longer viable under the current build of the game. That SMG build relied heavily on the fact that Burst used to be affected by Special Attack modifiers. The last update removed this feature and completely destroyed the build. I am no longer able to beat Tchort with it, whereas I used to be able to take down one tentacle per turn, and Tchort in 2 turns. Now it takes me 3 turns to kill each tentacle, and I can't even beat Tchort before they respawn (and that's with the Mutagen Puzzle solved). Even all the lucky crits in the world aren't enough. I simply cannot do enough damage per turn, regardless of how many attacks I evade. The build is dead.

That being said, I can no longer recommend a high dodge/evasion build on DOMINATING anymore. I'm sure there are still some builds that could make it work (critical glove builds, sniper, maybe LoC psion), but I haven't had time to try out any new builds since the last update, so I can't provide any honest input. At the very least, it seems to me that 3 CON SMG builds are now dead on DOMINATING--unless somebody has some tactic I'm not aware of?

As for Uncanny Dodge, I still think it's useful for dealing with Death Stalkers w/o Quick Tinkering spam (esp. since that got nerfed, too), but honestly, with the way things are now, it's not worth the 40 Skillpoints and the 1 feat slot.

I should also admit that I have no idea how the game is going to change once the expansion is out. I'm not on the alpha-testing crew (too busy IRL, I'm afraid), so the only content I know is that in the dev-logs. Maybe the new veteran feats or whatever will revive my SMG build and make 3 CON dodge/evasion viable on DOMINATING again, but as of now it seems like a hard path to take.

Regardless, I wish you the best of luck in your efforts! I hope that my post on that old thread hasn't misled you too much. I've been totally AFK from the Steam forums for the past 8 months because I don't have the time or the patience for it anymore. I'm just glad Styg added a loading bar so I don't have to answer any more of those "black box" threads! Anyway, I digress. Good luck on your build! Sorry I can't be of much help. I have no idea what the meta is these days.