Underrail: The Incline Awakens

[Lord_Potato]

Ok, finally I mustered the courage to approach this giant of a game.

Created an extrovert psionist with sticky fingers (4 psionic schools, 3 social skills, lockpick and hacking).

Played for 18 hours so far, reached level 11, cleared out Depot A (until the doors I cannot lockpick/hack because their difficulty level is around 90), got the drill part. Now the game opened up, but before undertaking any of the new quests, I'm finishing the Junktown content, exploring nearby tunnels/caves, killing off lunatics, exterminating burrower hives (most difficult enemy so far for my build), generally having a blast and hoping to level up at least once before going farther into the storyline.

I enjoy this very much, and I am curious to see more content, meet more fleshed out factions (Scrappers and Black Eels so far seem like mirror images of each other) and seek knowledge about the mysterious Faceless.

Very impressed by this several guys project.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Ramnozack]

People hate Protectorate because it's cool to hate authoritarianism.

Truth be told, I hate authoritarianism IRL too, but the Protectorate isn't worst offender in this case, I mean stations can elect leader for sure and choose their own laws (I think), that is like more democratic than in some IRL countries, where people isn't able to choose governor or even major of city. Not to mention that nobody guaranties that if Protectorate falls - shitload independent stations go full blown Reich with their own little fuhrers or feudalism.

Citation needed. Only Underrail 2 can clarify which is the best decision.

Spoiler

Actually in the ending slide for this ending was written that Todd at some point was treated as laboratory mouse, he became object of experiment and decided to escape.

Huh, would have thought him living in Dis with a real chance to start a family and find happiness would have been better than riding around on some dudes boat in the death trap known as the black sea

 

[Parabalus]

So Patsy finally arrived in the infamous locust vacation spot yesterday. It wasn't that annoying with sneak, since you can plant tnt and it one-shots them, but whoever came up with the idea that such enemy design would be fun in turn-based...

Styg At this point my improvement suggestion would be to add a disco inferno soundtrack and a disco-spinning ball to the action bar meter in the hive areas.

If you have sneak you can avoid them entirely, no need to waste time TnTing them.

People hate Protectorate because it's cool to hate authoritarianism.

Truth be told, I hate authoritarianism IRL too, but the Protectorate isn't worst offender in this case, I mean stations can elect leader for sure and choose their own laws (I think), that is like more democratic than in some IRL countries, where people isn't able to choose governor or even major of city. Not to mention that nobody guaranties that if Protectorate falls - shitload independent stations go full blown Reich with their own little fuhrers or feudalism.

Citation needed. Only Underrail 2 can clarify which is the best decision.

Spoiler

Actually in the ending slide for this ending was written that Todd at some point was treated as laboratory mouse, he became object of experiment and decided to escape.

Huh, would have thought him living in Dis with a real chance to start a family and find happiness would have been better than riding around on some dudes boat in the death trap known as the black sea

You can also give him to the pirates, wonder what that ending slide looks like.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Ramnozack]

So Patsy finally arrived in the infamous locust vacation spot yesterday. It wasn't that annoying with sneak, since you can plant tnt and it one-shots them, but whoever came up with the idea that such enemy design would be fun in turn-based...

Styg At this point my improvement suggestion would be to add a disco inferno soundtrack and a disco-spinning ball to the action bar meter in the hive areas.

If you have sneak you can avoid them entirely, no need to waste time TnTing them.

People hate Protectorate because it's cool to hate authoritarianism.

Truth be told, I hate authoritarianism IRL too, but the Protectorate isn't worst offender in this case, I mean stations can elect leader for sure and choose their own laws (I think), that is like more democratic than in some IRL countries, where people isn't able to choose governor or even major of city. Not to mention that nobody guaranties that if Protectorate falls - shitload independent stations go full blown Reich with their own little fuhrers or feudalism.

Citation needed. Only Underrail 2 can clarify which is the best decision.

Spoiler

Actually in the ending slide for this ending was written that Todd at some point was treated as laboratory mouse, he became object of experiment and decided to escape.

Huh, would have thought him living in Dis with a real chance to start a family and find happiness would have been better than riding around on some dudes boat in the death trap known as the black sea

You can also give him to the pirates, wonder what that ending slide looks like.

I kinda thought thats what the Ferryman option was for, so you didn't have to go full dickhead mode and leave this poor guy with a bunch of murderous criminal degenerates if you sided with said degenerates.

 

[Parabalus]

MK III corrosive

this is cool! forgot about serpents! I guess quick tinkering is mandatory though - i usually like larping with trap expert. While I didnt encounter(yet) nagas that do not let me prepare traps beforehand I assume there is at least 1 such encounter?

I don't think there is one if you have meta knowledge, there are naga ambushes but you can save/reload.

If you side with pirates you can get corrosive acid from katya, she sells DC-only components.

do throwing knives work with seeker lenses and recklessness?

EDIT: and what about ambush?

Recklessness for sure, the other two I'd wager no. Ambush should be easy to test though.

 

[Maggot]

Swarms would be okay with simultaneous turn resolution.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Jezal_k23]

Swarms would be okay with simultaneous turn resolution.

That would be a clusterfuck. Easily said, not easily executed.

 

[Blaine]

Swarms would be okay with simultaneous turn resolution.

That would be a clusterfuck. Easily said, not easily executed.

As I suggested a few pages ago, swarms (or rather, groups of what are now 4-5 individual locusts) could perhaps be treated as single entities for the purpose of positioning, movement, and attack. That way, there would be a maximum of three active swarms per nest. As for how to resolve the attacks of 4-5 locusts at once, that should be fairly simple: Treat each spitting action similarly to bursts or shotgun blasts, so that each "shot" deals multiple hits.

The real problem in my view, however, is that they have unlimited ranged attacks. Why are they ranged attackers? They're locusts, for Christ's sake. No doubt it was inspired by real-life schistocerca, which are known to regurgitate nasty fluid as a form of defense against predators. I should know, because I used to catch grasshoppers as a kid... but come on now.

They'd be so much more tolerable if they had to get into melee range. Even the fucking sea serpents spit bio fluid. "But they wouldn't be as much of a challenge! They wouldn't be able to harass you while you're funneled through a small labyrinth of fences!" Well, tough shit. Combat is supposed to be challenging, not actively annoying.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[hell bovine]

Blaine i know you have sniper with ambush feat, lead that save and throw few knives for me plz

Know my good heart: ambush didn't trigger when chucking a throwing knife. (checked the placement with a pistol, so the light was ok for ambush) I can confirm however that it works on shotguns.

PS. If you want, I can upload Patsy's save and you can test for yourself.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[HoboForEternity]

is this a fucking jojo reference!?

dude's quest spoiler

Spoiler

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Jezal_k23]

Yes. Dodge and Evasion have been long debunked as the farce that they are here in this thread. I'll be avoiding them at all costs in my builds from here on out, unless there's a requirement for a feat.

 

[Tigranes]

With all the flurry/onslaught-happy assassins and the like, I'm not even sure building for things like Uncanny Dodge is worthwhile. I've also found the Temporal windbacks fiddly, and only use Last Stand as a distinctive 'pick feat for survivability' ability. It's honestly disappointing how stealthy quick dudes built for mega alpha strikes is nearly always the way to go. Fixing the balance there would have opened up many different cool build opportunities, but no we got 4 years of locusts

Of course, then you dramatically finish off the Rathound King at level 9, quicksave with trembling fingers, Last Stand runs out, but there's one tick of bleeding left to go...

 

[BING XI LAO]

I assumed that Dodge and Evasion would be like Avernum and some other rpgs where playing on harder difficulties makes them not worth it because enemies get improved to-hit. Or because all the strongest boss enemies have good to-hit. Funny that I was broadly right despite knowing nothing of the actual game mechanics when I made the assumption.

 

[ciox]

not happy with evasion. Even with amazing boost from evasive maneuvers natives accuracy with nets is 50%. Evading shots from plasma turrets is rare occurrence too. For reference I easily get 200-300 boost from maneuvers. I play on hard.
Only nice thing is how little damage naga aoe attack does due to reduction.

Should have gone for high int instead... although I didnt realize that you can easilly craft rusting acid traps when I made my choice.

I thought people knew that evasion can't reduce by itself an attack's precision below 40% https://www.underrail.com/wiki/index.php?title=Precision#Skill
This seems to be designed so that light levels and perception (cave ear poison) remain relevant as factors, but it's probably too brutal of a cap.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[hell bovine]

Of course, then you dramatically finish off the Rathound King at level 9, quicksave with trembling fingers, Last Stand runs out, but there's one tick of bleeding left to go...

That's why I tend to give my characters doctor if I have room for a spare feat. I'm not a very careful player and often enough at the end of combat Patsy has a few hitpoints left and multiple dots running. Gauze has no cooldowns.

 

[Blaine]

I've fucked Evasion and Dodge so hard in this thread that their mothers couldn't walk for a week afterward.

I've continued thinking about possible solutions, and I feel that raising their mutual synergy to 50% or even higher might be the best one. It's even logical for them to have very strong synergy: Both skills have to do with avoiding attacks via abstracted acrobatics or whatever. Additionally, an exception should be made so that base ability scaling functions for Dodge and Evasion even if they only hit the level cap via synergy.

My reasoning here is that Dodge and Evasion taken separately each offer far less return on investment than any other combat or crafting skill in the game. Ideally, they should be merged into a single skill—but allowing them to remain two separate skills that only require the investment of one skill is also a workable solution.

I don't give a flying FUCK how useful Dodge and Evasion feats are, either, because that doesn't address the fact that the skills themselves are bad investments when considered separately. If anything, the feats only serve to highlight the problem, because all of them are focused on making Dodge and Evasion not suck for a short period of time.

 

[Inf0mercial]

I have never rage quit quite so hard as when i finally dragged my heavy melee guy to silent isle and found 3 psi beetle goliaths, i actually deleted the saves lol, kind of regret that but i was angry and tired.

Like ok, i like the new enemy's i like the new enemy types, i actually had to come back to kill GMS guys, but no, just no, i had access to the scrapyard from scrappers but at that stage i was so sick of it, the build was metal armour spear on dominating, it did ok but then it hit go into depot A and i could not be fucked with visions of acid dog spam on a melee character.

Grenades make it doable but i did not have the patience to slam my head against a wall anymore, opening and closing a door to throw grenades through does get boring as fuck i will tell you, as does sitting in a corner getting a rathound to hit you and trapping the three alphas behind it to murder them slowly as they take 6 stabs ea of 40 damage ea.

I like the idea of new enemies and new ai stuff but 50% hp is stupidly bloated but even then i could do it, with some patience time and abuse of doors and corners its the 25% sell value that got to me it was too much it does not hurt so much as it delays everything combined with the new enemy types and it just blocks off entire sections of content until you chip sway at a bunch of easier things then backtrack to do them, the sad thing is i know if i made an AR tin can i could mulch most things without all that but i played that so i was looking for a change.

Basically, Hard is too easy at times but Dominating is tedious as fuck.

Also well, if you have a spare skill to invest i honestly can say pickpocket is up there with competing with hacking or a convo skill, probably not lockpick though.

Spoiler

I should finally actually get to Expedition soon, Versatility is actually worth it, it seems on a light punching build, you don't have to invest any skills but you can use Sub Machine guns with that dex boost to AP, its pretty fun, makes robots easier.