The "What should I know before I play this game for the first time?" Q&A!

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > The "What should I know before I play this game for the first time?" Q&A!

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Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

The biggest thing about 1404 that hasn't been mentioned is that you absolutely want the unofficial community patch. It adds a ton of poo poo, fixes a ton of poo poo, and is all around a great thing.

Get it here http://forums.steampowered.com/forums/showthread.php?t=2271596

I went through blacklist last weekend, and the wiki page was pretty much right:

* upgrade your goggles first, then go for the crossbow, each google upgrade incorporates the ones lower on the list
* upgrading the plane gets you a money multiplier
* you won't really have money issues so don't worry overmuch about 100% stealthing through missions to get the top score, you could shoot everyone in the face and it wouldn't matter
* the Kill/Spare QTE has zero effect on anything, do what feels right at the time
* Doing all 4 of grimm's missions unlocks the stealth suit
* getting the stealth achievements is really loving hard, you have to not be detected by anyone and can't knock anyone out so don't sperg out when you get 4800/5000 stealth points
* the wrench next to weapons can be clicked on for upgrades to other devices

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 16:50 on Feb 19, 2015

# ¿ Feb 19, 2015 16:42

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# ¿ May 14, 2024 11:07

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Sociopastry posted:

Does anyone have something for Sunless Sea? I have no ideaa what I'm doing.

Best to wait for the patch if you haven't started. Also the last few pages of the sunless sea thread is good, and mostly explains why.

# ¿ Feb 23, 2015 16:30

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Sociopastry posted:

besides what's already on the wiki, anything else for Pillars of Eternity? any skills I shouldn't invest in? Anything I should know about locking myself out of sidequests?

Oh uh I am surprised there isn't a lot of stuff on the wiki. I have a whole text file full of notes and cut-pastes from the thread that I'll try and remember to post when I get home.

As far as skills go, only your main character's skills count for skill checks during conversation. I've seen conversation checks for survival, mechanics, and lore. There are party-wide checks for athletics (save vs damage) so you'll eventually want all characters to have 5 points in it for both that and fatigue but it doesn't really matter for the first half of the game. You'll want one char to focus on mechanics since locks and traps are really important. Survival is useful later for the potion time increase.

There are a few points late-game where you can get locked out of sidequests, but generally that's just by bypassing them and finding different routes to your goal. You'll be max level in the game if you try to do even half the sidequests; doing a completionist run is hard.

# ¿ Apr 23, 2015 16:13

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

juliuspringle posted:

Does anyone have anything for State of Decay? I can FINALLY play it so I wanted some tips before I got too far in to restart.

You're surprisingly strong in melee, you can buzz saw through zombies, the games not really difficult. The only base worth taking is the loading dock thing, so explore southwest until you find it before you move somewhere that sucks

# ¿ May 14, 2015 14:02

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

For miasmata if you leave the trails you're going to have a bad time (get lost). It's easy to go up a river and sort of short circuit the story a bit even while uncovering the map but the story's meant to be discovered in a specific order so stick to the trails and the guide note path when you can. Learn the triangulation thing, it's the whole game mechanic. Don't wander around hurt, top yourself off as fast as you can because it attracts the monster. When he comes, duck into a bush and stay still, you'll be fine

# ¿ May 14, 2015 14:06

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

I know it's an exploring game but seriously stick to the trails or you're gonna tumble down a hill you can't get up again and spend an hour trying to work your way back to somewhere you recognize. You can't uncover the map without one known landmark and so all that tine you'll be unable to make overall progress. It sucks and it will happen to you, just stay on the trails

# ¿ May 14, 2015 14:11

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Sociopastry posted:

Factorio?

The campaign is a tutorial. You can hold f to pick stuff up while running, combinations of shift and ctrl and alt while clicking do different things, I believe you can alt-click to remove all or if you're holding a stack shift click puts half in, this makes it easy to run down a line filling everything

The thread has great build ideas but part of the game is figuring it out on your own, it's easy for someone to spoil half the game by giving you an efficient layout. Solar is way better than steam at the moment because low pollution is king, that goes for efficiency chips too

Research to electricity asap

Don't ignore the biter bases and build mass defense, it's better to clear them out early around your base once you get armor piercing. If you do that and also keep the pollution down you might never see them

The car is too weak to be worth building, the tank is good

Early game, you can build two coal miners pointed to each other and the coal will go in each other's inventory then you can just run by and empty them like free chests, this goes for iron miners feeding into a furnace too, just keep it stocked with coal

# ¿ May 24, 2015 13:47

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Capsaicin posted:

I started playing The Witcher. The first one, not the new one. Anything that's not on the wiki? I feel like in battle, I'm just waiting until my sword turns to fire and then I'm clicking again.

you've got it. The multi-enemy style is awesome for almost the entire game, as is the fire spell. Don't feel bad if you get to act 4 and want to shut it off, 2 is much, much better

# ¿ May 24, 2015 17:37

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Vlad the Retailer posted:

Anything I should know for Sherlock Holmes: Crimes and Punishments? How easy is it to mess up and get the culprit wrong?

The game is not hard, all the clues glow and everything is gated to small areas. It's more like an interactive story.

# ¿ May 31, 2015 13:50

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

GOTTA STAY FAI posted:

Anything important before I jump into Shadowrun Returns? beforeiplay.com has some tips but it says they're all for Dragonfall (which I did pick up, too, but I'd like to start with the earlier one).

Unless you really, really like shadowrun or really need to fill some time, just don't. Just like it's not really worth playing witcher 1 unless you're really a completionist.

As far as actual tips, don't try and make a melee guy with powers, it just doesn't work. Extreme specialization is mandatory, don't spread your points around. Drones are pretty OP, so are mages. Guns are good, just avoid smgs. Stuff that damages AP is king; actions are life.

# ¿ May 31, 2015 15:56

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Contingency Plan posted:

It's been out for a little while now, so any tips for The Witcher 3? I'm particularly interested in character development and combat. I just finished the Noonwraith quest at the very start of the game and despite using specter oil on my sword I was only doing ~10 points of damage per strike. I used the Yrden sign and was suddenly doing ~100 damage/strike and I have no idea why.

If you read the bestiary entry it tells you they can go insubstantial, yrden forces them into the real world so you can do damage to them. the bestiary is really good, many monsters are built around a gimmick; attack from the back, use this one spell that is really effective, that sort of thing. Spectres and ghost-like beings get a teleport and huge damage reduction when they aren't attacking you.

As for skills, there's a respec potion for 1000 so don't worry too much about gimping your character. You have to drag stuff to the right to 'use' it, so don't spread your points around. I leveled the weak attack and put points into the mind spell for extra dialog and the stun. You have a chance to autokill creatures (even skulls) when they are stunned so I really like it. The 2nd tier conversion is a trap since it takes too long to cast. I've heard the ingni flamethrower is pretty good but haven't tried it myself. I got the armor melt but i haven't noticed much difference. By far the most useful I've found is the active shield, they hit you, you regain life. It's mandatory on the harder difficulties.

I can also see buffing potions/oils, and 'general' skills are very strong since they are 1 point each. About midgame you'll get the decoctions which give 100 toxicity and if you want to use any other potions with them you're going to need to put points there. Oils are just free damage if you can be bothered to open the inventoy screen so the skill that makes them poison too is just ace.

Don't worry about running out of alcohol to refill potions/bombs every time you rest, even casually looting random boxes will give you more you can use.

As far as general tips, every merchant you can play cards with will give you a free card when you win, most innkeepers have cards in their inventory. If you go through the first area and part of the second you'll build up enough of a decent deck to slam pretty much anyone. You won't be able to beat the guy in the palace when you first meet him, but go back and take that bastard's card when you think you're ready.

Don't get too burned out going to every ? because there are too many in the map and by the 2nd map it'll suck all the enjoyment of the game out of you. You can "clear" the first map and I recommend doing it because there are a lot of places of power in the first map, but in the second map if you wander off the trail you'll get murdered by skulls and I've only found two places of power on the second map.

OH one more important thing, side-mission experience scales based on your level versus the level of the main quest, so the game strives to keep you at a reasonable level as you progress through the main quest no matter how many side missions you do. If you do all of them, they won't give much XP. It's mathematically impossible to significantly outlevel the main quests, so just do stuff at your own pace and do anything that interests you along the way.

I'm not saying it's the wrong way to play, but if you go into the second map with the 'must uncover and do every single ? and quest' completionist-style than you're going to get very burned out and annoyed because almost everything off the paths are 10 levels higher than you are and you run through high-level areas to complete lower-level quests a lot.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 15:32 on Jun 1, 2015

# ¿ Jun 1, 2015 15:22

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

that goes counter to what I was told in another thread, interesting. I didn't try it myself. Flamethrower was garbage? bummer.

# ¿ Jun 1, 2015 15:34

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

HOOLY BOOLY posted:

Didn't find anything in the Wiki so what should i know for Invisible Inc?

The thread is pretty short and has some great tip but

don't worry about failure. You get xp based on difficulty and level of missions completed. Keep playing till you unlock all the other chars, some are beasts
credit missions are only worth doing with a vault card, but sometimes cybernetic implants have a vault door too with two extra implanters
items with ammo (2/2, 6/6) do not reload between missions and power packs only reload one charge. In general I avoid them. Same goes for items which take PWR, it's just not worth it
have your agent with anarchy search executives pockets before whacking them since they have ~1k base
guards only go to the last thing they heard/saw, so you can distract them from something else by running by or opening a door they can see
peek open peek, unless you're playing on beginner
better to avoid guards than KOing them when possible, since then they go from patrol to search. But don't worry about leaving KO'd guards in your wake either, they'll spend a dozen turns being confused. You're fine if you keep moving, just don't do this until you know where the exit is, since it's a pita to get through searching guards.
waking guards keep each other distracted since they attract each other with groaning and standing. You get an extra few turns before they start searching.
move fast. Time is not on your side. I upgrade strength to two for drag speed and then speed to 4 usually
sometimes it's worth getting spotted by a camera and running through if you're going to sit around for two+ turns to hack it instead
searching guards check open doors first, so close all doors behind you but leave some side ones open for distraction
guard sight lines don't angle left or right when they turn 180, you can stand next to a guard and he won't see you when he turns around or continues the patrol
unless the guard is dead on, he can't see into where you are hiding crouched even if he's next to you. You can hide in way more areas than you think. You can also keep a guard busy by just ducking to another side of a pillar, he'll never see you. It's his buddy who comes in that is the problem.
internationale, xu, banks, sharp all have abilities that make them a step above the others and one should be in your squad
xu can crack both safes and firewall shields on guards with his ability, also kill camera drones
don't underestimate the SLAM implant, it's amazing! Credits are life.
some items are better than others but shock trap 3 and cloak 3 are game breakingly good. So is wisp.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 14:27 on Jun 14, 2015

# ¿ Jun 14, 2015 14:10

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

HOOLY BOOLY posted:

Why should you avoid doing this on other difficulty modes?

You can get away with a single peek in beginner but guards patrol wider and you have less rewinds so you have to play it safer and double peek .

# ¿ Jun 15, 2015 06:54

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

exquisite tea posted:

Just picked up Alien: Isolation with no expectations other than I like the Alien (movie) series and System Shock 2. The game called me out on the difficulty select screen so I chose Hard. Any generalized, spoiler-free advice? This seems like the kind of game where you can really gently caress yourself over with save points if you just blindly overwrite everything.

Keep moving and don't crouch walk everywhere like a stealth game, it makes things worse.

If hard becomes too obnoxious, drop the difficulty.

Playing with environmentals is not all that useful, unfortunately.

Play in a dark room with headphones.

# ¿ Jun 15, 2015 13:51

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Doctor Spaceman posted:

Anything for Invisible Inc?

Only a few levels.

last page

# ¿ Jun 16, 2015 16:04

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

exquisite tea posted:

I'm having fun so far but I'm dying all the time, that's normal right? Why should I expect to live?

when you die enough, death loses meaning and you become less scared, and the game becomes less fun.

# ¿ Jun 16, 2015 16:48

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

I REALLY don't recommend starting as a wizard. They get pretty strong late game, but they are a real chore to play early. If you play one you'll be 8-10 hrs in before they finally start to pick up steam.

both druid and ciphers are extremely strong, with rogues a close third.

# ¿ Jun 18, 2015 22:38

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Largejaroalmonds posted:

Is there any reason to go for Morrowind over Skyrim? How much has this game aged?

No, and terribly.

People's love for morrorwind are nostalgic and viewed through rose-colored glasses. It was game breaking for it's time, but in terms of modern game design, it really hasn't held up at all unless you are already married to a janky-rear end open world game with game mechanics that can be bent over your knee.

# ¿ Jun 19, 2015 15:27

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Go straight to enemy within. It just adds more options and variation.

# ¿ Sep 3, 2015 20:36

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

paco650 posted:

I know it's relatively new, but anything before starting Sexy Beach Premium Resort?

This one's easy!

The best thing to do is :gb2gbs:

# ¿ Sep 11, 2015 19:46

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

I only watched my friend play it but one of the axes (?) was really good because you could swing twice at their back and stagger the enemies, staggering seems really powerful because you can't use a shield.

# ¿ Nov 2, 2015 22:48

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

TheOneAndOnlyT posted:

Anything for Obduction or is it best to just go in completely blind?

I didn't realize the pillars had buttons on the top of them :cripes:

# ¿ Feb 8, 2017 20:47

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

TheOneAndOnlyT posted:

Anything for Obduction or is it best to just go in completely blind?

oh one thing that was not obvious at all was the minecart can be moved if the laser is off. (you'll understand this when you get to it)

# ¿ Feb 9, 2017 19:37

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Keeshhound posted:

Anyone have tips for Hacknet? I've already played Uplink, if that helps.

It's literally uplink with less depth and more typing and a veneer of real networking concepts like ports. The mechanisms and logic are the same; you'll be fine.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2017 16:36

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Ainsley McTree posted:

Anything for Battlefleet: Gothic Armada (or whatever order those words are supposed to be in, I can't remember)?

Between the skills and upgrades it seems potentially fairly overwhelming, so any must-knows or traps I should be aware of would be cool.

I'm basically just playing through the campaign on easy mode, I'm probably not gonna gently caress with multiplayer. So if the advice is "easy mode is easy, just do whatever" then that's cool

The small ships you start with are harassers; don't try to ram things with those HOWEVER take ramming prow and ram ships every day on the medium and large ships. It's the specialty of the fleet. The ability that does better crit(?) on your guns within 3000 works well with the 'ramming speed' tactic.

Get the troop upgrade (terminators deep strikes?) on the small ships you start with. The best abilities are the bomb/mines that do hull damage and the 10 second invincible shield. The shield bombs aren't terrible and shield transfer on larger ships is real good as well. Focus fire is the name of the game so anything that lets your ship stand up to assault will see you through. Extra shield is nice too; on battlecruisers swap the invincible shield for the faster shield recharge as it's mechanically a better deal.

For skills absolutely upgrade your troop strength to make your assaults stronger, it's the primary method of controlling the fight by taking weapons/engines offline and canceling their warp out and snatching data lots of missions focus around , you'll have to keep a ship in range ready. Gunnery is good. Stay grouped and use those double speed engine tactics and fast rotate.

The game isn't particularly difficult on normal, so just sit back and have fun. You don't need to save scum if you lose a battle; it's expected you lose a bunch, often due to bullshit like them snatching data and warping out and not having deep strikes cooled down.

# ¿ May 10, 2017 16:47

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Ainsley McTree posted:

Is it worth keeping a deep strike in reserve to prevent that kind of thing from happening, or is it a small enough deal that it's just better to spam it when it's available and not worry too much about getting caught with your pants down?

I'm very bad at micromanagement so if there's any way to build a fleet capable of "attack move > win" that's extremely my style, but I knew going in that this would be "fleet micrcomanagement: the game" so I'll just learn to play I suppose

if it's a mission where you have to prevent them from warping out with data, yeah you'll need to keep them in reserve or they'll use it on you and warp out and you won't be able to do anything about it. If you fail to do so you'll lose very fast and can just retry (it saves before every combat IIRC) so you'll get the hang of it

# ¿ May 10, 2017 17:02

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

the beforeiplay wiki is pretty up to date, if you want a bit more guided tour you can look up the game progress route on the bloodborne wiki.

Choose the axe, buff vit to 25 & stam to 15 before you raise any other stats. hold r2 in 2handed mode and spin to win every day. Use every insight skull you come across. Spend all those shards for upgrades, you get more than enough throughout the game to upgrade at least 3 weapons to +9 and later you can buy them for souls and insight so don't worry about experimenting. If you can GET to the hunter's dream, you can probably do a little bit of the start of it.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 23:08 on Aug 14, 2017

# ¿ Aug 14, 2017 23:04

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

food court bailiff posted:

I actually came here to ask about PUBG though.

Things to know:

Drop as far to the 'side' of the flight path as possible so you can at least get a basic weapon before getting murdered. You can fly around 2 "squares" distance.
All shirts/boots/whatever are cosmetic.
Bind the 'loot nearby / inventory' key to something convenient and use it to loot rather than looking down and hitting F. Just run into a room and open inventory to see if there's anything worth looting in a pile.
Dragging loot over is faster than right clicking. Looting fast is absolutely critical to the game.
Larger cities have better items. Vehicles spawn along side the road. Mobility is life until the very end of the game, so try and get a vehicle.
Get in the habit of closing doors behind you, at least in the early game. If someone sees doors open they know you're around and can hunt or ambush on exit.
Pistols are bad after the first 2 mins (unless you've got a silencer), and you'll optimally want a modded rifle & a shotgun/smg and a frying pan as a melee weapon. Silencers+Scopes are A+
The key items in initial looting are helmet, backpack, police vest (armor) and medpacks/bandages + a weapon. Once you get those, get out there and get hunting and kill someone else for their probably better weapon. Looting and scavenging makes you vulnerable, so keep it to a bare minimum.
Don't use hip fire (holding right click) on any weapon except for the shotgun and SMG. Tap it to sight down the barrel for rifles.
Don't hoard ammo or mods, you probably won't get to use them before you die. You'll want backpack space so if you kill a guy you can run over and loot everything and sort it out later when you aren't vulnerable
NEVER STAND STILL. Especially while looting a corpse. Get in the habit of moving back and forth while looting. If you're fired at and duck behind something, keep moving left and right and alternating crouch as much as you can to make headshots harder.
If you start taking fire in the open, DON'T GO PRONE. It won't work and you'll die. Juke around and run for cover instead. Only go prone if you're sure no one can see you do it. The "grass" is only visually ~100yds out from your character so it's easy to see someone prone/ducking relatively far away unless they are in a bush. Turn yours to minimum in the options like everyone else does.
Bind the autorun key and hold ALT while running to look around you constantly. Check your flanks, check your back to see if someone's following.
Sitting still and waiting for the circle to contract is completely viable mid-game strategy, if a bit boring. The first few circle contractions don't do a ton of damage, so don't treat them like a death wall if you're in a skirmish or about to be in one. Just let it past you and soak the damage. The later ones do serious damage though so be careful if you make it to end-game.
Opening fire tells everyone exactly where you are and you WILL get opportunists shooting you in the back. Sound is more important than sight in a lot of cases.
You have to lead your shots significantly if you're gunning for someone running across a field, best to watch a video or don't try at all. Really re-consider before opening up without a silencer because it's a giant dinner bell.
7-8-9-0 are your medical hotkeys.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 19:42 on Aug 27, 2017

# ¿ Aug 27, 2017 17:39

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

LawfulWaffle posted:

Well, I guess this question naturally follows: What should I know before playing Ur-Quan Masters for the first time?

Don't forget to *enjoy the sauce*!

I wonder if i've forgotten enough to make a run-through worth it. It was probably my all-time favorite of my childhood. I still kinda remember where a lot of the races are and what to do, unfortunately.

# ¿ Oct 12, 2017 14:25

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

credburn posted:

Question about Invisible Inc.

I just finished the game on Beginner difficulty, and I'm rather annoyed with the result. I hate basically playing the game over only this time it's a little more difficult. All the progress I made is lost. Can you tell me 1: what is different about experienced vs. beginner mode, 2: is this just a rotating roguelike with the only added benefit being unlocked agents, 3: does the story develop any further by different difficulties or will I simply have to beat the game on Expert to get the true ending?

I had great fun with this game for many hours, and I think what happens next is meant to be kind of enigmatic, but if what I have to expect is simply more of the same, I may not be interested in continuing.

There's no other ending. It's the same game but harder. There's more guard responses, guards are slightly more vigilant and more often have special attributes, less time, less energy, less money. Unlocking heroes is the only advancement, yeah. Take the beginner win and be happy with it; it's not an easy game at all. I'm pretty good at tactical games but have only won experienced once and that was "declare mission accomplished, shelve the game" time for me.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 14:13 on Oct 15, 2017

# ¿ Oct 15, 2017 14:11

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

I used one of the steam walkthroughs for dragon's dogma. The top rated one has everything in spoilers and "finish this quest before act 2 begins when you do X" warnings because the game is separated into several parts and leaves quests dangling.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2017 15:52

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

It starts with creatures doable at level 30(?) which is around half way through the game but the drops are absurdly strong for that level. It fairly quickly ramps up to post-game content. I honestly went there to unlock the different specs at level 10, went back at I think around 40, got through a bit, died, then went at the end of the game but got quickly bored and just uninstalled.

# ¿ Oct 16, 2017 23:58

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Leavemywife posted:

What do you guys have for Horizon Zero Dawn?

The wiki is mostly good, one thing is make sure you buy all the weapons, you have 4 slots and 6+ weapon types but you'll probably develop a favorite. Enemies will be hard if you aren't at least aware other weapons exist because different beasts demand different approaches.

Often spaming lower damage shots is more effective than one or two carefully lined up sniper shots. Lots of things are weak to fire arrows and you can always place spark mines.

Melee is virtually useless past the very early game except for the stealth takedown skills which are really really useful. I leveled them first. Double shots are real good also for that initial sniper initiation arrow. Note the skill tree connections; they don't connect straight down and the middle tier has dead end skills.

# ¿ Dec 26, 2017 04:58

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

I went through that game on very hard with flying swallow comboed with that move where you launch a guy up in the air hit them a bunch of times and then slam them back into the ground, mostly because you can't be staggered while you're doing it so you can just eliminate enemies one by one.

# ¿ Feb 13, 2018 18:13

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

HOOLY BOOLY posted:

What is Kingdom Come:Deliverance and why am i suddenly hearing so much about it?

Skyrim, but you aren't special and there aren't any dragons.

# ¿ Mar 4, 2018 00:23

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

McCoy Pauley posted:

Anyone have any advice for how to get started in Dawn of Discovery? I have that and the Venice expansion, and was thinking of starting in on one or the other. From just booting up the game, it's not immediately apparent whether there is some tutorial or starter campaign. I didn't see anything in the wiki on this.

Any basic advice for starting out? Is there in fact some tutorial I'm missing? Perhaps an even more basic question -- with Venice content installed, is the entire game just Venice now (and if so, should I first play without the Venice content installed?)

The first thing you do is download the fan patch because it adds context-sensitive menus that give things like basic building ratios like the newer anno games do. Venice is pretty much mandatory and I'd recommend playing the normal campaign as it's is pretty much a tutorial. The problem with it is midway through you'll start to do actual combat with armies and that part of the game really sucks (and is why venice is so good - you can just buy islands without the clunky army system). The "meat" of the game is the challenges which are on random maps with varying difficulties and objectives.

# ¿ Apr 1, 2018 18:24

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

McCoy Pauley posted:

Any tips for Battletech beyond what's in the wiki?

In particular, is the tweak to the audioconstants file still recommended? I thought the game had been patched since release in ways designed to speed things up.

Yes, that patch hasn't come out yet. I also enabled the debug mode per the OP of the battletech thread. For faster movement because combat is really really slow.

I have a few tips having just finished playing it.

Scrap is not the same as store, if you have a sellable mech, store then sell, you'll get more cbills

You can reorder the refit queue. Don't go crazy trying to refit your first mech, refitting takes a long time and time is money. Remove/add a weapon here and there until you have a lull and can afford it.

In the beginning of the game it's really cheap to pay lavish for +2 morale every month, it's a lot more expensive later so build it while you can. Morale is amazing.

There's no reason to not drop the heaviest as possible every time, once you get heavier mechs you'll decomm your lighter, this is normal but a bit sad.

Mechs are assembled from parts and come fully equipped so if you got banged up bad it's probably cheaper just to scrap what you were piloting and use a newly assembled one.

Generally you want to pilot mechs at the top of the weight for their class. Some are better than others, there are steam guides if you are looking for specific good mechs and fits, also tweak weapons so they mostly fire in the same range and then stay at that range. Jumpjets on everything. At least 4.

Generally, their default fits are bad. Really weak on armor. Take out those ac5s/lrm5s and max front torso armor. Armor saves you cbills because it's repaired for free. Front torso armor should be maxed and back generally no less than 50% of the bar. Legs and arms 75% ish. No less than 50% unless the arm is empty and you really really need the tonage.

Don't do too many side missions until you get the argo, unless you really need cbills, consider yourself in the prologue and do story missions if they come up and you have the drop tonnage.

Expert tactics is by far the best skill. Allows you to go twice by delaying your turn to after they've gone, letting you reposition while firing every round and also remain braced. Bulwark is second. By late game you're not going to be able to dodge and agility isn't worth it, bulwark letting you take half damage and also fire back same turn is amazing. If they ever change the guts skill to brace on melee get that for your brawler but otherwise just spec everyone the same, get bulwark then go up the tactics tree

If you're not braced for half damage when the enemy fires at you or at least a lot of evasion, you're doing it wrong. If your first mech is over the hill and charging to medium range, maybe spend morale for that brace after moving so he doesn't get cored on the enemy return stroke! If you have low heat, jump jet in instead of sprinting so you can brace.

Your guys are going to get injured, comically and seemingly every mission from a head hit even if you perform flawlessly. It's a bullshit part of the game. Check market for cockpit mods to ignore a number of hits and you'll need a roster of 7ish to rotate the injured out. Once you get the argo research medbay asap.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 22:23 on Jun 23, 2018

# ¿ Jun 23, 2018 13:52

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Kanfy posted:

Sure, but that page's gonna get awfully crowded and is probably gonna need some trimming already from someone who knows their Battletech.

TBH, a lot of these tips are pointless or are in the "specific list of tactics" category of which there are a million steam guides. Also some things like the refitting issue and vigilance tip aren't true anymore. I've combined our lists:

Campaign tips:
Don't do too many side missions until you get the argo. Unless you really need cbills, consider yourself still in the prologue and do story missions if they come up and you have the drop tonnage.
Your guys are going to get injured, comically and seemingly every mission from a head hit even if you perform flawlessly. It's a bullshit part of the game. Check the market for cockpit mods to ignore a number of hits and you'll need a roster of ~7 to rotate the injured out. Once you get the argo, research medbay asap.
Scrapping is not the same as storing. If you have a sellable mech, first store it then sell it to get ~30% more cbills.
In the beginning of the game it's really cheap to pay lavishly for +2 morale every month. It's a lot more expensive later so build it while you can.
Destroyed mechs leave salvage for you to collect after the mission; it takes 3 pieces to build a full mech. Destroying the head or killing the pilot will leave 3 parts. Destroying both legs will leave 2, and coring a mech (destroying the center torso) leaves 1. If you have a lot of stability damage, just knock down the mech and/or destroy side toros to keep it intact. Always negotiate for 3 salvage if possible, you never know when you'll want to reconstruct a rare mech you run into!
Mechs assembled from parts and come fully equipped so if you got banged up bad it's probably cheaper and faster just to scrap what you were piloting and use a newly assembled one.
Feel free to withdraw from a tough fight that isn't worth the losses you'll take. If you can manage to accomplish one goal of the mission before withdrawing, the client will count it as "in good faith", and award you partial pay.
Drop in your heaviest mechs every time. You only need one full lance plus one or two backup mechs to use while one's in the shop, so swap out lighters for heavier as you progress and store/sell extras.
Generally, you want mechs at the top of the weight for their class. Some are better than others, there are steam guides if you are looking for specific good mechs and fits. Highly recommend to keep/use: firestarter(mg), hunchback, centurion, kintaro, catapult(ac20), grasshopper, and the overall best mechs in the game are the atlas, highlander and king crab.
For the late-campaign defend-against-APC mission, you can stand in the doorway to prevent the APC getting to the finish line in two turns.

Fitting Tips:
You can reorder the refit queue. Don't go crazy trying to refit your first mech; a total refit takes a long time and time is money early game. Remove/add a weapon here and there until you have a lull and can afford it.
Remove weak weapons so they mostly fire in the same range and then stay at that range. Take Jumpjets on everything. At least 4. Generally, default mech fits are bad and really weak on armor. Take out those tiny LRMs/ac5s and max front torso armor with the extra tonage. Armor saves you cbills because it's repaired for free. Front torso armor should be maxed and back generally no less than 50% of the bar. Legs and arms 75% ish. No less than 50% unless the arm is empty and you really really need the tonage.

Tactics:
Expert tactics is by far the best skill. Allows you to go twice by delaying your turn to after they've gone, letting you reposition while firing every round and also remain braced. Bulwark is second. By late game you're not going to be able to dodge so bulwark letting you take half damage and also fire back same turn is amazing. If they ever change the guts skill to brace on melee get that for your brawler but otherwise just spec everyone the same, get bulwark then go up the tactics tree to bulwark, then piloting until you get extra sprint distance, then 4-5 gunnery, 9 tactics, then piloting/guts to taste. You'll never need more than 5 gunnery.
If you're not braced for half damage when the enemy fires at you or at least a lot of evasion, you're doing it wrong. If your first mech is over the hill and charging to medium range, maybe spend morale for that brace after moving so he doesn't get cored on the enemy return stroke! If you have low heat, jump jet in instead of sprinting so you can brace. You can rotate your mech as your move action without losing brace and side attacks are more likely to hit arms.
Melee attacks and Death from Above (DfA) will fire all of your support weapons as well as causing heavy damage to a single hit location. Note that DfA can severely damage your own legs, and causes a hefty chunk of stability damage to both you and your enemy. Use it as a finisher.
Melee attacks ignore evasion pips, making them useful against annoying light mechs trying to run circles around you.
Vehicles and turrets take double damage from melee and DfA. Stomp those tanks!
Morale is amazing. Use called shots to core mechs in one volley or vigilance (after moving) for a free brace + stability + go earlier next round. Killing an enemy lends you almost enough morale to use an ability, so use them often (but stay above 50 morale for the +1 hit if possible)
Hover over a location on a mech's paper doll to see the components in that location. Useful for finding ammo reserves to blow up or weapons to destroy. Note that you can't salvage destroyed weapons so watch your fire if you see something you like!

Still kinda long, but it's a complex game.

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 23:15 on Jun 23, 2018

# ¿ Jun 23, 2018 22:54

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# ¿ May 14, 2024 11:07

Bhodi: Dec 9, 2007; Oh, it's just a cat.; Pillbug

Frostpunk:

Expeditions travel twice as fast when their destination is known, so travel to a distant known location before spurring off to explore. The direct path back is fine.

child workers are a poor choice, even in dire situations. the other path unlocks engineer apprenticeships which are flat better in every way

Soup isn't great either.

Make a new law every time you can, including pausing and doing it at the start. There's an increasing cooldown on new laws and like research you want to get to the bottom asap

Think of morale as a currency and hope as a lose condition. Fill those bars up! Emergency work right at the start can help give your colony a boost and a normally running colony can weather permanent longer hours

Cold people get sick and this can cause a death spiral as healthy people auto-shuffle through your one illness-causing edge meat locker building

Gather huts are useful not only because they keep your people warmer but they also increase gather rate by letting one guy gather from all nearby patches simultaneously. Build them.

You can put people in gather huts and also manually gather the same patch if you're trying to deplete quickly to free up the land

Manually heating buildings and the smaller heaters are almost always a more cost effective option than bumping your central furnace

Don't overheat! People treated will almost always get better, and the difference between liveable and comfortable is small. Just avoid "cold" for buildings.

You can build multiple lifts which let you have multiple temporary colonies, one per lift

Bhodi fucked around with this message at 14:51 on Aug 13, 2018

# ¿ Aug 13, 2018 14:39

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > The "What should I know before I play this game for the first time?" Q&A!

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