Crossbow Dominating Build (without Aimed shot and snipe)

[Kiruha]

Warning: This build is obsolete and needs to be redesigned around new game version and new psi system.

Build is here

https://underrail.info/build/?HgMHBwMQAwcAWsKgAADCoMKgQUEAS01kMjAAAAAANy4AQjknJjAiAsKAOExLaivChzEoJMK1wqTCncKtwp7Cn2wabeKhpAXip74K378

Gameplay is here
https://youtu.be/N2lt3QGyuSg

Be sure to enable Extra options, enable crafting bonuses,  choose food - underpie and +2 int to see real skill levels. Also check jackknife, trapper belt, huxkey and lemurian engineer suit to see lockpicking and  hacking skills thresholds

About atributes:
7 dexterity for quick tinkering - it was nerfed, but  it is still very useful
7 intelligence - for bowyer and our crafting skills
7 agility - because bonus to stealth and evasion is useful, and we still have some spare points. If you don't want sprint, you can set it to 3 and raise int or con. Also we will be able to lear improved naval combat with 7 agility if we join pirates - i strongly reccomend doing it
Max perception is obvious

Skills selection
They are standard. You can lower lockpicking and hacking - but if you want to join pirates, remember what you need to have 100 effective lockpicking skill to hotwire an Aegis Patroller
Also you can lower stealth - i just had free points and dumped all of them in stealth
Throwing is high - i like when my molotovs are flying in right places. Also it useful for flares, because they have a shorter ligh range
I avoided Tailoring - i used Rathound regalia and then Phantom Dancer armor with ninja tabi boots
Chemistry and biology - we will be able to craft all we need with these levels, we need 75 effective chemistry to craft corrosive acid bolts. We don't need any more
Mechanics - for q160 cyclone crossbow we will need 128 effective skill
Electronis - for cool dual low freq high effective shield
Traps - you will need only 50 for deadly snares, but i decided to go for 75 to  be able to disarm and snatch all mines in a game
Persuade - for rathound king and Jacksilver quest in Foundry
Mercantile - for oculus shop and katya shop in a pirate camp - corrosive acid before deep caverns

Feat selection
Pack Rathound - is very useful for 3 str builds. Also we will use traps, and we need to deal with they weight somehow. I recommend  to carry only bear traps,  but sometimes you can disarm enemy mine and use it for your advantage. Just don't try to carry many of them at once.
Sprint - very useful for moving around, like running away after stealth. But can be skipped, because temporal manipulation is much better.
Opportunist - it will proc a lot
Quick Tinkering - very useful for setting up traps near enemies before combat
Marksman - we will use special bolts all the time. Also it has nice spec bonus

Ambush - why we need ambush if we have deadly snares? because in some cases it will help us a lot, especially when enemies will be immune to our bear traps (shock spiders and spiders from expedition are nasty). Just use molotovs, incendiary bolts and flares to illuminate enemies

Bowyer - extra crit damage is so good, our build is about criticals
Special tactics - one extra attack in a  first round is useful. But can be skipped - we will attack 5 times with TM, and only one more attack in only first round is not so useful
Deadly snares - no comments
Critical power - Core feat in our build. Put all spec points here. You can pick it up before deadly snare for this reason
Elemental bolts - Main reason to not use aimed shot and snipe - because elemental bolts will crit too
Psycho-Temporal Acceleration - We will get 70 actions point with it, and we will be able to shoot 5 times for 3 turns.

Increased Perception  is useful
Scrutinous is too

So we still have 3 more feats to choose. They are not so important, you can pick what you like.  I decided to pick what i picked, but grenadier, power managment, strafe, blindsiding - they are all good. Even skinner is usefull - if you would like to level up tailoring and make your leather armor.

Gear:
Head - Night vision seeker googles, balaclava for extra stealth, and aegis helmet/gas mask when you need it
Body - Rathound Regalia  and then Phantom dancer armor. Chemical assault armor for switch. In expedition, also carry cave hopper boots and armor, cave hopper stake - for agility checks and easy path to Nexus
Secondary weapon - Jackknife
Main weapon  - Anatomically-aware pneumatic cyclone crossbow
Belt - Arrow Quiver. Trapper belt for switch
Shield - Dual low freq high effective shield (150+ quality)
Boots - Ninja tabi boots 40+ sneak. Biohazard boots for switch

Combat Utilities:
Molotovs
Cloaking device (75 and more bonus to sneak)
Shock bolt MK3
Incendiary Bolt MK3
Acid bolts, later corrosive bolts
EMP grenades and mines MK3
Flares
Bear traps
Caltrops - the cralwer poisoned are the best ones

Combat stimulators - jumping bean, focus, irongut, bullhead, adrenaline

For jetskies  in expedition - use combo with aegis helmet, chemical assault unit  amor and biohazard boots to be nearly  immune to annoyng snakes attacks

Gameplay - main strategy in video. Set traps in chokepoint, throw molotovs and ambush enemies. Crossbows have a nice range of 14, use it for you advantage

[Fenix]

Неплохо, Кирюха. )
Well, now I would like to see crossbow buils without traps...

[Kiruha]

Well, now I would like to see crossbow buils without traps...

You can play this build without levelng up traps and without quick tinkering, deadly snares - you can still use bear traps with o traps and use staff like caltrops to slow down enemies and molotovs to illuminate them and ambush them left and right. Ambush is so good, but sometimes it fails (for example  - gray military base - it's just to bright to use ambush). And when it fails, if you have traps, you can use deadly snares to still get criticals. You will have about 56-60 percents of raw critical chance with focus stim by using mentioned gear and  feats

[Waterpls]

You need tailoring 10 for incendiary grenades.
So far build feels comfortable for Dominating, but i am only finished with GMS.

[Doxy]

Hmm no one seem to be including concussive shot in their build.
Is it that useless?

[Kiruha]

You need tailoring 10 for incendiary grenades.
So far build feels comfortable for Dominating, but i am only finished with GMS.

You can buy molotovs from biologist in SGS and doctor in junkyard. Also you can use flares - they are silent, unlike molotovs. And it's better to save magnesium and napalm C for bolts

[Kiruha]

Hmm no one seem to be including concussive shot in their build.
Is it that useless?

It's not so useful because most living targets will be dead in one critical shot. At the same time, you wil have throwing and mines for slowing down enemies anyway

[Waterpls]

You can buy molotovs from biologist in SGS and doctor in junkyard. Also you can use flares - they are silent, unlike molotovs. And it's better to save magnesium and napalm C for bolts

Why? Grenades have better AoE, do more damage (mostly over time, but i am abusing bear traps anyway). I believe its totally worth ~10 skill points.

Also, what is your tactic against robots? I was forced to just ignore them in GMS, because i cant kill them even in 1vs1.

[Kiruha]

You can buy molotovs from biologist in SGS and doctor in junkyard. Also you can use flares - they are silent, unlike molotovs. And it's better to save magnesium and napalm C for bolts

Why? Grenades have better AoE, do more damage (mostly over time, but i am abusing bear traps anyway). I believe its totally worth ~10 skill points.

Also, what is your tactic against robots? I was forced to just ignore them in GMS, because i cant kill them even in 1vs1.

The tactic is the same - bear traps and ambush. Also EMP grenades, EMP mines and shock bolts mk3. I skipped most early fights on dominating, the most difficult moments are Newton's warehouse and silent island. On island I used bear traps to silently kill all rathounds and then sneak around beetles to get the package. Depot A is easy because there are so many mines that you can use - you dont need to kill all enemies if you are sneaky anyway. Even before you get deadly snares, you can use bear traps and molotovs to trigger ambush. This build will shine when you get deadly snares and when you will have enought points into stealth to always get criticals from ambush, because it will eliminate the luck factor, and all fights will be much more predictibale and easy. Also night googles is very useful, because precision is bad without them.

[Eximus]

If you're going to spec into traps and electronics, Plasma mines are extremely strong, especially if you can reliably detonate them with throwing invested.

I don't really understand why you wouldn't take aimed shot & snipe though, especially for a steath & critical focused build. I understand how deadly snares works.. but are you really using beartraps for every fight? If it's for the personal challenge, then all power to ya.

Snipe, aimed shot and cryostasis shattering let you breeze through early, middle and any time you ever run into a group of three or less enemies later on as quickly as you can encounter them with no prep.

[Kiruha]

If you're going to spec into traps and electronics, Plasma mines are extremely strong, especially if you can reliably detonate them with throwing invested.

I don't really understand why you wouldn't take aimed shot & snipe though, especially for a steath & critical focused build. I understand how deadly snares works.. but are you really using beartraps for every fight? If it's for the personal challenge, then all power to ya.

Snipe, aimed shot and cryostasis shattering let you breeze through early, middle and any time you ever run into a group of three or less enemies later on as quickly as you can encounter them with no prep.

I used to play build like this with aimed shot and snipe, but i found that these feats are nearly useless in late game, because of ambush and deadly snares. For ambush you just need a single flare or molotov, there are so many of them ingame. Also you can't use elemental bolts with snipe and aimed shot, for me it was another reason to drop them. In lategame you will be able to kill 4-5 enemies in first turn if you ambush them. Traps will be useful mostly for the most difficult fights (like beast or rednecks camps in expdeiton), or in places where Ambush can't be used. Plasma mines and grenades are cool, and it's better to join coretech faction because of that (they usually sell plasma grenade blueprint, unlike JKK)

About cryostasis  - I never used that strategy, also I never used statis from temporal manipulation. They can be very useful, I just used TM only for a speed buff.

So I dropped aimed shot with snipe because you can score criticals every turn by other ways (mostly ambush, but also snares for a backup option)

[Eximus]

Makes good sense, I didn't know you couldn't use elemental bolts with either of those abilities.

cryostasis + Induction & a critical basically 1 shots every enemy in the game, the only enemy I can think of that it didn't was Magnar, but frozen targets can still be contaminated so enjoy your 20 stacks and give me that dreamcatcher 

..or was it the rune necklace...

[Lyca0n]

Would recommend the Spec ops goggles located within a certain military base in expedition when you can get them, but cool build man.

[Kiruha]

Would recommend the Spec ops goggles located within a certain military base in expedition when you can get them, but cool build man.

They are sweet, but unfortunately they have an amor penalty. But with nimble you can use them with regalia and still have 0 penalty, and you will have regalia for most part of the game anyway.

[destroyor]

They are standard. You can lower lockpicking and hacking - but if you want to join pirates, remember what you need to have 100 effective lockpicking skill to hotwire an Aegis Patroller

Just want to note if you want to join pirate you can just kill Aegis trooper and just take their Aegis Patroller, no lockpicking required.