Jagged Alliance 2 Help

[Petey_the_Skid]

Nobody seems to have answered this, but I'm on heavy meds at the moment, so i might have missed it: To fire a burst, press B on the keyboard...if you have an auto weapon, it will change to burst mode, to change it back to single shot, press the B key again. Bursts are mostly effective only at very close range, though they're also useful for making enemy's duck their heads, unless you have a merc that specializes in auto weapons, in which case they can be dramactically awesome.

 

[Whipporowill]

Ok. I'm stuck in character creation right now - just can't figure out why they ask you questions, but at least give out one of level of skill randomly? Which ones should I aim for? I seem to have gotten the choices right for auto combat, but which should I aim for apart from that? I also saw that I could get expert level auto combat if my randomly assigned skill was the same. Also, what kind of stats are recommended? I'm a bit overwhelmed, in a very good way - but still. Don't want to have to start again realizing my char sucks ass.

Also a general recommendation for hiring mercs. What kind of money will I be making short-term - should I aim for as many cheap mercs as possible instead of fewer and better in the beginning?

Cheers. Looking forward to actually playing the game.

 

[Astromarine]

It's been a while, so if I say crap please someone correct me.

leadership doesn't matter, strength and dex matter very little. Marksmanship is an auto-85, explosives mech and med is up to you. The one that governs your hitpoints is also an auto-85. Wisdom governs learning, so it's pretty important too.

The series of questions define 2 skills that you can have, as well as your psych eval. The skills can be 2 different ones, or one at expert level. The psych governs some things, especially the "psycho" one. That means some of your shots will be uncontrollable, but quite accurate, bursts. Not good for tight-ammo situations. Others like optimist govern intermerc relationships and a few other things.

EDIT - about merc selection. It's good to have the basic skills covered, so a combo of mercs that give good Med, Mech, and Expl. Unless you are good at any of those, of course.

For spoilery reasons, get a merc with Martial Arts or humongous STR and DEX. Trust me on this one.

WIS is also important, since that will govern how much the merc will learn.

I usually go for 2-3 mid-range mercs, and MAYBE a top one. Steroid is strong and has good skills, for a doctor I usually go for Blood (he has Martial Arts) and for a mechanic/exlosives expert there's no beating Trevor. Shame about price though, the bastard gets greedy fast. With 92 WIS, I can't blame him.

GOD, I want this game again. Pity I don't remember my job skills this well.

 

[Whipporowill]

Leadership doesn't matter? That's odd - I had it pinned down as one of the more important ones. Just wishful thinking I guess...

Thanks for the heads-up anyway. But I almost feel more confused... hehe.

 

[Astromarine]

leadership, AFAIK, has bearing only on militia-training, it doesn't do much for your merc team. Since you will end up getting el-cheapo mercs or Ira to do perma-training, and not making your primary team stay in a town for days just to train militias, it's pretty useless. Plus, if you DO make your merc train, it's insanely fast to raise. Wisdom, Marksmanship, and the Endurance-lookalike are the big ones.

 

[Whipporowill]

Then getting the teaching skill as your random one is pretty useless as well? Ok. Get it. :!:

 

[Astromarine]

good random skills are autoweapons, stealth, night ops, and the like. Maybe martial arts.

Let me see if this shows up correctly. If it doesn't, just copy it and paste it in Notepad, which has fixed fonts. Or go here Choose the skills, then the game chooses randomly from the ones you selected.

|A 1 2 3 4 5 6
--+----------+----------+----------+----------+----------+----------+
Q |==========|==========|==========|==========|==========|==========|
1 | martial | loner | H2H | lock | throw | optimist |
2 | teach | stealth | psycho | friendly |==========|==========|
3 | lock | arrogant | stealth | normal |==========|==========|
4 | auto | friendly | normal |unfriendly| loner |==========|
5 | coward |aggressive|==========|==========|==========|==========|
6 | coward |night ops |==========|==========|==========|==========|
7 | elec. | knife | night | ? |==========|==========|
8 | ambidex | ? | optimist | psycho |==========|==========|
9 | ? |pessimist |pessimist | ? |==========|==========|
10| ? |pessimist |unfriendly| ? |==========|==========|
11| ? | teach |aggressive| normal |==========|==========|
12| martial | knife | ? | auto | H2H | elec. |
13| ? | normal | normal |==========|==========|==========|
14| ? | normal | ? | ? |==========|==========|
15| throw | ambidex | arrogant |==========|==========|==========|
16| ? | ? | ? | ? |==========|==========|
--+----------+----------+----------+----------+----------+----------+[/url]

 

[Reklar]

That's a very helpful diagram, Astromarine. I'll have to keep that one in mind when I start a new game. Thanks!

-Reklar
(a Fallout/RPG fan)

 

[Whipporowill]

Where's that damned pilot - I can't seem to find him. Have checked all around N/NE Drassen - esp the swamp ones. Took the Sam site, but still haven't found the bugger.

 

[Sol Invictus]

He's just left of Drassen.

 

[Whipporowill]

Just found him, while passing trough. Thanks anyway. Also found Hassoum and his jolly truck... hah. This game is amazing - in every way.

 

[Petey_the_Skid]

A note on character creation: Even if you answer certain questions right, you won't get the skill in question, here's the most obvious example: If you answer the locker question by saying that you wait and then pick the lock, but you have a 0 in the mechanic ability, you cannot get the lockpicking skill, as mechanic ability is necessary to pick locks.

The most important things to have are high agility(action points rule), high wisdom, and high health, these are all very important in gameplay, and nearly impossible to raise.

Marksmanship is nice but you don't need it higher than 70-75 unless you really want to start the game with an SMG, it will raise up quite nicely on it's own.

Leadership is mostly usless, though i have noticed it has an effect on NPC reactions,*one example spolier* with a leadership over 50, you can convince the factory owner in drassen to leave peacefully instead of killing her*spoiler done*.

As for mercs, I prefer cheap ones that you groom into power houses, they cost less money, and it's kind of fun molding them into warriors(MD, Igor, Fox, Grunty and Grizzly, for example). It's worth it to hire a couple MERC mercs, as eventually you'll get access to Numb and Cougar, who are both top class soldeirs. To expand on a point made above, Igor when he reaches 5th level, still costs only about 10000-12000 dollars for 2 weeks, while his Uncle Ivan, who starts at 5th level, costs something like 28000, I believe, and by the rime Igor gets there, his skills are pretty much Ivan's equal.

 

[Kizmiaz]

This game just gets more and more impressive the longer I play it. No wonder it's a community favorite.

My thoughts exactly. The sad thing is I now consider Silent Storm "JA light". :D

Besides, how do you combine rod/springs with rifles? Never figured that one out.
Could be real useful with the Dragunov, or does it only work with certain types? Or do I need an über-mechanic?

 

[Azael]

You need a pretty über mechanic to do that, yes.

A note on traits, I wrote a longish post on that that apparently vanished with the board upgrade. I'd say that the best three traits for your IMP merc are Nigh-Ops, Stealthy and Auto-Weapons. My two favorite combos are Night-Ops (Expert) [meaning two levels of Night-Ops] and Night-Ops/Auto-Weapons. The former because that one gives you the longest sight range at night, combine it with UV-goggles and you're nigh unstoppable. The latter because at the ranges you (usually) fight at night, it's easy to pull off those oh so lethal head bursts. Night-Ops/Stealthy is also pretty good if you want to try to get up close and personal with the enemy.

 

[Kizmiaz]

Ok, thanx for the tips.
Now, being Swedish, I like to keep my distance.
And I'm also afraid of the dark. Huga.

 

[suibhne]

I'd say that the best three traits for your IMP merc are Nigh-Ops, Stealthy and Auto-Weapons. My two favorite combos are Night-Ops (Expert) [meaning two levels of Night-Ops] and Night-Ops/Auto-Weapons. The former because that one gives you the longest sight range at night, combine it with UV-goggles and you're nigh unstoppable. The latter because at the ranges you (usually) fight at night, it's easy to pull off those oh so lethal head bursts. Night-Ops/Stealthy is also pretty good if you want to try to get up close and personal with the enemy.

I did NightOps/Stealthy, but I kinda wish I'd done NightOps/Auto-Weapons. Stealth is easy enough for characters with tip-top Dexterity, whereas the burst-fire penalty affects everyone equally, no matter your stats. And I'd love for my silenced Mac-10 to be more effective at burst head shots during night operations.... That's sound advice, Azael.

 

[Azael]

Ok, thanx for the tips.
Now, being Swedish, I like to keep my distance.
And I'm also afraid of the dark. Huga.

Hey, just noticed that you're from Östergötland, what town? I assume that Badsville is not some poor translation of the name.[/off topic]

Anyway, attacking at night is by far the best and easiest method of clearing out a sector, if you know what you're doing. Still, that might not always be an option, so thus it's probably better to have something like Night-Ops/Auto-Weapons instead since it's a viable combo at daytime too. Also, attacking during the day changes the gameplay quite a lot, but is still fun. Expect some more casualities and downtime due to healing injuries though. This doesn't apply as much to the Urban Chaos mod since they saw it fit to nerf night assaults by putting lights at literally every fucking streetcorner, and then some, and if you're caught in the light during the dark hours you're pretty much bumfucked.

 

[Kizmiaz]

Hey, just noticed that you're from Östergötland, what town? I assume that Badsville is not some poor translation of the name.[/off topic]

Motala.

if you're caught in the light during the dark hours you're pretty much bumfucked.

Yep, so I noticed.

 

[Azael]

Interesting, I'm originally from Mantorp.

Night-Ops + Night-Vision/UV-goggles + breaklights = TEH WIN!11 Correct use of breaklights can really help you set up some nasty kill zones. Basically, it's exploiting a flaw in the AI since it doesn't seem to realize that a high concentration of dead bodies equals bad news and should be avoided. I hear that the enemy are pretty adept at using breaklights too in Wildfire though, which might be the only reason to get it.

 

[Talorc]

I hear that the enemy are pretty adept at using breaklights too in Wildfire though, which might be the only reason to get it.

I can confirm that - I've had break lights thrown on me quite a fews time in Wildfire during the night. That plus the fact the enemies ALL seem to have way better sight range than you at night, makes night assaults a no no for Wildfire.

You are way better of just having a long range gun battle at day, firing from cover. Just keep all your mercenaries together so they can cover each other, and shoot anything that moves. The enhanced gun damage means you will pretty much kill them in 3 shots max before they get close enoguh to start hitting you.

 

[Reklar]

Something I've been meaning to ask, but keep forgetting, is about merc fatigue. Is there any way to check the fatigue level of your mercs other than right before you go into combat? It would be nice to know how far I can push my mercs until they need sack time without suffering from the "<name> is too tired to travel" when I'm on a long trip, or having them drop out of the team because they need sleep. Also, it seems as though mercs won't sleep while you have them on duty, so I was wondering do you have to have them assigned to some other task before they will sleep?

-Reklar
(a Fallout/RPG fan)

 

[d3aD^]

you can check the bars right of the chars picture the red is health blue is fatigue green for moral

i suggest go find the ice cream truck and the humvee

 

[Azael]

In the "map" screen, when passing time, clicking on the 'bed' icon next to a merc's name will force him to go to sleep, unless he's well rested. That's what I usually do as I prepare a night-assault so that all my mercs are rested before action since a well executed night operation will mean no (or very minor) injuries enabling you to take several sectors in one sitting.

 

[Whipporowill]

My popularity started to go downhill when I went after Cumbria. After having taken 2 areas (hospital and one more) my approval rating is about 3% in Cumbria, while 85% in Drassen and Chitzena. Only odd thing is that those two used to be stable around 100%. What gives? And no, I haven't noticed killing any civilians.

 

[Kizmiaz]

Ehh, I'm not sure 'cause I've played too little but I don't think you can sloth too long. It seems to me that you need to go after the baddies and conquer new cities once in a while before popularity start to drop. And I guess Belime is a special case.

[Off topic to Azael] Mantorp sure is a nice place. Lost my fair share at the track and the mall. Also seen some drag-racing in the 70-ies. I think it was Ragnarök that gave me tinnitus.