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

[Abelian]

 

[DalekFlay]

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.

Can't wait, still putting off playing until the release version. Looks super worth it. Great work!

 

[epeli]

knife stuff

You forgot about the jackknife, which I suspect was one of the major reasons for the TfB change...

You could get -1 AP cost with it. (At least in theory, I never got around to testing it with that high dex.)

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

epeli please get to work on those portraits now. :D

 

[blamzooie]

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.

How did I not see this post before? This explanation is brilliant.

 

[epeli]

TwinkieGorilla They're are already done! But I was thinking of delaying uploading them until Underrail is complete because

Avatars are nice, but it reminds me of AoD avatars - there was a time they were everywhere and all the portraits are already burned in my memory, before I even played the game.
I think it'll take away something from the freshness of the "first playthrough experience". Make them, but upload on the codex few weeks after release imo.

But I might change my mind if you absolutely can't wait

 

[TwinkieGorilla]

But I might change my mind if you absolutely can't wait

Upload just the one I want then. Screw the reject.

 

[Twiglard]

It's almost three years and you haven't given up. I caved in and bought it on Steam.

Also the isometric art looks great.

 

[ST'Ranger]

You forgot about the jackknife, which I suspect was one of the major reasons for the TfB change...

You could get -1 AP cost with it. (At least in theory, I never got around to testing it with that high dex.)

I believe in my early testing of the jackknife, I found that it was limited to 1 or more AP cost - though admittedly this was quite long ago when I didn't understand the mechanics as solidly.

Another part I glossed over was bladed combat gloves + Eviscerate. Since the bladed gloves are a weaker bleed but more probable (35% vs. a knife's 25%), the combination of bladed gloves + bladed armor gives a ~60% chance to bleed. Against, combatants of roughly similar level, this means that ~50% of your strikes are going to bleed. If you bleed someone ten times, you can switch to a nice Tungsten combat knife or dagger and do 10-12x damage to a guy following the same logic as my previous post - in the space of one attack.

Of course, now that everything has been nerfed, Underrail is no longer a machete rape land simulator. So we will have to march solemnly on to new and fresh ideas.

 

[Zdzisiu]

How can you not love the man.

Underrail ‏@UnderrailGame 2h2 hours ago
Don't worry @RPGCodex, the Holy Troll is watching over the development now, making sure I stay on the Path of Incline

 

[Ninjerk]

We've heard these sorts of promises before Styg

 

[Jaesun]

We've heard these sorts of promises before Styg

Well at first this game was RTwP, and we bitched and moaned and this is now turn based.....

 

[GloomFrost]

Decided to give it another shot after the latest update and created a new character. Been playing the whole day now and I must admit that I was sooo wrong last time. This game is awesome, a real and true fallout follower. The art, atmosphere, lore, music and character development are superb!! Hey wait a second, why am I wasting time here when I have dozens of hours of post-apocalyptic adventures waiting for me ha.
P.S. but seriously guys can you do something about the font size? It is really difficult to read dialogues.

 

[Ninjerk]

We've heard these sorts of promises before Styg

Well at first this game was RTwP, and we bitched and moaned and this is now turn based.....

Clearly bitching is the solution

 

[polo]

Bitching incline.

 

[ST'Ranger]

We've heard these sorts of promises before Styg

Well at first this game was RTwP, and we bitched and moaned and this is now turn based.....

It all began with the development of the Heralds of Incline. Three were given to the Storyfags; unthinking but wisest and most decadent of all beings. Seven to the Combatfags, great number crunchers and party craftsmen of the basement halls. And nine, nine Heralds were gifted to the Newfag, who above all else desire mindlessness. For within these Heralds was bound the strength and the will to overcome The Decline.

But they were all of them deceived, for another Herald was developed. In the land of Mordor, in the fires of RPG Codex, the Dark Lord Styg forged in secret a masterpiece Herald to control all others. And into this creation he poured all his smugness, his decadence and his will to dominate the Incline. One Herald to rule them all.

One by one, the free peoples of RPGdom fell to the power of the Underrail. But there were some popamoles who resisted...

 

[pakoito]

^ That was gold, mate.

 

[GloomFrost]

We've heard these sorts of promises before Styg

Well at first this game was RTwP, and we bitched and moaned and this is now turn based.....

It all began with the development of the Heralds of Incline. Three were given to the Storyfags; unthinking but wisest and most decadent of all beings. Seven to the Combatfags, great number crunchers and party craftsmen of the basement halls. And nine, nine Heralds were gifted to the Newfag, who above all else desire mindlessness. For within these Heralds was bound the strength and the will to overcome The Decline.

But they were all of them deceived, for another Herald was developed. In the land of Mordor, in the fires of RPG Codex, the Dark Lord Styg forged in secret a masterpiece Herald to control all others. And into this creation he poured all his smugness, his decadence and his will to dominate the Incline. One Herald to rule them all.

One by one, the free peoples of RPGdom fell to the power of the Underrail. But there were some popamoles who resisted...

Thank you, that was by far one the best and funniest comments I v ever read

 

[I'm Big Into Anal]

average to middling

 

[Ninjerk]

It works. I wonder whose alt that is.

 

[Abelian]

Three Games for the casualfags who don't even try,
Seven for the shitlords who don't atone,
Nine for popamolers doomed to cry,
One for the DarkUnderlord on his dark throne
In the Land of Codex where the Ad Plants lie.
One Styg to rule them all, One Styg to find them,
One Styg to bring them all and in the underrail bind them
In the Land of Codex where the Ad Plants lie.

 

[ST'Ranger]

average to middling

Storyfag detected.

It works. I wonder whose alt that is.

Sup Drog.

 

[haraw]

Decided to give it another shot after the latest update and created a new character. Been playing the whole day now and I must admit that I was sooo wrong last time. This game is awesome, a real and true fallout follower. The art, atmosphere, lore, music and character development are superb!! Hey wait a second, why am I wasting time here when I have dozens of hours of post-apocalyptic adventures waiting for me ha.
P.S. but seriously guys can you do something about the font size? It is really difficult to read dialogues.

You're right that the default font size is too small. Check your options to make it bigger.

 

[Eyeball]

So, last time I played this admittedly rather good game, there really were pretty limited uses for the diplomacy skill. Are there more uses now that development has progressed further?

 

[ST'Ranger]

P.S. but seriously guys can you do something about the font size? It is really difficult to read dialogues.

This is something a lot of people complain about, but in the most recent update there are options to make the font size larger. There is also the option to rebind keys so you can WASD scroll or similar. Personally I felt that the font size was ok (on 1920x1080), but the white on black is a bit difficult to read. The Large McHuge font makes this a little more apparent. If the white font was a shade closer towards grey, it would probably be easier on the eyes. Keep in mind that this can be quite dependent on the monitor one has - the color accuracy, brightness/gamma etc. can all have a strong effect on black-white juxtaposition.

So, last time I played this admittedly rather good game, there really were pretty limited uses for the diplomacy skill. Are there more uses now that development has progressed further?

My impression with Persuasion and Intimidation are that they are not mechanics which are "always-on" like Pickpocketing. You can get a consistent drip of benefits with Pickpocketing, but Persuasion and Intimidation are high-impact low-frequency skills. They can prevent lots of large combats or otherwise radically alter the outcome of certain events, but you will not be mashing the [Persuasion] option in every conversation.

These two could use some work, imo, since they are quite metagame-y at the moment - but you can do some impressive things with them still.