Bad luck or bad decisions?

[Nakayama Hayato]

hello, I have played this game like crazy. I feel I am quite experienced and yet I have never made it past floor 20. I only play Hiver Warrior because he is my favorite character. I know he is a difficult character but I have commited myself to mastering him. I feel I have basic strategies down (using mostly melee, not using armor right away, etc) . My main two issues have been running out of ammo and food.

It feels the only reliable weapon is his pistol he starts with since most of the weapons I find are human and he gets a nasty penalty for using them. Is it necessary to level up your weapon skills every chance you get? I have been prioritizing leveling up non combat stats such as lockpicking and mechanical to aid in getting that necessary loot. I havent tried a run where I prioritized leveling weapon stats since it starts out fairly high. Does leveling up weapon stats increase the damage and accuracy by so much that it is really important vs stats such as mechanical and computer?

Now for food, I usually make alot of simple recipes to level cooking as much as I can and I don't attempt any recipes unless it is over 50% success rate. but since his cooking starts so low, do you think it would be better just to eat most ingredients if i cant cook something above a higher % to avoid risking food waste? Or do I have the right idea for food?

Any and all advice appreciated please and thank you.

[Nakayama Hayato]

Also to add, every level up I put 1 point into finesse and 1 into brain. should I be putting more focus on finesse and might or is this fine?

[Azulavis]

Don't invest into Brains unless you find a weapon the requires Brains (Meson Rifle).
When I did Warrior on Hard I used his pistol to attack everything in melee until I got Pistol skill leveled to 45 from attacking enemies; the tradeoff was losing half of the pistol durability. Then I was investing in Pistol skill at every level-up, found St'torz - a hiver pistol that uses Pistol Rounds and does 6 shots per 5 bullets. Skills: Computer, Lockpick, Mechanical, Biotech. I don't remember when I stopped leveling Pistol, probably at 80.
Around floor 12 I had to take a risk and craft 3 Hero Sotswitches at once with low chance to succeed. In case of failure I was just starting a new run from the entrance.
Warrior on Hard took me like 3-4 months of attempts to win, it's a very difficult character to play.

[Nakayama Hayato]

The main reason I level brain is because it helps with skills that help get me loot such as computer for the armor stations. I dont really think I would need more Might for anything or should I go just full finesse?

[Azulavis]

The bonus from Brains is negligible: +1 for every 5 Brains points.
High Might helps resist Poison, Disease, Unconsciousness (from KO grenades), helps to break out of Grabbed status, adds inventory space. The best armor Warrion can wear is Ceramic Plate Armor: 90 armor, but reduces Might by 10.
When I was experimenting with warrior on Hard I tried to go Might first or Finesse first.
With Might first (up to 80), Poison and Disease aren't a problem and I have lots of inventory space, but I can't use weapons like Laser Carbine, which drops from Medium robots MK2.
With Finesse first, Disease becames a huge problem. It's feels like Warrior has special weakness to Disease, a lot of times a lvl 2 Disease guickly went up to level 9.

I did Finesse 65: Laser Carbine requires Finess 60, but when you are poisoned or diseased, the Finesse got reduced and you no longer can use the Laser Carbine effectively.
Then I did Might 80 or 90, then all points into Finesse.
I didn't want any Brains, but I found 3 Brain boost serums and using Augmentation Bay gave me +5 Brains, and then I put some points into Brains just to make it 55 (for Meson Rifle).

If you find Branding Blade, save it for final boss fight. That sword inflicts Pain, which prevents boss from casting psi abilities.

[Nakayama Hayato]

You were right I stopped putting points into brains and I see no difference in brain related tasks haha. I have been trying to focus finesse first up to 65 but sadly I havent been able to make it very far lately due to getting really skimpy loot haha.

I took a small break from hiver and played some of the mercenary and sgt gunny. Feels super unfair how much better they are than the hiver lol. Honestly I think the hiver would be perfectly fine if they just took away that hefty penelty from using literally any weapon he doesnt start with. his lore states that we was taken in by humans so i think he should be a little more proficient with them lol.

[Azulavis]

It depends on the difficulty setting. On Normal Marine is stronger that Warrior, because Warrior has high hunger rate. On Hard Warrior is stronger than Marine because strong monsters spawn earlier and they tend to drop food (meat, ribs, fat strips, tainted meat; apes drop crabs; etc.)

Warrior has low penalty (-15) with Zuul weapons: Heavy Assault Rifle, Pounder, etc.; no penalty for using Spear and Vorpal Blade. X-Rifle has very high accuracy and is a good weapon to craft.
Bypass Circuit + Hiver Multi-Tool + Electronic Toolkit + Nano Control Module = around + 120 to Electronics skill.

Investing into Brains you get +1 to Brains-related skills at every 5 Brains points, which means +1 at 45, +1 at 50, +1 at 55 and so on.

For me the hardest classes are (for Hard, Insane, Seriously!?):
1) Gunny
2) Marine
3) Warrior
4) Mercenary

[Nakayama Hayato]

Thanks for being so informative. It just seems that most weapons I find or for humans which sucks for me lol. mind to clarify why Gunny is so difficult for you? I find him to be my best character. Yeah he doesnt get as much level up points but his stats start out so high and he practically doesnt need to eat lol.

Today I have had mixed luck with the warrior, this current run I found like 3 armor for him but I havent found a single other gun or any ammo for his starting pistol lol

[Azulavis]

Comparing Gunny to Marine
1) Gunny gets less experience points
2) Gunny starts with less ammo and food
3) Gunny gets less stat and skill points per level
4) Gunny has move penalty wearing Brawler PBA (Marine doesn't have that penalty)
Overall he's just a weaker Marine. Gunny may look easier in early game, but winning with Gunny is harder than winning with Marine.

[Nakayama Hayato]

I guess that is true, I just remember I the run I did on normal with Gunny I didnt have to eat until like floor 15 lol. I really like Gunny but I felt like i was cheating using him considering the way you unlock him but if he really is worse than the marine in the long term then I dont have to feel bad using him haha.

[spoofy1085]

The warrior is also my favorite class to play as well. Hiver warrior is my first and only Seriously! clear from floor 1 (no blue room). Here is how I approach playing him and finding success.

For stats, I usually go Finesse 60 into Might 70 into Power 40. Then Finesse 65 and then dump rest into Might. Finesse 60 is an important benchmark since it's the requirement for Laser Carbine, and on harder difficulties especially you can find a Carbine drop early from enemies or lockers if you're lucky. Now, if you happen to obtain a Laser Rifle before a Carbine instead, then there's no need to go Finesse 60 early in the game and instead you can move to Might 70 for more inventory space and disease resistance. I bring power to 40 just for extra Psi resistance when using Psi Shield. Helps sometimes, though with the really powerful Psi opponents like male zuuls, unknown agents, and uberwolves it fails a lot more, but, with the exception of the unknown agents, these enemies aren't too dangerous (the rippers and pain heralds are much more dangerous though). Brains I don't upgrade unless I get a Meson Rifle, then it goes to 45. Extra Finesse is important just in case you get poisoned you can still use your laser weaponry. And, if you're really lucky and come across heavy weaponry, those require a large amount of Might so endgame you can put points there.

For skills, early on I try to pump lockpicking and biotech every level I can of which it's only 1 point to boost. I also pump Telekinesis and Resistance for Manipulation and Psi Shield, but those are the only Psi disciplines. I let pistol naturally get to 45, then pump it as much as possible until I find other weaponry. I also put some early points in blade for some better accuracy and damage since your blade can be use to save some durability on your pistol in exchange for health and food (it takes longer to kill with blade so that's the offset). I let electronics, computer, and mechanical raise naturally, though early on I use my Hiver tool on any refridgerator or weapons crate I find if the percentage chance is 80 or less. I also will backtrack to recharge tool traps and use energy cells to recharge my tool if need be, since early in the game it's more important for the Warrior to try to get these skills to 45 more than it is to stockpile energy cells for the late game.

The warrior is really looking for an efficient long range weapon (a rifle, which can be converted to a sniper rifle is a great find) and an energy weapon. The pistol is like the Hiver verions of Adamantium Claws so any way to preserve its durability is important, such as nano reconstructors or durability up weapon bio-mod. Ballistic repair kit if you really have to. An assault weapon can be nice but that's later, once you established the most important weaknesses in your weaponry which is long range efficiency and high energy penetration and anti specter weapons. The warrior's melee and short range burst is strong enough. For armor, try to preserve the original armor as long as you can as it's really rare to find usuable armor. You can craft Impact Armor for the warrior to wear, Padded armor is also very good (and can be repaired with living steel patches for full durability restore), and if you get really lucky, Ceramic Plate essentially makes you very tanky, pretty much invincible in the lower difficulties.

Some other things to mention: spore daggers are a great way to preserve ammo and handle the giant unarmored apes. It'll take some time to kill, but the spore damage stacking ramps quickly and you save a good amount of ammo/durability on your other important equipment.

If you can spare, bring along extra armor if you face armor-deteriorating enemies. You really want to preserve the Warrior's natural 40 armor at all costs and also save your best armor from being deteriorated.

Healing can be an issue for the Warrior if you don't find a Pocket Doc, so food is gonna have to be largely the way the Warrior heals up through constant resting. This is the major, major problem on harder difficulties because both food and healing are big hurdles to work on skill wise. Obtaining an EZ cooker, bourdox, and/or Pocket Doc really helps out a lot.

Good Luck.