YOUR MERC AND YOU (MOSTLY LEGACY)

WITH UPDATE 0.7, THIS GUIDE IS 60% USELESS

INTRO:

I’ve written guides on guns and tactics, but there’s an incredibly important part to Quasimorph that I haven’t talked about yet: BUILDS. Anyone who see’s that word and gets terrified is a highly intelligent piece of prey.

I’m not going to shower you with math (okay maybe a little bit), but instead I’m going to go over the dreaded meta, various viable builds, potentially broken Operators, and the abominable class system.

I essentially broke down every single operator. If you hate reading, just find the one's you like.

THE META:

I’m going to talk about this first because, contrary to popular belief, not everything is viable. Everything performs a niche, sure, but +40% pistol accuracy falls off hard by the time enemies are milly-rocking grenades onto your position and advancing under a withering hail of gunfire.

Currently, there are two builds that I consider good enough to be viable throughout the entire game: the Immortal Percy and the Flesh Eater, Isabella. Percy is a very good Operator, with +10 resistance to everything, making him an early game powerhouse; stacking this with armor turns him into a juggernaut. Isabella (my personal favorite) can be given a melee weapon– even a poor one–, a bandage, a splint, and one bit of morphine, and can solo most of a floor, using guns to augment her terrifying close-range strength. The reason she’s so good is because Eclipse Blades gives her 30% evasion, and she can strike from the Sprint stance thanks to the Athletics perk, turning her into a naked, cannibalistic sword-fighter that laughs in the face of death.

There are other builds, but those two work in any situation. They’re not noob traps, as a single poor roll of the dice, or one bad decision can send you straight back to the main menu. Only someone with decent knowledge and experience of the game can exploit a build’s maximum potential. Not even I know how to fully work the Immortal Percy, but Isabella hasn’t died in a disturbingly long time. Its a matter of playstyle and mindset.

Experiment, but also learn from others. Become the ultimate prey.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– FRANCIS:

I’ll start with Francis, since I wouldn’t consider him terrible in any respect. He boasts very average stats, and isn’t particularly fancy. He does, however, more than double the durability of weapons (+120%), and allows inconsequential repairing of said weapons. If you play Francis for three hours, then switch to another character, you’re going to feel it.

Most people will say to combine Francis with the Scouts of Hades class: the result is a very balanced blade that can harm almost anything in the game. Blind Fury (+25% damage for 6 turns) and Combat Focus (+40% dodge chance for 6 turns) can trigger at the same time, making you that much more deadly.

This build is mostly reactionary, however, and ultimately you will struggle with assaulting mid-game defensive positions, as you lack solid agency within your own run. My personal suggestion is to pack extra grenades (not a grenade launcher), which are very good at softening up rooms before a push. For most cases, your biggest threat will be counter-attacks and extreme levels of Quasimorphosis. I recommend grinding Mars before sending your Francis to places such as Venus or worse.

Running Francis with Tifton’s Elite changes your playstyle dramatically. In the macro side of things, you should only have one Tifton’s Elite character that can reliably power through defense missions and nothing else. Francis is decent in defense missions, as he can outlast his opponents if you bring high-capacity firearms, turrets, and plenty of bullets.

Killing people is only half the battle– the other half is coming home for dinner, and any build that sacrifices survivability for damage is an arrogant and faulty one. Francis/Scouts of Hades has defense options, but they are very committal, forcing you to fully retreat from a situation in order to maximize your chances for survival. To this end, using an SMG and assault rifle will give you adequate space to deliberate your moves without being pressed against the wall half the time. Just remember to bring plenty of grenades to force your way through unfavorable situations.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– VICTORIA:

She’s either very ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ bad or very ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ cool. On one side, +2 weapons range doesn’t make any sense for most guns, and marksman rifles are already ridiculously far ranged. On the exact opposite side, +2 range on a ♥♥♥♥♥♥ shotgun is literally overpowered. Outfitting her with a Taiga is expensive, however. She’s a Scouts of Hades girl for sure, as any other build doesn’t do her justice. You could argue Tunnel Rats for the Shelters perk (+15% accuracy when in cover), but staying still doesn’t work against Quasimorphs.

Victoria turns non-sniper weapons into sniper weapons. That’s her purpose. Turning a Course VTK into a diabolical 9mm laser beam is cool and all, but she has no strategic use besides killing people 2 tiles further than normal. I would recommend her as a farming tool in Absentia areas such as Mars, where you don’t have to risk higher level Operators against Quasimorphs.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– PERCY:

Jesus himself. As an early game powerhouse, Jesus– I mean, Percy can tank hits like no other (including beam), which makes him ideal for storming positions. He can also harass enemies from a distance because even if they fire back and hit you, the damage falloff turns chip damage into no damage.

Mathematically, you shouldn’t give your best armor set to Percy– rather, you should give him one that protects from the most DIFFERENT kinds of damage. For middle to late game players, Carnage Pattern and Myrmidion pattern are the best. For early game, Impactor. You’ll be saving your best armor for someone else….

Percy has little offensive value besides the skill of the player. Running him as Spaceborne Ghosts or Tunnel Rats gives him the Immune Response perk (+20% to all resists), but that only doubles down on his defense pornography. Turning him into a KV-1 doesn’t make him better at killing things.

I recommend Spaceborne Ghosts over Tunnel Rats, and SMGs over assault rifles. He can also be equipped with a Servo-Backpack to carry three weapons, allowing him three different types of damage to further augment his middling offensive capabilities. You could give him Scouts of Hades for extra kick, but as we said before, sacrificing survivability for damage is cringe.

Your biggest foe will be cutting damage, since you don’t want to get involuntarily amputated. Avoid melee unless you have a very decent melee weapon, such as a Shovel. Quality melee enemies should be avoided completely, as the risk of debilitating injury is just too great.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– ISABELLA:

Essentially a minor god in her own right, Isabella is the perfect example of mathematical perfection: as Hermann Gottleib from Pacific Rim once said, “Numbers are as close as we get to the handwriting of God.”

Defensively, Isabella has 20% dodge chance. If we run her as an Eclipse Blade, she gains an extra +10%. A maxed out Athletics perk gives +40%, meaning she has a 60% flat chance to dodge an attack when leveled. She also has Taste of Blood (+1 Regen for 6 turns), allowing her to shrug off chip damage in a pitched fight.

Strategically, she kicks the ♥♥♥♥ out of people with her high accuracy. She has +20% accuracy in Sprint mode, negating the inherent poor precision. She also has +5% with the Knife Fight perk; coupled with her built-in 75% melee accuracy, she has an 80% chance to hit things. It can only go up from there, and she can reliably hit every attack so long as she doesn’t take too many serious wounds.

Offensively, Isabella is a power fantasy. Killing people activates Carnage, which ups damage by +50% for 12 turns. Eating living flesh- cooked, spoiled, or inhuman- will activate Cannibalism, which increases melee damage by +25% for 12 turns. I recommend eating rotten meat, as it doesn’t contribute to the Quasimorphosis buildup. All of this translates into a +75% damage boost– wielding a Quasimorph melee weapon (I strongly suggest Duggur’s Blade) allows her to kill anything in the game in a single shot. If anyone can find anything that she can’t kill, lemme know. I’ll try and prove you wrong.

Oh, and she also ignores infections. I would call her perfect, but if my wife see’s this she’ll file for a divorce.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– MAXIMILIAN:

I consider Max to be very, very, very ♥♥♥♥♥♥. Sure, ignoring pain is cool, but I don’t believe it can be combo’d with any classes. His inherent stats also leave much to be desired. Ultimately, Max isn’t cool enough to justify bringing him around high level missions. Low level farming seems to suit him better.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– PRIYA:

At first, Priya seems like a farming character, since she can hold more consumables than anybody else. Great. Fantastic. Nobody cares.

Then you look at her stats and realize that she’s actually ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ cracked.

Above-average accuracy, more pain tolerance than normal, a generous hunger bar, and insane critical strike chance makes her extremely solid and difficult to counter in the early game. The extra consumables perk is inherently useless, as it only helps with looting– bringing seven bandages into a firefight is just a waste.

Combinations wise, running her with Tunnel Rats seems obvious, as the extra loot will stack up. You can play defensively with the Shelters perk while leveraging her excellent accuracy, critical chance, and Reinforced Ammo perk (all shotgun ammo deals +20% damage) for extreme damage potential. She doesn’t starve easily, too, which can allow her to hunker down for long sieges.

She has the same problem that Francis (and a lot of other Operators) possess: lack of a dedicated offensive option. Sure, shotgun combos can delete minimum wage workers off the face of the planet, but mid-game enemies sprinkled throughout the level might cause serious trouble. I always suggest grenades, since explosives are an easy solution to the problem of overpopulation.

For a loadout, I suggest any automatic shotgun, and a lower quality SMG. This will give you Cut/Blunt damage. Shotguns can brute force their way through defense values, so wielding a Piercing weapon is a moot point. I could also suggest laser weapons, but you will overkill your target; save your better weapons for your actually powerful soldiers.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– JACQUES:

When I first unlocked Jacques Kennet, -2 reload duration seemed like a godsend. 20 hours later, I’m here to tell you…

…kind of.

Playing Quasimorph with a speed-loader will change how you fight forever, as you’ll never be able to stop left-clicking ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ with 0 turn reloads. Unfortunately, you’ll eat through ammunition very quickly and your weapons will degrade faster. In a short, pitched, brutal firefight, Jacques has pushed the very boundaries of balance. On a 4 mission slog, grab a knife and amputate your head.

He does have his use– defense missions. Giving him Scouts of Hades or Phoenix Brigade will form a creature of unimaginable damage potential. It depends on the weapons that you intend on bringing to a mission, however. Scouts of Hades is great for ballistic weapons such as SMGs (particularly the Mantis) and automatic shotguns.

For an energy weapons build, Phoenix Brigade ends people’s lives faster than carbon monoxide. With Jacques/Phoenix, you can bring your heaviest energy weapons because the Combat Physicist perk grants -1 reload duration every time you discharge an energy weapon, making you reload a machine gun like the Legacy in 2 ♥♥♥♥♥♥ turns. This can also combine with marksman rifles for a 360 no scope compilation from 2014.

Just don’t forget to bring food when packing all that ammo, or you might have to taste test some flesh.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– MIRZA:

Absolutely not, she’s bad. Her melee stats are good, but nothing can combo off of her mediocrity. Besides, you already know who the melee gal is. -60% calorie consumption is an extremely poor perk. If someone is looking for mind chips, selling Mirza (even if you don’t have her yet) is good business.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– KENZIE:

While absolving the sins of capitalists with your .357 Magnum, you turn a corner and come face to face with a man in power armor and a shotgun pointed directly at your chest. The irony falls upon you like a torrent, and you realize that the suffering you’ve visited upon your enemies in the name of profit is utterly meaningless. You accept death with one last serene, almost grateful breath. The last thing you feel is fire, then peace.

Kenzie doesn’t give a ♥♥♥♥ about that nerdy junk and dodges a point blank hit before roundhouse kicking the bastard in the head.

If you’ve ever watched The Matrix and saw Keanu Reeves dodge bullets with the power of Hollywood Special Effects, then congrats, you’re about halfway to understanding just how absolutely broken Kenzie is. Be warned, you might need to grind a fair bit, but the result is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ epic.

Kenzie and my wife are identical: they avoid logic and reason, dropkick their problems, then blame the world when their luck runs out. She (I’m talking about Kenzie now) can be outfitted with either a ranged or melee loadout– I’ve seen more success with firearms, but you do you; both are viable.

For melee, I suggest Kenzie/Eclipse Blades, although the Cannibalism perk doesn’t steamroll everything because she’s not immune to infections. You can either ignore the perk or not, that’s up to you as well. Desperate times call for desperate measures, and always focus on short-term survival over long-term planning; if extra melee damage is called for, then such must be done.

For a ranged build, might I suggest an assault rifle and a Flash MG-76? The beam can burn mid-game enemies away, while the assault rifle can handle hordes of hostiles. Alternatively, you can take the Servo-Backpack and help yourself to a shotgun, laser, submachine gun combination?

Spaceborne Ghosts allows you to focus on shotguns (especially laser shotguns for late-game enemies), although I recommend any automatic shotgun, as the Last Bullet perk (+20% accuracy for 6 turns) can trigger, allowing you to switch to your energy weapon and finish off tougher enemies. Since you have Reflexes and Athletics, you can easily outpace your opponents and keep them out of harms reach.

Kenzie can also benefit from extremely long-range weapons, allowing her to more easily dodge idiots who fire their guns beyond their effective range. If you take the Servo Backpack, I recommend taking a decent melee weapon such as a Chainblade, or an Axe. You want to maximize your chances at severing limbs since you have ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ 80% melee accuracy. Of course, don’t get into fights you’re not sure you can win.

What separates Percy, Isabella, and Kenzie from one another, though, is Kenzie’s perk: -75% weight affects dodge. Percy cannot dodge, Isabella can easily get weighed down with all of the ♥♥♥♥ she carries, but Kenzie just flows through it like water. Equip your best armor on her.

If your dodge works, great. If it doesn’t, your armor catches it. Survivability onion.

For once, the Meat Grinder and the Cutter serve some actual purpose; if the serrated, rotating blade comes spinning back at you, Kenzie can just dodge it. Or not. Remember you’re playing a gambling Operator within a gambling game– getting upset when a Quasimorph puts all five of its fingers straight through your chest is understandable, but you ARE the one that chose to gamble your soul.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– MARIKA:

I don’t like her, sorry. +2 vest slots is a low end perk that combos with nothing. However, she does have 70% ranged accuracy, which makes lasers incredibly good. Use her for low level farming, giving her Scouts of Hades for extremely accurate shots. Apart from that, she’s utterly useless.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– AUBERON:

Also bad. +1 weapon slot can be combo’d with the Servo-Backpack, giving you four weapons for you to piss on people with even more variety. I think its over-hyped.

There is one extremely niche use for Auberon, however: farming for long pipes. If you play your cards right and scour the map, you can make off with loads of pipes. Now why pipes, you might ask?

Building guns bruv. Auberon brings back pipes, I build assault rifles and give Francis the firepower equivalent of a single American from Texas. If you’re not from the States and you don’t get the joke, good– we have problems here.

Auberon can combo well with anything. Just don’t make him into a defense mission specialist or else you’re going to have a bad time.

OPERATE YOUR OPERATORS– NIKO:

This one is so confusing because on one hand, +40% pistol accuracy falls off hard. On the other hand, the Scorpion (and anything derived from it) now plays Perfect Cell’s theme anytime it’s pulled out. She can actually solo lower level areas, and during the mid-game she can out-stat security contractors. She requires ridiculously expensive gear to even justify her deployment.

She uses high-end pistols such as the Redeemer, Law, Order, Moneykeeper, Eagle ST-13, Scorpion, Hel Trinity, Starlock ADP, and Ripper. Go onto the wiki and look at how extremely high up these weapons are. Finding manufacturing chips for these guns makes her much easier to send off.

Her dodge stats leave much to be desired, and so she requires relatively powerful armor to keep apace with high Quasimorphosis and high-end firearms, such as the Storm TT. It’s very hard to play Niko when you’re outgunned, which is going to be almost all the time since you’re pistol-hunting.

Niko’s poor performance on high difficulty missions can be made up with the Gorgon, a much less dangerous alternative to the flamethrower. If, however, you choose the flamethrower, you can use laser pistols and play Phoenix Brigade for Gambit (exploding barrels gives +10% Crit chance), Pyromaniac (+1 fire duration), Combat Physicist (-1 reload duration after firing energy weapon), and Destroyer (destruction damage +20%). Leveraging barrel spawns and mines can allow you to punch up against tougher opponents. Be warned that there are more flame-resistant armors than poison resistant ones.

Without Phoenix Brigade, Scouts of Hades is the next obvious choice if you’re attempting to complete actually difficult missions. Obvious stat boosts aside, CQC Specialist decreases the scatter of pistols, shotguns, and SMGs by -15%, allowing you to take a shotgun for a chance at going up against Quasimorphs.

A WORD ABOUT TIFTON’S ELITE:

Why are they just so bad. None of the perks combo at all, and they promote a wasteful playstyle: ARs and machine guns are the most difficult weapons to produce and find, spamming prescription medication isn’t a good use of your Benadryl, Grenadier assumes you’re made of explosives, and Stationary Defense requires you to place a turret. I’d rather serve Teztclan. Its so bad.

HOWEVER!

Pain Immunity is such an interesting perk that I thought I’d attempt to offer my two cents on the subject.

Go to the wiki and look at the perk for yourself, I’m not going to copy down what each level does. Come back when you’ve done so.

Hey, you’re back. Did you read it? If you didn’t, I curse you with testicular tortion. If you’re a woman, I won’t curse you further.

Yeah, Pain Immunity is insane. Further testing may be required, but I wonder if amputating your limbs will trigger the ability. I don’t know. I’ll return when I know more.

For now, Tifton’s Elite is only viable for experimental builds. Steer clear of this thing for now, but if you think you’re up for the challenge, go for it! I relish your wasted runs.

A MESSAGE FOR The 21st CENTURY HOMINID:

Quasimorph is a hard game. You rely on chance and skill to push through insurmountable odds. Against creatures and humans infernal, you may give something your all and still lose. That’s life. That’s everything you’ll ever do for the rest of your life.

Killing things is hard. Killing things and coming back home is almost impossible. No matter what side of the corporate war you’re on, its always going to be hard because the enemy can always mobilize a planet’s worth of defense contractors to chase you to the edge of space.

But armed with knowledge, weapons, chemistry, and the very small but ever-present electrical charge that guides your neurons, you can– and will– come out on top of this. You’ve got your guns, your drugs, and your will; make use of 'em.

[kirb]

just want to say here the last section is lowkey inspirational

[Fatass]

@melting is cold

I'm glad you can find some usage for this guide, especially since its gonna get invalidated real quick thanks to the new update :P

[melting is cold]

Great guide!

After doing some experimenting, I've found that Marika is a solid pick for a Spaceborne Ghost, with already high melee and ranged accuracy complimenting the sprint perk excellently. Plus, as a Ghost you're gonna be running all the time, and that's when having a few more slots (for more grenades, medkits, whatever) can come in handy.

[Fatass]

@NFK

Isabella's infection resistance is a core part of what makes Eclipse Blades so good. Furthermore, Mirza's dodge chance is half of Isabella's. The point is that Isabella can combo more accurately with Eclipse Blades than Mirza can.

[NFK]

Why is Mirza bad? She's almost identical to Isabella in terms of stats. Their core perk is just a two sides of a coin. For Mirza you bring little food but lot of sorbents. For Isabella, you bring lot of food. But both have similar melee and ranged accuracy. Can you please explain why love for Isabella and not Mirza?
P.S. I also played a lot with Isabella. But for some reason it's hard with Mirza even though they both have same stats