Chaosforge Forum
DoomRL => Discussion => Topic started by: Lord Typh on March 22, 2013, 20:49
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Hey, just curious on this but I recently got DoomRL. And I was curious on just what might be the best way to go about getting something that would classify as a more 'long-range', 'rapid-fire' character. ANy suggestions on that?
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If being long-range is a high priority for you, then you will probably want to get Cateye over Ammochain. Cateye isn't necessarily a rapid-fire-specific master, but it doesn't block you from building for rapid fire, and it compliments one nicely. Ammochain is specifically a rapid-fire build, but it blocks eagle-eye, so it isn't long range per se, although it's still effective at range. With Cateye, you need to watch your ammo carefully. It's not as bad as it sounds, though. In practice it usually means that you need to carry a rapid-fire weapon that uses 9mm ammo and another rapid-fire weapon that uses plasma, so you can draw from both ammo types.
A nice build might look something like
Int->Int->SoB->SoB->TH->EE->MCe->TH->EE->SoB->Fin->Fin
Where you would be relying on a shotgun until you got a level or two in SoB. I'm fond of double-intuition starts on my rapidfire scouts, but you could always get SoB/TH/EE/Fin earlier instead for the extra emphasis on offense.
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Which class would work best for that, if I may ask? And what weapons?
I'm wanting to try a more squishy guy for this, possibly evasive with the afformentioned long-range abilities.
Woudl a Chaingun and Rocketlauncher be good for that?
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Cateye is a scout-only master trait, so you'd pick a scout. Scouts also fire weapons and move 10% faster than other classes, so it's a small boost to your offense from the get-go. Yes, initially you'll be using a chaingun, and later a plasma gun too. You might find special variants of these weapons along the way, like a mini-gun or a nuclear plasma rifle, which you'll definitely want to grab if you see. There are assemblies you can make as well, but I don't know if you want anything spoiled or not. (Every time you beat the armory, you learn a new assembly, so you can earn them yourself if you like.)
By the way, yeah, you should definitely carry a shotgun and a rocket launcher along with you as well. The shotgun will help out a lot in the early game for radar shooting (and it's just generally a better option than a chaingun until you get some traits behind you). The rocket launcher does massive damage, can reshape levels (useful for completing certain levels and for tactics), gib corpses (useful against arch-viles) and it also allows you to rocket jump, which can get you out of some mighty scrapes.
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Alright.
Is it still alright to use the Shotgun? At least for the early-game and for the Hell's Arena segment?
I find myself liking to go there a lot, so I can get the extra experience. And blue Armor and missiles and a large health kit are good too.
Woudl the rocket launcher be good for a standby weapon?
Edit: Ignore the last part, I"m a blind idiot. But I am curious. How is it possible to strafe and shoot? I'm not totally sure how to do that after my quick glance at the controls and such.
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Shotguns are great for the early game, especially for scouting out of sight enemies. Rapids begin to overcome the shotgun's usefulness shortly after Hell's Arena.
Rocket Launcher is always a great utility weapon.
Don't want to use a door because you know there's something sinister behind it? No problem, the RL will make a door anywhere you need. Also great for avoiding acid/lava rooms.
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There isn't strafing in this game, but it does have an interesting dodge mechanic.
Let's say an imp is directly to your west. If you move either north or south, this will grant you a 50% intrinsic chance to dodge its fireball. Beware the resulting explosion, though. If you had moved east or west instead, then you wouldn't get the dodge chance.
But no, you can't fire 'while' moving. Dodging is something you do to get behind cover. Definitely read up on corner shooting if you haven't already.
Also, I don't want to make it sound like you have to get Cateye to be able to hit stuff at long range. You can build any way you like, as long as you get two Eagle Eye in there somewhere. I only suggest Cateye because it allows you to see farther than normal, which allows you to be accurate at a greater range than any other build.
Also, in general, it is very wise to carry a variety of weapons (as long as you aren't playing a challenge game that restricts your weapons). The rocket launcher is as close to a "buildless" weapon as there is in DoomRL and the shotgun is not far behind.
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Yeah, I saw what Cateye did so I know what it does. Didn't immediately think that it was osmething I should get though.
Another question. Would it be better for me to go for the evasion thing first? Or the Accuracy thing first?
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With rapid-fire builds, you generally want to focus on damage, damage, damage. The point is that you kill things so quickly you don't even need to evade. You want to focus on being able to fire your weapon quickly (Finesse), hit things (Eagle Eye), and do a lot of damage (Son of a Bitch, Trigger Happy). Hellrunner and the like can be passed over pretty safely in a rapid-fire build.
The reason I like to throw Intuition 2 into the mix is that it is the ultimate form of damage mitigation (and Cateye requires Int 1 anyway), worth delaying your damage for (in my opinion) but not everyone would agree.
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Alright.
What would be best in a more Melee/close rangebuild? I was thinking of having that as another route to go.
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For melee, Brute is your bread and butter and Berserker is your trump card. Brute increases your melee damage very nicely and Berserker boosts it to insane levels and keeps you alive. The key to playing melee is to tip-toe around until you get ahold of the chainsaw in the Chained Court special level. Then you'll be able to rip up guys left and right. Most people who play a melee character will end up getting the melee master trait, because it's hard to enhance a melee build further without one.
But as always, there's no reason not to take guns with you unless you're playing Angel of Berserk or going for a Strongman badge. (With Strongman, you can still use guns to blow holes in walls and stuff, but be careful!)
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Not much left to add here, I see, but I'd still like to try:
I think that, no matter what type of game you play, you pick one master trait to aim for. On very rare occasions (due to finding some exotic special weapon or some such) you'll want to divert from that path, but otherwise these masters have enough to add to build towards these in a fairly straight line.
Since master traits also exclude the availability of certain skills, and you know you'll only have so many points to spend, eventually, you can more or less plan out the entire course beforehand. To use the Cateye example, I'd take INT-INT-SOB-SOB-TH-MCe, since INT2 provides a huge advantage early on, benefits extra from the extended range MCe brings and you'll need at least 5 other skills before you can take MCe anyhow (or is this outdated?).
For MVm I'd prefer BRU-BRU-BER-BAD-BAD-MVm; again 6 skill required, you'll want BER a.s.a.p. and the extra level BAD allows you to immediately start boosting your health up to 200% once you get MVm.
With this in mind, you can also make a mental shopping list regarding what weapons you'll want to take. For pistols, SOG is a must (as I believe is a master trait), so anything that excludes the use of this will generally be a bad idea. Melee is worthless without BRU, so builds that exclude this tend to rely on another backup weapon.
So, barring any restrictions placed by challenge mode or badge hunting, you base a primary weapon on your master trait - possibly a secondary too - and pick another as backup. Shotguns are versatile enough to support almost anything, rocket launchers can work miracles as well, as long as you manage to keep out of the blast (and not blow up useful stuff in the process). BFGs are a mixed blessing, but I tend to keep one handy as well.
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But no, you can't fire 'while' moving
Isn't it the purpose of the new "gunrunner" scout mastery ?
I didn't try it yet (not picking my target doesn't look very appealing to me), but I think it can be quite valuable
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Huh, I hadn't noticed that! I'll definitely have to look into it.
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Isn't it the purpose of the new "gunrunner" scout mastery ?
I didn't try it yet (not picking my target doesn't look very appealing to me), but I think it can be quite valuable
Hey! I didn't even notice that one. Good to see Running Man has been replaced with something that sounds worthy of a try. Since it requires DM, you should actually be able to focus on evasion while the RNG takes care of the shooting for you. And although you technically cannot pick your target, you should of course be able to lend chance a hand by making the right moves....
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Gunrunner sounds extremely powerful in combination with Int2 and letting your opponents coming into your sight one at a time.
Gotta try that sometimes.
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Gunrunner sounds extremely powerful in combination with Int2 and letting your opponents coming into your sight one at a time.
Gotta try that sometimes.
Indeed, though I can imagine how nerve-wracking it can also become when the enemy moves unpredictably and forces you to shoot at barrels and destroy items in the process...
Shooting without the DoomGuy's consent can always become a problem imo. Needs too careful handling. At least such a game will be a unique experience that's for sure. :P
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I can say that I would like an option to turn the trait on/off at will. There are times when you want to only move without shooting, and they are quite plentiful.
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The trait requires juggler (imo, the contrary would have been quite absurd), so I guess switching to a rapid fire or melee weapon does the trick. Still, shooting before asking can lead to many collateral damages, and I don't think I'll pick this outside AoRA
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Alright, new question. What does the Arena Master's staff do? Raise dead? I nuked the guy with a rocket launcher and all so...
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http://doom.chaosforge.org/wiki/Arena_Master%27s_Staff
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...
Question. Will the Arena Master's staff kill Lost Souls in one hit?
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It's possible. The wiki says that Lost Souls have 10 HP and the stuff does 10d1 damage so...
You'd have to test it out, though.
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Don't forget that gunrunner requires you to run. As to be in running mode. And with the fact that running is limited it's not that powerful.
AM's staff iirc deals fire damage, and fire souls have fire resistance, so iirc it doesn't kill them. Otherwise it would be pretty popular start in CoS, and i don't remember anyone mentioning such.
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I remember one person mentioning that it was a pretty decent strategy. The drawback is you have to burn 2 or 3 medkits to be able to use the staff enough to kill them.
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I see.
I just needed a way to get past the first boss section since those freaking lost souls keep swarming me.
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You mean in Anomaly?
You can destroy first door by shooting in it's direction with non-shotgun something and use alternate fire of rocket launcher (rocket jump) when walls suddenly disappear. It will propell you out of first section entirely.
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I see.
I just needed a way to get past the first boss section since those freaking lost souls keep swarming me.
If you don't have a phase device try rocket jumping to the left or right.
It literally saves your life there, must have saved me 2-3 times at least.
Also don't forget to wear the red armor, to lessen the dmg you get from the jump.
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Yeah. Thing is? I wanna KILL the opponents too. More kills equal more leveling up and more leveling up means more skills and more skills means it's easier to go through. If possible, I'd love to just jump back to the entrance and shotgun the lost souls to death.
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Yeah. Thing is? I wanna KILL the opponents too. More kills equal more leveling up and more leveling up means more skills and more skills means it's easier to go through. If possible, I'd love to just jump back to the entrance and shotgun the lost souls to death.
It's obvious you'd kill everything after the rocket jump...
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I'm guessing I can worry about the hell baron twins after I deal with the lost souls?
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Yes. As long as you don't get near second wall (and rocket jump simply can't take you that far) you can do whatever you want.
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So I just found a plasma shotgun.
...I feel really good about my life situation now.
It's actually letting me fire more than once, something that the freaking Combat Shotgun lied to me about.
EDIT: And then, not two minutes later, I got killed by a shambler. How do you stop those things?
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Never trust anything a shotgun says. Chances are, you're drunk.
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That's certainly strange, considering I don't drink alcohol.
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Never trust anything a shotgun says. Chances are, you're drunk.
The Enrichment Center reminds you that the Weighted Combat shotgun will never threaten to stab you and, in fact, cannot speak. ^^
Btw, it's not obvious, but pumping combat shotty only takes 0.2 seconds, which is faster than reloading. I think that pumping + reloading takes 0.2 + 1 seconds, though... which seems quite stupid. @devs : I'd vote for an alternate reload taking 1 sec and doing both, instead of the current useless & dangerous "full reload".
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So, which would be better in the long run? Double-barrel shotgun? Or Combat Shotgun?
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Double shotgun has huge damage dropoff. It's doing good only on very short range. Most of the time combat is better
Pumping + reloading takes 0.2s + reload time, why could it be anything else?
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Plus, double shotgun with with SM and MAD is absolute overkill.
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If you have juggler, it can be useful to keep the double shotgun equipped in the ready slot when you're corner shooting hell knights and barons. Fire at them until they get close enough to knock them back properly, then insta-switch to the double shotgun and fire at them. Not only does it do a lot of damage at this range, but a lot of knockback too.
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Dear god, I'm getting tired of these Pain and Agony elementals. They keep spawning monsters and I can't deal with them all...
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They go down to shotguns like a hot knife through butter. I'm pretty sure they're weak to sharpnel damage. Not to mention that you can get most of them in your cone of fire. (By the way, they're resistant to bullet and fire damage.)
By the way, the City of Skulls is a pretty extreme challenge. You don't have to do it (and probably shouldn't) without at least shottyman and/or a tactical shotgun. Without a shotgun build I'd feel much safer with a super shotgun. Or, you know, a melee build. Or like, a nuclear plasma rifle..
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By the way, the City of Skulls is a pretty extreme challenge. You don't have to do it (and probably shouldn't) without at least shottyman and/or a tactical shotgun.
I used to get crunched in CoS every single time, until I started complaining about it on the forum. In a constructive fashion, of course. With a double shotgun and a couple of shellboxes, it's not that bad actually, if you move carefully. Also, having a homing phase helps hugely, since it takes to the stairs on the far right of the level and prevents you from being swarmed.
Find the discussion here (http://forum.chaosforge.org/index.php/topic,5735.0.html).
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I haven't actually played City of Skulls since the new lost soul AI. Does it change the difficulty or tactics much?
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I have no idea, I've only played 4 runs so far and only managed to reach the City twice. But this was on Too Young, so it doesn't really count.
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BTW, when clearing CoS with the double shotty and you are in the phase when you mostly meet single lost souls, you can use the alternate fire (single shell) to dispatch souls in short range to save ammo/be ready to kill another one without needing to reload.
Wow.. been playing this game for longer than a year and never knew you could do that.
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shotty man also reloads both shells to break it even more.
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Isn't it the purpose of the new "gunrunner" scout mastery ?
just test it. It not works with Int*2. But with shottyman works perfect. Elephant gun + Gunrunner mastery + Shottyman = fire & reload & move in 0.28 s
And because SM now works with rocket launchers too, killing bosses like Cyberdemon/Mastermind/JC with RL become fun.
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How much longer does running last than normal?
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How much longer does running last than normal?
Wiki says 50% longer - 45 actions instead of 30.