Underrail: The Incline Awakens

[ItsChon]

You still get access to Stasis which is extremely powerful. Still worth taking, but using more as a last resort, than as a standard opener in every fight.

What surprised me about the nerf is that casting a new instance of haste doesn't remove the slow debuff (happens when the slow is 6 turns).

It was kind of underwhelming for me, at least with my sword build. Any time I had to resort to using stasis, there were too many enemies alive for me to survive after coming out of it.

 

[Tigranes]

With melee, Stasis is sometimes about letting people come to you, so that when you unfreeze they are there for the taking (e.g. if the natives had you webbed from afar). But yes, I wouldn't say it's a must. I still find haste worth it, though, especially if you reserve adrenaline to counter kickback.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Parabalus]

Stasis' simplest use case prolongs all buffs by one turn with no real downside (barring nets and no Escape Artist), it's very close to a no-brainer net positive. Very useful on jets too.

 

[Trashos]

I mean, PTC works perfectly for all fights that are 2 turns (3 with PTAccelelration) long. Yes, it takes planning for longer fights, but it is very powerful.

Very useful on jets too.

Hmmm.... does Stasis work for the Jet Ski?!

------
OK, can you help me recap the situation with Pirates?

- I join them by giving them an Aegis Patroller. Either kill Aegis skiers to get it or wait until it is given to me by Briggs down the Aegis questline (iirc after Nexus?).
- If I do not do the raids, only Aegis is going to be hostile due to me being a pirate. Correct?
- If I do the raids???
- Pirates do not have Defend Base missions (correct?).
- Pirates do not have a timer. Correct?
- Does Aegis' timer work if I join the Pirates? That is, are Aegis going to leave on their own eventually?

Any corrections and info will result in brofists.

 

[Yaz]

OK, can you help me recap the situation with Pirates?

- I join them by giving them an Aegis Patroller. Either kill Aegis skiers to get it or wait until it is given to me by Briggs down the Aegis questline (iirc after Nexus?).
- If I do not do the raids, only Aegis is going to be hostile due to me being a pirate. Correct?
- If I do the raids???
- Pirates do not have Defend Base missions (correct?).
- Pirates do not have a timer. Correct?
- Does Aegis' timer work if I join the Pirates? That is, are Aegis going to leave on their own eventually?

Any corrections and info will result in brofists.

Getting the Aegis Jet from Briggs would mean that you've saved the Professor, which I'd expect to mean that the Pirates are already aggressive. Best practice, imo, is to deal with the lone ST that jets you over to the Core for 50 coins after you get the chip.

No one else than Aegis will be aggressive if you're a pirate. Their raids are not mandatory, but even so they won't put other factions as enemies outright. If you raid the Eels at the Rig will be aggressive after the last raid.

Pirates need to defend against Aegis if you join them and they kidnap the Professor. But that defence is so casual as Pirate Poppers/Piners just steamroll the STs.

No timers with pirates.

Aegis timer works. They will go for auto defence success unless you intervene. Pretty much one beach raid with you present at some corner and Aegis are done. Don't even have to fight.

 

[Trashos]

Awesome! Thanks, Yaz!

 

[Oreshnik Missile]

Getting the Aegis Jet from Briggs would mean that you've saved the Professor, which I'd expect to mean that the Pirates are already aggressive.

Huh, that's a bit strange, they ARE aggressive even though all I did was dob in their agent after pickpocketing the radio in the Aegis camp.
Not entirely logical but easier than writing more complex logic concerning when the player can join them.

 

[Ol' Willy]

Today is the first and the last time I tried the Gauntlet.

First room - Burrowers. It's fine, blow some rocks, kill some bugs.
Second room - Spiders. It's easy, I shanked them all one by one.
Third room - electric floors. Not finishable by my character. I reach the most south-eastern room. It's a death trap. I reload and reach the room to the north of it. There's a key! From there I head to the safe spot in the north. Not possible - I get killed in the same spot every time. Well, with Sprint I would be able to reach it, but I don't have sprint on my current char. I don't have adrenaline as well. So it's a deadlock. Great fun, gee.

I know that rooms are randomized every run, but how would I know that I won't get the electric room? I may get all good rooms before and then get electric room as the last. Or before last. So, it's savescumming until I have clear run without the electric room. Not my idea of fun whatsoever. I'll better go and destroy ten hives on one map, or fight some more stalkers.

Imagine people who are not taught by the bitter experience to make reserve saves. Games does a courtesy and autosaves right before the run, but after you can bail out. Imagine replaying the Gauntlet for hours to get the run without unfinishable rooms.

 

[Alexios]

Third room - electric floors. Not finishable by my character. I reach the most south-eastern room. It's a death trap. I reload and reach the room to the north of it. There's a key! From there I head to the safe spot in the north. Not possible - I get killed in the same spot every time. Well, with Sprint I would be able to reach it, but I don't have sprint on my current char. I don't have adrenaline as well. So it's a deadlock. Great fun, gee.

I don't think you need Sprint or adrenaline. I'd have to go back and see if I have a save from that point but I also thought it was unfinishable until I managed to get to the end.

On the topic of not fun I'm doing DC for the first time (Dominating) and I want to kill myself.

 

[Fenix]

I think Stasis require small AI fix - when mobs attacking you deal no damage because PC in Stasis, they should't spent abilities and chems on turn 2, instead the should run away from PC.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Expeditions seems to be extremely annoying with locust which do no damage but spam in huge groups and take a lot of time to deal with due to attack animations and spend a lot of resources. Crabs spamming out of the ground is getting old too...
I literally spend like 600 bullets on 1 compound. It takes a while to replenish.
Also, selling stuff is extremely annoying. It isnt noticeable when you get money from quests, but when you need to sell your loot (half of which you left laying on the ground due to weight) - it gets very tiresome going from traders, selling shit for half a price because they only have like 200 stygian coins in their inventory.

Do you need to play like max stealth to avoid this idiocy?

 

[Yaz]

Do you need to play like max stealth to avoid this idiocy?

High Stealth helps a lot. But there are other options.

There are certain armour types that can make dealing with Locusts easy as you can make yourself immune to their damage types and/or the damage types you can use to deal with them en masse. Snipers are a very good way of dealing with Locust Nests as you can shoot them while they are in the Fog of War, which means you can take them down while half the Locusts are still inside without engaging in combat.

Crabs are much more easily dealt with either by using high damage singular attacks like Impale, Snipe or Aimed Shot, or Energy Weapons, Acid and/or Toxic Gas. Raw armour-piercing rounds are actually quite bad against those.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Do you need to play like max stealth to avoid this idiocy?

High Stealth helps a lot. But there are other options.

There are certain armour types that can make dealing with Locusts easy as you can make yourself immune to their damage types and/or the damage types you can use to deal with them en masse. Snipers are a very good way of dealing with Locust Nests as you can shoot them while they are in the Fog of War, which means you can take them down while half the Locusts are still inside without engaging in combat.

Crabs are much more easily dealt with either by using high damage singular attacks like Impale, Snipe or Aimed Shot, or Energy Weapons, Acid and/or Toxic Gas. Raw armour-piercing rounds are actually quite bad against those.

My biggest issue is ammo. I can kill enemies, but they don't drop ammo. And I there are no traders. I basically have to go back to the original content, and spend half an hour restocking. It's absolutely retarded. Right now I am trying to get to the Nexus of knowledge, and I have less than 150 ammo left. I will have to go back through the crab caves and than locust island to the base, than go back to the main game and restock. It will take at least an hour I feel like just to get back to that position. It take a while to gather 600 bullets, but grabbing 2000 is just ridiculous, just for one location (well, I was going to Nexus, but there is locust location in the way).

 

[PrettyDeadman]

Do you need to play like max stealth to avoid this idiocy?

High Stealth helps a lot. But there are other options.

There are certain armour types that can make dealing with Locusts easy as you can make yourself immune to their damage types and/or the damage types you can use to deal with them en masse. Snipers are a very good way of dealing with Locust Nests as you can shoot them while they are in the Fog of War, which means you can take them down while half the Locusts are still inside without engaging in combat.

Crabs are much more easily dealt with either by using high damage singular attacks like Impale, Snipe or Aimed Shot, or Energy Weapons, Acid and/or Toxic Gas. Raw armour-piercing rounds are actually quite bad against those.

My biggest issue is ammo. I can kill enemies, but they don't drop ammo. And I there are no traders. I basically have to go back to the original content, and spend half an hour restocking. It's absolutely retarded. Right now I am trying to get to the Nexus of knowledge, and I have less than 150 ammo left. I will have to go back through the crab caves and than locust island to the base, than go back to the main game and restock. It will take at least an hour I feel like just to get back to that position. It take a while to gather 600 bullets, but grabbing 2000 is just ridiculous, just for one location (well, I was going to Nexus, but there is locust location in the way).

Using single target attacks aren't really an option. I am level 24, it will take me HOURS to grind to level 30 and get some skillpoints, and its not guaranteed I will have enough to make another build.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[Tigranes]

Depending on your build, energy weapons can make crabs trivial, and plasmas are good too. I think the key is really the limitation of reliance on mechanical damage. And if you've been to horticulture, you can use pesticide grenades to lessen the locust pain.

The path to Nexus can be particularly gruelling, and I really do prefer having the Agility or Stealth to bypass at least some of the obstacle course. Not sure what you mean by 'locust location on the way to Nexus' - if you mean horticulture that's different and you can land there by sea directly, or do you mean the quarry?

https://stygiansoftware.com/wiki/images/b/bd/Black_Sea_map_with_locations.png

I found Expeditions a huge, huge slog the first time, and I do think part of that is a design flaw. There is such a thing as laying it all on too thick when you introduce very specific enemy types that actively bog down the game until you figure them out, then tie them to very convoluted areas you must navigate slowly, and then trying to just get out and restock is a pain in the arse. Speedhack helps, and the DLC definitely gets a lot smoother the second time round you go through it.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

My build is assault riffle full auto with 10 bullets per attack. I use only one calibre of bullet. I have some stealth, but I use heavy armor right now. Maybe ill craft some infused bio leather ammo, but I would like to be able to use heavy armor. This dlc is just trash content combatwise for armored assault rifle build. Every step you take is 10 new enemies basically appearing out of thin air (100 bullets). I can single shots at them (missing 2 out of 3 90% shots), but it will still take a lot of ammo and will feel really lame compared to full-auto guys.
Grenades is not a solution. It can actually take 2 grenades to kill enemy group (even IV level grenade), and you have to wait the cooldown. By the time grenade is off the cooldown I could've killed enemies with assault rifle anyway...

I imagine playing other type of build could've been better, but I play this type of build and not other type of build.

 

[Yaz]

My build is assault riffle full auto with 10 bullets per attack.

9 Bullets?

Nvm.

Actually, as a high level AR user you shouldn't really have trouble with those with Concentrated Fire and 9mm Chimera with Crit Scope on.

 

[PrettyDeadman]

My build is assault riffle full auto with 10 bullets per attack.

9 Bullets?

Nvm.

Actually, as a high level AR user you shouldn't really have trouble with those with Concentrated Fire and 9mm Chimera with Crit Scope on.

What difference does a scope make when you have no bullets left? I don't have trouble killing enemies while I have ammo...

 

[Yaz]

I don't have trouble killing enemies while I have ammo...

You have trouble killing enemies efficiently.

 

[Tigranes]

My build is assault riffle full auto with 10 bullets per attack. I use only one calibre of bullet. I have some stealth, but I use heavy armor right now. Maybe ill craft some infused bio leather ammo, but I would like to be able to use heavy armor. This dlc is just trash content combatwise for armored assault rifle build. Every step you take is 10 new enemies basically appearing out of thin air (100 bullets). I can single shots at them (missing 2 out of 3 90% shots), but it will still take a lot of ammo and will feel really lame compared to full-auto guys.
Grenades is not a solution. It can actually take 2 grenades to kill enemy group (even IV level grenade), and you have to wait the cooldown. By the time grenade is off the cooldown I could've killed enemies with assault rifle anyway...

I imagine playing other type of build could've been better, but I play this type of build and not other type of build.

I've never done tin can AR, so I can't say for sure. But even as someone who's always criticised Expeditions encounters, it does sound like you're being a bit stubborn. Couple of grenades to win an encounter every once in a while to relieve your dire ammo shortage? Sounds great to me, not sure why it's "not a solution". You expect one grenade to kill everybody?? And when an energy pistol build would be one-shotting or two-shotting half of those enemies in Dominating, and you're burning 2000 ammo, you want to be open to unorthodox solutions.

Are you saying that you don't use any more ammo for these guys than you did for other enemies?

 

[PrettyDeadman]

My build is assault riffle full auto with 10 bullets per attack. I use only one calibre of bullet. I have some stealth, but I use heavy armor right now. Maybe ill craft some infused bio leather ammo, but I would like to be able to use heavy armor. This dlc is just trash content combatwise for armored assault rifle build. Every step you take is 10 new enemies basically appearing out of thin air (100 bullets). I can single shots at them (missing 2 out of 3 90% shots), but it will still take a lot of ammo and will feel really lame compared to full-auto guys.
Grenades is not a solution. It can actually take 2 grenades to kill enemy group (even IV level grenade), and you have to wait the cooldown. By the time grenade is off the cooldown I could've killed enemies with assault rifle anyway...

I imagine playing other type of build could've been better, but I play this type of build and not other type of build.

I've never done tin can AR, so I can't say for sure. But even as someone who's always criticised Expeditions encounters, it does sound like you're being a bit stubborn. Couple of grenades to win an encounter every once in a while to relieve your dire ammo shortage? Sounds great to me, not sure why it's "not a solution". You expect one grenade to kill everybody?? And when an energy pistol build would be one-shotting or two-shotting half of those enemies in Dominating, and you're burning 2000 ammo, you want to be open to unorthodox solutions.

Are you saying that you don't use any more ammo for these guys than you did for other enemies?

In regular game I never run out of ammo. Combination of convenient traders and ammo drop in enemies/loot. In expeditions in can take more time to get to a single trader in your main base than it takes in regular game to run through all major traders.

 

[Ol' Willy]

In regular game I never run out of ammo. Combination of convenient traders and ammo drop in enemies/loot. In expeditions in can take more time to get to a single trader in your main base than it takes in regular game to run through all major traders.

I played AR low-crit tincan on hard and true, ammo could be a problem. I used one rifle in 8.6mm and the other in 7.62 and was carrying around 1500-2000 rounds for each. The solution is to employ gas grenades - which raise the damage for every contaminated creature, or raise your critical chance. If you can tank some damage, get closer and your accuracy will improve. Use feats - Suppressive Fire works wonders with Opportunist, put some Concentrated Fire on top to make it even better. ARs are good even without crits.

If you are tired with traders, just use trader refresh. Life is too short for waiting them to restock.

Also, craft yourself high-quality Biohazard Tungsten armor, with it you will tank both mechanical and bio attacks.

 

[Tygrende]

actually tchort isnt any harder on dom

Wrong, he gets the usual 50% HP buff. which in his case mean 1000 more HP, from 2000 to 3000.