Wasteland Wasteland 2 Thread - Director's Cut

[CryptRat]

I assume gear will accommodate that boost in challenge whenever I find it

It will.

 

[cvv]

In the DC if you play on the last two difficulties you can't really afford to develop your chars lolrandomly. Previous knowledge of the game and meta is almost a must. In Cali you'll run into mobs that can easily one-shot you with a single burst and if you've been pumping only Animal Whisperer and the speech skills so far you'll have an uneasy time.

 

[PEACH]

Ah, okay. I appreciate both responses. I have a couple party members who are dragging the team down because of lack of metaknowledge / preplanning so I guess I'll try to see if I can salvage them / incorporate some of the companions to cover my bases as I go.

Definitely guilty of putting too many points in flavor skills

 

[Gunnar]

If you're having trouble with combat, try the aimed shots that disable enemies. Very effective and actually required for some of the tougher fights on SJ.

 

[Zombra]

Uh ... also intentionally running a party at 55% manpower is going to cause you problems. Why would you think otherwise?

 

[Infinitron]

Heh, I ran into problems with this myself just recently.

If you do the math, you'll find that there's a a rule of thumb: Amount of skill points you get per level = amount of skills you can maximize (and thus be at peak performance with at any given point in the game). You can probably afford to dabble in another skill, but make sure your fundamentals are covered.

The game does very little to signal this to you, even giving you Angela Deth at the beginning, a kickass high level companion with points invested in six different skills despite only getting 3 skill points per level. And it works at first, but then you start falling behind.

D&D 3E as seen in the NWN games was better at this - by capping your skills to your level, it made it clear that you were expected to specialize in a limited number of skills that you'd always want to keep topped off at their current cap.

 

[PEACH]

Uh ... also intentionally running a party at 55% normal fighting strength is going to cause you problems. Why would you think otherwise?

The previous 20~ hours which caused me no problems despite the same party composition, wherein I had dozens of health packs and never (still) ran out of ammo and rarely was forced to reload? Game was very simple when I had seven at the start so I pared it down until it wasn't and until Santa Fe it wasn't clear that it'd suddenly muscle up and kick my ass despite the limitations, at which point I didn't have a bunch of superheroes waiting on the wings to save the day. I didn't think this was a difficult notion to grasp but...

If you do the math, you'll find that there's a a rule of thumb: Amount of skill points you get per level = amount of skills you can maximize (and thus be at peak performance with at any given point in the game). You can probably afford to dabble in another skill, but make sure your fundamentals are covered.

The game does very little to signal this to you, even giving you Angela Deth at the beginning, a kickass high level companion who dabbles in six skills despite only getting 3 skill points per level. And it works at first, but then you start falling behind.

Yeah, I used the companions as a reference point for how to approach builds and it definitely set me up for being in a tight spot due to shortsightedness. I don't think anything is beyond salvaging for me at this point, but the jack of all trades approach is clearly not working out too well. Shotguns and Energy weapons being 50% of my squad wasn't the best choice either.

Thankfully my blunt and assault rifle characters are built much better and have given me a little more insight into what works and what doesn't.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Start of the California can be rough on any difficulty, but new gear changes this very quickly. Just hang in there and until find a shop or two.

 

[PEACH]

Yeah, made my way out of Santa Fe and found Angel Oracle and some traders on the world map. Everything seems to have simmered back down again after some big upgrades and I don't think I'll need to make any alterations to my party for the time being.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Heh, I ran into problems with this myself just recently.

If you do the math, you'll find that there's a a rule of thumb: Amount of skill points you get per level = amount of skills you can maximize (and thus be at peak performance with at any given point in the game). You can probably afford to dabble in another skill, but make sure your fundamentals are covered.

The game does very little to signal this to you, even giving you Angela Deth at the beginning, a kickass high level companion with points invested in six different skills despite only getting 3 skill points per level. And it works at first, but then you start falling behind.

D&D 3E as seen in the NWN games was better at this - by capping your skills to your level, it made it clear that you were expected to specialize in a limited number of skills that you'd always want to keep topped off at their current cap.

Don't worry, I'm sure for W3 they will signal it to you straight as an on-screen walkthrough. Or reduce it to 3 skills because too complicated.

That should make you

 

[Infinitron]

Don't worry, I'm sure for W3 they will signal it to you straight as an on-screen walkthrough.

Why shouldn't they? In a game with 19 non-combat skills that lets you create four party members, your immediate instinct is to try to cover all of those skills to maximize the amount of content you can unlock. When you have just one character, it's obvious that you can't have it all, but with four it seems like you can make it. Especially since a lot of the skills are thematically similar ("Why SHOULDN'T my Mechanical Repair guy also know how to Repair Toasters? Why SHOULDN'T my Lockpicker also know how to Crack Safes? I'll give them those skills too!")

Only oops, unless you make all four characters high INT geniuses you're potentially committing character build suicide that you won't notice until you're tens of hours into the game. It's not a big thing to tell you to be wary of overextending beyond your INT.

 

[FeelTheRads]

Why shouldn't they?

Because what's the point then? Either limit the way you can build the characters or, if you want an open one, let me discover how it works. Don't build it for through those ever helpful "hints".

In a game with 19 non-combat skills that lets you create four party members, your immediate instinct is to try to cover all of those skills to maximize the amount of content you can unlock. When you have just one character, it's obvious that you can't have it all, but with four it seems like you can make it.

What? First of all, any reasonable human being who played more than 1 rpg in his life would figure out that putting point in every skill won't work that well in the end. If not from the beginning that after a couple of levels when they see how man skill points they get per level and how much the skill costs increase.
If a couple of possible "suboptimal" levels trigger your autism then too bad and fuck off.
Also, again, what? I think it's more likely that someone would try to cover all skills with a single character than with 4 where you can split between them. If you try to cover all skills with each of the 4 then maybe you are a bit retarded.

 

[Infinitron]

If not from the beginning that after a couple of levels when they see how man skill points they get per level and how much the skill costs increase.

The fact that they eventually increase is part of the issue. When they're still at 2 points per increase, your INT 1 dump stat character seems like he won't be that bad.

"I want my high STR and CHA, low INT Arnie-style commando to be good at Heavy Weapons AND Brute Force AND Hard Ass AND Leadership. Why shouldn't he be? <30 hours later> Oh fuck." I think there's something not entirely sound in a character system that does this.

Also, again, what? I think it's more likely that someone would try to cover all skills with a single character than with 4 where you can split between them. If you try to cover all skills with each of the 4 then maybe you are a bit retarded.

I obviously meant cover them all collectively with the four characters.

 

[undecaf]

"I want my low INT Arnie-style commando to be good at Heavy Weapons AND Brute Force AND Hard Ass AND Leadership. Why shouldn't he be? <30 hours later> Oh fuck."

That player does not deserve anything but that "Oh fuck. <30 hours later>".

 

[Infinitron]

"I want my low INT Arnie-style commando to be good at Heavy Weapons AND Brute Force AND Hard Ass AND Leadership. Why shouldn't he be? <30 hours later> Oh fuck."

That player does not deserve anything but that "Oh fuck".

Really? Does that situation sound like logical roleplaying to you? Doesn't it sound like a character concept that should work?

And this doesn't have to be a Sawyer-style "gamist" thing. It can be solved with more "simulationism", by having high STR and CHA give you some sort of bonus to those skills for instance.

 

[CyberWhale]

Drop leadership and then we can talk. Arny was mostly a one-man army type of guy anyways.

 

[Elwro]

The stuff Infinitron mentions was my main factor in not finishing the game. I thought that of course covering most bases is the reasonable way to go. But nah. W3 does not tell you 'hey, in 40 hours you'll notice you had actually been making wrong decisions in character development, fuck you!'

Somehow Fallout made it fun to play even something like a Traps + Repair + Gambling build.

 

[Infinitron]

undecaf You can quibble about the exact number of hours, but it is a build that works well enough for a while. If it gets you through the Ag Center, that's already a lot you have to replay.

 

[FeelTheRads]

"I want my high STR and CHA, low INT Arnie-style commando to be good at Heavy Weapons AND Brute Force AND Hard Ass AND Leadership. Why shouldn't he be?

For example because you're LARPing based on whatever arbitrary name the developers gave to skills. Perhaps if they had a German accent skill you'd think you should have that too because it's what you want to play?
If you want to play fantasy characters then deal with it, otherwise adapt to the system and the game world and make your character to win the game not to have cool clothes.

Of course, I'm not saying that the W2 system is great or good, but not telling you how to build your character is not part of its problems.

I obviously meant cover them all collectively with the four characters.

And that's not possible? I covered pretty much everything save maybe 1 or 2 and others that were not really maxed. Of course, without maxing two kinds of firearms for the same character, that seemed kinda pointless.

 

[Elwro]

Now, guys, I want to ask an honest question. Is it viable to change your idea for a build, let's say, halfway through the game and not suffer miserably?

I find character development in RPGs to be fun when you can adapt to what the game offers, well, like a reasonably intelligent person would. There is absolutely no reason in Fallout to tag Energy Weapons at the start or invest in the skill. You can start doing that when you actually have access to the weapons and decide to go for it.

In W2, do I really need to start with a predetermined idea for builds for my chars and just unlock consecutive levels of the skills I had chosen at the beginning? I'd love to be mistaken, but that's a significant factor in the game felling quite boring to me.

 

[Infinitron]

FeelTheRads Sure, but in a choice between revamping the system and a one line notification warning you if you invest in too many skills, the latter is easier to implement.

Now, guys, I want to ask an honest question. Is it viable to change your idea for a build, let's say, halfway through the game and not suffer miserably?

I find character development in RPGs to be fun when you can adapt to what the game offers, well, like a reasonably intelligent person would. There is absolutely no reason in Fallout to tag Energy Weapons at the start or invest in the skill. You can start doing that when you actually have access to the weapons and decide to go for it.

In W2, do I really need to start with a predetermined idea for builds for my chars and just unlock consecutive levels of the skills I had chosen at the beginning? I'd love to be mistaken, but that's a significant factor in the game felling quite boring to me.

I think the fact that Wasteland 2 has a lot more skill usage in it, with transparent and constantly ramping up thresholds, makes it feel more frustrating if your characters start falling behind. "God damn, I can't crack any of the safes in this new area. And my guys keep getting blown up by landmines they can't spot. This playthrough sucks." So it's riskier to change direction and adapt your character to a new skill set.

 

[undecaf]

undecaf You can quibble about the exact number of hours, but it is a build that works well enough for a while. If it gets you through the Ag Center, that's already a lot you have to replay.

Well I don't know. I started the game with wrong kind of build and too much reliance on Angela (not taking it to account that she would leave - and not knowing where). It took some work, but wasn't that hard to do the corrective moves to compensate. I mean, you really needed fuck up and not pay attention if you 'needed' to restart for a bad build; in my experience.

 

[Roguey]

I've likely mentioned it before, but my learned behavior is to put everything into weapon skills while hoarding unused points until it's beneficial to put them into an ancillary skill. It's never let me down.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

WL2 system certainly was broken and we probably all ended up with imperfect characters on first playthrough, but it was just frustrating I guess, it wasn't so broken that it'd to be detrimental to gameplay. If you can't cover all the important skills with 7 characters, you're doing something wrong, guv. The one great thing about that game is you have multiple approaches to everything. Failed to pick the lock, force the door open, blow it up, talk your way in. So even though you run with bunch of poorly developed characters, they're not shitty to such an extent that you'd get stuck. And it was actually fun, in a LARPy sort of way, although for obsessive minmaxers it was probably a nightmare.

 

[Infinitron]

WL2 system certainly was broken and we probably all ended up with imperfect characters on first playthrough, but it was just frustrating I guess, it wasn't so broken that it'd to be detrimental to gameplay. If you can't cover all the important skills with 7 characters, you're doing something wrong, guv. The one great thing about that game is you have multiple approaches to everything. Failed to pick the lock, force the door open, blow it up, talk your way in. So even though you run with bunch of poorly developed characters, they're not shitty to such an extent that you'd get stuck. And it was actually fun, in a LARPy sort of way, although for obsessive minmaxers it was probably a nightmare.

I agree that you're unlikely to actually get stuck (especially on non-Ranger/Supreme Jerk difficulties) but ending up with a dead weight character who just isn't fun to play is bad too.

Speaking more practically, it's possible that all of these complaints can be boiled down to "Don't make a low INT character".