Underrail: The Incline Awakens

[Gord]

I'm currently lvl 14 or so and doing some quests in CC. Dex is at 10, but Per only 6 or 7 (I pushed Dex and Int). I've also taken the Chem-pistol crafting perk, but I've some serious trouble finding good parts. Usually I find parts for Acid Pistols, but with the highest quality available (and craftable), I only get 33% chance to root an enemy in place, with 2 attacks/round. Sure, they are rooted in place, but the additional damage is still puny (despite the perk).
I'm still looking for more fire/cryo pistol parts, they seem to have a really shitty chance to spawn.

 

[Inf0mercial]

I'm currently lvl 14 or so and doing some quests in CC. Dex is at 10, but Per only 6 or 7 (I pushed Dex and Int). I've also taken the Chem-pistol crafting perk, but I've some serious trouble finding good parts. Usually I find parts for Acid Pistols, but with the highest quality available (and craftable), I only get 33% chance to root an enemy in place, with 2 attacks/round. Sure, they are rooted in place, but the additional damage is still puny (despite the perk).
I'm still looking for more fire/cryo pistol parts, they seem to have a really shitty chance to spawn.

How are you finding ammo? I guess 10 vials a part and the massive amount of acid and cryo you find in shops would help but do you have ammo issues if you try to stick to one damage type?

 

[Ellef]

Anyone got some experience with chemical or energy pistols?

This might be useful for you, it is comentary how to build char which specifically uses energy, chem pistols.

14 mins of stilted English to tell me what could be summed up in about 2 sentences.

 

[ArchAngel]

I am kind of stuck in DC again. Got a question about Arke power station that you enter though the map with burrowers.

Spoiler

It is map north of Faceless camp. Another place I entered without a quest, don't know if that is the problem. I got no clue how to advance here now. I turned off all 3 power levels on two maps there, opened all doors that are not red and tried to crawl through ventilation space a bit. Two things I could not do something with is the boulder that asks for high Strength and a red door that asks for 130 hacking. Is one of those two required or did I miss something else?

Can anyone answer me this?

As for my impressions of DC so far

Spoiler

I went west at first and noticed shoorms are hard to skill and respawn within 20 seconds and automatically see stealth characters. So my stealth/crossbow guy without biology or chemistry quit that area and went north.
There I got irritated by 40% penalty to everything and how when you kill an enemy they respawn after 20 second as well. So I just proceeded to stealth through everything. After a while I figured out there are areas where the debuff disappears and I can run through areas while new one is being gathered. Still the "on the clock" feel DC gives me all the time is pretty irritating. I cannot imagine going through it with a non-stealth character, I think I would go berserk. I don't plan to take another character into it until this shit is fixed or stealth is now part of each and every character I make.

 

[Eyestabber]

To me crit-immune enemies in the late game means two things:

- Forget about that energy weapons crit build. Save yourself the disappointment
- My overall strategy of going for consistent damage (smart modules, bigger bursts etc) instead of relying on crits is proven "right" once again.

Also, 75% DR means green bullets are mandatory. But what about DT? If their DT is high enough, AR might trump SMG in the end...

 

[Gord]

How are you finding ammo? I guess 10 vials a part and the massive amount of acid and cryo you find in shops would help but do you have ammo issues if you try to stick to one damage type?

Tbh, I don't know. I've not used it much due to it (so far at least) looking so underwhelming compared to my usual SMGs or Snipers. Acid can also be obtained from mutants, but requires some biology. The other stuff seems to show up in shops commonly enough, but only in low-ish quantities. I'd guess that Acid Pistols are easiest since you can farm muties to some extend.

 

[Jack Dandy]

About the crit-resistant fellas ...
I'm obviously a bit biased, as my build isn't focused on crits- but, isn't it consistent with the rest of the game?
I mean, some builds are great against certain opponents, and not so great against others. When you reach these others, you are still offered enough ways to find your way around them, or beat them somehow.

So isn't it all well and good?

 

[Tito Anic]

14 mins of stilted English to tell me what could be summed up in about 2 sentences.

Scientist aka energy,chem pistol cowboy aka its all about the crits

base stats:

strenght 6
dexterity 10+(14-16)
agility 3
constitution 3
perception 8
will 3
intelligence 7

skills:

guns
throwing
hacking
lockpicking
mechanics
electronics
chemistry
biology
tailoring

feats:

recklessness
aimed shot
opportunist
steadfast aim
mad chemist
practical physicist
critical power

 

[epeli]

I still need to test the mechanics of re-entering stealth during combat thoroughly. I know that under many conditions, enemies will still have the "red eye" even if you sprint halfway across the map and around two corners. I think they have to "lose interest and give up" for it to work properly. Can anyone shed light on this?

You need to incapacitate enemies before you can hide from them. Both stealthing or breaking LoS works.

Enemies also do "lose interest and give up" if they can't get to you within about 4 turns, but that's a different thing.

They're crit-immune?

crit-immune enemies in the late game

About the crit-resistant fellas ...

There's also a lore reason why those specific creatures have certain characteristics.

Spoiler

The shroomlings are another adaptation of the Foundry psimorphs and share a number of traits with them, including the high resistances and crit immunity. The adaptation Ezra had worked on before.

However, crit immunity is more fitting for living rocks than mushrooms. And the shroomlings are immune to poison as well. Maybe it's an oversight -- the creatures are basically made from the same template, both lore-wise and technically. Scratch that, it's intended.

 

[Zetor]

About the crit-resistant fellas ...
I'm obviously a bit biased, as my build isn't focused on crits- but, isn't it consistent with the rest of the game?
I mean, some builds are great against certain opponents, and not so great against others. When you reach these others, you are still offered enough ways to find your way around them, or beat them somehow.

So isn't it all well and good?

As I said in previous posts, the problem is that a lot of builds can't do that. Well, to be a bit more precise, crossbows (and traps, since a crossbow-user will definitely be using them) can't do that. Gun users can switch to a sniper rifle or AR (if they haven't dumped strength) or even an SMG or magnum with AP or special ammo and do fine. Crossbow users can um... use lots of poison bolts and pick up talents that are less than marginally useful elsewhere in the game (Hypertoxicity), and woe betide the crossbowman who doesn't have Biology. Elemental Bolts is sadly underwhelming. As for traps... well, there's no counterplay for a teleporting enemy, except maybe planting HE mines all over and blowing them up when it pops up near them.

I suspect that just giving crossbows an armor-piercing option would resolve most of my complaints entirely. That option could be as simple as making serrated bolts worth a damn (they're barely worth the carry weight as they are... yes, even against soft targets) by making sure they bleed for at least SOME damage against heavy armor... or it could be some goofy shit like a heavy crossbow / arbalest that requires the player to stand still for an entire round before firing (and make a lot of noise), but do decent armor-piercing damage in exchange.

 

[Sykar]

Eh, hypotermia probably helps against that mobs, also think of the thermodynamic destabilaztion damage they'll inflict!

BTW do not cast cold spells on enemy that is inflicted with thermo.des. You'll just douse the victim.

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

About the crit-resistant fellas ...
I'm obviously a bit biased, as my build isn't focused on crits- but, isn't it consistent with the rest of the game?
I mean, some builds are great against certain opponents, and not so great against others. When you reach these others, you are still offered enough ways to find your way around them, or beat them somehow.

So isn't it all well and good?

I think - especially with energy weapons - this is doubly true. You already use a weapon that the vast majority of enemies have little to no resistance to. It's not like you're dealing with the insane mech resistances that nearly every other character is.

 

[mixer]

Game where i can kill a fire elemental with firebolt is not my type of game.

 

[ArchAngel]

About the crit-resistant fellas ...
I'm obviously a bit biased, as my build isn't focused on crits- but, isn't it consistent with the rest of the game?
I mean, some builds are great against certain opponents, and not so great against others. When you reach these others, you are still offered enough ways to find your way around them, or beat them somehow.

So isn't it all well and good?

As I said in previous posts, the problem is that a lot of builds can't do that. Well, to be a bit more precise, crossbows (and traps, since a crossbow-user will definitely be using them) can't do that. Gun users can switch to a sniper rifle or AR (if they haven't dumped strength) or even an SMG or magnum with AP or special ammo and do fine. Crossbow users can um... use lots of poison bolts and pick up talents that are less than marginally useful elsewhere in the game (Hypertoxicity), and woe betide the crossbowman who doesn't have Biology. Elemental Bolts is sadly underwhelming. As for traps... well, there's no counterplay for a teleporting enemy, except maybe planting HE mines all over and blowing them up when it pops up near them.

I suspect that just giving crossbows an armor-piercing option would resolve most of my complaints entirely. That option could be as simple as making serrated bolts worth a damn (they're barely worth the carry weight as they are... yes, even against soft targets) by making sure they bleed for at least SOME damage against heavy armor... or it could be some goofy shit like a heavy crossbow / arbalest that requires the player to stand still for an entire round before firing (and make a lot of noise), but do decent armor-piercing damage in exchange.

Funny thing is that in real life crossbow has more armor piercing power than low caliber guns while Styg made crossbows be weaker in Underrai.

 

[epeli]

Funny thing is that in real life crossbow has more armor piercing power than low caliber guns while Styg made crossbows be weaker in Underrai.

Funny thing is that crossbows do pierce bulletproof vests in Underrail.

 

[Eyestabber]

About the crit-resistant fellas ...
I'm obviously a bit biased, as my build isn't focused on crits- but, isn't it consistent with the rest of the game?
I mean, some builds are great against certain opponents, and not so great against others. When you reach these others, you are still offered enough ways to find your way around them, or beat them somehow.

So isn't it all well and good?

Not really. Because some builds and build paths ditch their options in favor of crits and that choice turns out to be a trap choice in the end.

Blaine already provided an example of this: the psi user can go either for tranquility or psychosis. They both seem like viable paths for most of the game, but in the end one turns out to be a trap.

Take a high dex build. You can go smg, gunpowder pistols, energy pistol or chem pistol. But since crazy high crits is the only thing energy weapons really have going on for them, EE users play the entire game one shoting people only to reach the end and hear: "oh, you chose EW instead of SMG like all the cool kids? Well, eat a dick, then!"

Snipers can use snipe ("this ability can't crit" turns out to be a good thing, huh? who would've thunk!), but should forget about their bread and butter feat Aimed Shot.

In the end, burst fire (and other builds favouring reliable damage over crits) has all the answers. I don't see that as a good thing, since the main selling point of the game is having so many viable builds to try and have fun with.

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

How many enemies in DC are actually crit immune? I was a fister when I finished so I didn't really notice it (although I can confirm that big bad and others are NOT bleed resistant so vile weaponry and taste for blood will do juuuuuuuuuuuuuuuust fine).

 

[epeli]

How many enemies in DC are actually crit immune? I was a fister when I finished so I didn't really notice it (although I can confirm that big bad and others are NOT bleed resistant so vile weaponry and taste for blood will do juuuuuuuuuuuuuuuust fine).

AFAIK only the

Spoiler

mushrooms.

So the entire game has a grand total of 2 enemy types immune to crits. Crit builds are completely useless traps. Sawyer save us!

 

[Tito Anic]

So the entire game has a grand total of 2 enemy types immune to crits. Crit builds are completely useless traps. Sawyer save us!

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

How many enemies in DC are actually crit immune? I was a fister when I finished so I didn't really notice it (although I can confirm that big bad and others are NOT bleed resistant so vile weaponry and taste for blood will do juuuuuuuuuuuuuuuust fine).

AFAIK only the

Spoiler

mushrooms.

So the entire game has a grand total of 2 enemy types immune to crits. Crit builds are completely useless traps. Sawyer save us!

I will say this - those enemies do fucking suck. Them and the

Spoiler

deep worms

were probably the only two enemies that I really hated.

After giving it some thought, I'm trying to figure out what the issue with DC is for most. I didn't think it was that hard, and I thought some of the areas

Spoiler

Especially Arke Power Station and the residential area

were very well done and incredibly atmospheric. The debuff wasn't a huge issue, and the perk that deals with it does help a ton even then.

Then again, I think I ended up having an incredibly strong build (maybe even an OP build), so that could have changed my opinion. I could see how an xbow user would have a problem especially - I do think xbows need a lot of love.

 

[Zetor]

Then again, I think I ended up having an incredibly strong build (maybe even an OP build), so that could have changed my opinion. I could see how an xbow user would have a problem especially - I do think xbows need a lot of love.

Yep. I mean, this guy is not crit immune, but he may as well be...

endgame fight screenshot spoilerz

 

[Eyestabber]

So the entire game has a grand total of 2 enemy types immune to crits. Crit builds are completely useless traps. Sawyer save us!

I never reached the DC. I was going by the complaints ITT and was under the impression that every single critter in DC was crit immune. If that is not the case, then I'll withdraw my criticism until I see the content for myself. Err...providing your opinion based on other ppl's opinions instead of first hand knowledge: never a winning strategy

 

[ArchAngel]

OK, instead of wasting time of complaining about crits, can anyone here tell me already how to do the Ark Power Plant because I cannot continue until that shit is finished? And it seems that is critical to finding everything else

One of bigger complaints from me about DC is how hacking suddenly jumps to 130+ difficulties when before I don't think I seen more than 100

Spoiler

The elevator to DC is 120 or something but in DC fucking boxes with random loot are suddenly 130?!?!!?!?!?!?!

. The whole area is really badly designed. It needs 2 more months of polishing.

 

[hell bovine]

So the entire game has a grand total of 2 enemy types immune to crits. Crit builds are completely useless traps. Sawyer save us!

I never reached the DC. I was going by the complaints ITT and was under the impression that every single critter in DC was crit immune. If that is not the case, then I'll withdraw my criticism until I see the content for myself. Err...providing your opinion based on other ppl's opinions instead of first hand knowledge: never a winning strategy

No, deep caverns don't have that many crit immune enemies. My psychosis-based mage did well in those areas I've uncovered, because the damage output of metathermics at higher levels, combined with grenades, is enough. That still doesn't make deep caverns encounters any less boring (the backstory that you can decipher from the various information tidbits is interesting, though). Which is why I'm taking a short break for now to experiment with cheesy ways to kill NPCs in cities.

 

[MasterSmithFandango]

OK, instead of wasting time of complaining about crits, can anyone here tell me already how to do the Ark Power Plant because I cannot continue until that shit is finished? And it seems that is critical to finding everything else

One of bigger complaints from me about DC is how hacking suddenly jumps to 130+ difficulties when before I don't think I seen more than 100. The whole area is really badly designed. It needs 2 more months of polishing.

Spoiler

Look for keycards, basically. Keep going in and eventually you'll be able to shut down the security and reroute the power to different areas of DC.