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AOD Combat Demo Impressions

Nickless

Educated
Joined
Dec 16, 2009
Messages
960
Beat everything but the last fight with a bow user. I was able to defeat the last six guys with a dagger and shield combo. I've found it very effective to max out a single weapon and defence skill and ignore the rest; I'm not sure of the value of critical strike, as I seem to be scoring a number of them without even touching that skill.
 

Darth Roxor

Royal Dongsmith
Staff Member
Joined
May 29, 2008
Messages
1,878,377
Location
Djibouti
Here's a walkthrough for the demo:

1. Make a character.

2. Choose a weapon.

3. Get 10 dex and 8 con, 10 str if melee weapon, 10 per if ranged weapon.

4. Pump all possible skill points to dodge.

5. Keep pumping all possible skill points to dodge until you get 180 of it.

6. Then start pumping skill points into the weapon skill until it's even with dodge

7. Distribute new skill points evenly between weapon skill and dodge

8. ???

9. PROFIT!
 

Murk

Arcane
Joined
Jan 17, 2008
Messages
13,459
Goddamn now we have 3 threads in 3 different sub fora.
 

Nickless

Educated
Joined
Dec 16, 2009
Messages
960
I found strength more useful for ranged than I did perception, really. With strength I was able to break through the opponent's armour quite easily, and sometimes one shot an opponent dead. I suppose I was never far away enough from an opponent for perception to matter much.

I found barbed arrows useful against every opponent; vs. an armoured foe I aimed at the torso to reduce DR to great effect.

The reloading clickfest of crossbows I found to be rather tedious, and I found it annoying that a cocked crossbow would be unloaded by an opponent disarming me. I did like the range of weapon choices I was presented with crossbows, and wish I had the same amount of diversity with bows.

Throwing weapons I didn't find very useful compared to crossbows and bows, they were also much too expensive for the amount of damage they did. It'd be nice if their cost was offset by allowing some to be recovered from dead enemies.
 

Mr Happy

Scholar
Joined
Jul 15, 2006
Messages
574
I have only had a chance to play for the first few guys (easy + one difficult) with the spear+throwing combo guy. The combat system seems really tight, both visually and gameplay wise; I would love to see it in action with a party system (make your own party + recruit combo, Prelude to Darkness style, of course).

Anyway, question for whoever. Are the passive, actions (like interrupt, block and counterattack) affected by how many AP you have left, as in a game like JA2? If not, is there any reason to leave some left over at the end of a turn, or are they just wasted?
 

janjetina

Arcane
Patron
Joined
Mar 28, 2008
Messages
14,231
Location
Zagreb, Croatia
Torment: Tides of Numenera
After playing with a melee (dagger+ dodge) character, I conclude that playing with a crossbowman is much more challenging and interesting. With a ranged character, keeping the distance has to be taken into account when choosing actions. With a melee character it is only a matter of choosing the most suitable attack to bypass the oponent's armor.

The merchant has only about 6000 credits available. Is it a bug?
 

hal900x

Augur
Joined
Jul 2, 2009
Messages
573
Location
A good place to own a gun.
I have played all the way through with a Crossbow, and started another game with Sword/Board/Crit. I thought Crossbow would look one-dimensional compared to melee (because it lacks the combat "styles"). But I'm finding sword/board to be a gimped nightmare. VD expresses very strong confidence in combat balance in another thread, but I'm compledtely stonewalled on the Triarii. I suspect, if you go with the traditional defensive tank, you'd better skip crit entirely and pump ALL your points into Sword and Block. I'm gonna try that now. I want to see someone get past the Triarii or similar multi-opponent teams with an even split on Sword/Block/Crit. I really do. STR:10 DEX:6 CON:10 PER:6
 

relootz

Scholar
Joined
Sep 9, 2009
Messages
4,478
I have 10 str 8 dex 10 con 4 per and use a sword with block and a bit less on cs.

I am stuck at the butcher. I should not have put points in cs.
 

tarkin

Augur
Joined
Apr 27, 2005
Messages
939
Wasteland 2
Alright, i have finished the demo 2 times now.

First build: Axes + Block was very painful. All went well until the Triary, i had the same problem as everyone else with axe guy splitting my shield. Managed to defeat them (after about 20-30 reloads and a day off) with a stack of 5 tower shields wich i just kept replacing until the axeman died and i could finish off the other two. Beating the six imperial guards was quite easy.

Second build: Dagger + Critical strike. It was a complete walk in the park. I had 11 AP, so when i got my hands on the Mack's the knife knife i could just spam 1AP fast attacks with criticals here and there. The Triary went all down in 2 rounds. Had to reload the last fight tho, but after positioning myself better before starting conversation with the IG Captain i managed to kill both him and the xbowman right away and wound some other guy. Finished the rest of the imperial guards quite fast.

All in all i enjoyed it very much and i will probably play at least two another builds (ranged and dodge melee). Music is very fitting, i like the animations, especially the death ones (i counted 3 different death animations, might be wrong tho). There is nothing wrong with the graphics and i haven't encountered any glitches and only one bug (freeze after my turn when i crippled someone and stepped back). There is talk about lessening the shield splits by implementing shield HP and here's another vote for that solution. Can't wait for the final product, good job guys, keep it up.
 

Vault Dweller

Commissar, Red Star Studio
Developer
Joined
Jan 7, 2003
Messages
28,024
relootz said:
I have 10 str 8 dex 10 con 4 per and use a sword with block and a bit less on cs.

I am stuck at the butcher. I should not have put points in cs.
Perception affects your to-hit chance, so I would neither ignore it nor put it to 4, which gives you a 10 points penalty. It's not a dump stat for fighters.
 

Starwars

Arcane
Joined
Jan 31, 2007
Messages
2,829
Location
Sweden
I want to see someone get past the Triarii or similar multi-opponent teams with an even split on Sword/Block/Crit. I really do. STR:10 DEX:6 CON:10 PER:6

I went through that fight using a sword and shield character. Same main stats as you I believe but I put 50% of the skill points into Sword (probably too much) and split the rest over Block and Crit, though I started feeding Block a bit more at one point (can't remember if it was before or after Trarii fight).

But yeah, that fight was a real bitch and took me a lot of replays. Main thing I had to do was to avoid having all 3 on top of me. I kept the axe wielding guy at a distance (see if you can position yourself so that he hits his mates). Sliced the leader in the face until he died. Then I think I used the aim vs torso option for the hammer dude, seemed to work well. Then after that, just pray to god that you have enough HP left to take on the axe guy. And I pretty much had to get lucky with A) the leader getting knocked down when slicing him in the face and B) the hammer guy not knocking me on my ass with crits.

I also had some early troubles with the Barbari fight with this build, but not as much. After beating the demo with the sword and shield character, I'm not playing a hammer wielding dodger and I fucking owned the Barbari fight, go figure. On the other hand, now the Urdu guys (the swordsman and bowman) are owning me.

It's awesome how different the fighting styles feel.
 

hal900x

Augur
Joined
Jul 2, 2009
Messages
573
Location
A good place to own a gun.
Vault Dweller said:
I can do it, but I wouldn't go with Dex 6. Too low for my taste.

But you put armor that reduces AP to 8 in the game, which I thought made sense to wear with a full defensive build. All I see in the readme is AP and sequence. Is there some other value to Dex I'm not seeing?

Do Axes also bypass shields? I did what I said, splitting all my points between sword and block. Got to The Butcher, and I think I blocked 2 or 3 hits the whole fight with him. I brought a bunch of shields with me, thinking I'd need them against Axe, but my shield only broke once, because he isn't being blocked.

Edit: Confirmed: only blocked 3 times the entire fight against the Butcher. 1 successful block + 2 shield breaks (refreshing shield each time from inventory). Block is at 150+. Unless Block is calculated based on Dex, something is wrong IMO.

I can see if I had more AP there would be more options for this fight, but that essentially admits that the heaviest armor in the game is pointless. Do you just not want people to use a pure defensive tank, as it hints in the readme?
 

Elhoim

Iron Tower Studio
Developer
Joined
Oct 27, 2006
Messages
2,878
Location
San Isidro, Argentina
hal900x said:
Elhoim said:
I just used a pure defensive tank with 6 Dex, 10 Str and 10 Con and it kicked ass.

Well, shit. I am mystified then. Maybe I just suck. Tell me how you killed The Butcher, for example.

I had a 9DR armor, and bought a steel sledgehammer. Pummeled him with torso attacks. The first time he got lucky and killed me, won on the second try.
 

hal900x

Augur
Joined
Jul 2, 2009
Messages
573
Location
A good place to own a gun.
Elhoim said:
hal900x said:
Elhoim said:
I just used a pure defensive tank with 6 Dex, 10 Str and 10 Con and it kicked ass.

Well, shit. I am mystified then. Maybe I just suck. Tell me how you killed The Butcher, for example.

I had a 9DR armor, and bought a steel sledgehammer. Pummeled him with torso attacks. The first time he got lucky and killed me, won on the second try.

OK, but I assume you got some knockdowns. All my posts have been about sword n board classic fighters. I've got a tower shield, a hardened meteor gladius and bronze imperial armor. I wouldn't have had enough to upgrade my armor for this fight, even being frugal and upgrading rarely, so I went for the weapon.

The Butcher goes like this: he doesn't miss, I don't block and his called torso shots are mostly sucessful. That's with modified attack/block of 137/152. With my 8AP, I have tried all the attack variants. I cannot beat him in the damage race up close, not by a LONG shot, regardless of the attack sequences I have tried. I tried the disarm route, which with 6 of my 8AP will be my only attack that round, and he simply reequips and hits me unerringly the next turn. By the way, I thought there was a threat of being hit if you attempt to rearm? Or was it that you need to back off one square to rearm? Neither of these appears to be true.
 

relootz

Scholar
Joined
Sep 9, 2009
Messages
4,478
I have the same build and problem as you hal. The butcher's torso attacks are unstoppable it seems, he has very high DR and if u unequid him, he just reequips and starts hitting again.
 

hal900x

Augur
Joined
Jul 2, 2009
Messages
573
Location
A good place to own a gun.
relootz said:
I have the same build and problem as you hal. The butcher's torso attacks are unstoppable it seems, he has very high DR and if u unequid him, he just reequips and starts hitting again.

What I had to do was reload and put all 45 skill points (20 from the last fight, 25 for reaching executioner) into Sword instead of dividing equally between sword and block. Then I got a Scimitar, left the shield at home and eventually got enough lucky hits to take him down. So yeah, I beat him, but only by by changing the style of my fighter.

By the way, you have to talk to the Arena Master about the Butcher fight to get the extra 25 points for hitting Executioner. It shouldn't be that way, because what you must do is decline the fight, assign the points, then talk to him again and accept the fight.
 

tarkin

Augur
Joined
Apr 27, 2005
Messages
939
Wasteland 2
You can arrange your Skill Points on the arena. Just hit 'C'. Now on my 4th build i just go to arena check my to hit chance, if it's too low i pump the weapon skill and if it's ok i pump block, dodge or crit (whatever my character specializes in). Or i leave my Skill Points be, and use them when things get nasty.
 

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