Completed Lets Play the latest Jagged Alliance 2 1.13

[Ashery]

Restart with drop all along with a possible increase to the percentage of elite troops to compensate.

 

[hoverdog]

drop all is popamole. restart, but on hard instead of insane (other options unchanged), it should really be enough.

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Finally...some casualties.

Bro, what you should do is restart the game with better Bobby Ray's selection, no sci-fi, be popamole and do Chitzena first, and lower the cost of IMPs so you can get more of the Codex characters to die for FREEDUMBZ on the cheap.

If you're going ironman, on insane, in 1.13, and with unlimited reinforcements for the enemy, it should still be a good challenge even with the above helping hands. We'll see plenty of deaths, and you might actually get this done (kidding; finishing a JA2 LP is like trying to win a land war in Russia).

 

[Black]

Is there any way to forcefully enter combat mode?

 

[SoupNazi]

Is there any way to forcefully enter combat mode?

Yeah, Ctrl+X

 

[Norfleet]

drop all is popamole. restart, but on hard instead of insane (other options unchanged), it should really be enough.

Drop All is REALISTIC. People who DIE drop their STUFF. That's how things work. That's how they SHOULD work. You shouldn't have to engage in a ridiculous dance to acquire that cool gun of his. Prying it from his cold, dead hands is the right and proper method of doing it. Reality is not popamole. Reality doesn't scale to your level.

Also, I would advise doubling the damage of all guns and tripling the damage of explosions. That way, people die when they are shot and get blown to bits when shit blows up. Stepping on a landmine shouldn't just harmlessly throw a guy to the floor, it should blow his freaking leg off.

 

[SoupNazi]

It makes the game ridiculously easy even on Insane, though. Especially with fast enemy item progression.

 

[Norfleet]

...then maybe you shouldn't turn on fast item progression. Increasing the amount of damage headed your way as directed above helps, too. It makes everything more satisfying when people die after taking realistic amounts (meaning, not a lot) of damage. And harder, since just like in real life, even fancy top of the line armor does relatively little when you get shot in the head with a high-caliber round.

 

[hoverdog]

drop all is popamole. restart, but on hard instead of insane (other options unchanged), it should really be enough.

Drop All is REALISTIC. People who DIE drop their STUFF. That's how things work. That's how they SHOULD work. You shouldn't have to engage in a ridiculous dance to acquire that cool gun of his. Prying it from his cold, dead hands is the right and proper method of doing it. Reality is not popamole. Reality doesn't scale to your level.

Also, I would advise doubling the damage of all guns and tripling the damage of explosions. That way, people die when they are shot and get blown to bits when shit blows up. Stepping on a landmine shouldn't just harmlessly throw a guy to the floor, it should blow his freaking leg off.

it is, but it eliminates some of JA's finer points - scavenging for equipment, ammo, guns and other stuff. after Omerta you're swimming in LBEs, good guns full of ammo, armor and whatnot. take drassen airport and you won't be changing gear for most of the game.

 

[Black]

Drop All is REALISTIC. People who DIE drop their STUFF.

How do you know?

 

[RK47]

Drop all isn't overpowered when he's outnumbered.
The gun condition will prevent it from being reliable and I can see he has no luxury of time to repair, it all balances out. It also provides a dynamic in the game where getting a new gun in the middle of battle can change the whole game plan immediately.

Instead of, 'Oh, another pistol. Yay.' we get 'A dragunov! Now I can play long range! Etc'

 

[Norfleet]

it is, but it eliminates some of JA's finer points - scavenging for equipment, ammo, guns and other stuff. after Omerta you're swimming in LBEs, good guns full of ammo, armor and whatnot.

Omerta has good guns? Since when? Unless you're playing on super-fast progression, the stuff they drop is utter crap, often worse than the stuff you started with. Sure, you're swimming in some rather dubious shot up equipment, but so what? That's what they had, and you SCAVENGED it from their DEAD BODIES, as is proper!

Or would you rather go and kill spiders that drop polearms? That seems far more popamole to me. Killing people and looting their corpses is what it's all about.

take drassen airport and you won't be changing gear for most of the game.

If you successfully take and hold Drassen, you've BEATEN the craziest portion of the game. That's pretty much the game right there, the epic Drassen battles, where your band of horribly outnumbered mercenaries must defend the place for days from waves and waves of attacking enemies. Why, the Drassen Defense is pretty much a game in and of itself.

 

[Black]

Just adjust the difficulty already and roll with it. Drop all, normal Bobby Ray's, think about disabling Drassen counter-attack and fucking go, so far this is the shortest JA2 LP ever

 

[hoverdog]

Omerta has good guns? Since when? Unless you're playing on super-fast progression, the stuff they drop is utter crap, often worse than the stuff you started with.

so, what's the point of drop all, then?

 

[Cassidy]

First of all, I'll take a mix of hoverdog and Norfleet advices, as it's clear most would rather for me to restart it at less ridiculously near impossible odds.

From hoverdog, I'll take the suggestion of playing on Expert rather than INSANE, but keep all the other tough setups equal, and no dropopamole all. From Norfleet, I'll take the suggestion of boosting damage ratios for guns and specially explosives.

Also, on something that will work both in favor of the mercs and of their enemies just like boosting damage:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Iron_sight ... ble_sights

// This setting represents the longest distance at which Iron Sights are 100% effective.
// Beyond this range, shooting accuracy begins to drop, and a scope will be required
// to avoid that drop.
// ALL SCOPE RANGES ARE DETERMINED BY THIS VALUE. For instance, a 2x scope will
// negate penalties for shooting at twice this distance. A 10x scope will 
// negate penalties for shooting at ten times this distance.
// By decreasing this value, you can make all shots more accurate, and naturally
// make scopes more powerful.
// 
// This value is an INTEGER, with a range of 10 to 1000. The distance is
// measured in METERS, not tiles, so 100 means 10 tiles.
NORMAL_SHOOTING_DISTANCE = 100

IMO the ideal would be for each weapon to have separate iron sight ranges and for the range of scopes to work independently from theirs(As far as I remember the CZ 452 shown in the linked Wikipedia article is available in JA 2 1.13 for example, and it would be totally useful as a early to mid game sniper rifle even without a scope if it came with a up to 30 tiles range adjustable iron sight), but as it is not possible, and I'm no modder, I just changed this setting from 7 to 10 tiles (100 meters), which I find a bit less arbitrary, and some of those 12.7mm high-powered rifles and the AWM are technically more than able of having a 1 kilometer effective range.

By the way, I won't be showing again Omerta or any battle along the road to Drassen, because this time I'll go to San Mona first, Chitzena second, Drassen last. And speaking of Drassen, no, I didn't disable the counter-attack.

Only question now is whether to consider the dead characters dead or not. I think I won't. Casualties will happen anyway.

 

[Cassidy]

If you read the OP again you'll notice I activated the new agressive AI in the game, same on limitless reinforcements for Deirdranna.

;------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------
; Queen's Pool
;
; These settings control how many troops the queen has for using against you, how many new troops she gets every day,
; and so on. If the queen runs out of troops, she cannot dispatch new army units to send against you.
;------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

; Determines whether or not the queen has unlimited troops. If she does, most of the settings below are completely ignored.
UNLIMITED_POOL_OF_TROOPS_NOVICE 	= TRUE
UNLIMITED_POOL_OF_TROOPS_EXPERIENCED	= TRUE
UNLIMITED_POOL_OF_TROOPS_EXPERT 	= TRUE
UNLIMITED_POOL_OF_TROOPS_INSANE 	= TRUE

 

[Thor Kaufman]

Good thing you changed from insane to expert.
Insane turns JA2 into a total grind especially if you want to defend your cities and removes all the fun from it.

Btw if there's still room put me in the team. Either recruit my alter ego from AIM or make me a dextrous doctor with decent agility, some tech ability and marksmanship. Character traits psychotic and asshole.

 

[PorkaMorka]

Drop all kind of offends me because it removes a significant aspect of the game. Scrounging and stealing equipment, fighting with inferior items for long periods of time.

But it might be worth it to avoid having to search through all those god damn cupboards for loot. I have spent at least 5 hours of my life searching cupboards in JA2. Probably a lot more than that. And I'm pretty sick of it.

 

[Majestic47]

.......I stopped giving a shit when I realized cupboards in civilian areas don't give much. Maybe a random 1st aid kit etc or a bubble gum.

But try doing that at Alma and Xmas has arrived folks. That's the kind of loot I expect from military towns.

 

[pipka]

You can tweak Drop Rates with xml editor. Augmenting chances for ammos or even setting it to 100% might be useful. It's pretty straightforward and doesn't require restart, so you can set it back after a while.

 

[RK47]

Is the revolution so short-lived?

 

[Cassidy]

It's back!

As a recap: Expert Difficulty, 75% chance of ammo drop, firearms dealing 2x more damage and explosives 3x, 100m maximum iron sight range. All other settings unchanged.

==================

The Game is Rigged from the Start: San Mona

A full team is assembled, including Orgasm, who has some skills with knives as well.

After clearing Omerta, they realize that Drassen was too heavily guarded for a direct assault. Better for them to secure another source of income first. But along their way, they meet hostiles that are too much of a threat in an area with too little cover.

Bee watches their patrols with a 10x scope as they attempt to sneak through.

Getting out of there undetected would be the safest approach. There is nothing strategically important here worth fighting for.

Along the way, they found an isolated enemy, which means Ulminati's silenced SMG could be useful.

Without alerting any other foe, he is taken down by Ulminati.

BTW I changed Ulminati's clothes colors for one reason that start with Duke and ends with Nukem. And he has kicked far more ass. Coincidence but nevertheless:

Bee shows to the team why getting out is the wisest approach.

Luckily, they scavenge an assault rifle from the enemy soldier they killed before departing. It is an Indian crap that has no automatic fire but it's still better than the weapons they currently have. After getting it, they move west.

Quietly, they witness a short-lived battle between a very large number of enemy soldiers and a few so called Bloodcats. The creatures stood no chance and were promptly slaughtered. They knew they would most likely share a similar fate if they tried.

Thus once again they slowly and carefully sneaked through the woods.

But their stealth skills weren't enough. Thus only one thing was left to do: RUN!

Because if they tried to fight them under these circumstances, it would have been a total slaughter.

They made it through just in time, but peace was still a distant perspective. Chitzena was getting close, but they were exhausted, and needed somewhere to stop by where they wouldn't be shot on sight.

WELCOME TO NEW VEGAS SAN MONA.

Orgasm goes to a leather apparel shop, where the owner tries to sell a Kevlar treated leather suit, but they decline. After Azira continues to speak with the owner friendly, he finally explains the only reason he is in this seedy town:

Her sister was made into a sex slave for the thugs that run this city.

Stealth, surprise and subterfuge are Ulminati specialties. A. Ryan to the rescue! But first, why not take a look at what this city could provide?

Femshep EXTREME senses detect something XXXTREME nobody was bothering with. Lesbian alien sex surely led to considerable changes in the types of pr0n Femshep enjoys. Afterwards they move further through San Mona.

In one of its bars, they find a man selling explosives. Femshep becomes ecstatic about it and quickly asks for him to show what he got.

A WIRE CUTTER!!!!!!!!!!

Femshep:

Later, as expected from a Kodex Kool Krew, they head to the porn store. A very obnoxious lesbian is there complaining about the lack of variety.

Until Femshep gave her that tape she "borrowed".

Somebody buys and sells guns in the back of a porn store. Exactly what they needed!

Surplus 10mm SMGs are sold, while duckbills and a muzzle flash are bought. Unfortunately his selection was quite lacking right now, even in 9mm SMG ammo, and there were no scopes. Because Femshep would like something EXTREME to represent her nature, she then heads to the Tatoo Parlor next to the porn and gun shop, and Azira comes as the party spokesperson.

: And by the way, I'd love to buy that Leather shop but that cute Angel refuses to sell it.

Once Angel's sister is rescued, we should see if we could sell something this faggot.

Watching thug patrols make you wish for a nuclear winter.

But everything went like a textbook covert rescue.

The Leather vest treated with Kevlar has reduced protection compared to a Kevlar vest, buch a higher coverage, meaning the odds of a lucky shot bypassing it completely are much smaller.

Note: I forgot to sell the deed to the fag before heading to Chitzena. No big deal, it's not like I have much purpose for money until I take Drassen Airport to get Bobby Ray's orders delivered anyway and they will be heading back to San Mona.

But first they scavenged what they could in the town for supplies. Orgasm and Black got Wood Camo Kits, and other useful stuff was found too. Femshep then went to fix their stuff, particularly a rambo knife that was badly damaged after several tries of leveraging doors because a swiss army knife is only a very effective lockpick in very skilled hands.

After some hours they are ready to get to Chitzena.

Predictably, along the way they meet some threats. Although this time they aren't really outnumbered, they are most likely out-gunned and out-ranged. Sneaking through is the safest way, but:

No guts, no glory

First, they sneak through to get in the best possible position for an attack.

Several rocks, bushes and trees will make it hard for enemies to try hitting them from beyond the range of their own weapons, and thus, with a silenced MP5, the battle begins.

Bee's assault rifle proves particularly deadly. The battle rages on dangerously, but crawling inch by inch very carefully and aways ready to fire, they prove they are not cowards for never picking up fights along the road.

And thus Deirdranna lost eleven soldiers. Time to loot for ammo and possibly better weapons.

Not counting a Calico SMG that will replace yet another 10mm SMG with diminishing ammo, this is it. Bee won't have to worry about running out of ammo for her assault rifle for a long time too. The UDAR is pretty much a revolver firing shotgun shells, and although deemed too unskilled for the coming assault, Ira will take it as it is a slow gun, and thus not that useful as a sidearm for the main forces.

As they would rather launch a night operation, Femshep once again uses the time for repairing some of their newest acquisitions.

Morning will come soon, and thus, except for Ira, who will arrive some minutes later purely as a backup doctor, they will now launch their offensive to take Chitzena, the first strategically important objective in this campaign. Once Chitzena is secured, then they will risk going to Drassen, but not before another shopping in San Mona, and hopefully next time Devin and Tony will have better hardware for sale.

 

[Azira]

Update!

 

[Desmodus Rotundus]

Sweet, some amidst all the skyrim and derp age lp's

 

[Edward_R_Murrow]

Excellent.

Now just get some people killed. Blood for the blood god and all that.