Long Blades

[Ryacchi]

What skills do you prioritize in the long blades tree? I find I don't care for long blades as much as axes mainly because of how the skills are set up. But I want to like them because they seem to be one of the most effective weapon types.

The strength based skills look more appealing to me than the agility ones. Do you just go one or the other? Spread out? Tell me. =)

[FuhFuture]

IMO agility skills are OP compared to Strength ones.

Regarding long blades: for me it works best to start with the short blades skill tree... later on move to a long blade with a short blade in the off-hand (thus keeping all the short blade bonuses -- especially get the ones that double offhand attack chance, and the one that lets you use agility instead of strength). With one or two levels of dual-weilding, I was hitting with offhand pretty much 100% of the time, and the offhand dagger was doing 2-3 times the damage of my unique artifact main weapon because of the bonuses

The long blade skill descriptions are misleading. The description is a passive 'on-all-the-time' move, but you also get the stance, which is like a super-charged version of the passive boost.

Last game I got the long-blade skill that lets you parry attacks (forgot the name)... Whenever I activated the stance, I was pretty much invincible, even able to take down much much stronger opponents without even taking damage.

[Ryacchi]

I didn't realize parrying was that powerful. Maybe I'll try out an agility longswordsman.

Also, I have consdered running offhand shortblades before, but it just seemed like extra skill points wasted to go with multiple weapon types. Maybe if my characters start living a little longer...

[FuhFuture]

I was thinking about making a guide, because I've gone all-the-way, or almost, with this similar build a few times.

Max out agility in character creation. Leave willpower sucking. Put a few points into ego if you want to use shops (don't go past -1). Put intelligence at 19 if you want to be able to craft grenades and recharge batteries by level 12 (int at 18 will let you craft at level 18, but by then you've already basically won).

Divide the rest between strength and toughness. Up agility every time you have a chance.

Early game go for the skills under acrobatics. First one to buy is the +4 dodge to missiles. Then save up for Juke -- this move is so much better than it looks. Bind it to a key like 1, and use it all the time with sprint. Can't tell you how valuable these skills are, and the dodging one is so cheap, too

After you got those two, dive into short blades (you probably already have some short blade skills based on your class) and spend all your points there for the foreseeable future (maybe buying one level of dual-wielding later on when you're a bit stronger, but you should be dual-wielding from the beginning).

Don't go into long blades until somewhere around after you complete grit gate. It also coincidentally works out that there's a spoiler long-sword you can get just after grit gate (technically you can get it anytime, but you will probably die going before that)

Never use shields

Prioritize armor that doesn't have huge negative dodge bonus (exception being for the very beginning of the game, say when you are levels 1-3)

Now that your agility is pimped out, rifles are going to be so powerful. When you get a good one, consider dropping some points into the entry level rifle skill, since it's so cheap.

[FuhFuture]

Forgot to add: you should eventually buy all the short blade skills, except for the most expensive one, as that one doesn't give you too much bonus once you switch to long blades as a primary

[Ryacchi]

Thanks for the rundown, I'm always on the hunt for tips. Your build certainly seems a lot heavier in agility than I've been running.

It is interesting that you get juke so early, because it has always been something I've wanted to pick up, but never find the time to do it.

I think I'll try something along this build for a couple of runs and see how it goes.

[McLovin']

Originally posted by doubleshuang:

I was thinking about making a guide, because I've gone all-the-way, or almost, with this similar build a few times.

Do it do it do it! Community needs more guides!

I'm gonna go out on a limb and suggest that Willpower isnt a dump stat over Ego, because Will improves HP regeneration rate...shop seems secondary to this.

[FuhFuture]

I just never found a use for willpower. If you need to regen in battle, there's usually a better 2nd option, and if you need to regen out of battle, then time doesn't matter.

Also, ego only to (-1)... below that the penalties are so high

[McLovin']

Thinking a high lvl willpower could make an interesting regen-tank build. But not many points to go round with agility, considering strength is also needed for a damage modifier.

Was wondering which mutations/subtype you might be using...

Arconaut with multiple arms, triple jointed and night-vision (so you can dual wield without a glowball thing) seem like the decent choices for an agility/blade build. I've thrown in heightened speed (quickness) and paralysing sting (crowd control) with a defect of spontaneous combustion (easy to manage with a flask of salt water).

[FuhFuture]

I did with True Kin the first time.

As a mutant I always take nightvsion. It's too good for only one point

Then freezing hands... I like it better than flame, because you can take on much more powerful enemies since it freezes them. Also, coldness in general makes things slow... later on freezing hands will make a whole area shut down. Also, since the move recharges in 10 turns, you can usually keep at least one enemy perpetually frozen (bosses included). You should ALWAYS spend your mutation point leveling up this skill, if it's available.

Carapace is also super OP (probably the best skill of all, but not as fun as freezing hands), and a must-have if you are trying to min-max (which I don't recommend). Even though it affects your dodge, it gives you sweet defense in the beginning, and the dodge penalty goes away as you level it up.

You can't realistically have more than 2 main mutations, since you don't have enough points to level them up.

I used triple-jointed on this build, too, but only to level 3 (enough to get one extra point of agility). It's hard to tell how much it's actually doing, though.

Stingers are pretty good, but then you can't use the jetpack. The jetpack's not that useful for this build, but still fun

[Ryacchi]

I had some success following fairly close to your build, but I think, just playstyle-wise, a full agility build isn't really for me. Also, while I am sure Juke is amazing, I just don't use it that much. I probably would be a better player if I did.

Also, I'm still not convinced on long blades, unfortunately. But I really am liking the offhand short blade. Next I am thinking of an axe/shortblade child of the wheel, and going more into strength.

Originally posted by doubleshuang:

Put intelligence at 19 if you want to be able to craft grenades and recharge batteries by level 12 (int at 18 will let you craft at level 18, but by then you've already basically won).

I just had a question about this. Tinkering I is a 19 int requirement and that is what lets you recharge, right? So you'd only need to start with 17 to do it by level 12, not 19. Unless I am missing something.

[FuhFuture]

Yeah, I think you're right on the tinkering probably. When I wrote that was thinking Tinkering I was 21 INT (have to check which it is).

Play however is most fun, but for juke, I use it like this:

Bind sprint to 'ctrl-S' and juke to 'ctrl-1'
I never use it for offense, but use it all the time as a GTFO button.

Stumble onto a named unique that is WAYY out of your league? juke back, and it's like it never happened

Melee going wrong? 'ctrl-1' juke, then 'ctrl-s', then GTFO
"♥♥♥♥'s on fire, yo"?, juke out of the flames
"stuck" in vines or other other terrain features? juke out
But honestly, the main use of Juke is just: juke, sprint, GTFO

That one tile where you are in an opponents field of view vs. not in it is super important. Juke gives you that tile for free


I'm still trying to get a strength/axe build off the ground. I just keep absorbing too much damage

EDIT: also, I think that named unique long blade I mentioned has been removed (or more likely, just moved to be harder to find)

[dis astranagant]

Longblades mostly exist for vibroblades, none of the rest will do much against cragmensch or high end robots.