Underrail: The Incline Awakens

[ItsChon]

but I find Underrail a paler shadow of it. Most of the early levels start out as a Fallout asset dump.

Agree to disagree I suppose. Underrail's use of color is much more aesthetically pleasing to me than Fallouts, but it is what it is.

Though I don't understand what people mean when they describe Expedition as busy and messy? In what way?

 

[Blaine]

Though I don't understand what people mean when they describe Expedition as busy and messy? In what way?

Go to your private quarters in SGS and really take in the scenery. At its essence, it's simple, clean, and unadorned, though with several points of interest.

Now go to any floor in the Nexus of Technology and take in all the junk and detritus on the floor and walls, the elaborate and heavily decorated props and scenery, and the very high quantities of said props and interactable objects.

It's neither a good nor a bad thing, in my view. It's just a thing. There does also seem to be more raw artistic skill (or perhaps time and effort) behind many of the new art assets when compared to those from years ago, though the older ones are by no means bad or even amateurish.

As for the complaints that some of Expedition's areas feel copy-pasted, they're quite objectively valid, and the Nexus of Technology is again a great example. It's the same floor and nearly identical layout copy-pasted six times, but with rearranged props and set dressing. Contrast with SGS, where each individual floor is totally unique and can be recognized in a quick glance.

 

[Parabalus]

Some pics to add to what Blaine is saying.

This one is without many party, yet it already looks far busier than the SGS one:

Spoiler

Can't find a good pic of Hollow Earth sadly.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Can someone tell me why the "best" rpgs all share the same primitive graphic and ugly interfaces and menus? it's a matter of nostalgia or what?

Two things you never complain about on the Codex: Graphics and difficulty.

I actually think Underrail looks fine. Not great but fine, especially for a long-ass indie RPG made mostly by one guy.

 

[ItsChon]

Go to your private quarters in SGS and really take in the scenery. At its essence, it's simple, clean, and unadorned, though with several points of interest.

Now go to any floor in the Nexus of Technology and take in all the junk and detritus on the floor and walls, the elaborate and heavily decorated props and scenery, and the very high quantities of said props and interactable objects.

It's neither a good nor a bad thing, in my view. It's just a thing. There does also seem to be more raw artistic skill (or perhaps time and effort) behind many of the new art assets when compared to those from years ago, though the older ones are by no means bad or even amateurish.

As for the complaints that some of Expedition's areas feel copy-pasted, they're quite objectively valid, and the Nexus of Technology is again a great example. It's the same floor and nearly identical layout copy-pasted six times, but with rearranged props and set dressing. Contrast with SGS, where each individual floor is totally unique and can be recognized in a quick glance.

The debris and all the stuff fit thematically though. They're supposed to be packed ruins that are filthy with junk and detritus. As for your point regarding NoT, to that I say fair enough and I agree.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

That's how Underrail plays for me. Since every single enemy (more or less) is capable of burning me down from full health to dead in a single turn, I have to win initiative in every fight and make sure every enemy is dead or otherwise unable to attack me every round. Okay. It's certainly doable, but I wouldn't call that "easy" by any definition of difficulty.

That's why with squishy characters like psions people tend to go the sneaky route: if you initiate combat from stealth, you go first. The other two solutions are: high con tin can (doesn't matter if you go last) and high initiative (when testing guns with Patsy I gave her gunslinger, paranoia and trigger happy - she had 40+ to initiative and that was on a low level character).

My character is high Con (9) but that 25% health hit sucks. I also have enough agility to take Sprint but only 3 dex. I'm planning to take paranoia next level (16) to see if that helps, I don't have the stats for trigger happy and gunslinger seems like a waste of points.

(as an aside I'd note in 3.5E D&D Improved Initiative feat has no pre reqs. Why would you limit initiative feats only to high dex characters who are the least likely to actually need them?)

 

[Blaine]

The debris and all the stuff fit thematically though. They're supposed to be packed ruins that are filthy with junk and detritus.

Yeah, that's true. I never said there wasn't any reasoning behind it, though; and regardless of the reasoning, the contrast in styles is visually obvious.

 

[Tigranes]

That's how Underrail plays for me. Since every single enemy (more or less) is capable of burning me down from full health to dead in a single turn, I have to win initiative in every fight and make sure every enemy is dead or otherwise unable to attack me every round. Okay. It's certainly doable, but I wouldn't call that "easy" by any definition of difficulty.

That's why with squishy characters like psions people tend to go the sneaky route: if you initiate combat from stealth, you go first. The other two solutions are: high con tin can (doesn't matter if you go last) and high initiative (when testing guns with Patsy I gave her gunslinger, paranoia and trigger happy - she had 40+ to initiative and that was on a low level character).

My character is high Con (9) but that 25% health hit sucks. I also have enough agility to take Sprint but only 3 dex. I'm planning to take paranoia next level (16) to see if that helps, I don't have the stats for trigger happy and gunslinger seems like a waste of points.

(as an aside I'd note in 3.5E D&D Improved Initiative feat has no pre reqs. Why would you limit initiative feats only to high dex characters who are the least likely to actually need them?)

What's your build generally? You want to focus, so that your strengths are laser sharp to take down the enemy before they get a turn to wreck shit. Underrail's about alpha strikes, disables and gaining control of the battlefield, rather than maintaining equilibrium for a drawn out match. If you've put 9 in CON then face tanking is what you should develop. You want Paranoia for the +5 initiative? When you have 3 DEX? What's the point? That's like giving yourself 10 extra HP when you have 3 CON.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

That's how Underrail plays for me. Since every single enemy (more or less) is capable of burning me down from full health to dead in a single turn, I have to win initiative in every fight and make sure every enemy is dead or otherwise unable to attack me every round. Okay. It's certainly doable, but I wouldn't call that "easy" by any definition of difficulty.

That's why with squishy characters like psions people tend to go the sneaky route: if you initiate combat from stealth, you go first. The other two solutions are: high con tin can (doesn't matter if you go last) and high initiative (when testing guns with Patsy I gave her gunslinger, paranoia and trigger happy - she had 40+ to initiative and that was on a low level character).

My character is high Con (9) but that 25% health hit sucks. I also have enough agility to take Sprint but only 3 dex. I'm planning to take paranoia next level (16) to see if that helps, I don't have the stats for trigger happy and gunslinger seems like a waste of points.

(as an aside I'd note in 3.5E D&D Improved Initiative feat has no pre reqs. Why would you limit initiative feats only to high dex characters who are the least likely to actually need them?)

What's your build generally? You want to focus, so that your strengths are laser sharp to take down the enemy before they get a turn to wreck shit. Underrail's about alpha strikes, disables and gaining control of the battlefield, rather than maintaining equilibrium for a drawn out match. If you've put 9 in CON then face tanking is what you should develop. You want Paranoia for the +5 initiative? When you have 3 DEX? What's the point? That's like giving yourself 10 extra HP when you have 3 CON.

5 initiative would help win initiative contests. My base value of 14 is evenly matched with common enemies, so a 50/50 dice roll would change to a 75/25 dice roll, which isn't bad. Cut down on a few reloads. That and the detection should help with the stupid mines everywhere. Either that or crafting feats at this point.

my stats are like str 3 dex 3 agi 6 con 9 per 3 int 7 wil 12. Psychosis/Mania/Premeditation/Locus of Control. Metathermics/Thought control/Kinetics(whatever) maxed, points spread to lockpicking/hacking/persuasion and crafting skills as needed. I have 25 in pickpocket and mercantile I would really like to have put in stealth, but oh well. 0 in all weapons and dodge/evasion.

As long as I go first I usually win the fight, assuming I can see all enemies and they are close enough together. I don't have cryo ball yet but I think that will help. Usually my fireball is not quite strong enough to kill everyone. My armor blocks about 50 points of bullet damage and most enemies have little trouble punching through that but I can at least survive for a few rounds, if someone hits melee range or has a crossbow I am toast.

I'm using PSI beetle regen vest w/ kevlar, universal PSI headband with crit damage boost, and some shield I looted. Plan to build a better shield soon now that I'm seeing the parts in shops.

 

[ciox]

My only problem with Expedition's clutter is that there are very often so many interactable objects in the same spot that their tooltips overlap into a terrible mess where you can't read what's going on and are liable to miss something. That should happen pretty much... never. But it's a common occurence in Expedition.

 

[Tigranes]

Master theorycrafters here can tell you better than I can on the numbers. My intuition is that 14+5 won't get you very far, and that Paranoia generally isn't a hugely valuable feat. But I can always be wrong. With 3 PER the detection won't do much, either.

OK, so a high CON psion - never went for such a mix. The vest is fine but it won't offer enough in sheer protection - as level 16 you should be able to craft yourself a 1k shield. My general go-to is Low + High + Efficiency. I guess the issue is that it's not built for full tin can (you want psi beetle), but you're too slow, and presumably all the PSI feats meant you didn't stack survivability stuff either. Did you not take Force User? 4-turn force field is godly, though the empowered punch is probably not so great for you so far into the game.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[hell bovine]

My character is high Con (9) but that 25% health hit sucks. I also have enough agility to take Sprint but only 3 dex. I'm planning to take paranoia next level (16) to see if that helps, I don't have the stats for trigger happy and gunslinger seems like a waste of points.

(as an aside I'd note in 3.5E D&D Improved Initiative feat has no pre reqs. Why would you limit initiative feats only to high dex characters who are the least likely to actually need them?)

Decide on one method and build your character for that, instead of trying to go in all directions at the same time. If you want to go the high inititative route, then it needs to be on a character with high dex & agi. If you want to go the resistant tin can route, then it's heavy armor with juggernaut, conditioning etc. Failing all that, there is stealth & initiating combat manually, because you don't need high agility to sneak succesfully. Heck, if you craft the right items, you don't even need high stealth.

As for the D&D comparison, I disagree. If your character has the agility of a turtle, then they shouldn't have the reflexes of a mangoose.

edit:for psi tactics, it's all about mixing spells. E.g locus of control > mass enrage > run away to hide out of sight while they kill each other. For metathermics vs. groups try destabilization, the explode damage is hp-based. Much better than fireball.

 

[Tigranes]

Yeah, mass enrage is just so fucking good, when used right it will win most fights on its own for your character. You can even use force field to funnel people into a tight zone (not by blocking the path completely but by leaving 1 tile corridor), and then a frag grenade + mass enrage = half-dead dudes who stab each other instead of healing up then smashing you in the face.

 

[hell bovine]

A shotgun with 20p shells is also nice for detection, because stray pellets can knock sneaking enemies right out of stealth while they try to jump you. Like those annoying spiders.

On a side note, my expedition experience so far can be summed up as: locusts, locusts, locusts > crabs, crabs, crabs > spiders, spiders, spiders.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Master theorycrafters here can tell you better than I can on the numbers. My intuition is that 14+5 won't get you very far, and that Paranoia generally isn't a hugely valuable feat. But I can always be wrong. With 3 PER the detection won't do much, either.

OK, so a high CON psion - never went for such a mix. The vest is fine but it won't offer enough in sheer protection - as level 16 you should be able to craft yourself a 1k shield. My general go-to is Low + High + Efficiency. I guess the issue is that it's not built for full tin can (you want psi beetle), but you're too slow, and presumably all the PSI feats meant you didn't stack survivability stuff either. Did you not take Force User? 4-turn force field is godly, though the empowered punch is probably not so great for you so far into the game.

I do have force user and the force field is a nice ability to get out of trouble spots sometimes but usually the enemies just heal and stack up for a massive beatdown once it expires. Mania+telekinetic fist one-shots almost everything but the PSI cost is too high on repeat rounds. I don't like enrage because I don't get XP for the kills but it works as a last resort. I don't have some of the PSI skills yet. As for survivability feats I don't recall anything looking useful for a pure PSI person but I'll take recommendations. Stoicism + Conditioning? The bonuses seemed pretty lackluster.

Really though my build seems fine, I'm getting through the game, I just think the overall concept of Underrail's combat isn't completely to my liking. But it's fine.

 

[Jrpgfan]

I wonder when is styg gonna fix the loading screen during launch. It still takes a long ass while for the game to start.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

As for the D&D comparison, I disagree. If your character has the agility of a turtle, then they shouldn't have the reflexes of a mangoose.

People always use realism to justify unbalanced mechanics and balance to justify unrealistic mechanics.

I don't think Underrail is a particularly realistic game, where you can punch someone 10 times in the face in the same time it takes you to fire a handgun once.

 

[Tigranes]

Master theorycrafters here can tell you better than I can on the numbers. My intuition is that 14+5 won't get you very far, and that Paranoia generally isn't a hugely valuable feat. But I can always be wrong. With 3 PER the detection won't do much, either.

OK, so a high CON psion - never went for such a mix. The vest is fine but it won't offer enough in sheer protection - as level 16 you should be able to craft yourself a 1k shield. My general go-to is Low + High + Efficiency. I guess the issue is that it's not built for full tin can (you want psi beetle), but you're too slow, and presumably all the PSI feats meant you didn't stack survivability stuff either. Did you not take Force User? 4-turn force field is godly, though the empowered punch is probably not so great for you so far into the game.

I do have force user and the force field is a nice ability to get out of trouble spots sometimes but usually the enemies just heal and stack up for a massive beatdown once it expires. Mania+telekinetic fist one-shots almost everything but the PSI cost is too high on repeat rounds. I don't like enrage because I don't get XP for the kills but it works as a last resort. I don't have some of the PSI skills yet. As for survivability feats I don't recall anything looking useful for a pure PSI person but I'll take recommendations. Stoicism + Conditioning? The bonuses seemed pretty lackluster.

Really though my build seems fine, I'm getting through the game, I just think the overall concept of Underrail's combat isn't completely to my liking. But it's fine.

Sure, I think it's fine and you don't have to minmax. My point is, as others have pointed out, you seem to be rummaging around for a range of bonuses here and there, but UR's systems really reward someone who picks two or three synergistic strengths and hones them sharp. Don't like it, don't want to do it? That's OK, it's your game.

As for the prereqs, I wouldn't make the realism argument, but I'd say the whole system is built around using skill/attrib prereqs as gateways for feats themed around that skill. And again, because UR is supposed to encourage you to specialise, I think that's fine.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Master theorycrafters here can tell you better than I can on the numbers. My intuition is that 14+5 won't get you very far, and that Paranoia generally isn't a hugely valuable feat. But I can always be wrong. With 3 PER the detection won't do much, either.

OK, so a high CON psion - never went for such a mix. The vest is fine but it won't offer enough in sheer protection - as level 16 you should be able to craft yourself a 1k shield. My general go-to is Low + High + Efficiency. I guess the issue is that it's not built for full tin can (you want psi beetle), but you're too slow, and presumably all the PSI feats meant you didn't stack survivability stuff either. Did you not take Force User? 4-turn force field is godly, though the empowered punch is probably not so great for you so far into the game.

I do have force user and the force field is a nice ability to get out of trouble spots sometimes but usually the enemies just heal and stack up for a massive beatdown once it expires. Mania+telekinetic fist one-shots almost everything but the PSI cost is too high on repeat rounds. I don't like enrage because I don't get XP for the kills but it works as a last resort. I don't have some of the PSI skills yet. As for survivability feats I don't recall anything looking useful for a pure PSI person but I'll take recommendations. Stoicism + Conditioning? The bonuses seemed pretty lackluster.

Really though my build seems fine, I'm getting through the game, I just think the overall concept of Underrail's combat isn't completely to my liking. But it's fine.

Sure, I think it's fine and you don't have to minmax. My point is, as others have pointed out, you seem to be rummaging around for a range of bonuses here and there, but UR's systems really reward someone who picks two or three synergistic strengths and hones them sharp. Don't like it, don't want to do it? That's OK, it's your game.

As for the prereqs, I wouldn't make the realism argument, but I'd say the whole system is built around using skill/attrib prereqs as gateways for feats themed around that skill. And again, because UR is supposed to encourage you to specialise, I think that's fine.

I guess I don't see how I could have min-maxed more? I'm pure PSI nuker-assault with no guns no stealth no melee no dodge/evasion. I've looked at shoring up some weak spots in the build that have revealed themselves in hindsight but I wouldn't say this is some intent to create a balanced jack of all trades, far from it.

 

[ItsChon]

Have you considered the fact that you're just bad? I haven't had nearly as much trouble as you seem to be having running builds that are far inferior to Psi nuker-assault and AR Tin-Can.

 

[Tigranes]

I mean, I think 9 CON on a psi-nuker while foregoing CON related feats wasn't super optimal, and I think taking Paranoia at this stage is not optimal at all. But I'm not saying your build is total garbage, you say you're having fun & doing fine in most fights so there's no problem.

 

[Blaine]

I disagree with Tigranes' premise that 10 HP is less useful for a low-CON character than a high-CON one. If anything, 10 HP is worth a lot more when you've got a much smaller pool in the first place. You will have to take a hit or two here and there on occasion, no matter what sort of build you're playing.

In general, though, Underrail greatly rewards [insert favorite euphemism for min-maxing]. It rewards min-maxing so richly that an entire ecosystem of min-maxing euphemisms has developed in the fertile soil of this very thread.

Sadly, the min-maxing aspect of Underrail has grown considerably worse now that feats, environmental interaction nodes, and even dialogue tree-based conversational rewards sporting minimal base ability requirements in the double digits have become commonplace. They were a step backward for this game.

I guess I don't see how I could have min-maxed more? I'm pure PSI nuker-assault with no guns no stealth no melee no dodge/evasion. I've looked at shoring up some weak spots in the build that have revealed themselves in hindsight but I wouldn't say this is some intent to create a balanced jack of all trades, far from it.

When it comes to Initiative, shoring up a weakness so that it's mediocre instead of bad isn't going to help you a whole lot. If you can't rely on going first almost all of the time, its value is drastically reduced. That said, a mediocre Initiative will often allow you to act before low-Initiative enemies, so it's not all bad.

More than a few weaknesses CAN be shored up in a usefully gradated fashion, despite what some may believe. However, if you're playing stealth psi, it's usually counterproductive to try to shore up weaknesses. Stealth psi is the utter epitome of a min-maxable glass cannon.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

Have you considered the fact that you're just bad? I haven't had nearly as much trouble as you seem to be having running builds that are far inferior to Psi nuker-assault and AR Tin-Can.

I have, actually. But I am the target demo for this game (hardcore Fallout fan) and I've played hundreds of RPGs, so if I'm bad at the game what does that say about it?

In any case it's more like i'm hyper-critical and nitpicky. I'm not completely failing at the game or anything, I'm making solid and steady progress. So far I have not encountered a situation that was totally unwinnable or anything. Other than the mines, I had a perfectly fine time in the junkyard with the acid dogs and mutants, which seems to be a common sticking spot for people. I'm just bitching about certain things that bug me about it.

What I would really like is to have a squad at my command rather than just one person, but ah well. I'm still really enjoying other aspects of the game, like how rewarding the fights are when you do win, the loot, the crafting, the great sense of progress and character growth, and the wonderful level and dungeon design. Seriously, I thought the ventilation ducts were going to be a one-time thing, but they are used to great effect throughout.

 

[Grampy_Bone]

It rewards min-maxing so richly that an entire ecosystem of min-maxing euphemisms has developed in the fertile soil of this very thread.

Here's a question for you, is a melee sword parry/riposte build viable? Would it need stealth, dodge/evasion, or heavy armor?