New player here - All custom party or use premade Rangers?

[vonbleak]

Hi guys, i have been eyeing off this game for a long time but have waited until the release of the Directors Cut before actually getting it. I am huge Fallout fan, i played the first 2 years ago, and in general i am a big fan of old school rpg's...

Anyway, i know this game is very deep when in comes to character creation and making a party thats balanced and effective can be tricky so i was wondering...Of course i will custom make my main character (not even sure if not doing that is an option) but when it comes to the rest of my party are the premade rangers any good? - Or should i just spend the time and premake my entire party..?

[One]

If you want to get really strong squad you should build all 4 rangers yourself. But before you do it , you should read forums first to know how to set all atributes and skills properly. If you build squad without this knowledge you will most likely fail to build a strong squad and will have to restart the game as soon as you realize your mistakes.

I suggest you reading this thread first https://forums.inxile-entertainment.com/viewtopic.php?t=8637

[***]

One of the most exciting of RPG is planning and making your own party member,
So I suggest browsing for awhile and plan first before making a custom character.

I play the DC again from the start yet I still spend hours for planning,

Custom or premade, it is all good if you plan your party first.

[vonbleak]

Yeah - all very true. I should (and will) just spend the time to do some research and custom build all of my rangers...it is the rpg way after all :P

[DevilBlues]

Originally posted by vonbleak:

i know this game is very deep when in comes to character creation and making a party thats balanced and effective can be tricky

If you want to be story-oriented, use the easy difficulty. If you want a challenge, don't go to Supreme Jerk. It's not adding anything, it's just making combat take longer.

Originally posted by Xtreme-Void:

O
So I suggest browsing for awhile and plan first before making a custom character.

Stick a party together. Do some combat. Get a feel for the differences. Action points are muddy. Don't worry about them. You get turns based on initiative. It's not "everyone gets a turn in initiative order" it's "high initiative characters go more often than low ones."

Combat is about three or four of your characters reliably killing enemies before they can become problems. A lot of combat is about having up to date weapons and mods.

Genuinely hard encounters (early on, swarms of honey badgers) get solved by explosives. Leave grenades or similar items on every character. When a normally unbeatable group of badgers lines up in front of you like British Red Coats? Take the next character, break out the grenade and throw one. Boom. Encounter changes entirely.

Did a whole supreme jerk playthrough like that. Very boring. Definitely consider easy mode plus "fun" tactics, like shotguns or fists or something.

[Demonbox]

The only real suggestion you might need (imo) is not to make more than 2 characters using the same ammos, at least at the beginning (it's also affected by one of the very first choice in.game you make, won't spoiler it).

So to sum it up for the starting weapons:

Assault rifles and heavy weapons use the same ammos
Shotguns and some pistols use the same ammos
Machineguns and some pistols use the same ammos
Sniper rifles use ammos of their own

Unless you are a minmaxer completionist (nothing wrong in it), you'll always find a way through the game, certain options will be precluded, but be sure there's no way for you to create a party that can do everything, for something you might go back later on, for something else... well you always can have a 2nd run at the game. :)

[One]

Originally posted by Demonbox:

The only real suggestion you might need (imo) is not to make more than 2 characters using the same ammos, at least at the beginning (it's also affected by one of the very first choice in.game you make, won't spoiler it).

So to sum it up for the starting weapons:

Assault rifles and heavy weapons use the same ammos
Shotguns and some pistols use the same ammos
Machineguns and some pistols use the same ammos
Sniper rifles use ammos of their own

Unless you are a minmaxer completionist (nothing wrong in it), you'll always find a way through the game, certain options will be precluded, but be sure there's no way for you to create a party that can do everything, for something you might go back later on, for something else... well you always can have a 2nd run at the game. :)

Assault rifles are the best weapon in game. So you need 3 rangers with Assault rifles I would say + 1 sniper maybe. Pistols and melee can be used as a backup weapon at close combat. Other weapon not really needed.

Ammo is not the problem since you can buy it.

Here is more info about weapon https://forums.inxile-entertainment.com/viewtopic.php?f=40&t=14051 (Spoiers inside)

[Demonbox]

Originally posted by One:

Assault rifles are the best weapon in game. So you need 3 rangers with Assault rifles I would say + 1 sniper maybe. Pistols and melee can be used as a backup weapon at close combat.

Not questioning assualt rifles beign the "best weapon", still 3 rangers using the same ammos?
On what level of difficulty?
and you tried starting with AG Center? 'cause I know in Highpool is easier to receive as drops ammos, but good luck in AGC

Other weapon not really needed.

Disputable, but that's a matter of how someone wants to play the game, being it an RPG I like a bit of variation, but that's just me.

Ammo is not the problem since you can buy it.

Where? In the citadel? The chick outside the actual citadel only sells you bit of everything, so early into the game you don't find travelling merchants, vendors have limited resources, unless you go back and forth.

Start a mission > deplete your ammos > leave the mission and go back to the store > Rinse and repeat

For me this breaks the immersion, but agree that's just my point of view.

[One]

Originally posted by Demonbox:

Originally posted by One:

Assault rifles are the best weapon in game. So you need 3 rangers with Assault rifles I would say + 1 sniper maybe. Pistols and melee can be used as a backup weapon at close combat.

Not questioning assualt rifles beign the "best weapon", still 3 rangers using the same ammos?
On what level of difficulty?
and you tried starting with AG Center? 'cause I know in Highpool is easier to receive as drops ammos, but good luck in AGC

Other weapon not really needed.

Disputable, but that's a matter of how someone wants to play the game, being it an RPG I like a bit of variation, but that's just me.

Ammo is not the problem since you can buy it.

Where? In the citadel? The chick outside the actual citadel only sells you bit of everything, so early into the game you don't find travelling merchants, vendors have limited resources, unless you go back and forth.

Start a mission > deplete your ammos > leave the mission and go back to the store > Rinse and repeat

For me this breaks the immersion, but agree that's just my point of view.

I have just finished AG center. Ranger difficulty.
AG center is not that hard anymore as it was in original (I didn it in original at Ranger level too and it was hard then) cause you can now buy ammo from the merchant directly in AG center while in original he didn't sell it.

For role play you can use any weapon you want, but I am speaking about max squad performance here.

[Demonbox]

Originally posted by One:

I have just finished AG center. Ranger difficulty.
AG center is not that hard anymore as it was in original (I didn it in original at Ranger level too and it was hard then) cause you can now buy ammo from the merchant directly in AG center while in original he didn't sell it.

While is true that the dude now sells a bit of ammos, if you have 3 rangers using assault rifles (I guess one is Angela?), you either have spent a lot of points into the specific skill on all of them (giving up on other skills) or you are in good terms with the RNG god.

For role play you can use any weapon you want, but I am speaking about max squad performance here.

That's why in my first post I specified "unless you are minmaxing completionist", again there's nothing wrong in it.

If you are then yes at all costs spend some time searching internet for the perfect (or close to it) configuration of your party, you can also find informations on which dialogues (and relative skill checks) are "worth" using, so you can avoid spending points in speech skills, etc...

Whatever your choice is OP, have fun. :)

[One]

As I said I've just finished AG center in this versioin at Ranger level and didn't have any problems with it.

My team was

Ranger 1 - SMGs
Ranger 2 - Assault+pistols
Ranger 3 - Assault+pistols
Ranger 4 - Assault+blunt
Angela - Assault+blunt
Rose - pistols+sniper

Now I feel that SMGs is just a waste of ammo, so I will train ranger 1 to some other weapon later I think - haven't decide what weapon exactly yet. Energy weapon probably.

As for role play I look at my team as a team of professional soldiers and I actually don't see a reason why professionals would use anything other than AR most of the time.

[MC1_Judge]

Make your own team, it makes it more personal.

I have one based around Firefly...

Capt Reynolds - Automatic Rifle/Handgun - Lockpick and safe cracking
Jayne Conn - Heavy Weapons/Blunt Weapons - Brute force and demolition
River Tam - Sniper/unarmed combat - medic and perception
Kaylee Frye - Energy Weapons/SHotguns - Mechanical Repair and weapon smithing

These are all upgraded and other skills added to now, but thats what I started with.

[Dorok]

You can use pre made characters as a base and fully edit them.

If it's your first play, most chance you'll screw up a bit your party design, but it's not picking among pre created characters that will change that.

The only way would be to check carefully a guide but it won't match DC version, and companions available, and when you get each companion, and what skill really worth it, and so on.

But don't make a full AR team to avoid inflict yourself less fun combats. You can be more creative than that and get more fun combats. I can't say yet what weapon would be really a burden, for now I'm fine with those I try, but I'm still in first areas and didn't get yet much opportunities to try more weapons/mods.

[Darkeus]

Yeah, don't pay attention to the "Assault Rifles are best." That is just people that worry about Damage per turn and min maxing. If you want to do that, be my guest though. And , Assault Rifles are debatably not the best anymore since the weapon rebalance.

Make what you want, but research what does what. Any team with the right setup can complete the game. Just make sure you know what the skills, attributes, and weapons do before you start.

[One]

Assault Rifels are still the best actually and have best talents either. However if you play at normal or easy level of dificulty you can probably use anything.

[Darkeus]

Originally posted by One:

Assault Rifels are still the best actually and have best talents either. However if you play at normal or easy level of dificulty you can probably use anything.

I have played every difficulty level. I have 165 hours in the original release. :-) Never needed to use all Assault Rifles. Still in California.

I never thought Assault Rifles were the best. Expensive ammo. Personal opinion. I just never really cared. I am not min maxing and I pick weapons I want to use. Like I said, if you min max and worry about small differences, hey. Different strokes.

But it is an RPG. I would not limit myself. Guess some people like to limit themselves.