Sniper sidearm (why pistols are underrated)

[Vokial]

Upon checking some other builds online I do not see two great abilities mentioned - and even when they are, never really for the reasons they could be truly valuable for a sniper.

Quick Tinkering - For me, to employ of this ability outsie of combat even outweights it's use within. With instant traps, you can quickly sneak close to the enemy, drop a bear trap and dash back before their awareness meter turns orange. Setting up a trap that close the normal slow-ass way would be impossible, even with high stealth skill. Because of this, you can stop the enemy advance much earlier than placing traps further away from them in order to remain hidden - this will get you more physical distance between them, even in smaller areas. QT-denying the Black Clawler right as you drop by is also handy.

Interloper - Goes really well with QT making you able to perform the above mentioned tactic much easier. And while the movement speed is convenient, we can value it perhaps even more for it's MP bonus, something that I found to be underappreciated by others. Because the one thing this ability synergizes with perhaps even more than QT is Snipe. Shooting out of stealth while already in combat is not easy, due to the fact that it requires you to restealth at the end of your previous turn and remain hidden while the enemy attacks you. This might force you to restealth in cover as if you do that in the line of fire, you can get hit which takes you out of stealth. But if you do it behind a wall, moving out to shoot will cost you valuable AP which you could otherwise use to shoot again - making Snipe too expensive of a move. Because upon starting a turn while stealthed, you're without any MP. Even if Contraction is still on - if you begin your turn while hidden, you only get the AP bonus.
Interloper solves that by granting you 15 AP while being hidden, enough to move out of cover and allowing restealth to be much more accessible and a perfect move to end those speacial 4th turns I mentioned earlier. Especially since Snipe benefits from Smart lens and modules and are considered surekills, contributing Shooting Spree. Also reignites the bonus of Blindsiding all over again (if you somehow managed to squeeze that feat in to your build).

[Vain]

Upon checking some other builds online I do not see two great abilities mentioned - and even when they are, never really for the reasons they could be truly valuable for a sniper.
Interloper - Goes really well

I goes not well - it goes deadly well. Interloper + 1sp point to sprint and 3sp points to blitz.

Dominating is easy. Personally, I want Super Dominating.

Now let me explain AP:

level 19

50 initially
20 adrenalin shot
20 blitz
22 from psi
= 112 = 28*4 = so 4 shots with 7.62 sniper riffle out of stealth. With Shooting Spree, Aimed shot and Limited Temporal Increment... this is 3 dead enemies.
Personally i even did not have Sharpshooter. Build is crazy even without it.

Lets go further and add Interloper :
level 23

50 initially
25 vitality Powder
26 blitz
22 from psi
= 123 = 41*3 = so 3 shots with 12 sniper out of stealth with +20% accuracy = 3 dead full hp heavy enemies LOL

As you can see, you can forget about bonus critical damage devices. You basically do burst with your sniper riffle.
Pistols or SMG or whatever - does not matter at all.
You can play for fun after 19/23 level. Dominating goes easy. Personally i even stopped taking sniper riffle as i want to play game with challenges.

And i use pistol just because it is very fun to cosplay 007

[harperfan7]

And i use pistol just because it is very fun to cosplay 007

I have yet to play a build that would do it, but taking a smart silenced 5mm hawker:

>smart goggles
>infused rathound leather armor
>focus stim
>adrenaline/cocaine
>hardcore chips
>whichever of w2c or jhp that makes the most sense
>taser
>a net if this goes into round two
>opportunist
>blindsiding
>recklessness
>scrutinous
>execute
>aimed shot
>point shot
>rapid fire
>kneecap shot

[Vokial]

I have many problems with Blitz. First, I don't see it as a good ability for anybody else other than a high DEX, low AP per attack melee with Fancy Footwork. Yaaay you get to enjoy 20 AP for a single turn. And it costs you most of your MP, 10 Agility, and TWO feat slots. That's sounds foolish. Two feat slots, because you have to take Sprint with it to be able to move two inch afterwards and if that's not the bane of a ranged character, then I don't know what is. Consider what other stats could you improve, what other feats you could take instead of those two, are you sure those would benefint you less that that 20 AP for a single round PER battle due to that huuuuuuge cooldown? Hell no.

The fundamental thing I absolutely wanted my build to have for it's own is consistency. High dps, but not once in a lifetime all blitzed and drugged up, but as long as I want, for free, granted only by my self owned abilities. X dps that I can reliably maintain on my own, not X+Y that I can attain for a moment, then suffer the after-effects. The effectiveness granted here doesn't even cost a psi booster until the 16th round, but no battle should last our onslaught for that long (10 psi regen is okay too with at least level 1 Philosophy). The consistency is based on kicking ass 3 rounds straight, then on the 4th performing some other action in order to continue having the luxury of doing nothing but attacks until we empty our next mag. And to be able to empty it by the time we recover our cooldowns that are reduced as much as possible.
So we shoot the 10th and last bullet in our rifle (or Kneecap Shot / Trap / Grenade), then reload our weapon (4 AP with Bullet Strap belt), reduce the cooldown (10 AP with Future Oriented Increment), restealth to use Snipe + enable Blindsiding next round and repeat the cycle. I don't see a non-craftable Vitality Powder with it's one time 2 round effect and it's crippling fatigue afterwards as something that I can fit anywhere here.

Drugs are something I cannot implement in my build because those are not part of the character. Combat drugs are situational. Of course we can use them occasionally, but I don't think they should be part of the daily grind of a build that is properly made. And they benefit every character the same, so there's no point in saying one is better because they pop an Adrenaline, the other can do that too. That's like saying that mine has more HP because I use a health hypo.



Silenced 5mm Hawker? Silenced pistol has to be a NeoLuger:)

[harperfan7]

Silenced 5mm Hawker? Silenced pistol has to be a NeoLuger:)

Well we're hoping for crits you see.

[Vain]

I have many problems with Blitz. First, I don't see it as a good ability for anybody else other than a high DEX

This is typical mistake that people want Blitz with high Dex. As well as it was my mistake before.

Agility build is complete different from Dex build.
I know. Dex builds are so popular in this game. People want to put "DEX" everywhere.

Look at this build
http://underrail.info.tm/build/?HAUGDQMIAwjClh4AAAAAeD09YCFfajpQXwAAAEZNAEQrASQ5Fk83R8KHSX5ZHcKFU8KlwqbipYoB4qeXA-KnqgPisZYE378
(i pre-build only 28 levels.. no use to calculate 30 levels)


The main idea is to obtain as many AP & MP as possible.
    
As a result - the game changes completely. New tactics, new strategies, new...

Give a try. Forget about high DEX and you might be surprised in a good way how game begin shining by new colours 

Example we use aforementioned build with SMG and sniper riffle:
AP (50 + 25/20 + 26 + 22 + 10 + 9) = 142/137 AP during 1st round and 116/111 during next rounds with crazy amount of MP //
Personally, i hardly remember fights that last more than 2-3 turns... dominating during dominating game difficulty

Going back to the pistol topic as sidearm. YOU DO NOT NEED high Dex. As you have Point Shot -75%/-95% AP cost. It makes no sense to decrease AP cost of .44 from 8AP to 6 AP.
Fair enough?

[Vokial]

I know I don't need high DEX, it's just that with it you can at least eliminate the 60 MP requirement if you're using the kind of melee that is influenced by DEX (knives, knuckles), but even then it's value is debatable. High calibers not benefitting from DEX is also something I already mentioned here and in some other thread too. But I don't need Blitz. It's not that bad of an ability, I like that it's an AP buff that doesn't involve psi. But it's just a one-time buff due to it's long cooldown and to alter a build that is not revolving around AGI, just for the sake of it having this +20 AP in a single turn is not a good example of how priorities should be. One even takes Sprint solely to throw away the MP. Convert all those stats, feats, activations so that in the end, you can have ONE additioal shot every TENTH round... Wow.
The MP condition is what a high DEX knifer or hand-to-hand combatant doesn't mind much because with Fancy Footwork, they can just get free MP with each hit, replenishing that 60 HP easily with a mere 8 attacks. I also planned a knifer once just to play with the idea, even then I dropped Improved Sprint. To me, that seems much better than Blitz due to the lower cooldown with the Infused Cave Hopper tabis, lasting for two rounds and the fact that it doesn't take away MP but provides instead. Still the abnormal stat requirement is just too big of an investment to make it worthwile. Spending at least FIVE more stat points than what we need solely for this one ability is a bad idea no matter how I want to make it work. And it also takes two feat slots, the second just gives 10 AP to it. 10 AP and it requires you to have 13 AGI. A stat, that even my build without Interloper would only need 5 (although I always set it to 7 or 8, same with DEX). It's not like AGI influences any skill we use on Dominating aside from Stealth and we're already good on Initiative and MP to the point that even Sprint is a waste. Leaving these out allows me to spend stats and take up the feats that relates and benefits a ranged character much better.

[newageofpower]

Especially on DOMINATING, which throws really big swarms of enemies at you. Smart A-A spearhead can easily 1-shot almost everything in the game, with the exception of only a few boss enemies on DOMINATING, so you will be essentialy cutting the amount of enemies killed each turn in half. And there will be a lot of them on DOMINATING. Really, a lot.

*This* is actually why I prefer a SMG or Shotgun as the sidearm; when 10 Burrower spawns show up the sniper rifle with it's multi-thousand damage aimed shot is worthless, but a single burst can kill 3+.

[Vokial]

Especially on DOMINATING, which throws really big swarms of enemies at you. Smart A-A spearhead can easily 1-shot almost everything in the game, with the exception of only a few boss enemies on DOMINATING, so you will be essentialy cutting the amount of enemies killed each turn in half. And there will be a lot of them on DOMINATING. Really, a lot.

*This* is actually why I prefer a SMG or Shotgun as the sidearm; when 10 Burrower spawns show up the sniper rifle with it's multi-thousand damage aimed shot is worthless, but a single burst can kill 3+.

The build discussed here is not wielding only a sniper rifle, having a pistol of the same 7.62mm caliber cost 12 AP even with the minimum 7 DEX and can one-shot 6 of these these critters per turn, no problem. No wonder you brought up Burrower spawns, they are the perfect, ideal enemies for SMG builds. Low HP small fries in packs. But they were never a threat anyway, even at early game. I mean their damage can be resisted by the DT of even some decent tac vest.
This build can shoot 10-11 times within 4 turn and each bullet takes a life regardless if it's a spawn or a full grown Burrower. That's the beauty of this rifle. Once it finds a target, it doesn't wound it - it takes care of it. With the first draw, so it won't cost you another attack to finish the enemy. There's no unreliable spray and pray here where you don't even shoot at the enemy, you merely shoot in the direction of it. And against single targets, that's not the best way to go, especially when they are tanky. With the rifle, it's another pull of the trigger and another mob to forget. Each action delivers results. Something you can count and therefore plan with.
Then there's the often underrated advantage of attacking from a safe distance. The luxury of outranging even the guns of the enemy, safe oppurtunities to restealth and allowing better use of covers - instead of the close range requirement of a burst, which often involves to be hurt by anything you leave standing.