Guide for latest version

[Hentaika]

I noticed that a lot of the guides are outdated, hence I decided to do a list of things one would like to know when starting out and overall a power start.

The game is a very long one and some starter decisions can be very important. It's very hard to fix starting character mistakes in the game.

So let's start with the character:
Main character - select Melee one(because best companions are ranged)
Best traits - Steel body(a must trait for any melee character), toughness OR thorns(those are actually not best in slot, but best in slot is sadly not available for selection and you will have to either reselect it or stick as is, since those 2 are not too much worse)
I prefer resilience overall.

March is BY FAR best logistic trait to pick. Only highest rank trait works for logistic and you won't find a higher rank march for a very long time.

Best stats/weapons for ranged and melee
Melee is mainly a tank, it will do okay damage if you go damage way, but don't expect it to deal as much as back row.. hence better to go into being tankier.
Best stat is IMO full dexterity for dodge/resilience, which give pretty big value to survival of party when stacked on all 3 front liners.

Weapons for melee are all balanced overall, At start I like sword since it's biggest single target over time DPS and pairs extremely well with Anne since rifle is dealing 40% more dmg to bleeding.
Hammer is nice for it's stun for 30 AP...
Axe is imo nice to have one of in late game for it's 20% more dmg to target passive. Nice on bulkier/mini boss type units.
So overall 1 of each melee weapon is what you will want.. but axe is certainly only worth near the very end. Axe is the least important weapon overall.
Don't dwell too much though if you can't get 1 of each weapon in party and just use whatever, the difference is minimal.
MC can equip any weapon efficiently... the extra damage for wielding specific one is just not worth rerolling, better stick to versatility and use a great weapon if you find one.

Ranged are full glass cannons since only enemy ranged can touch them.
Best stat is IMO full luck. It gives more value the further in the levels you go. It's VERY close to full agility.
The disadvantage of luck is it sucks early on and it's often overkill or heavy damage loss if no crit. But it's highest potential damage math wise.
Full agility is stable damage but a bit lower overall damage potential.

Weapon is kinda mostly chosen for you - Anne has to be Rifle, Jing Wei has to be crossbow.. so you only have 1 slot left.
I will describe other weapons instead:
Sniper rifle - IMO the way to go. Highest damage and pretty accurate but slow, meaning you will likely move last in turn.. pretty much used simply as basic atk option, since there are a lot more important ways to spend AP.
Shotgun - the IMO 2nd best choice... it's not too accurate and not too powerful.. but has arguably best debuff on it's 40 AP AoE, a 20% hit reduction to up to 3 targets. Skills consume 3 bullets, basic atk is 1.
SMG - super fast, will likely move first, consumes 3 bullets per shot. Has one of the most efficient AoE - up to 225% total for 35 AP and a -10 speed to enemy, making them often go slower than most other allies.
A totally viable option for helping with removing armor before jing wei moves... but nothing too special.
HMG - 10/15/20 bullet cost for attacking. Is EXTREMELY inaccurate and slow. But has by far biggest AoE damage potential end game.
IMO for it to work well you would need a very specific build focusing on AoE and speed clearing overall. Hit chance increases are very welcome.
Bullet cost and moving last is also pretty problematic.. also you likely want to wear pretty light armor, ideally where RNG blessed you with hit chance on armor piece.
Usually AoE is something you want to move first with.

Story companions:
Here I will give some info on each story companion and whom to pick or ignore in the setup I recommend.
BE AWARE THAT SHOULD YOU CHOOSE TO ATTACK/BE RUDE TO THOSE - IT'S ENTIRELY POSSIBLE FOR THEM NOT TO JOIN YOU!

Reid vs Anne:
Anne is the way to go overall. She has the most important traits(focuses on SPECIFIC weapon, rifle for her) and gets a hit chance boost.
2 most important passives.
Both her uniques are nice. First one is nice for combat, second one is amazing for early game.

Reid is pretty much a worse than random character since trait slots are super important for melee and he only has one. And his unique is kinda meh.

MC + Anne or Reid do not cost salary.. which is extremely good, since salary raises with levels and your combat allies want levels for sure.

All next story companions actually cost salary and you have to recruit them from an inn once you are done with main quest progress involving them. Assuming you didn't kill them obviously.

Jing Wei - first story companion and arguably strongest one. Also the one that makes you learn how mood works since she and Anne are not too compatible by default.
Luckily this can be solved by improving team mood via reaching 100 reputation with civillians in first 2 zones.
Her weapon of choice is crossbow, which is kinda meh.. BUT she starts with S rank crossbow, A rank precise(6% crit), a logistic slot you can replace with 'command' ability to give hit to other ranged allies.
And an unique passive which makes her shine - thorny rose(60% extra damage to unarmored targets).. this one pretty much makes her the number 1 damage dealer in the game.

Mr J/Jimmy - he is a ranged merchant.
He is very incompatible to Jing Wei, hence he is on the bench.
As a trader he is not too suited for combat.. and also lacks the logistic slot.
His unique is for combat, which kinda makes him whatever as both combatant and non combatant.
If he was more compatible with Jing Wei - he would be okay'ish since he starts with the good A rank merchant passives.. but it's easily replaceable.

The 2 below are not part of main story and are instead side quests.

Baker/Beck - doctor.
The quest starts in Ampton city(zone 4 west).. it's relatively simple - do ~3 battles with bandits, get loot for him and he will wait in the tavern.
Yet another pretty useless character, since it's yet another semi combat semi support type, meh at both.

John - mechanic.
His quest starts in Dimore Town(zone 4 west) then proceeding into Bagpipe town and then into zone 4 east Liao Dong Town for a relatively easy combat after which he is in tavern.
Nicely compatible to jing wei but overall useless as he is another semi combat semi non combat. Has machine gun trait and unique trait of +20% dmg/hit chance per dead ally.. could be fun to use, but not worth overall.


Recruiting, whom to look out for and how to:
Since first 3 combat companions are MC(melee) + 2x Ranged(Anne + Jing Wei) - you need to recruit 2nd melee as priority.
As for non combat - priority is mechanic/trader >>> doctor

Do NOT recruit anyone before you get Jing Wei - you need to balance your party around giving her no more mood penalties(at least not much) while also not having a bad mood yourself.
Overall when balancing mood you need to keep in mind that bad mood is okay if you can balance it with good mood via other character + the civillian 100 reputation +~7 mood per zone, which pretty much ensures you should be fine if you know what you are doing by zone 3.

Here is what to look for when recruiting:
Every combat ally has to end up on positive mood.. it's fine to have some negative moods but the total must go into positive(include the passive mood bonuses from civillians friendship, which gives a huge leeway)

Be aware that starting stats are slightly random, so there is that if you care about min maxing. Sadly you can't save/load those as those are decided upon character spawn in tavern. While important(sucks to have agi on melee and str on ranged) - not too critical overall.
Another somewhat important stat to look out for is self immune value. This value is 60-80 on random mercenaries.. if mercenary is ~60-65 pre food immunity, I would say it's better to look further, ideally you want 70+ on combat allies.
The exclusion is if you are fine with rolling casino. 2nd casino has a trinket you can equip which gives everyone +20 immune, making even those with 60 self immune 80 by default and the rest is kinda fine via food.
And main thing is obviously the traits.

Melee character - 100% needs to have steel body and status resistance trait.
Status resist is biggest value by far, giving huge % amount. Someone without steel body is pretty much dead to a few unlucky crits later on.

Range character - you only need one extra one on top of story ones.
I would take a shotgun or sniper(can also accept SMG or a 2nd rifle/crossbow if you are too lazy to search for merc longer) or ignore weapon entirely and just reset it with elixir to suit your needs.
As for titles: Command + Divine Eye is the best BUT this can only happen through RNG or even bug(?) since those are mutually exclusive upon character creation/skill reset. I did get a character with that combo.
Precise + Command(best resettable) OR Divine Eye + Swift or Hector(a bit worse option but viable if you are too lazy to roll more)

NB: SINCE IT IS VERY HARD TO RECRUIT ONES YOU WANT WITH PRECISELY THOSE TALENTS - WHAT I RECOMMEND TO DO IS IGNORE WEAPON SPECIALIZATION AND ALSO ACCEPT SIMPLY GOOD OTHER 2 TALENTS WHILE MAINTAINING OKAY MOOD,
The reason is your main limiter being combat permanent books - those are what you will always lack when farming books. You should have plenty for weapon ones

Mechanic/Trader/Doctor:
Those you want ideally at level 1(and manually up traits via tomes) for lower salary.
Their own mood does not matter BUT their mood given to combat party members does.
Ideally you go recruit those in zone 1. Zone 2 ones are still cheap enough to ignore their cost though.

Mechanic - fuel cost reduce is most important. Cheaper repair as 2nd is slightly more efficient at lowering amount of cash required.. but don't dwell on that too much.

Trader - reputation/bargain are the nice ones. Reputation is nice to lower amount of grind for civillian 100 REP in each zone.. and if you like to improve the towns then you want reputation from towns as well, which is kinda grindy.

Doctor - the least important one... first aid is the only important trait.. the serious injury is an okay'ish 2nd that you likely won't ever profit from much.

2 of those(likely mechanic/trader) want the following logistic traits:
Thrift - less food/water required is nice

Transport - more load is very nice

3rd logistic trait is not important as your MC should already have march.

Starter Progression:
Use following guide to see basic info of what is where and a decent starting farm route.. https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=2582683329

First zone - beat the whole zone with 2 starter characters, don't recruit more.
Upgrade your carts ASAP as bigger cart = more money per trade route.
Eventually you want to end up with 2 trolleys and gather ~110-120k cash before moving to next zone.

Second zone - now that you got over 100k cash it's time to move out.
Your first arrival here is your scariest, since you are too slow to evade opponents and too weak to fight most of them. Be very careful.
Your goal is not the initial town but a town called Turt instead.
Start the recommended trade route to arrive in it eventually while making some cash along the way.
Here you sell your 2 carts and buy a tricycle for 100k which can fit 2 people.
With this cycle - nothing can catch up to you if you are careful. You now need fuel as well though.
Your main goal is now doing a bit trading and getting 2nd tricycle to massively improve your carrying capacity.

Now that you have 2 cycles - move on with main quest, make sure to best equip your 2 characters and make sure to be nice to Jing Wei. She will show up in tavern if all goes correct.
Recruit her as your 3rd character(and aim at getting 3rd bike as well)

3 combat characters are technically enough for this zone.
But now that you got Jing Wei - you can now easily judge which of the mercs are mood compatible with your party.
Your first priority is getting mechanic/trader/melee combat extra characters for a 6 man party.
Mechanic/trader overall profit you more than you lose from having them via talents alone so no reason not to recruit if you see a compatible one. Make sure you do NOT level your non combat characters, it's useless/harmful.
Does not need to happen in this zone, but you certainly want 4 combat chars on zone 3 quests.

Once you got a 5-6 man party(trader/mechanic + 2 range and 1-2 melee) and got ~2.7-2.8m in cash you are ready for zone 3.

In zone 3 the town is luckily close by and has the vehicles we need.
You need to buy 2 cars, ~1.3m each. It has 3 passenger slots each, exactly what we need for our 6 man party.
This car allows you to outrun everything in this zone. There is a more expensive one, but it's slower and less efficient overall, so it's in fact the best vehicles for this area.

The important part of zone 3 though is the casino in New Moon City instead of usual blackjack game.
Casino is an easy way to get some nice stuff - unique accessories in each casino, purple weapons/armors, books for talents, talent reset and so on.
Obviously this requires saving the game. Overall the casino has good odds for triple symbol winning and with only a bit save/loading you will likely be staying at positive cash or at least be balancing it out.
The reason for that is one of possible 3 symbols being diamond ore, which costs 500k+ if you sell it right there. Also selling armor/weapons is pretty big amount of cash.
Overall I would spend ~200-300k and reload if you get no 3 symbol stuff.
Keep doing this until you get a solid set of armor for at least melee and hopefully a few suitable weapons(ranged are a pain to get so don't dwell too much if you don't)

Zone 3 casino unique trinket is +2 dexterity and +40 mood, nice enough to use if one of your frontliners ends up with low mood, but not too great otherwise.
Unique trinket is gotten via 3 bags. After you get it - you will be getting forgotten elixirs instead, you can only get trinket once.

Don't go too crazy as this gear is temporary and last 2 zones also have casinos. Just get strong enough to clear zone 3 with 4 man combat party.
But technically you are free to take 5th/6th man into combat as well and taking a 3rd car.

That's about it for starting tips, you should know game well enough now :)
Most extra stuff like bunkers/town upgrading/guilds and such is mostly for fun I would say, it's technically much faster to just rush a good trade route > get better gear to beat current one main quests > prepare to instantly get next zone vehicle and move on.

I will quickly summ up the remaining zones now:

Zone 4 part 1(west) has the best vehicles for both speed and efficiency already - those are the final ones a min maxer would get.

For speed - vagrant bike is the way to go with 12.5 speed. with 9 party members you will be able to haul a total of 2.25k weight(+~12-16% from load passive and a bit from the each party member for a total of ~2.7-2.8k weight)
There is also +12% more load trinket in last casino, pushing it even further until ~3k+.
Main risk comes from injuries - if someone gets injured, since you are using max amount of vehicles - you will be in trouble. Also maintenance costs are pretty noticeable, although cash should never be an issue as there isn't much you can get with it.
You can get those in Ampton city(3 per month) and Dimore town(1 per month) for 3.3 million per bike.

For weight efficient fastest one - iron ox truck in Dimore town up north is the way to go. It offers 10.5 speed(highest out of truck type vehicles) and 1600 weight for 6 million per truck.(1 per month)
If you have more than 6 members you would need to buy vagrant bike to make sure your speed gets boosted to avoid encounters.
Getting multiple ox trucks is how you can increase your weight carry considerably more. 2-4 of those trucks is all you will ever need IMO. Getting more is too overkill. 2 is a good early cheap option which fits up to 8 people.

Which you get is up to you - both are enough to outrun everything.

Vehicles in final zone are mostly worthless in comparison to those.

Casino of zone 4 part 1 is in Ampton city.
Same save/load works. The main cashback comes from gear - selling armor pieces is ~1.8-5m and weapons/headgear is ~400-850k.
There are 2 unique trinkets in this one:
1) License sheet of vaccination - this one gives +20 immunity to all team members. You can equip it on non combat ally and it will work. EXTREMELY useful to avoid diseases.
2) Joker's Mask - gives +15 mood to all other party members. Another huge one to equip on some non combat ally. This along with all civillian reputation mood bonuses allows you to get joy with all or nearly all party members. If your least mood ally triggers an event with permanent mood increase - it will likely also reach it.

NB: THERE SEEMS TO BE A BUG WHICH SOMETIMES OCCURS ONCE YOU HAVE ONE OF CASINO TRINKETS - IF YOU EQUIP THE TRINKET YOU WON'T BE ABLE TO GET SECOND ONE UNTIL YOU UNEQUIP IT SINCE GAME WILL THINK YOU DIDN'T GET IT YET BUT WILL ACTUALLY REMEMBER YOU ALREADY HAVING IT, HENCE INFINITELY GIVING YOU RESET POTIONS ALL THE TIME INSTEAD!

Both those casino trinkets are totally worth their time. You will likely spend ~30-60 minutes getting them both at most while getting some good gear improves and maybe even some cash and books.
Do not bother farming casino longer than 2 trinkets take you - next final casino is only behind ~10-15 minutes worth of main story with 0 combat.
Set on autoclicker if lazy, you will get most cash back anyway.

Zone 4 part 1 is where I would do either a 5 or 6 man combat party(6 man + mechanic + trader is pretty nice, allows you to get by with only 2 ox trucks)
If you decided to go for 5 man party - better composition would be 3 melee 2 ranged.
That being said - the main quest has no combat there.

Zone 4 part 2(east)
As I already told - vehicles in this one are not as efficient overall. Its better to just stack ox ones.
This also means you can still outrun everything.

Casino - this one has same equipment set, sadly you cant seem to get better.
The only thing though - it seems like weapons are split between 2 casinos.
In 2nd one I got rifles/crossbows out of important ones.. in 3rd one I got sniper rifles/shotguns.

Also 3 final trinkets:
As usual - unequip all previous casino trinkets just in case to avoid bugs.
1) Multimodal Transport Stowage Manual - load +12% and caravan load +12%.
This is especially huge if you are riding a bike army, allowing you to reach 3k+ weight limit. But also nice if you want to keep your truck count to a minimum. 3 OX is all you need for more load than you ever want and full party transport.
Nice to equip on Jing Wei if you want to equip a heavy chest armor with hit % on her.
2) Ancient Banner - crit +4% and initial AP +45. Amazing value for combat as it allows you to cast an extra skill 3 on round 1. Also a nice accessory for one of ranged.
3) Implicit Code - 15% condition resist to everyone. Pretty massive when paired with resistance from character perk.

Best in slot gear:
Overall info:
Each purple casino gear has 2 random slots and 3 upgrade slots. I will mention what's best in both.

Melee:
Heavy Armor/Heavy Helmet:
Melee has big accuracy by default, and honestly their hits are mostly armor removers for your Jing Wei to unleash hell.
Explosion proof set is the best one, available from casino 2 and 3.

Random slots: Dodge/Resilience(reason is resilience getting huge value on random slots) > Hit
Upgrade slots: Dodge > Resilience

Weapon:
Random slots - Dodge >>> Hit/Crit Rate(hit value is too small to matter, hence about same tier)
Upgrade slots - flat damage(hit% for legendary hammer)

Ranged:
Light helmet/Heavy OR light armor
Helmet is best being light, but armor might actually be okay being heavy as it's decent boost. Assuming you get a good one with hit% bonuses.
Keep in mind if you have to use load accessory to use it - it's usually not worth too much over accessory that gives some combat bonus.

Random Slots: Hit > Dodge > Resilience
Upgrade slots: Dodge > Resilience

Weapon:
Unique weapon(best, list below) OR casino weapon

Random slots: Hit%/Crit % - this depends on how much hit you end up on. Random slots give more crit%, so if you get crit % - just get more hit via the upgrade slots. Only shotgun and heavy machine gun wants hit% on absolutely everything.
Upgrade Slots: Hit%(best value unless you are already super accurate via armor + traits) or Crit%(if you focus on luck) or flat damage(if focused on Agi)
While math wise flat damage is overall slightly better in both cases - reality is your crit will kill and non crit won't matter too much if you are focusing on luck.

Unique weapons:
Those involve side quests with very hard combat.
I would say minimum requirement for reasonable is level 9-10 full party, full casino purple gear, medicine(you probably have a lot from casino too)..
Ideally A+ traits too.
I will mention if some is easier or harder than usual.

Unique weapons are super cheap to upgrade in comparison to purple gear.

Easiest quest chain starts in Ampton Town but you might need to progress story until some point for it to become acceptable.
The quest is called suspicious highland town. In town you got option of either taking all gold which leads to easy 3 wave fightI(easy relative to all other unique weapon quests) or taking a bit but no fight.
This quest chain leads to 3 different weapons depending on what you do.
1) Heat Energy Axe - fight and win this 3 wave fight.
339 dmg, 95% hit, 14 speed, 3% dodge, 3% crit.
Extra effect - ignore all damage reduction of enemy.
2) Doomsday Raider SMG - choose to take gold but still blame the town.
411 dmg, 71% hit, 20 spd, 3% crit/dodge
Adds 20% of your damage as poison effect while retaining original submachine dmg bonus.
3) Titanium Crossbow IV - choose to take gold and blame outsiders.
456 dmg, 70% hit, 12 spd, 3% crit/dodge
Extra effect - each hit gives back 14 AP.

Crossbow is IMO best choice if you use Jing Wei. Makes skill 3 of hers much more worth using as when it triggers - you will get over 2/3rd AP back by basic atk follow up. Worst case it costs 26 instead. Requires no combat, making it easy first legendary weapon and improving the ease of next quests.

Another quest split starts veeery early, and it has considerably harder fights. it's crystal delivery from Gobi Town. This has 2 ways to go about it:

For hard fights - be aware that levels seem to make more difference than you would think. It seems like if you have level gap with enemy - there is some extra miss chances and vice versa. I missed like half of my attacks when I was level 6 vs level 10 enemy across many attempts but once I came back with same hit % at level 10 I easy stomped it with almost no misses(aside of dog who has 30% dodge)

1) KE Shotgun - reward for delivering crystal to Bagpipe Base instead of Li Mu. Has hard forced fight in Dimore Town.
435 dmg, 3% crit, 3% dodge, 66% hit
Best casino shotgun is 329 dmg, 64% hit, 2 random slots of ~2/3% value.. for example you can reach 66% hit 3% crit with it. or 69% hit.
A must if you want to use shotgun, since if you use it - you HAVE to save AP for its main skill, hence profiting from dmg boost.

2) Xue-Xiao sword - reward for delivering crystal to Yin City.
The quest then leads you to far north not too far from dead end up there. It's one of hardest fights in the game individually speaking. Each enemy death aside of the guy on top left gives a 25% damage buff to all enemies. The death of boss gives 50% dmg to everyone, it all stacks. The hard part is basically the fact that lowering amount of enemy does not make it much easier, unlike usual.
Sword stats are 330 atk, 95% hit, 18 spd, 3% crit/dodge.
Unique effect is life leech 15% - not too impressive since it usually won't be life or death thing.

I would say this one is quite debatable. On one hand - sword is nice, on the other hand - no shotgun means your last ranged(who are your main damage dealers) needs to use non legendary weapon, which kinda harms the damage potential.
My main gripe with shotgun is it requiring you to use the skill, which means you need to skip all other skills aside of Jing Wei(and free leg hammer stun), like the potential axe 20% extra dmg one and such...
I would say shotgun is still a bit on the better side. Sword does not add as much to us since we are full tank either way and it's not really a problem to just use a heal potion instead.

3) EXTRA Info edit:
Apparently there is a Heavy Machinegun as well.
It's part of the crystal delivery quest as well but I couldn't confirm exact conditions but it's somehow involved with delivering it to Bagpipe.
It's something along the lines of refusing to show the crystal in bagpipe first but then still completing the quest in Dimore or something.
Might also be going to Yin city and refusing to deliver the crystal there.
HMG stats are atk 518, Hit 51%, spd 4, crit/dodge 3% and an unique passive to consume no ammo (can't equip ammo on it, hence can't get bonus damage/crit chance from that as well)

Next up are some only one choice quests:
Titanium Giant Hammer - quest from Sword of Order for Unique Bug Beast. It's location is faaar west of the west zone 4. It's in the area where the 2 path splits lead into one, which leads into dead end.
Hammer is a drop from boss - it's only 3 fat beast enemies and a very fat boss... but Jing Wei with legendary xbow will tear them apart.. make sure you pick it up after fight or you lose it forever. Boss also drops 2k fuel and 300 water, so you don't really need to stock up on those for a road back.
Also you get an item which raises HP by 40 permanently. I recommend giving this to Jing Wei.. surviving an occasional one shot kill on her is big deal as you certainly don't want her to die.
319 dmg, 95% hit, 16 spd, 3% crit/dodge.
Unique effect makes the stun move cost no AP... this one is pretty huge. Make sure to only upgrade hit % on it and try to have it on ally with the most hit % on armor and lowest STR, since you will rarely be using it for damage.

HW Rifle - near entrance to zone 4 east rad zone you can find a treasure hunter camp.
This gives a quest leading into this zone. The goal is a little south from the very center.
This one is probably THE hardest one in the game. 4 fights in a row against zombies with 4th being elite zombies. Those fights go to level 11 meaning you still get a small level difference penalty even at max level.
Jing Wei with her legendary crossbow is the star of this fight, with some luck I got up to 3 turns in a row, each doing ~4k dmg if you crit with your very high(50-66%) crit chance.
Rifle has 467 atk, 70% hit, 10 spd, 3% dodge/crit
Unique effect is 55% to hit both front and back enemy, which is essentially double damage. Amazing improvement for Anne.

In the end after all those you will own 4 different legendary weapons used across 6 characters.
Those will likely be - Hammer and Rifle(100%), Crossbow(best choice if you use Jing Wei and Jing Wei herself is best choice as well), Sword OR Shotgun OR HMG (the most debatable choice)
That means you either have to choose 2 purple melee weapons or 1 purple melee+ranged weapon.

Endings:
The 4 ending first split happens on quest 'Final meeting'
If you want to see all endings - save before each ending split.
Main quest is much easier than the harder legendary weapon fights.

End 1 - Homeless and unstable - fastest to achieve, a 'bad' ending.
Disagree to betray sword order. You will face a relatively easy fight, win it and you will get story bombed with being ambushed by the whole squad of black death, all your allies dying and only you escape, becoming a fugitive.

Reload choose the peaceful way out. You will get quest to deliver message to Selina of the sword order, where the next split happens:
End 2, another bad ending- Life of Revenge. Lie to Selina about bug invasion then go back to black death to report.. you get a happy life and then get killed. No fights required, fast to check out.

Reload again and this time tell Selina the truth.
Next step requires LOADS of weight limit - 10k on resources you need alone and likely +~1-2k on supplies and other stuff you keep with you. This much weight is overkill for real play IMO, so just buy temporary vehicles. Assuming you have decent amount of cash(~40-60m to be safe, I had over 100m at that point, a very short lap on zone 4 east can net like 10-20m, so shouldn't be big problem) - I would go to Yin city.

If you were using 3 ox strategy - just buying the 2 pioneer trucks will push you to ~12-14k.
If you were using bikes strategy - you would need to buy 2 trucks + 1-2 oxes.
Those are temporary and I would sell them after quest is done, so don't worry about being left with little cash, you won't need this many ever again anyway.
If you were using bikes - buy garage slots and stow unusable ones there temporarily.
Stock up on ~4k fuel.

Once you are done with those - head directly to Paraiso(NE of Ampton city). Stock on 3k vitamins/antibiotics. Restock supplies/fuel if required and head south to Valando Village. Stock up on 2k sugar+2086 flour. For remaining load stock up on fuel/supplies.

You are pretty close to Sword Order so head there for the final ending split:
For 'Bad/Normal' End 3 and 4, choose 'I can't turn my back on my people.'
Now go back to Black Death. You got another split - to activate or not to activate EMP.
Not activating leads to - The Search for Hope 'bad' End 3. You escape but black death remains, hence you are on the run.
Activating leads to - Home Lost 'bad' End 4. Black Death is wiped out but bug beasts get out of hand.

Reload all the way to Selina choice.
For the good/true ending path choose the black death's doing option.
Selina's camp appears on the map where you can accept new quests. I would start with heading to Yin City and reverting to vehicles you previously used.
This one leads to a relatively long quest chain of persuading 3 leaders, but there is no choices aside of that - you will get the 'best' ending by the end of relatively linear quest chain.
In zone 4 east you will want to increase prosperity in a lot of towns +2 leather jackets.. In zone 4 west it's increasing guild shares to 100% in a lot of towns.
In zone 3 you will need 100 million coins to progress the questline.

After the whole questline is over you will face final three wave Angela fight, which is the hardest version of it but still only on par with legendary weapon fights.
You will achieve End 5 - Brave New World!

[bunny de fluff]

You didn't mention golden/ultimate weapons , which could affect your team build drastically. When intending to get Jing Wei, it is recommended to get Reid instead of Anne, because a full blue team is easier to manage. The vampiric sword which can steal life should be given to the most tanky melee.

[Hentaika]

Originally posted by bunny de fluff:

You didn't mention golden/ultimate weapons , which could affect your team build drastically. When intending to get Jing Wei, it is recommended to get Reid instead of Anne, because a full blue team is easier to manage. The vampiric sword which can steal life should be given to the most tanky melee.

Because of rumors like that I actually made the guide.

1) Reid is useless, a random merc with crit resist + status resistance is hundredfold better.
Resilience/thorns arent bad either but worse, as avoiding status with huge chance is big deal and the fact that non combat ally own mood does not matter if it doesnt harm combat party.
Unique perk does not make up for it. Does not help that he has useless default ability either.

2) Mood managing is super easy if you are smart, by zone 2 you already can have Anne + Jing Wei at positive mood, recruiting a decent team along with it is super easy due to how much leeway civilians give.
By zone 3 you pretty much solidify it.
IF your team is in positive mood - even if people hate each other - bad events wont happen.
This means each new recruit you make only has to boost or ignore lowest mood one and you are good.
By end game you actually have to try hard to get the people into bad mood due to huge civilian boost.

3) Team has big leeway in equip, MC can be anything and other 2 characters can wield what thy are good at on melee.
On ranged you also have 1 free slot + rifle + crossbow unless you want to change up via manual.
That being said while leg weapon is late game, I think I should mention them indeed, good point.

[bunny de fluff]

Never a rifle guy myself, but the ultimate ARwas good on Anne. Reid might not be combat oriented but his look was bad*ss (LOL)

[Hentaika]

Added all legendary weapon information - missing sniper rifle and machine gun info, but I think those simply don't exist.

Also added all 5 endings information.

And all casino trinket information. Although I am missing the implicit code I still can't get after hundreds of millions of coins over many nights in casino.

[Shini]

I got the legendary machine gun from the crystal delivery quest as I delivered it to Bagpipe.
Stats:
DMG 518
Hit 51%
Attack Speed 4
Crit/Dodge 3%
Weight 12
Special: No need for ammunition

[Hentaika]

Originally posted by Shini:

I got the legendary machine gun from the crystal delivery quest as I delivered it to Bagpipe.
Stats:
DMG 518
Hit 51%
Attack Speed 4
Crit/Dodge 3%
Weight 12
Special: No need for ammunition

Interesting, you didn't get shotgun for it? Oo

Wonder what was different from what I did to get shotgun, since that's what bagpipe choice for crystal quest gave me.

Also how does no need for ammunition work on it?
Does it shoot without it or it does not consume ammo?

As in - can you equip ammo to get atk boost and it will stilll get consumed but you can keep shooting even without it or you can essentially put the most expensive ammo and get stats from it for free.


Also still require sniper rifle and implicit code casino trinket if anyone has those.

[Shini]

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Originally posted by Shini:

I got the legendary machine gun from the crystal delivery quest as I delivered it to Bagpipe.
Stats:
DMG 518
Hit 51%
Attack Speed 4
Crit/Dodge 3%
Weight 12
Special: No need for ammunition

Interesting, you didn't get shotgun for it? Oo

Wonder what was different from what I did to get shotgun, since that's what bagpipe choice for crystal quest gave me.

Also how does no need for ammunition work on it?
Does it shoot without it or it does not consume ammo?

As in - can you equip ammo to get atk boost and it will stilll get consumed but you can keep shooting even without it or you can essentially put the most expensive ammo and get stats from it for free.


Also still require sniper rifle and implicit code casino trinket if anyone has those.

You can't equip ammo on the Machine gun
I got the implicit code but I don't know where from

[Hentaika]

Originally posted by Shini:

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Interesting, you didn't get shotgun for it? Oo

Wonder what was different from what I did to get shotgun, since that's what bagpipe choice for crystal quest gave me.

Also how does no need for ammunition work on it?
Does it shoot without it or it does not consume ammo?

As in - can you equip ammo to get atk boost and it will stilll get consumed but you can keep shooting even without it or you can essentially put the most expensive ammo and get stats from it for free.


Also still require sniper rifle and implicit code casino trinket if anyone has those.

You can't equip ammo on the Machine gun
I got the implicit code but I don't know where from :sugarplumps:

Ty regarding HMG ammo detail, still wonder what exactly are conditions to get it instead of shotgun.

Code is one of three casino trinkets. I am interested in its stats since its the only trinket I didnt manage to get.

[bunny de fluff]

The code item is from Yin city casino, add 15 % resist to abnormal effects

[Hentaika]

Originally posted by bunny de fluff:

The code item is from Yin city casino, add 15 % resist to abnormal effects

Thanks, now only more details on legendary HMG acquisition remains..
And sniper rifle if it exists at all.

[Shini]

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Originally posted by bunny de fluff:

The code item is from Yin city casino, add 15 % resist to abnormal effects

Thanks, now only more details on legendary HMG acquisition remains..
And sniper rifle if it exists at all.

I went first to Bagpipe and then to Dimore.
Maybe because I was already at Yin City or declined the first request in Bagpipe as he wanted to see the jewel...

[Hentaika]

Originally posted by Shini:

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Thanks, now only more details on legendary HMG acquisition remains..
And sniper rifle if it exists at all.

I went first to Bagpipe and then to Dimore.
Maybe because I was already at Yin City or declined the first request in Bagpipe as he wanted to see the jewel...

Yeah, I thought if you decline to see it then that's it for that part.. guess it somehow involves that.

[corisai]

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Best stat is IMO full luck. It gives more value the further in the levels you go. It's VERY close to full agility.

Not close. ~5% difference and growing past ~27 points invested in Luck. And in 80+% cases that damage would go into overkill.

Originally posted by Hentaika:

The disadvantage of luck is it sucks early on and it's often overkill or heavy damage loss if no crit.

Yes. That's why besides boss fights - full AGI is actually better.

[Hentaika]

Originally posted by corisai:

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Best stat is IMO full luck. It gives more value the further in the levels you go. It's VERY close to full agility.

Not close. ~5% difference and growing past ~27 points invested in Luck. And in 80+% cases that damage would go into overkill.

Originally posted by Hentaika:

The disadvantage of luck is it sucks early on and it's often overkill or heavy damage loss if no crit.

Yes. That's why besides boss fights - full AGI is actually better.

I wouldn't say so, no.

Hardest fights in the game have enough HP(all 'true ending' and legendary weapon fights which you actually might have trouble with, everything else you simply kill naturally as you upgrade your gear and get more people in party) to live through quite a lot of crits as well.(besides maybe a crit from xbow wei)

Don't forget you can reach ~65% crit chance, without too much trouble potentially more by stacking all bonuses game has to offer.

IIRC 'soft cap' was ~75%, which is all that game has to offer including trinkets, enchants, etc. This soft cap includes bullets, which you likely won't have though, but it's not too critical to get the very best either.

At which point difference becomes pretty huge and you can even 'retry' fights to achieve a closer to 100% crit chance with such 'natural high' chance when required, making those hardest fights even easier.

The damage difference IN THE END after you min max becomes pretty massive. I kinda semi forgot to edit in the fact that luck is indeed the go to with nearly no debate though, thanks for a reminder.

The thing is - natural progression(getting more chars, getting better gear) is enough to handle your progression until last zone pretty easily in either build.

All main 'zone progression blocker fights' are also very sturdy opponents, which helps balance those builds out mid game.

Main difficulty comes from when you unlock side quests for the leg weapons in last zones - those fights are often something you would have to delay at least a bit. Luck allows this delay to be considerably less(if at all) with a few retries, a lot of them being available from get go as well if you have been keeping up with the gear more or less.

In short fights agi might have been a bit faster to optimize kills(although that's debatable) but auto function is luckily pretty fair and you can easily heal up after the AI does slightly worse than you but instantly. I rarely ever used manual for random fights besides early game. If game was more punishing towards auto - things might have been different.

[corisai]

Originally posted by Hentaika:

IIRC 'soft cap' was ~75%, which is all that game has to offer including trinkets, enchants, etc. This soft cap includes bullets, which you likely won't have though, but it's not too critical to get the very best either.

~90-100% with triggered trait for 25% crit after kill that's a natural pick for Jing Wei.

Originally posted by Hentaika:

The damage difference IN THE END after you min max becomes pretty massive.

Not so big as you thing as flat +damage is also massive buff to DPS. I'd done calculations :)

Originally posted by Hentaika:

I rarely ever used manual for random fights besides early game.

Same.

Few extra updates for your guide:
1) About legendary HMG - I submit it to Bagpipe AND given jewel to him immediantly. Still get a HMG.
Other guides also mention that you can get only HMG here.

2)

Originally posted by Hentaika:

Zone 3 casino unique trinket is +2 dexterity and +40 mood, nice enough to use if one of your frontliners ends up with low mood, but not too great otherwise.

It's actually very awesome and a top-tier pick for Jing Wei if it's pushing her into next level of happiness (happiness not only gives a crit chance but also a damage multiplier - on top of her own ability).

3) Final zone casino.

Originally posted by Hentaika:

3) Implicit Code - 15% condition resist to everyone. Pretty massive when paired with resistance from character perk.

Unable to get it even after stripping all trinkets from my guys (and I don't experienced a bug you're described in previous casino on current game version).