Reaper ability?

[LeftPaw]

How do you use the reaper ability? When ever I click it nothing happens.

[Bullett00th]

Originally posted by .O.:

Personally I use reaper on my scout Ranger. By itself it's a pretty good ability and just like Serial, it's a situational ability. The only real problem with Reaper is that it has to compete with Rapid Fire. An ability that sees a lot more regular use.

The one way to make you feel OK about not taking Rapid Fire is using SMGs on your blademaster. It's what I've been doing on my previous walkthrough and it's been great.

You get the MUCH NEEDED extra mobility so your blademaster becomes an even better scouting unit in concealment and can run to slice enemies who are much farther than usual.
When taking Reaper you also have extra distance to cover for each kill so the chain is likely to keep on.

There isn't much incentive to take Rapid Fire with the SMG, there is a LOT of incentive to use the blade more often and you can do some medium range damage when needed. It's great.

Also good metaphor on the comedy move there!

[Kunovega]

Originally posted by .O.:

Personally I use reaper on my scout Ranger. By itself it's a pretty good ability and just like Serial, it's a situational ability. The only real problem with Reaper is that it has to compete with Rapid Fire. An ability that sees a lot more regular use.

This is not the best comparison, but you can think of it as the difference between a great comedic movie and a good comedy sitcom. Rapid Fire is like the sitcom, gives you lots of little laughs multiple times a week. Reaper is like the movie, you don't want to watch it every day but when you do watch it, it delivers.

I've given up having to choose.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=629969084&searchtext=both+perks

So many of the skills are niche and would never get used otherwise. I like having them for maximum versatility.

Plus I play with a bunch of difficulty increasing mods so a few things that make your soldiers stronger aren't out of place.

[.O.]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Originally posted by .O.:

Personally I use reaper on my scout Ranger. By itself it's a pretty good ability and just like Serial, it's a situational ability. The only real problem with Reaper is that it has to compete with Rapid Fire. An ability that sees a lot more regular use.

This is not the best comparison, but you can think of it as the difference between a great comedic movie and a good comedy sitcom. Rapid Fire is like the sitcom, gives you lots of little laughs multiple times a week. Reaper is like the movie, you don't want to watch it every day but when you do watch it, it delivers.

Which then means that Reaper is an Adam Sandler comedy whereas Serial is an actually good comedy.

I dunno man, Serial's biggest weakness is a lack of bullets, the best I've managed to do with Serial is 18 kills and that's with a sniper on the 3rd floor of a building and I think the superior auto loader and superior extra ammo (gun wasn't full when I first started that turn). The best I've managed to do with Reaper is 20+ kills. Either way neither situation happens all that often, usually I only get 3-4 kills with Serial, same with Reaper.

[Kunovega]

Originally posted by .O.:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Which then means that Reaper is an Adam Sandler comedy whereas Serial is an actually good comedy.

I dunno man, Serial's biggest weakness is a lack of bullets, the best I've managed to do with Serial is 18 kills and that's with a sniper on the 3rd floor of a building and I think the superior auto loader and superior extra ammo (gun wasn't full when I first started that turn). The best I've managed to do with Reaper is 20+ kills. Either way neither situation happens all that often, usually I only get 3-4 kills with Serial, same with Reaper.

The balance difference is that serial has a better chance at killing enemies with higher health

Reaper will taper off unless all of your targets are low health

[.O.]

Originally posted by Kunovega:

The balance difference is that serial has a better chance at killing enemies with higher health

Reaper will taper off unless all of your targets are low health

True, which is why I don't think either one is worse than the other. They're both situational.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by .O.:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Which then means that Reaper is an Adam Sandler comedy whereas Serial is an actually good comedy.

I dunno man, Serial's biggest weakness is a lack of bullets, the best I've managed to do with Serial is 18 kills and that's with a sniper on the 3rd floor of a building and I think the superior auto loader and superior extra ammo (gun wasn't full when I first started that turn). The best I've managed to do with Reaper is 20+ kills. Either way neither situation happens all that often, usually I only get 3-4 kills with Serial, same with Reaper.

How, exactly, does Reaper's damage falloff work once you run out of damage, anyway? Does it bottom out at 1-3, or 1, or what?

[Bullett00th]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

How, exactly, does Reaper's damage falloff work once you run out of damage, anyway? Does it bottom out at 1-3, or 1, or what?

this. not calling anyone a liar but I'm finding 20 reaper kills a highly unlikely prospect.

Reaper is an amazing cleanup ability that you use on a heavily wounded pod to not waste other troopers' high damage shots on overkills.
I also like ending Reaper with an enemy that it won't kill, but the ranger will finish the job during the enemy turn with Blademaster.

[lwn_1978]

Originally posted by Bullett00th:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

How, exactly, does Reaper's damage falloff work once you run out of damage, anyway? Does it bottom out at 1-3, or 1, or what?

this. not calling anyone a liar but I'm finding 20 reaper kills a highly unlikely prospect.

Reaper is an amazing cleanup ability that you use on a heavily wounded pod to not waste other troopers' high damage shots on overkills.
I also like ending Reaper with an enemy that it won't kill, but the ranger will finish the job during the enemy turn with Blademaster.

Not if you use the LWS perks, yes there is still a drop off, but the inclusion of the fleche ability (+damage for tiles moved) along with say wraith armor, SMG and the PCS mobility and you have an unstoppable whirling death pinball.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by lwn_1978:

Originally posted by Bullett00th:

this. not calling anyone a liar but I'm finding 20 reaper kills a highly unlikely prospect.

Reaper is an amazing cleanup ability that you use on a heavily wounded pod to not waste other troopers' high damage shots on overkills.
I also like ending Reaper with an enemy that it won't kill, but the ranger will finish the job during the enemy turn with Blademaster.

Not if you use the LWS perks, yes there is still a drop off, but the inclusion of the fleche ability (+damage for tiles moved) along with say wraith armor, SMG and the PCS mobility and you have an unstoppable whirling death pinball.

There's little point discussing modded versions of Reaper or related skills in comparison to each other because you can mod them to be whatever you want.

[orion winterfire]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Originally posted by lwn_1978:

Not if you use the LWS perks, yes there is still a drop off, but the inclusion of the fleche ability (+damage for tiles moved) along with say wraith armor, SMG and the PCS mobility and you have an unstoppable whirling death pinball.

There's little point discussing modded versions of Reaper or related skills in comparison to each other because you can mod them to be whatever you want.

Sure there's a point. The mods are the best part of the game, and some of them (particularly longwar's) are quite common.

[Kunovega]

Originally posted by Bullett00th:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

How, exactly, does Reaper's damage falloff work once you run out of damage, anyway? Does it bottom out at 1-3, or 1, or what?

this. not calling anyone a liar but I'm finding 20 reaper kills a highly unlikely prospect.

Reaper is an amazing cleanup ability that you use on a heavily wounded pod to not waste other troopers' high damage shots on overkills.
I also like ending Reaper with an enemy that it won't kill, but the ranger will finish the job during the enemy turn with Blademaster.

I don't know what the bottom damage for reaper is but I'm almost certain that the minimum is at least the health of the baby snakes in the cave of the serpent king mission (which if my memory is correct is 3?)

I have had reaper chains of more than 20 kills in a single turn. They have happened in 3 particular ways:

1. the baby snakes in the cave of the serpent king. I've had a reaper clear the room at it's fullest in a single turn

2. The weak mechs in the tower of shens last gift while picking up your first SPARK. I've sat in that tower getting 90+ kills (on the total mission) simply to see if I could (and also to ensure every member of the team that came leveled up from kills)

3. I play with larger pods than normal so my maps sometimes have 20 to 30 aliens (not just 9 to 15). If I trigger multiple pods of codex, injure them all, let them all clone themselves it leaves a mess of dozens of near dead codex. These get cleaned up with either a reaper chain of kills or if they are all close enough to my sharpshooter its an impressive face off with a pistol shot to each of them

So whatever the bottom number of damage for reaper is, it never reaches 0 (in my experience) and I'm fairly certain that it's at least 3

I've gone out of my way to set up long chains whenever I can and I've had missions with more than 100 kills (total) like the avenger defense mission where I frequently sit there letting every soldier level up and simply toying with the aliens for fun

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by orion winterfire:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

There's little point discussing modded versions of Reaper or related skills in comparison to each other because you can mod them to be whatever you want.

Sure there's a point. The mods are the best part of the game, and some of them (particularly longwar's) are quite common.

No. There isn't.
Mods are great and everything, but if you change the skill (or other relevant skills) with mods then people aren't even talking about the same skill any more, because they work differently. You can't have a conversation about something when the people involved can't even agree on what they're talking about.

[orion winterfire]

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

Originally posted by orion winterfire:

Sure there's a point. The mods are the best part of the game, and some of them (particularly longwar's) are quite common.

No. There isn't.
Mods are great and everything, but if you change the skill (or other relevant skills) with mods then people aren't even talking about the same skill any more, because they work differently. You can't have a conversation about something when the people involved can't even agree on what they're talking about.

As with any communication, it is certainly important to be clear, so I get where you're coming from.

[.O.]

Originally posted by Bullett00th:

Originally posted by gimmethegepgun:

How, exactly, does Reaper's damage falloff work once you run out of damage, anyway? Does it bottom out at 1-3, or 1, or what?

this. not calling anyone a liar but I'm finding 20 reaper kills a highly unlikely prospect.

Reaper is an amazing cleanup ability that you use on a heavily wounded pod to not waste other troopers' high damage shots on overkills.
I also like ending Reaper with an enemy that it won't kill, but the ranger will finish the job during the enemy turn with Blademaster.

My one was on a modded game. But not one where any of the mods buffed swords, most of my mods were either cosmetic or dealt with giving me more enemies to fight. From memory the majority of the kills were from codex clones. Most of the clones would have been on very low health.

I don't remember what the minimum damage on the reaper sword slash is, but I believe it was at least 2.

Edit: Forgot to add, as far as cleanup goes, Reaper and Serial are not even the best. I've managed to get 32+ kills using the sniper face off(?). Again also situational, but that one has no ammo limitations and you don't even have to move, so no risk of triggering more pods.

[Choppa]

I use reaper situationally when I want/need just two kills, usually to clean up after all my other soldiers have moved. I am concious of triggering other pods so I don't send them too far unless i dont care.

With unbreakable(name?), even if the ranger doesn't finish the pod I'm fighting, it can be pretty good bait to draw fire, and tank some enemy attacks with them just standing in the open. Couple that with Blademaster against enemy's who like to melee and it's kinda fun to watch it unfold.

Anything beyond 2 enemies, and If I seriously need to bring the pain though, and its Serial/Sniper Madness all the way. That can be so effective, sometimes I try not to do it just to get other people some kills. ;p