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Underrail [PRE-RELEASE THREAD, GO TO NEW THREAD]

Eyeball

Arcane
Joined
Sep 3, 2010
Messages
2,541
I PREFER the "enemies killed give XP" system, but that's mainly due to habit. I wholeheartedly applaud your taking a stand on giving players the option of using a non-popamole leveling system and hope you will keep it in the game.
 

Zewp

Arcane
Joined
Sep 30, 2012
Messages
3,566
Codex 2013
I also prefer the traditional leveling system, but do think the oddity system is novel.
 

polo

Magister
Joined
Jul 8, 2014
Messages
1,737
I've only played oddity, so i can't really compare. What i can say is that the amount of xp given felt it started slow, but then increased exponentially.
 

Doctor Sbaitso

SO, TELL ME ABOUT YOUR PROBLEMS.
Patron
Joined
Oct 22, 2013
Messages
3,348
Codex 2013 Codex 2014 PC RPG Website of the Year, 2015 Grab the Codex by the pussy Serpent in the Staglands
Agreed polo. The first couple of levels were tough because everything is deadly and with so few resources it is hard to get going.
 

polo

Magister
Joined
Jul 8, 2014
Messages
1,737
Yap, once you can survive almost everything, its a lot easier to get oddy tits.
 

Nael

Arcane
Joined
Dec 12, 2005
Messages
11,384
Location
Indy
voted classic then saw most people are going the oddity route

whys and wherefors please; ill be running a few chars through this puppy in the coming months and will give it a whirl

The oddity system is great if you don't want to mow down everything in your path. It's good if you're playing a tinkerer or more stealthy character. I played up to the beginning of the 2nd Act and never felt like I was too inexperienced to handle any challenge and I wasn't even heavily combat focused. Basically some investment in melee and crossbow, lots of stealth, and specialized in mechanics and electronics in order to build custom crossbows and use infiltration tools. With the level cap on skills I don't think it is possible to play the game without killing anything barring some very significant save scumming but I certainly didn't kill everything in my way.

In short, oddity works well as long as you are a completionist/explorer type. If you don't want to have to open a lot of locked boxes, doors, secret passages go with the traditional system.

EDIT: Also I should mention that a lot of corpses had oddity items on them as well so killing stuff does give you xp in that manner.
 

Pope Amole II

Nerd Commando Game Studios
Developer
Joined
Mar 1, 2012
Messages
2,052
Oddity system is a much better one because it forces a more comfortable playstyle unto the player. Or, rather, it's the common experience one that drives you into specific behavior. See, it's all about the experience scaling - specifically, different kinds of experience scaling differently. Monster experience scales down (the higher you are in level, the less xp you receive), quest xp is constant, skill xp scales up. Therefore, it's much more beneficial for you to rush into combat first, killing as many foes asap there, and leave the quest stuff for the later. As an example to this, one of the ways to powerplay Underrail's early game was, instead of gaining that introductory level at the station, to rush straight into the caverns, slaughtering rathounds for that sweet 90 xp per body gain. And then you followed it through to that compound area, killing rats until you were almost level 3 (that's when they ended). If you did stuff this way then, at the end of introductory mission, you would be almost level 4. If not 4 already. Huge difference.

And so forth, and so forth. Of course, maybe I'm just a compulsive metagamer, but at the same time it always felt like the system was punishing you for not rushing into combat. Though, at the other hand, it also punished you for fighting the monsters too early - after all, there was a penalty for overleveling the monster but no reward for fighting it too early. So it also created this "Am I doing this right, am I not screwing myself here?" feeling. And let's not forget that combat can be pretty brutal in this game so screwing yourself is certainly not what you want.

Also, that system created lots of backtracking - oh, no, why would I finish this quest now when I could do it 5 levels later when the experience will be more precious than now? Oh, no, I won't open this cluster of 4 locks, I'll wait for some more so I'll gain an extra hundred xp out of this. Once again, you can blame personal habits here, but the game is hard enough to compel you into stuff like this. Whereas with oddities this is just cut off. More than that, you don't even feel the need to do some stupid stuff. Like, why would I bother to disarm these stupid mines when it's faster to blast them away? Or why would I open to pick that lock if it opens a route that I've already explored from the other side?

And one additional boon of the oddity system is that it creates different tempo for different characters (which isn't that strongly present in the average version). For example, upon arriving into a junkyard, a thief can steal both gangs' oddities, earning what, 6 points in the process? That's almost a level. Whereas the other classes will probably also gain those oddities, but not until much later into the game. It's a help to the stealth characters and, considering how much effort was put into creating a decent stealth system in this game, that's certainly appreciated.
 

Styg

Stygian Software
Developer
Joined
Aug 18, 2010
Messages
742
Location
Serbia
Version 0.1.13.0 released; Development Roadmap

Hey guys, the new version is available on Steam now and, as before, it will be available on other platforms as soon as we stabilize it.

In this update we added new factions with their optional questlines, namely - Free Drones, Protectorate and the super secret one. We added most of the remaining areas that we planned for the game, which include Upper Underrail and Lower Underrail passages, so speaking geographically most of the game is complete. If you want the full list of what's new, check out the previous two dev logs before reading further.

One thing to note, however, is that if you want to experience the new questlines you'll probably have to start a new game, unfortunately, since we had to make some changes to existing areas and quests in order to fit them in.

Before I insert the obligatory list of miscellaneous changes, here's a little sneak peak at some of the new areas, focusing primarily on the mighty Protectorate war machine.

up1.jpg
up2.jpg
prot1.jpg
prot2.jpg
prot3.jpg


Screenshot unworthy stuff:
  • Bugs
    • Creatures immune to fear are no longer immune to Engrage (unless they are immune to all mind-affecting effects)
  • Tweaks
    • Eviscerate bonus damage per bleeding would changed to 50% (down from 100%)
    • Taste For Blood now stacks 10 times (down from 20)
    • Damage resistance provided by laminated fabric ballistic panel now scales with quality (though it's still weaker than the other one) and the damage threshold is increased; these changes will not apply to stuff that has already been generated in ongoing playthroughs
    • Melee resistance bonus of riot gear armor changed to 75% (up from 50%); also not retroactive
    • Maximum number of oddity XP required for leveling now caps at 25 (up from 15)
    • Maximum number of studies and/or amount of XP per studying reduced (or rebalanced) for a number of oddities; overall, less experience is available through some oddities now
    • Classic XP required to level changed to 1250 (up from 1000) * level
    • Base classic kill XP bonus per target level reduced
    • XP from a number of quests reduced
    • Lockpicking/hacking XP per required skill reduced

The leveling/XP changes introduced here are just the first step. I'll be tweaking leveling speed and level cap stuff further in the next update. From those that start a new playthrough with a new character in this version I would appreciate any feedback that they can provide on the leveling speed, time they hit level cap, and just general leveling experience (of both classical and oddity systems).

* * * * *

Now I want to talk a bit about the future development plans. I won't be giving you a release date, though I can safely say it won't be this year as I initially hoped. However, know that the end is in sight.

When it comes to mechanical stuff, there are still stuff like components, items, feats, abilities, etc to be added. However, there are currently no plans to add any more major mechanics (gas and fire should be the last). From the content side there are two parts of the main quest left that, as it happens, take part in two locations that are yet to be added - Institute of Tchort and Deep Caverns.

So here's what going to happen.

The next content update that we release will feature Institute of Tchort part of the main questline. This will be the last Early Access release. Afterwards, only the Deep Caverns are left before the game is complete. When we finish those, we will take extra time to polish up the game (we won't release Deep Caverns right away), especially the older areas which are no longer up to par with the new stuff. We will also take extra time to test the game to stomp out as many bugs as possible. Then we will release the game in full, make lots of money, retire to a tropical island and live happily ever after. That's the plan at least.

How long will this take? As long as it needs to. It would be pointless for me to give you a release date estimate, since I will gladly ignore it for the sake of the game as I did before. The quality of the game is my primary concern and in the long run that is best for everyone. We're nearing the end, though, so stay patient, dudes.
 

polo

Magister
Joined
Jul 8, 2014
Messages
1,737
Where are my brofist when i need em?
I really want to play it again man, can't wait.
:bro:
 

TwinkieGorilla

does a good job.
Patron
Joined
Oct 19, 2007
Messages
5,480
Serpent in the Staglands Divinity: Original Sin Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Pathfinder: Wrath
I'd been logging in the last few days just hoping and praying for an update and-

Holy fuck! This looks so goddamn great....Xmas has come early this year, woo-hoooooo!!!!

:bounce:
 

Surf Solar

cannot into womynz
Joined
Jan 8, 2011
Messages
8,828
Styg - I know this is just nitpicky - but have you considered to mask the outer walls of room tiles with a kind of "shadow" or, eh, "blackness" how it was in Fallout?

I've made a quick paint to show what I mean:

prot3qicsw.png


1311952_3neag8.jpg


IMO it differentiates the rooms and the "background" much better.
 

ST'Ranger

Augur
Joined
Oct 23, 2014
Messages
306
My most recent character was a knife wielder with maxed Dex/Agi going for Cutthroat kills. The character before that was a Snipe-based maxed Per/Agi character. They both have the same philosophy - one-shot kills (or nearly so) from stealth. For those not in the know, Cutthroat does 8x damage and stuns for 3(!) turns with its only requirements being that the player remains undetected and the attack is made from behind the target. Snipe is a similar, though simpler mechanic where the player simply needs a Sniper rifle or Crossbow and requires the player be in stealth.

These two seem terribly similar at a glance, but I must say that the differences were stark. Snipe seems to be, on paper, the superior option. It can easily be done from 30 tiles away while Cutthroat requires one to be adjacent. Additionally, many ( :argh: ) enemies in the game are placed very smugly with their backs to a wall or otherwise unreachable. But I'll tell you that the Cutthroat option was a far superior one, and the nerfs to bleeding tactics are in no way overdone.

Cutthroat is a knife-based option, making it lie solely in the realm of a character with strong Dex. One of the most intriguing things about Dexterity is that it lowers the AP cost of light weapons. Knives normally cost 9 AP, but with a Dex-based character, you'll quite soon find yourself with 7- and 6-cost knife attacks. Snack on some Dex food, and you'll find yourself with 5-cost knife attacks (that's 10 knife attacks a turn, for those paying attention). I submit the following absolutely broken combination for your consideration:

Using a serrated knife (25% chance to cause bleeding) and a bladed armor ( :smug: ) (35% chance to cause bleeding), one has approximately a 50% chance to cause bleeding per attack. This means that you'd generally expect your character to generate a bleed within the first 3 attacks. But let's be conservative and guess that we'd bleed in the first 4 attacks to account for misses and for Styg punishing our dishonorable powergaming. Given a character with 5-cost knife attacks, we have 10 attacks in the first round. If we have the wonderful feat Taste For Blood, the AP cost of our attacks is reduced by .2 per strike against a bleeding enemy. Thus, were we to bleed on the 4th hit, we'd have 6 remaining attempts to strike again. Let's say we have ~65% chance to hit, i.e. an enemy far above our own level. The combat will proceed as follows:

1st round:
4th hit causes Bleeding. (6/10 remaining)
4/6 hits land, gaining 4 stacks of TFB.

2nd round:
Inject a health hypo (assuming the fight goes badly) [40/50 AP remaining = 8 knife attacks remaining]
1/2 hits land, gaining 1 stack of TFB, putting us to 5 stacks, which makes our knife attacks cost 4 [30/50 AP remaining = 7 knife attacks remaining]
4/7 hits land, gaining 4 stacks of TFB --> 9 stacks total

3rd round:
[50/50 AP remaining = 12 knife attacks]
1/2 hits land, gaining 1 stack of TFB ---> 10 stacks total ---> knife attacks cost 3 [42/50 AP remaining = 14 hits remaining]
5/8 hits land, gaining 5 stacks of TFB ---> 15 stacks total ---> knife attacks cost 2 [27/50 AP remaining = 13 hits remaining]
5/8 hits land, gaining 5 stacks of TFB ---> 20 stacks total ---> knife attacks cost ONE [17/50 AP remaining = 17 hits remaining]
11/17 hits land

4th round if it somehow goes that far:
[50/50 AP remaining = 50 knife attacks]
32/50 hits land
:smug::smug::smug::smug::smug::smug::smug::smug::smug::smug:

To summarize, in 3 rounds against an enemy far above our own level, we have successfully made 32 knife strikes, 16 of which we expect to cause bleeding wounds. One extremely broken thing I didn't mention was the Fancy Footwork feat, which gives up to 8 additional (less with higher armor penalty) movement points per successful hit. This allows one to quite easily start a combat to build up TFB strikes and then to run a full screen away to waste enemy AP before doing it even harder next round (possibly leading them into a minefield of your own creation [remember, you're a Dex character - act like it!]). The super-human speed of this character's movement and attacks utterly destroys any combat encounter with the right planning and the correct threat assessment. It's quite trivial to defeat groups of enemies 10 levels higher, assuming one has removed a nice shield from inventory as assault rifle bursts are deadly to this character.

The seeming simplicity of Underrail mechanics are a pleasant lie hiding significant depth and charming interactions.

:incline:
 

TwinkieGorilla

does a good job.
Patron
Joined
Oct 19, 2007
Messages
5,480
Serpent in the Staglands Divinity: Original Sin Torment: Tides of Numenera Wasteland 2 Shadorwun: Hong Kong Divinity: Original Sin 2 BattleTech Pathfinder: Wrath
Oh gawwwwd the new music is so great and the player portraits finally!!! And they change with background AND LIGHTING WTF!!!

EDIT: I am so happy right now.

:love:
 
Last edited:

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