Completed Let's play System Shock 2 (impossible / video)

[potatojohn]

OOPS

 

[DraQ]

OOPS

Your "oh no" would've been more convincing if you didn't start bouncing up and down as you said that.

 

[potatojohn]

Have to keep fit in the space apocalypse.

 

[DraQ]

Ok, I calculated my cybermodules needs for builds I'd like to take and after some tweaking they are within allowance on impossible.

One question - why don't you just pop spiders with ordinary pistol you seem insistent on carrying around?

 

[potatojohn]

No point in using the standard pistol when there's a recharger around the corner.

 

[DraQ]

No point in using the standard pistol when there's a recharger around the corner.

There is no recharger for maintenance tools, though, laser doesn't seem to do you much good against spiders, and you're hoarding all those standard and anti-personnel bullets you'll likely never spend anyway.

 

[potatojohn]

I'll use it in later levels where recharging stations are rarer and the enemies are exclusively fleshy.

IIRC the laser pistol degrades one level per 20 shots, so a maintenance tool with maintenance 4 would give you 80 shots. So it's very unlikely to ever be a problem.

 

[baturinsky]

Btw, is it true that degrade per shot is exactly same for different modes of firing?

 

[Average Manatee]

This is the case. Makes them quite efficient in overcharge. Just carry like 5 of them around if you want infinite energy. Biggest annoyance is upgrading them, you either make due without upgrades or have to spend the modules.

As for easiest impossible build, I'd say early energy for laser pistol but switching to standard weapons for the big enemies that the laser pistol can't cover. Psi/energy is also a powerful combination with a lot of synergy if you know what skills to get.

 

[Zboj Lamignat]

Standard weapons are easiest build for all difficulty levels. Adding 1 point to heavy wepons for more overkill. Energy weapons are kinda bad even considering the "free ammo".

 

[DraQ]

SS2 is generally pretty bad mechanically (though it has some lone highlights).

 

[zwanzig_zwoelf]

I watched a bit of the first part, got suprised when I heard the voice.
But LP without a single KURWA from a guy with 'potato' in his nickname seems too weird.
Didn't watch further.

 

[potatojohn]

I'm not a potato

not that there's anything wrong with being a potato

not to say that you need my approval to be a potato

Part 6: Recreation

 

[Average Manatee]

Standard weapons are easiest build for all difficulty levels. Adding 1 point to heavy wepons for more overkill. Energy weapons are kinda bad even considering the "free ammo".

Pistol is shit though and you can't find an assault rifle till about 1/3rd of the game in, meaning you have to make due with a lot of wrenching. On lower difficulties that works fine, on impossible your health is so low and ammo so tight that it becomes hard to handle without save/load spam for melee. 1 rank to get the Laser Pistol makes this part of the game a breeze and lets you save tons of ammo throughout the game on every turret, security bot, protocol droid, etc. Then you can pump another field when the heavies come out and you need the firepower.

Energy weapons beyond the laser pistol are pretty bad. Anything the EMP rifle can kill the Laser Pistol can kill nearly as well, and the Laser Rapier alone is not that great for the cost it takes to get. It does combo well with most of the other fields however. Besides standard, you can go high energy weapons/1 heavy and really abuse overcharged pistols to kill everything but the few enemies that grenades are for. PSI can also play well with many things, letting you ghost past powerful bio enemies or absolutely wreck them with the insane damage of laser rapier + the psi ability that lets you deal something ridiculous like 10x normal damage.

 

[Sodafish]

Btw, you can use the weapon hotkey (is it 4 for the laser pistol? Can't remember exactly) to cycle through multiples of the same weapon, rather than manually doing it via the inventory screen.

 

[DraQ]

Pistol is shit though and you can't find an assault rifle till about 1/3rd of the game in, meaning you have to make due with a lot of wrenching.

You still have shotgun, though, and you'll be swimming in ammo, if only because you can pluck at least one shell off every shotgun hybrid you kill.

On lower difficulties that works fine, on impossible your health is so low and ammo so tight that it becomes hard to handle without save/load spam for melee. 1 rank to get the Laser Pistol makes this part of the game a breeze and lets you save tons of ammo throughout the game on every turret, security bot, protocol droid, etc. Then you can pump another field when the heavies come out and you need the firepower.

Energy weapons beyond the laser pistol are pretty bad. Anything the EMP rifle can kill the Laser Pistol can kill nearly as well, and the Laser Rapier alone is not that great for the cost it takes to get. It does combo well with most of the other fields however. Besides standard, you can go high energy weapons/1 heavy and really abuse overcharged pistols to kill everything but the few enemies that grenades are for. PSI can also play well with many things, letting you ghost past powerful bio enemies or absolutely wreck them with the insane damage of laser rapier + the psi ability that lets you deal something ridiculous like 10x normal damage.

I need to try PSI build plus energy up to 4. Localized pyrokinesis (due to fire shield) and cutting up bots with PSI-boosted rapier might be p. lulzy.

Should work in terms of cybermodule allowance as well, even on Impossible.
I wonder if on impossible there will be Deus Ex Realistic syndrome with my gameplay style...

 

[Average Manatee]

Pistol is shit though and you can't find an assault rifle till about 1/3rd of the game in, meaning you have to make due with a lot of wrenching.

You still have shotgun, though, and you'll be swimming in ammo, if only because you can pluck at least one shell off every shotgun hybrid you kill.

Shotgun doesn't have AP rounds though. That's your real trouble. There are lots of turrets, mechs, and protocol droids in your way. They are all hell with early standard weapons. Whereas with Laser Pistol, you rape all robots and your only weakness is the shotgun hybrids who still fall to overcharge pretty easily (potato was rather bad about this, he wasted lots of energy ammo on the wrench hybrids who are easily wrench-able). Early laser pistol basically makes the early game a cakewalk when used properly (and it continues to mow down just about everything but rumblers/psi reavers/spiders pretty well with skill and upgrades).

Granted, you can run past most of the robots, dodge protocol droids, etc. But I like killing everything in my path I guess...

I wonder how (im-)possible a game with no upgrades would be. lvl 1 standard weapons + lvl 1 energy weapons. If only you could start with lvl 1 energy + lvl 1 heavy, that probably wouldn't be so bad.

 

[DraQ]

Shotgun doesn't have AP rounds though. That's your real trouble. There are lots of turrets, mechs, and protocol droids in your way

Protocol droids don't really *need* AP ammo (and if you psi a bit there is localized pyro trololol). Turrets can be hacked/avoided/wrenched almost to death while security is disabled.
Mechs? Well, that's what AP ammo *is* for.

I'd love re-balancing/de-stupidizing/mechanical overhaul mod for SS2.

Some changes I'd like:

1. No more "you need to upgrade your black ops super duper cyber rig with cyber modules to be capable of firing basic shotgun, pistol or swinging non-wrench (any). Weapon skill would affect recoil (if any) attack rate (if non auto), reload speed (if applicable), degradation rate and jam chance instead of just being able to use given weapon. NO WEAPON, possibly with exception of fusion cannon and annelid launcher would need skill just to be usable.

2. Weapon rebalance. Seriously, fusion cannon is pretty meh for something that's supposed to spew fucking thermonuclear death and also rape all over its victims, EMP rifle is pretty underwhelming as well. OTOH AR is just rape, GL is pretty much lolpwnz0rz while only needing heavy weapons lvl1 and so on.

3. Weapon diversification/destupidification:
- how can annelids be resistant to energy and susceptible to incendiaries if laser is either burning through shit or blowing holes in it through explosive vaporization?
- why not make laser rapier glorious, but make it need charge (faithful to SS1 and logical)?
- AR is essentially pistol++, why not make pistol easier to handle with quick, repeated single shots (wildly inaccurate burst stays), but make AR primary fire triple burst (except accurate) with hefty recoil after third shot, and auto really fast and difficult to control?
- some projectiles - namely EMP and fusion look lame and are excruciatingly slow, while not do something about that?
- Maybe add more difference between shit like normal and death modes of FC (for example cone pattern scorching inferno, concentrated, rapid fire explosive beam cutting shit in half with nuksploshuns, rebounding blobs of ultraviolet-hot rape - pick 2) - in general FC should more along the lines of glorious SS1 plasma rape.
- Replace triple load for shotgun with something more sensible, maybe heavily kicking auto with reduced damage per projectile?
- TBH I'd probably replace EMP rifle with something else, maybe railgun (same model) requiring both battery and specialized ammo (1 shot ammo capacity, lengthy reload), firing modes could alternate between piercing multiple targets (AP damage) and hitscan explosion (projectile vaporizing on impact).
- EMP would get spliced into current stasis field generator, turning it into EMP based dual purpose AOE stun gun (like stasis, but organics only - something akin to PEPS)/anti-materiel focused EMP projector.
- crystal shard actually doing extra damage to psi-sensitive creatures as it should, maybe make it breakable as well.
- maybe hitscan lasers (because SS1 beams were more )
- laser pistol doing incendiary damage on norm (low powered scorching beam) and normal/explosive on overcharge (pulse vaporizing bit of the target and blowing crater in it)
- maybe HEAT or SABOT shells for SG.
- add warm-up for EMP grenades to nerf the GL a bit - simply make them like prox nades (stick or bounce), except going EMP after short delay (going whiiIINE *ZZAP*) instead of when there is enemy in range (also no impact fusing against enemies).

4. Enemy diversification/destupidification:
- annelids resistant to normal damage instead of energy (multiple redundancy in vital systems as actually stated in game instead of derpy "lol hi nrg nervous system trololol"), rumblers separated into their own category counting as annelids in terms of resistances, but half-humans in terms of anti-human weapon susceptibility
- maybe more hybrid types - whatever you could reskin dat shotgun into
- Assault bot conforming to the weapon changes - maybe just give it auto-GL?

5. Psi rebalance:
- Remote electron tampering? Making alarms go out a bit faster? Seriously? How about you GTFO and make room for something useful?
- maybe add psi resistance to those annelids that are supposed to be psionically potent (PSI has all those neat specialized powers - use them instead once in a while)

6. Plot destupidification:
- Add some series of indications (logs of otherwise) hinting that there was something that can't really be conclusively proven to not be remains of prototype, VB style hyperdrive found among grove debris on Tau Ceti V.

 

[Average Manatee]

A lot of these things are changed/balanced in the ADaoB mod. Unfortunately it's being re-worked atm.

1. No more "you need to upgrade your black ops super duper cyber rig with cyber modules to be capable of firing basic shotgun, pistol or swinging non-wrench (any). Weapon skill would affect recoil (if any) attack rate (if non auto), reload speed (if applicable), degradation rate and jam chance instead of just being able to use given weapon. NO WEAPON, possibly with exception of fusion cannon and annelid launcher would need skill just to be usable.

Problem is that almost none of these have any real effect, and degradation rate is already something that is appropriate for the maint skill. For 90% of the weapons the only statistic that matters is damage. The other 10% being the laser pistol which gets more shots.

2. Weapon rebalance. Seriously, fusion cannon is pretty meh for something that's supposed to spew fucking thermonuclear death and also rape all over its victims, EMP rifle is pretty underwhelming as well. OTOH AR is just rape, GL is pretty much lolpwnz0rz while only needing heavy weapons lvl1 and so on.

Other than nerfing the AR a bit and fixing the GL bug (which causes it to do +100% damage for the first modification), the weapons are pretty well balanced other than the EMP rifle (which is useless compared to the laser pistol) and the exotic guns (which aren't that bad on easier difficulties with more cyber modules to spare).

3. Weapon diversification/destupidification:

Ehh, some of these things are subjective or outside a pure balance mod.

5. Psi rebalance:
- Remote electron tampering? Making alarms go out a bit faster? Seriously? How about you GTFO and make room for something useful?
- maybe add psi resistance to those annelids that are supposed to be psionically potent (PSI has all those neat specialized powers - use them instead once in a while)

IMO, best option for the most part is to reprice a bunch of the powers. But you know, there's gonna be some lame things when you have that many powers available.

- Add some series of indications (logs of otherwise) hinting that there was something that can't really be conclusively proven to not be remains of prototype, VB style hyperdrive found among grove debris on Tau Ceti V.

IIRC they didn't need hyperdrive to reach Tau Ceti. Just an unreasonably fast normal-space drive (and even that I'm not sure about, but I don't recall an exact time table mentioned in-game to reference). Aimed perfectly at the spot where Tau Ceti V would be in x number of years to crash land and all that.

 

[potatojohn]

The only thing I would change is break way more found weapons so that the repair skill was less than completely useless.

 

[Average Manatee]

Breaking more weapons wouldn't really do much when you are only going to use 2 or 3 weapons anyway. There are enough auto-repair units at the moment to do that for you. Arguably this is a problem with higher difficulties which force you to streamline down to so few weapons that repair and modify are made pointless next to items that do it for you.

 

[Sodafish]

Also have pistols only take say two inventory slots rather than three.

 

[potatojohn]

Modify is still good if you're going with laser pistols though

Part 7: Deck 6

 

[DarthBehemoth]

The only thing I would change is break way more found weapons so that the repair skill was less than completely useless.

I always found it odd Hybrids carried shotguns which were broken/jammed when you picked them up Irritated the hell out of me

 

[Sodafish]

Not long to go until majestic giant teeth platforming then.