Octopus Overlords

Archinerd wrote:Started my first game ever last night and played for about 4 hours. I'm to the part where you have a conversation about radio relays with a guy in a hat and sunglasses.

I think I'm going to have to restart tonight though. After reading some more character creation tips today I think I've spread myself too thin on skills.
It's not all a loss though, now that I have a better idea of what I'm doing I should be able to get to the same spot in about 5-10 minutes.

It ended up taking me an hour to get back to the same spot... but that has more to do with the inability to save/recruit previously created party members than any analysis paralysis on my part.

I'm now well on my way into the first mission, and despite the sometimes clunky interface I'm having fun.

NickAragua wrote:Maybe there's a way to negotiate with the giant robotic scorpion.

There is...with fist, spear, big hammer or submachine gun.

Lordnine wrote:While combat isn’t entirely avoidable, I would say you can skip as much as 40% of the combat in the game. That said, you may not like what you have to do to skip it. Being the “good guy” in Wasteland 2 does not equal non-violent. Some people you encounter are beyond salvation and to side with them equates to taking a bribe and lying to your superiors.

The original Wasteland was also very combat focused while Fallout took things in a more nonviolent direction for those who wished to do so. I believe inXile wanted to replicate Wasteland's style with W2, not Fallout's, so combat is what's on the menu.

Lordnine wrote: Some people you encounter are beyond salvation and to side with them equates to taking a bribe and lying to your superiors.

I rather liked that about it. The best RPGs are those that create moral dilemmas rather than just giving you 'good guy' and 'bad guy' choices. In a violent world, sometimes a non-violent solution can cause even more problems than it solves.

I had forgotten how much fun being the animal whisperer was. I will be unstoppable with my army of cows and one goat!

Is there any way to level up just one character at a time? I took the Disparenumerophobia perk on one of my characters and would like to not level them up every time if possible. I did take it knowing there were drawbacks, just trying to manage them if I can.

Started a game last night. First time I played (up to California), I used the default party but replaced one of the characters. Not exactly sure why. I think I thought that some of them would have stories (ala Baldur's Gate 2).

This time, after reading a bit, I made 3 of the 4. But tweaked the one default character. Too many opinions. I ended up opting to drop CHA and LUCK to 1 and boost INT to 10. Then I played with the other scores to get the best combo. Then I gave all my characters the exact same values.

I did run into a slight problem in the first mission when I found that I didn't have a Computer Science person. But I leveled up part way through and was able to pick it up (along with 1 level of Toaster repair). They are doing okay so far. I'll be happy when I get a few more levels of skill points.

I also did some reading on the NPCs that you can pick up. The consensus seems to be that they pretty much all suck. I was thinking of going for Highpool this time instead of the Ag Center, but apparently the NPC there is pretty bad. Has anyone gone that route? Is the sniper worth trying to use? I know about the issues with Rose. But at least she gets a lot of skills and can be made fairly useful quickly. And by the end, I should really need her. I think in my last game I made her an energy weapon specialist.

I'm also thinking of grabbing the grunt at the mine. Mostly so I have someone to carry stuff. I dropped all my STR values to 3s.

I am shelving my playthrough right now as I hit the bug where your NPC party members disappear when you dismiss them rather than return to Ranger Citadel. Lost some gear and feel like there were some quests or dialog attached to a couple of them that are mia now

This game has its claws in me again. I've already clocked in 14 hours on the Director's Cut.

IceBear wrote:I am shelving my playthrough right now as I hit the bug where your NPC party members disappear when you dismiss them rather than return to Ranger Citadel. Lost some gear and feel like there were some quests or dialog attached to a couple of them that are mia now

I don't think they're gone permanently. They're still in your save file, but you just can't find them where they're supposed to be. Later in the game you're given the option to pick a couple to take with you, and the missing ones should show up then. Still, I'm going to hold off playing once I reach the point where I'm going to have to dismiss party members too, which luckily hasn't happened yet.

I was just dismissing them so I could get the xp from the recruiter

IceBear wrote:I was just dismissing them so I could get the xp from the recruiter

You don't have to dismiss them to do so. Just recruit them.

TheMix wrote:Started a game last night. First time I played (up to California), I used the default party but replaced one of the characters. Not exactly sure why. I think I thought that some of them would have stories (ala Baldur's Gate 2).

This time, after reading a bit, I made 3 of the 4. But tweaked the one default character. Too many opinions. I ended up opting to drop CHA and LUCK to 1 and boost INT to 10. Then I played with the other scores to get the best combo. Then I gave all my characters the exact same values.

I did run into a slight problem in the first mission when I found that I didn't have a Computer Science person. But I leveled up part way through and was able to pick it up (along with 1 level of Toaster repair). They are doing okay so far. I'll be happy when I get a few more levels of skill points.

I also did some reading on the NPCs that you can pick up. The consensus seems to be that they pretty much all suck. I was thinking of going for Highpool this time instead of the Ag Center, but apparently the NPC there is pretty bad. Has anyone gone that route? Is the sniper worth trying to use? I know about the issues with Rose. But at least she gets a lot of skills and can be made fairly useful quickly. And by the end, I should really need her. I think in my last game I made her an energy weapon specialist.

I'm also thinking of grabbing the grunt at the mine. Mostly so I have someone to carry stuff. I dropped all my STR values to 3s.

I love the npc at Highpool. Great scout, perception, outdoorsman, animal whisper, and a sniper. Decent charisma and intelligence. Little low on AP but you can work on that. I choose Highpool every time.

I opted for Rose again. Guess that will give me another reason to replay.

Apparently she has a lot of involvement in future quests. So you lose some of that interaction if you don't go with her. Though right now I sure wouldn't mind another sniper. With Rose I generally push her to energy weapons. That can help a lot.

Dammit! After 17 hours, I finally have to dismiss someone from my party, so this is where I stop playing until the bug is fixed. Luckily, the bug was apparently fixed internally yesterday, so a patch should be coming shortly.

TiLT wrote:

IceBear wrote:I was just dismissing them so I could get the xp from the recruiter

You don't have to dismiss them to do so. Just recruit them.

If I tried to recruit them I have to dismiss someone in my party. If I don't dismiss someone I don't get credit for them back at the base. I thought in my first partial playthrough I could get someone to the point that they asked to join me and I would get credit

Anyone else noticing any memory issues? Granted my PC is 5+ years old and only sporting 6GB of memory, but I've had to drop out a couple times now because my PC ran out of memory. Just firing up the game takes up about 5GB. I suspect they have a memory leak of some kind too.

Not a big deal. At least the game loads quickly. And I had been thinking of getting a memory upgrade to go with my recent video card upgrade.

Yes, there is a known memory leak with dynamic shadows caused by a bug in the Unity 5 engine. If you have a DX12-capable card, you can force the game to run with that on to reduce the problem (it's still there though), or you could just turn down shadow quality. This will likely be fixed in a patch, though I'm not sure it'll happen in the first one.

TiLT wrote:Yes, there is a known memory leak with dynamic shadows caused by a bug in the Unity 5 engine. If you have a DX12-capable card, you can force the game to run with that on to reduce the problem (it's still there though), or you could just turn down shadow quality. This will likely be fixed in a patch, though I'm not sure it'll happen in the first one.

Thanks for the info. Not a huge deal, so I've just been living with it. But I'll dial back the shadows.

On my first play through with generic squad, plus NPC Angela who joined the team.
In my first real battle,in Highpool, I had NPC Angela scout ahead. She gets spotted by a guy named "Jackhammer" and his crew and being pursued, she runs back toward her teammates. A couple of spaces away from her teammates she is not allowed to move any more in that direction. Then I find I can no longer control any of my other team members so they just stand a few feet away as Angela gets blasted and pummeled to death. WTF?

That sounds really unpleasant. And infuriating. I haven't run into anything like that. Yet.

Really enjoying playing the DC while waiting for Fallout 4. The graphics are definitely improved and some of the areas are laid out a bit differently than they were originally. Combat, though supposedly harder early on, is actually easier for me so far. I think because when I played the first time I was still learning the ropes. Now, I'm all about setting up my squad and drawing the enemy into ambushes. But in a few more days I'll probably have to stop until the stop the disappearing recruitable NPC's. Great game though, looking forward to the CA section which I never go to in the original.

Grifman wrote: But in a few more days I'll probably have to stop until the stop the disappearing recruitable NPC's. G.

I've decided to wait for this fix before I jump back in this. I've been using my game time pretending to be a prison architect. Another game I had been waiting to play until it was done.

I am too trying to kill time so I picked up my unfinished W2 game until Fallout 4 is out. Hopefully I will be able to finish this time. I keep getting turned down by the lack of sneaking, the dumb enemy AI, and the camera angle. I find it really hard to navigate on the map. I think the camera is a bit too high for my taste. Maybe I am missing a setting. W2 is not a bad game by any means, but with just a little more effort it could have been an amazing one.

Normann wrote:I am too trying to kill time so I picked up my unfinished W2 game until Fallout 4 is out. Hopefully I will be able to finish this time. I keep getting turned down by the lack of sneaking, the dumb enemy AI, and the camera angle. I find it really hard to navigate on the map. I think the camera is a bit too high for my taste. Maybe I am missing a setting. W2 is not a bad game by any means, but with just a little more effort it could have been an amazing one.

Several of your complaints, including the camera, would probably be addressed by playing the Director's Cut. It really is an improvement over the original.

So I've been getting ready to jump into this but the bug comments are scaring me. Should I wait for the next patch or no?

I bought a co-worker's extra copy from the kickstarter for 10 bucks when it came out, and while I'd like to play it, it's not a priority. However, my co-worker has been sniffing around, and I'm starting to feel guilty.

I noticed that I now have an entry in my Steam Library for the Director's Cut. Which is nice.

I tried reading up on party composition last night, but the article did not give me confidence. I'll eventually read this entire thread page for page, but if anyone can give me a link (or post your own opinions if you feel like it. I realize this might potentially be repeating yourself from earlier in the thread) to an article on character design and party composition to get me started, that would help.

I still manage to find a lot of playing time these days, it's the learning curves that keep me from playing most of the time. I don't necessarily need to min/max everything, but avoiding common mistakes is important to me. I'm not the kind of guy that simply fires up a game and clicks on things to see if they work. That's not what I enjoy about gaming.

I'll post some character stuff sometime this weekend but it will be based upon the DC - there are some significant differences to take into account in character building.

Grifman wrote:I'll post some character stuff sometime this weekend

I will wait to start until you do that. Because I'm lazy.

TiLT wrote:

Normann wrote:I am too trying to kill time so I picked up my unfinished W2 game until Fallout 4 is out. Hopefully I will be able to finish this time. I keep getting turned down by the lack of sneaking, the dumb enemy AI, and the camera angle. I find it really hard to navigate on the map. I think the camera is a bit too high for my taste. Maybe I am missing a setting. W2 is not a bad game by any means, but with just a little more effort it could have been an amazing one.

Several of your complaints, including the camera, would probably be addressed by playing the Director's Cut. It really is an improvement over the original.

I did not even know that existed. I see it is in my Steam library. When I click "play it now" it starts my regular W2 install. Am I playing the DC? How do I know?

EDIT:
Never mind. I am playing the original. I see save games are not compatible and I sure I do not want to start over. I doubt I would finish if I do.

Two questions for the DC:
1. Is enemy AI much better?
2. Is there stealth?

The DC shows in Steam as a completely separate game.

"Screwed up" last night. Doing the Rail Yard stuff. I took a Hard Ass option because I could and now I can't reconcile the two tribes. My only option is to let the Topekans wipe out the Atchinsons.

And like a noob I didn't make a hard save point.

TheMix wrote:"Screwed up" last night. Doing the Rail Yard stuff. I took a Hard Ass option because I could and now I can't reconcile the two tribes. My only option is to let the Topekans wipe out the Atchinsons.

And like a noob I didn't make a hard save point.

They put that option in the game for a reason. Enjoy it!

Normann wrote:Two questions for the DC:
1. Is enemy AI much better?
2. Is there stealth?

It's been a while since I played the original W2, but...

1. It has been improved as far as I can see. I remember every enemy on the map, no matter their weapons, making a beeline for my sniper in every single battle. Even animals would do that for some reason. While the sniper still gets more attention than the other members of my party, enemy behavior feels far, far more rational this time around. Gunners stay behind cover and will jump to new cover if exposed. Melee guys will charge as usual, but will be more sensible about their target selections.
2. I don't know. I've managed to sneak up on a distracted group of enemies, but there's no way to toggle stealth or anything like that. W2 is not a stealth game.

I had gotten roughly halfway through W2 when I stopped for various reasons. When DC came out I started all over again, and I was completely absorbed at once. Replaying content wasn't a problem at all, because it felt fresh again in many ways. The entire game has been rebalanced and has gotten a new design pass.

I successfully negotiated a peace on my first 1/2 play through.

I just feel really guilty. Especially for Ralphie. And Jessie.

I am a little curious what the overall ramifications will be.

TheMix wrote:I successfully negotiated a peace on my first 1/2 play through.

I just feel really guilty. Especially for Ralphie. And Jessie.

I am a little curious what the overall ramifications will be.

That area has numerous outcomes based on how you chose to do things, not just the big choices. Getting the best outcome is actually really difficult and requires you think outside the box.

TiLT wrote:

Normann wrote:Two questions for the DC:
1. Is enemy AI much better?
2. Is there stealth?

It's been a while since I played the original W2, but...

1. It has been improved as far as I can see. I remember every enemy on the map, no matter their weapons, making a beeline for my sniper in every single battle. Even animals would do that for some reason. While the sniper still gets more attention than the other members of my party, enemy behavior feels far, far more rational this time around. Gunners stay behind cover and will jump to new cover if exposed. Melee guys will charge as usual, but will be more sensible about their target selections.
2. I don't know. I've managed to sneak up on a distracted group of enemies, but there's no way to toggle stealth or anything like that. W2 is not a stealth game.

I had gotten roughly halfway through W2 when I stopped for various reasons. When DC came out I started all over again, and I was completely absorbed at once. Replaying content wasn't a problem at all, because it felt fresh again in many ways. The entire game has been rebalanced and has gotten a new design pass.

Thanks for the info. Sounds like I should shelf this and do a clean start in a few months.

Lordnine wrote:

TheMix wrote:I successfully negotiated a peace on my first 1/2 play through.

I just feel really guilty. Especially for Ralphie. And Jessie.

I am a little curious what the overall ramifications will be.

That area has numerous outcomes based on how you chose to do things, not just the big choices. Getting the best outcome is actually really difficult and requires you think outside the box.

Or use a walkthrough.

I find I do that more these days because I have too many games to spend too much time trying to figure things out. (Though I do usually reserve the walkthroughs for either getting stuck or replays.)

I would think you would want to avoid a walkthrough in a game like Wasteland specifically because there ARE so many outcomes. Getting a bad outcome in one area doesn't mean you fail, the game just goes on in a different direction. You have the potential to have a completely unique experience versus most “RPGs” where you are limited to the “Good” or “Evil” path.

The loading screens also warn you that no matter how hard you try, you won't always get a happy outcome. Just roll with it. Using a walkthrough for a game like Wasteland 2 (which doesn't really have "puzzles" that need solving for you) is a bit counterproductive.

Eh. I won't disagree with your opinions. But I will submit that my opinion differs. As I stated previously, I don't generally resort to walkthroughs on an initial playthrough. However, in this case, I already played the first half. Additionally, some people will play the game multiple times in order to try all the different outcomes. I have too many games in my backlog. It's unlikely that I will play it again.

So I like to read up on an area to see what all the outcomes are. Then pick the one I like. Or sometimes I simply read up on it afterwards to see what might have been. Occasionally I'll go back and redo to get a different outcome. This one annoyed me because I knew that it was possible to broker peace. I did it previously. I thought I was following the correct choices. I'm a little miffed that one decision removes that option. I'm also miffed that I didn't get all the dialogue options that I probably should have gotten (which would have changed my actions) - not sure what's up with that.