A guide concept: Ranged combat and groups.

[A kobold]

Just a concept right now. might make it a guide later.

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Abiotic factor is a co-op game first and foremost but don't think you can go in guns blazing like in so many others. Melee is your bread and butter and knowing which melee weapon you want to use is key. That said in groups you want to have a ranged option at all times.

The question is which type is for you?

Right now there are three types of ranged weapons in the game. DPS, AOE, and pinpoint.

DPS is things like the SMG, electro thrower and molotovs.
AOE, is grenades like the mugnade and scrapshot.
and pinpoint are things like the grinder, pipe pistol, and sec pistol.

In co-op you want to split these rolls. so bellow is a guide to picking which role is best for you. then figuring out how to play those roles in a group.

We will go over the ranged weapon damage rate types in order that they appear.
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Pinpoint

The first ranged weapon you get falls into this, the crossbow. pinpoint weapon use infact I would recomend anyone looking to do ranged combat use the crossbow until at least range 4. then moving to the weapons of their type (if it applies).

Pinpoint is based around well pinpoint damage. Your main ranged weapons are more generic and bland, they also have the most plentiful ammo both in crafting and find. that said being bland isn't bad as everyone will be able to take this role with out problem.

The problem comes in co-op where to many pinpoints means you will quickly find portal worlds and crafting doesn't give you enough grinder blades or paper.


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AOE

One of the first ranged roles you can get with bait bombs and slushy bombs in the office, these also train throwing allowing you to more easily use thrown weapons later. Note for this roll you really just need to know stealth is a key early on, especially with bait bombs, you also want faster melee weapons as such sharp weapons tend to be your best option.

Unlike other ranged rolls you weapons are mostly grenades until you go to flathills and gain access to the scrap shot. Then you get your guns.

For AOE your main weapons are shotguns like the scrap shot, double barrel, and military shotgun. in order of power. while your secondary is your grenades. unlike other ranged compat picks AOE has a lot of options in how they do their damage and what they do. including a few stunning options DoT options, and just heavy damage with purple shrapnel.

AOE is actually the most powerful grouping of ranged weapons but they come at a cost literally all of them cost resources to maintain, their guns have the lowest durability and all their throwns are one offs. that said you are the danger and the crowd control.

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DPS

the DPS role which is actually the last one you get access to, as in office and manufacturing you have no access to any DPS weapons, at all. Sure you can get the SMG drop from soldiers but those can not be used for a while and require you to use another roll first.

The first DPS weapon most groups get is the early mid game weapon that is the electro thrower. This ranged weapon doesn't give ranged XP and is a close range tool but it can easily disable most hostiles in the game unless they are creatures of the puppet master.

For this reason the DPS player tends to be one who is geared towards fast movement and getting in close anyway, these weapons actually pair the best with heavy weapons builds as they give you quick crowd control where your heavy weapon would fail.

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Now that the damage roles are stated lets get to how to play and split them in co-op. Unlike single player where you can split and move between the roles as ammo opens up or supply goes up and down. in co-op you will always be in a supply crunch. as such pick your roles smartly.

Example at the start while everyone should have a crossbow, they should start splitting off once flathill is complete. you ideally only want one player with a pistol (even if you get more from soldiers), and two with scrapshot/pipe weapons. as such in a 4 person game the last person will be your AOE player they will get less ammo for their gun but in exchange should have priority to explosives and the crafting of mug nades once farms are set up.

this only becomes harder to split once you get to the mines and gain access to the mug nades and grinder. While it may sound fun, the game only reliably gives enough grinder blades to keep 1 or 2 people supplied as such it is highly recomended you only have 1-2 people on them.

Generally best practices is the people using the pipe pistols get first dibs at grinders for upgrading. with the pistol still being viable even late into the labs. Though at this point general range use is not recomended.

Once you get to the labs though you should have access to DPS which is the electro thrower and at least one who can craft the biometric arm bands. once you have these two tools all ranged classes open up heavily to everyone.

SEriously if you are willing to take the set cut, having biometrics and a revolver can be really powerful even if it requires grinding for ammo.

That said a good rule of thumb form this point forward is noe more then 2 people per ammo type.

Actually I should have stated that earlier. As any more and maintaining ammo is hard. the exception is shotgun shells which should be one person only.