Are rusting hulks weak squad?

[Pawell]

Playing on normal, cleared all 4 islands + boss on 1st try with the starting squad. Similiar story with fire mechs. Now i tried rusting squad (the one with electric clouds) and it was first time i had to nonstop make choices between suiciding mechs, failing objectives or taking damage to the grid. In the end i defeated final boss after 3 islands but i had to spend 6 reputation just on fixing grid.

Is the starting squad just so versatile / easy to use or do i just suck at the game? Or perhaps i had very very bad luck with RNG? Is there even RNG in this game?

[Peterhobo1]

Not sure, but they're the only ones I consistently win with. They are super aggressive , you want to be covering the whole map in constantly smoke. It makes you play very fast with your artillery since it can smoke and damage, which is kinda usual since artillery normally wants to be at the back lobbing damage in.

[glass]

It takes a bit of time to learn what a squad can do. and be good with it. Some squads are harder to learn than others, like zenith and judo can be pretty tough to get a handle on.

You'll get there if you keep playing. Lots of tips and tricks you'll pick up along the way, like leaving clouds infront of buildings so the can't target it etc.

In games like this, slay the spire(low ascension)/into the breach/etc, there is rng, but it's not strong enough to change the outcome if a player is good enough.
A less experience player will not know what to watch out for and often get caught by "rng".

For example, the first turn, the enemies can target you in such a way where there is no way to get out unscathed, and it would be rng if you got punished for it, and also rng if you didn't get punished for it, since the enemies decided what to attack "randomly".
But a more experience player could change loadouts before entering the stage, and will check the range of enemy units before placing the mechs, negating the possible rng.

[Brosef Iosif]

It's normal to be better with some team than others.

The first team has strong displacement abilities, good damage at the cost of poor movement all around and costy upgrades. Similarly, the Fire Behemoths have a superb displacement game with the greatest grinding at the cost of poor direct damage.

The Rusting Hulks have one of the strongest hitter (Rocket Mech), good area denial and the rare ability to disable veks with the smoke.
The Jet mech is the central unit of the team, it has excellent movement but is cumbersome to use. It's important to realize where you won't be able to attack with it (near mountains or buildings typically) and cover that with the Rocket. My initial core usually goes to the Push mech's shield to be able to pretty much consistently tank and block emerging veks, also to attract enemies and incite a pile-up that you'll be able to deny.
The Rocket mech is one of the hardest hitter of the game, being one of the few who can deal 4-5 damage. You should target the most annoying veks first with this one and grind the others. You can bait spiders and blobbers with the rocket mech back smoke attack, you should be wary of its deployment.

Typical development is Push Mech's Shield with first pod, when first island is done Jet Mech's range, then further Rocket mech attack twice, then eventually Jet mech's damage. Getting range of the Jet Mech early will bypass alot of annoying situations and can also allow you to neutralize two enemies which is good.

Best pilots are typically Camilla or Harold in the Jet mech, Archimedes is gold in the push mech because you can block all the time but Chen Rong is good too.

[Pawell]

I see, so i really got coddled by easy to use squads and when i tried to use big brain one i got almost bodied. Thanks for input.

[Brosef Iosif]

Originally posted by Pawell:

I see, so i really got coddled by easy to use squads and when i tried to use big brain one i got almost bodied. Thanks for input. :lunar2019piginablanket:

Frankly, RH aren't really "big brain"... Blitzkrieg and Steel Judokas are the brainy teams.

[Sinocelt]

The Rusting Hulks are the second easiest squad for me to win with, just after the Flame Behemoths. Steel Judoka were a challenge at first (they were the first squad I unlocked, and that wasn't a good choice), and Blitzkrieg and Zenith are still hard for me to win with. (I play on hard.)

I think the fact that Rusting Hulks are cheap to unlock means the developers, at least, think they're relatively easy to win with.

[inkus]

I'd say it's actually the strongest squad. And the easiest one to clean a timeline.