Jagged Alliance 3 from Haemimont Games

[InD_ImaginE]

Trying the game with increased auto/burst damage (not full, just 1.5x) and enemy is in general much more lethal.

Now I can't have Igor and Q just shrugging off gunfire in the open. And Prison Boss burst fire in his confined space pretty much one shot anybody not name Steroid jacked in heavy armor.

Machine Gunners change from "who cares getting tickled by overwatch" to actually lethal. Overall feels like the game is much better this way instead of Sniper headshot bomb fiesta.

30 hours in I feel they need to make the AI less suicidal, just stay in cover and overwatch (its good action economy as you get more attack per AP). As currently is they are too willing to get themselves in the open just to flank your cover. Hopefully mod manager can mod that behaviour in the future. Right now enemies only ever overwatch if they are low in HP and staying in cover.

 

[ArchAngel]

Sounds good, will have to do a run on maximum difficulty. Because on Commando it's way too easy to get mega rich, which removes a lot of the worry. It also means you can afford big squads.

Unfortunately the hardest difficulty isn't much better in that respect. Two or three mines will still keep you well in the black with a balanced squad.

At least this seems like something that should be trivial to fix with a mod. It's as easy as lowering mine income across the board. I checked the existing enhanced options mod, but it's not in there. Hopefully someone steps up.

Better if they implement a gun/mod shop instead of guns and shit lying around in random boxes

 

[POOPERSCOOPER]

I'm still playing the tutorial Island thing and it seems very easy even on Commando. Does the game get harder or should I crank up the difficulty?

 

[spectre]

Nice review!

BTW - you should be able to execute melee attacks that you've "prepared" in advance just by walking next to the enemy - there's no need for a second click to make it happen. If you pick the game back up, that might solve some of your frustrations with melee.

Yeah, strange fellow already covered it for me. Might need some practice with it, but I didn't really want to save scum to get it right.
I wasn't really attempting a review, just some impressions after scratching the tutorial island. I'd need to actually get the feel of the advanced weapons/tactics for the full picture,
but the problem is with the fundamentals, as far as I am concerned - iffy controls I could probably live with and get used to with time,
scramble turn is something I don't really get the point of. It kinda made sense (ok, it didn't, but let's do some devil advocating) in EXCUM
with its brutal flanking bonuses out of cover and smaller pod sizes, so they sorta kinda wanted to setup an even playing field for an engagement.
Here, it just doesn't seem desirable, all it does for me is added hoops for ambushing... which is the order of the day in assymmetric warfare... which is what the game is all about.
That much I have known earlier, but having seen it actually play out it still baffles me as something really unnecessary.

 

[ArchAngel]

Nice review!

BTW - you should be able to execute melee attacks that you've "prepared" in advance just by walking next to the enemy - there's no need for a second click to make it happen. If you pick the game back up, that might solve some of your frustrations with melee.

Yeah, strange fellow already covered it for me. Might need some practice with it, but I didn't really want to save scum to get it right.
I wasn't really attempting a review, just some impressions after scratching the tutorial island. I'd need to actually get the feel of the advanced weapons/tactics for the full picture,
but the problem is with the fundamentals, as far as I am concerned - iffy controls I could probably live with and get used to with time,
scramble turn is something I don't really get the point of. It kinda made sense (ok, it didn't, but let's do some devil advocating) in EXCUM
with its brutal flanking bonuses out of cover and smaller pod sizes, so they sorta kinda wanted to setup an even playing field for an engagement.
Here, it just doesn't seem desirable, all it does for me is added hoops for ambushing... which is the order of the day in assymmetric warfare... which is what the game is all about.
That much I have known earlier, but having seen it actually play out it still baffles me as something really unnecessary.

It also "makes sense" here because they nuXcom this game and cover gives specific hit penalty to random hit rolls instead of just being cover for real projectile simulation.

 

[raeven]

I'm still playing the tutorial Island thing and it seems very easy even on Commando. Does the game get harder or should I crank up the difficulty?

I'm on commando. I'd say it gets harder and to stick with it until you take fleatown (or whatever town you go for first)

 

[Sunri]

Go to prison after tutorial map, i think it's L6 if you want to have fun.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Cacao/Prison was the hardest part of the game for me, tactically, and I did go there immediately after Ernie.

I like that as the tactical layer gets easier the strategic layer ramps up. Defending bases from constant attack waves while still trying to make progress, keep supplies up, gear repaired, etc. is a fun challenge.

 

[Modron]

Managed to clear the majority of the prison without entering turnbased combat more than once or twice, everyone is pretty isolated minus the upstairs and the two rooms next to jackhammer's office (but even then cleared the balcony and the rightmost room in the main building without alerting enemies). I assume you're talking about the Good Place and not one on the other side of the map I haven't encountered yet. Downstairs was a different story.

 

[spectre]

Some additional info on Leadership mechanics that's not immediately apparent, its effect on travel speed might raise an eyebrow:


Restarted the game, decided I wanna give it a fair spin. Turns out I misunderstood a whole bunch of things (including the way weapon attachments work,
a lesser man would take an opportunity to make a quip that the devs need to look up what "attach" means).

I stand by my opinion that the whole handling of takedowns is shit, but it gets better with practice and if you do it right, you won't even have to suffer any scramble turns
(cleared first two sectors this way, felt good but way too save summy). Thank goodness for the active pause mod. Lets you actually coordinate.
Sadly, the game balance looks extremely fragile (unintended throwback to 1.13?) and I'm worried if suppressed sniper action doesn't trivialize it all.

I'm eyeballing other mods out there, makes me wonder what exactly can be diddled with. A few are straight up cheating, but improved IMP portraits and models seem essential.
Vanilla game is incredibly crappy in this regard, to the point that I contemplated just sticking with mercs, which is sometimes hard to do depending on difficulty
and randomized availability.

Thinking about a chance to hit mod, not that I need it as much, the game seems to give the "feel" for the odds rather easy, but it's tempting to look under the hood.
I saw a version that doesn't give the exact %, just lists the modifiers, which is what I was looking for.

Still not a fan of "magical" abilities on some chars.
Still would like more in-depth inventory management.
And from what I saw early on, the game's economy would basically need to be unfucked and re-done from scratch
cause it looks like it's been stringed together by a series of questionable design decisions.
Gun running doesn't even seem to be a thing at all?

Think I took a leap of faith here, gentlemen, cause what seemed to look like a cautious but still essentially just a road accident,
now is starting to look more like a work in progress, with the the potential to actually get somewhere.
As far as I'm concerned, just being able to mod out scramble turns would be sufficient to elevate it.
Could be possible, if only via a hackjob of giving everyone the equivalent of Fox's unique trait.

 

[Agame]

I know its redundant to repeat here but seeing 'nu-xcom' system in jagged Alliance is simply disgusting. Living in the age of decline...

 

[Grampy_Bone]

I know its redundant to repeat here but seeing 'nu-xcom' system in jagged Alliance is simply disgusting. Living in the age of decline...

Don't listen to Archangel, he hasn't even played it and has no clue what he's talking about.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Vegas shooting mystery solved

 

[True Ukrainian]

The running out of ammo complaint is silly. Unless you're going full auto in every mission and regularly using LMG, you have more than enough ammo.

 

[PanteraNera]

The running out of ammo complaint is silly. Unless you're going full auto in every mission and regularly using LMG, you have more than enough ammo.

The RNG can be silly, where it only drops you 9mm, 45cal & shotgun shells.
If you reload and do the same fight again, you could get all rifle ammo.
And a third time, something in-between.

A big income of ammunition is the auto-resolve with militia and there is people that know about that and use that and others that don't.

Also using weapons that use different calibers is making it way more easier.

 

[Modron]

Not to mention melee is the strongest weapon in game, going full ITZ on any idiot who bothers to get close saves quite a bit of ammo.

 

[True Ukrainian]

You get a good machete very early on in fleatown as well. Almost as if the game's trying to tell you something.

 

[Fargus]

Ammo is not much of a problem. But seems like its better to craft some armor piercing rounds early on. You can break down garbage like pipe bombs for bullet crafting materials.

I gave it another go, so far money is not a problem like last time, because i just stuck to captured towns and mines and trained militia to the max. I also believe i had wrong ideas about some game mechanics. But i feel pretty much the same about most of the combat encounters, quantity over quality and tiny maps. Another thing that gets on my nerves is scripted shit like multiple wave sieges or unkillable characters.

Most fun i had so far was when we attacked an outpost with hyena's breeding grounds without any planning. Most of my mercs got pinned down, but thank God we had Barry and his shaped charges and also rpg we took from a nigger early on... and lots of rockets for it that we farmed on one of the captured outposts that constantly was under attack. We got rushed by some retard with a crocodile named after a crocodile from russian cartoon.

Another amusing fight was when we attacked a swamp outpost and mid fight when we were whacking some moles, a patrol wandering around the area joined the fight and spawned right behind our backs, around 8 nigs. Thankfully they spawned very close together and were taken care of thanks again to Barry's shaped charges.

Other than what i mentioned before there was surprising lack of cringe and wokeness in the the writing. But can't say i like it either. Plot twists are just meh and predictable. But the merc banters and dialogue interjections still deliver.

Some screenshots below.





Really like Raider's personality in this game, despite shitty voice acting. He also dislikes that fat fuck Hitman Hennessy for hitting on Raven. Back in 2000s when i played Jagged Alliance 2 it even lead to lovestruck and frustrated Hitman leaving my squad like in some teenage drama.


Just for fun.

 

[Fargus]

You get a good machete very early on in fleatown as well. Almost as if the game's trying to tell you something.

Where exactly was it? I dont remember any machetes there. I did get a bunch of nice stuff from lootboxes, some books and even metaviron syringe.

 

[Alienman]

I got Raven killed, and tried to recruit Raider a while later... it didn't go so well.

 

[Fargus]

I got Raven killed, and tried to recruit Raider a while later... it didn't go so well.

In my game Raider got machete in the face from some local rapist and died instantly in front of Raven. I think it was 140 damage lol.

But i reloaded because fuck that, dude has 91 leadership.

And Raven is too good of a sniper to lose.

 

[True Ukrainian]

You get a good machete very early on in fleatown as well. Almost as if the game's trying to tell you something.

Where exactly was it? I dont remember any machetes there. I did get a bunch of nice stuff from lootboxes, some books and even metaviron syringe.

It's in a crate near Lalee's house if I remember correctly.

 

[Fargus]

Hmm, maybe. But aside from some containers looting is randomized.

 

[PanteraNera]

looting is randomized

It highly is.

For example with the M.E.R.C. backpacks you can totally luck out and get a FAL, just after leaving tutorial island. Or just a diamond, a couple of skill magazines, a set of armor, crafting materials like a chip or a lens and so on. It is highly randomized.

 

[Beowulf]

It's randomized, I haven't found there a machete in my 2 playthroughs. So going by that logic of his - if you find a pack of shotgun ammo instead, the game tells you that shotguns are OP.