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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 7, 2012 17:54:10 GMT -5
I am. I hate that the nerf everything mentality has somehow found its way into a coop game. Seriously, don't use it if you don't like it. I'm not even crazy about the shield, but nerfing anything in a game with no competitive element is full on, pants-on-head retarded.
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Post by LeGitBeeSting on Oct 7, 2012 19:23:35 GMT -5
buff the shotguns
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Post by raxcoswell on Oct 8, 2012 7:22:22 GMT -5
I'm totally happy with no competitive games being balanced. The developers have a design that want and they should be able to go about putting it in place.
Anyway, no idea how you guys are sinking so much time in to this game. I've got an axton and a Salvador at about 20 or so, and a Maya and zero below 10. I started with axton so he's my baseline and I've enjoyed him a lot. Salvador is great and I really like him, but he feels like he takes a lot more effort to play and I'm still getting used to it. Started off with brawn but respecced pretty quickly in to gunlust which I'm enjoying a lot more. But I still don't have a feel for what are the really great Sal skills I should be basing myself around, and how I go about playing to their strengths. Guns require more effort too. With axton you can just find a good gun and use it, but with Sal you instantly have to think about a future pair for that weapon. I've tried a few things, most things (even gunzerked with snipers briefly) but settling in to pistols and shotguns for gunzerking - is this weird or pretty normal? How important are elemental things? Hardly bothered with axton, but most of the pistols I've been using with Sal have effects and they seem really great, but that might just be cause I'm shooting two at once - my shotguns are plain right now and are similarly brutal.
Took to zero instantly but as I started getting in to his trees I sort of tailed off, couldn't get a good vibe from his abilities. Maya I don't understand at all yet. But yeah I assumed Sal would be the boring plain guy, when he's required way more thinking and a more in depth playstyle than I expected
This game is p great anyway. I spend way too much time on slot machines is this normal
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Post by jackaltornmoons on Oct 8, 2012 18:19:32 GMT -5
Level 36 Axton duoing with a Zer0 now on the 2nd playthrough. Sniper Rifles and Shotguns > everything else Axton's left tree is the bees knees. Dual gun turret that fires slag bullets along with volleys of rockets, sustainability with Willing and Able, and extra gun damage with Onslaught. Oh god, how I miss you team ammo regen. We're thinking of switching from Axton and Zer0 to Gaige and Salvador when Gaige comes out .
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Post by beavernator on Oct 8, 2012 21:09:13 GMT -5
lots of legendary weapons seem like kind of a letdown this time round. A purple with the right parts can be just as good if not better than half of the legendaries That's a pretty accurate description of BL1's non-elemental legendary weapons. They all had a unique trait like an unusual fire mode, an unusually large magazine, or in Tediore's case (in BL1) ammo regeneration. Unfortunately when it came to overall firepower they were almost always outmatched by purple or blue weapons.
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 9, 2012 5:04:40 GMT -5
Sniper Rifles and Shotguns > everything else I think pistols belong in that group as well. Jakobs pistols are just ridiculous damage and accuracy with virtually no RoF cap. Some of the high cap Vladof ones are pretty much better smgs aside from the ammo constraints. Some of the legendary pistols are Foxtrotting sweet, too. I have a Maggie that does 49XX x 10 (spammable AND aimable because Jakobs), and Infinity is just really really well matched to Zer0's skills (since it has a one round magazine that never depletes, every shot gets the 0s0k bonus, and since it's full auto you get maximum value out of Rising Sh0t and Tw0 Fang as well). I don't have one on my Gunzerker, but if it triggers Money Shot it's probably one of the best possible weapons for him as well. I currently have an Assassin at 50, a Siren at 43, and a Gunzerker at 15. Has anybody checked out the skill trees for the mechromancer? The little big trouble tree seems like a more aggro take on the siren's cataclysm tree. The kill skill Evil Enchantress in particular seems powerful. And health regen in a tier one skill!
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Post by kirbyderby on Oct 9, 2012 6:25:08 GMT -5
I didn't know her skill tree was out, but I just checked it and man is it wonky.
Depending on how the whole Anarchy system works for her ordered chaos tree, I'm probably gonna either max it out or ignore it completely. Either way, I'm definitely splitting at least halfway through the BFF tree. Health regen right off the bat is sweet, and that bullet ricochet skill sounds too good to be true. Imagine, while you're taking cover to regenerate your shields, you can carry on shooting the bad guys... heck, you may never have to leave a safe area to kill stuff! Sounds too easy.
a 50% chance to deal 50% damage might not sound like much, but imagine it with the Anarchy damage stacks. The loss of accuracy doesn't even matter because the misses come back with buffed damage anyway and holy crap there are Jakobs shotguns with only 1 round this is fucking crazy
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 9, 2012 7:14:56 GMT -5
Not to mention with the Rational Anarchist ability the first activation gets you 25 stacks. That's a 43.75% damage bonus right out of the gate, and no Money Shot esque weapon restrictions for gaining additional stacks. Jakobs weapons will be nuts.
Close Enough has good synergy with Nth Degree, too
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 9, 2012 11:13:26 GMT -5
So Mechromancer is released early on xbox apparently. I've been playing with her for the past hour or so, just reached level six and killed Midge-Mong.
Anarchy is the nuts. Like, probably more powerful than any of the other characters' game changers. I'm blown away by it. I guess I didn't realize just looking at it how fast it stacks up. I hit level six in the bazaar area right before you fight Midge-Mong, got anarchy with the skill point, and I just left the area with 54 stacks. Playing perfectly normally (which for me means sniper+pistol for the most part) aside from the reload management. The stacks don't decay with time, nor do they disappear by leaving an area. Because of the way snipers work in this game (increased accuracy when scoped in) I'm walking around with this ridiculous (and growing) damage bonus at pretty much no cost. For one skill point.
Nuts.
...and I just two shotted Bewm. This is Bee level silliness
edit: sniper rifle accuracy becomes questionable at around 100 stacks or so. Still nuts though
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Post by jackaltornmoons on Oct 9, 2012 13:22:22 GMT -5
Some people are having their characters/gold keys/badass stats erased by playing Gaige; beware .
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Post by kirbyderby on Oct 9, 2012 17:19:42 GMT -5
I've yet to play the Mechromancer, but I'm thinking this is probably gonna be my skill tree for her. I'm undecided between filling Annoyed Android or Death From above, depending on how good the latter's effect is, and the Buck Up gamechanger point can be thrown in there if I'm not playing Co-op. I can see potential in Little Big Trouble but the Anarchy system sounds way too good to pass up. Pray tell aids, is there an indicator on the HUD that tells you exactly how many stacks of Anarchy you currently have?
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 9, 2012 20:09:32 GMT -5
There is such an indicator, it looks exactly like the ones used to manage Critical Ascensi0n, etc. And for what its worth I think the deathtrap movement speed skill is probably a waste of points. Deathtrap flies faster than you can run already, and has a ranged attack as well as his claws by default. He will also just straight fly up to enemies on platforms, raging goliath style.
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Post by kirbyderby on Oct 9, 2012 20:43:42 GMT -5
Yeah, I'm watching some gameplays now and you're right about that. Still, there's not much else to go for (except explosive clap if I want to pour even more points into that tree), and I don't think it would be a gamechanger either way.
And I'm watching these people play with the anarchy tree and using Bandit guns wtf people
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 9, 2012 22:52:36 GMT -5
I'm not sure how far I'm going to go down the tree. You can get the full damage bonus only two tiers in; most of the remaining stuff helps you build stacks faster. Once you max your stacks (and I was running around maxed at 150 for a good while earlier) those skills don't do anything. Rational Anarchist and Typecast Iconoclast only seem necessary if you want to use Discord. I'm going to respec and play around with everything, but I'm thinking of something like this The idea being to just sit on Anarchy stacks for the bonus rather than expend them for abilties, and mitigate the inaccuracy by means of Close Enough. Unlike the later part of the OC tree the LBT tree gives additional damage regardless of whether you've maxed stacks, and the final ability could potentially double damage output if Deathtrap can slag enemies (which he probably can do, since every other character has a way to apply slag via their action skill). The shock nova on reload skill seems like it would work well with the kind of weapons suited to building Anarchy stacks as well.
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Post by kirbyderby on Oct 9, 2012 23:31:37 GMT -5
It might be worthwhile to take a point off somewhere and throw it onto Discord. I would at least, because I have a tendency to reload constantly and it would be nice to not lose all my stacks to the slip of a finger (as the skill description implies). In addition, it would allow you to take advantage of the damage stacks using Tediore reloads (which don't suffer from accuracy penalties either) without sacrificing a ton of stacks to do so.
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 9, 2012 23:46:40 GMT -5
I haven't tried it, but the descriptions of the skills make it seem like you still lose all your stacks. If it is the kind of thing you can turn on briefly and turn of without losing them all then it's definitely worth it, that's just not how I read the skill. We'll see, hope you're right
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Post by jackaltornmoons on Oct 10, 2012 10:26:45 GMT -5
Aids and I were playing last night and discovered that you can build your stacks of Anarchy in the shooting gallery behind Marcus' store in Sanctuary.
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tiesieman
True Bro
mental lagger
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Post by tiesieman on Oct 10, 2012 13:14:48 GMT -5
another tip; you can active discord, respec in a different tree and get infinite discord (I think it goes away when you get downed, but not sure on that)
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Post by jackaltornmoons on Oct 10, 2012 20:48:59 GMT -5
Does Discord go away when you hit 0 stacks of Anarchy?
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 11, 2012 12:46:03 GMT -5
So I leveled up a bit and played around with Discord. It does override the reload effect of vanilla anarchy like kirbyderby thought. When Discord is active there is a visual effect somewhat like an elemental DoT, and stacks fall off at about the same rate as they do in FFYL. When you get to 0 stacks Discord deactivates. Definitely worth the point for short bursts of accuracy/finger Foxtrotup insurance, as well as the additional health regen to support Cooking Up Trouble, for reasons below. I discovered something else, as well. The ability "Blood Soaked Shields" in the OC tree in the online skill builder is a one rank skill. In game it has 5, and they scale linearly just like every other skill. That is, with all five ranks, every time you kill an enemy you instantly regen 100% of your shield and lose 5% of your current health. In other words, this character is the absolute nuts. This ability turns every amp shield into a mini-Bee, and every decent nova shield pretty much instantly recharges itself. Oh, and makes the final ability in the OC tree useful, since with BSS you can survive long enough to melee people and the health regen offsets the (marginal) cost of the ability. With a few stacks, Claws and Law+Order, you can run around with +500% melee damage, swinging twice per button press, and regen all shields and health proportionate to damage dealt each kill. The Law, Order, Anarchy build: Typecast Iconoclast means you can still stay at or near max stacks even if something (somehow) takes more than one 1000% melee override hit, you regen health each hit due to claws and Law+Order, regen shields completely each kill, and you regen 2% health/second all the time anyway due to Cooking Up Trouble. With Deathtrap out each kill either of you get makes your hits even bigger and keeps him around longer; one kill per five seconds means you have Deathrap until he dies pretty much. And that's completely achievable with the previously mediocre Unstoppable Force (+35% movement is pretty significant for melee, as any Innervate-using Zer0 player knows). Thoughts?
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Post by jackaltornmoons on Oct 11, 2012 17:54:57 GMT -5
That sounds awesomely fun.
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Post by kirbyderby on Oct 11, 2012 18:03:07 GMT -5
Have you tried getting huge stacks and spamming Tediore reloads yet? Heck, you'd barely be wasting ammo since most of your shots would have missed anyway.
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Post by LeGitBeeSting on Oct 11, 2012 20:17:34 GMT -5
One simply does not give up the ability to dual wield shotguns
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danoski666
True Bro
"He ran off the wall like a ninja!"
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Post by danoski666 on Oct 12, 2012 10:43:12 GMT -5
Not too big on the BL2 stuff, since I don't have anyone to play with, but from what I've seen, that ability seems to make you immortal as long as you kill people. That sounds ridiculous.
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 12, 2012 11:29:24 GMT -5
It is completely ridiculous. I have 3 ranks in it right now at level 21, and last night I just soloed the first 4 rounds of Fink's Slaughterhouse in less than half an hour. It plays like everyone wanted Salvador's Brawn tree to play. Every time a wave would start I just summon deathbro, watch him go to work on one side, and charge straight at the other trigger down hipfiring on a Torgue spinigun. Between Close Enough and Torgue splash damage I'm still able to hit people at 200 Anarchy stacks, and vanilla mobs my level die in 1-2 shots. Badass Goliaths take less than one magazine, and because it's explosive you can just kill shielded nomads like regular enemies. And with everything dying all around you you can't even tell if you're taking damage; your shield is pretty much always up.
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danoski666
True Bro
"He ran off the wall like a ninja!"
Posts: 2,484
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Post by danoski666 on Oct 12, 2012 11:35:32 GMT -5
So pretty much what I thought.
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Post by Morshu on Oct 13, 2012 9:55:54 GMT -5
Man I'm loving this game right now. So much many skills to get I'm trying to figure out who is the most effective character and skill setup once you reach level 50, other then giage which seems to be the most overpowered thing since the FMG9 akimbo. Is there anybody who played this game non-stop that can give me advice? I maxed out salvador but found his brawn skill tree disappointing.
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Post by aidsaidsaids on Oct 13, 2012 15:31:35 GMT -5
I have a level 50 Zer0 and a level 44 (I think) Maya in addition to my level 22 Gaige, playing with my brother who has a level 50 Axton and a nearly level 50 Salvador. Different characters and builds are good for different things, but my impressions so far of each character-
Zer0 starts out reasonably effective and gets better from there. Later in the game mobs do too much damage for Bloodshed builds to be optimal, in my opinion. Sniping and Cunning scale just fine though, and I've found that a combination of those two trees is the way to maximize damage endgame. I think the design philosophy for this character (deal lots of damage and don't get hit) is better suited to the high damage endgame mobs than some other characters.
Maya starts out pretty underwhelming in my opinion, but gets to be pretty useful later on (especially with the altered elemental math in TVHM). She's never quite on par with the others damage wise unless you have something phaselocked, and phaselock doesn't trigger against some bosses and other big mobs. She's got lots of support shit going for her, though. Res allows a party to win fights they really have no business winning otherwise. The team player character. Cataclysm tree for playing alone, Harmony for playing with friends.
Axton starts out extremely good, and levels off to just "good" as the game goes on, from what I've seen. His turret is nuts early game, and Double Up is incredible, but endgame mobs will destroy it really quickly if you aren't careful. I think the Double Up tree is his best tree, with the remaining points probably going into the Nuke tree. Axton seems to me to be a sort of generalist character. He's not doing a couple things to the extreme like some other characters (though I haven't seen anyone really explore explosives builds with him much), he's just solid at a lot of things.
Salvador starts out just fine but gets into more and more trouble as the game goes on, it seems like. The same design philosophy that makes Zer0 effective end game just gives Sal headaches. To really get the most damage out of Sal you need to be Gunzerking, and you need to be up pretty close for that to work. In TVHM you just can't stay up close for long because of how much damage enemies do. He really needs something to help him survive better for him to play properly, I think. The Brawn tree just isn't quite up to the task, in my opinion. Come At Me Bro is pretty much a death warrant at level 50.
You can probably guess my opinion of Gaige. She's nuts. I haven't played with her endgame yet, but the nature of her skills is such that I can't see her being anything other than insane. Anarchy with Preshrunk Cyberpunk and her Terra mod can get you over 1000% damage. Blood Soaked Shields, in the same tree, is exactly the kind of ability Salvador desperately wants; it makes you pretty much unkillable. All of that is located two tiers into a single tree. At level 50 you can do all that, and still have enough points to max another tree, or take a little from each. The tier 2/3 skills in the other trees are so good it might be worth it.
Deathbro has been awesome for me so far, but it remains to be seen whether or not powerful endgame mobs will kill him as fast as they do Axton's turret. My only real complaint about him so far is the lack of a recall function like Axton has. 60 second cooldown is a long time in this game.
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Post by Morshu on Oct 13, 2012 16:40:06 GMT -5
So, at level 50 how would you rate them best to worst?
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tiesieman
True Bro
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Post by tiesieman on Oct 13, 2012 18:28:59 GMT -5
Ive only leveled a zero to 50 so ill just rank his trees or something
Sniping: it's a pretty swell tree. Lotsa perks fo increasing critical hit damage, gun accuracy etc. And yes, those work on all guns. -n my opinion, you need to spec in velocity (faster bullets and higher damage), percision (more accuracy) and bore (bullets fly through people and deal more damage for each target they hit. Also crit spots are shown when going into stealth). As for how it plays, you snipe and things die.
Cunning: the whole tree ia pretty useless except the last skill saves the entire thing; death blossom. You throw kunai in stealth that explode in all elements and deal great damage. Think of it as a shotgun as a fifth weapon, with all elements in it. Its pretty rad
Bloodshed: i thought this tree sucked end game too at first. It does not. Bloodshed isnt all about meleeing stuff, since theres lotd of gun damage perks as well. Nost of the stuff activates on kill though. But once you start killing, you move faster, go into stealth better, kill faster. The games pace is much faster all of the sudden. Its pretty fun.
Id say spec as a hybrid in sniping and either choose if you want the kunais or gotta go fast
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