I’m pretty sure Niten Ichi-ryu was nerfed, as katanas, nodachi’s and other Japanese weapons were OP once you put the two together.
Either way, it’s still powerful. I recommend one of the smaller swords (Wakizashi or Katana) due to it being lighter in weight and the to-hit bonus and swing speed generally being better. However nodachi is better in terms of raw cutting power and strength, katanas are pretty balanced and wakizashi’s are definitely not obsolete because they’re fast, light, and if it’s a concern - they don’t gib enemies like katana or nodachi does. I’m pretty sure it costs less materials to make if that’s a concern.
To sum it all up:
Nodachi’s are good if your character is really strong, can easily gib enemies and the damage is immense if you have the martial art
Katana’s are the most balanced, being decently fast and powerful
Wakizashi’s, while small are definitely not underpowered. Very quick and easy to swing, and very cost effective to make. And if it’s a concern, it doesn’t turn enemies into a chunky red paste.
I may take a look into that if I find either of the other two, I just got very lucky on day one and found a mansion two tiles away from a forest and fifteen from a Triffid Grove that just so happened to have the nodachi sitting in a lounge room. My current character has twelve strength and the ten perception to go along with Niten so he does pretty alright.
Coming back after not playing for a few months. Did something get way way harder? I am not surviving an initial run into town. Playing with Static and Wander spawns, spawn rate at 2, item rate at 0.25.
My “go to” start has always been to craft arm/leg warmers, balaclava, some gloves, knife spear, crowbar and head on in … I usually was good unless i got an deep bite and couldn’t find a first aid kit, but now I getting massacred. Swarmed … and my knife spear doesn’t seem to be doing the job. tried cudgel with Krav Maga, and that didn’t help a whole lot either.
It’s still pretty OP. I run characters with high Int+Per and I’m still able to clear entire cities with it. The lucky character who finds it’s book along with some grorious nippon steeru at the beginning of the game doesn’t really have to deal with it’s primary weakness (hulks) very often, and characters who have to wait to find the book and forge their own katana usually have several methods available to overcome the negative downsides of “Flowing Water Cut” by the time they have the skill level and equipment to do so.
Actually, now that I think about it, the only weapon style that isn’t broken as hell in combination with a particular weapon type is Silat.
It’s a very slow attack. It’s noticeably problematic when surrounded by a huge horde, or when going toe to toe with a hulk. The former can usually be solved by turning off Niten and rapid striking everything to death. The latter can be solved with an Uncanny Dodge CBM, High Dodge Skill, Tactical Meth, or just shooting the goddamn thing from 20 tiles away (All hail the new ranged combat system for actually containing ranged combat!).
Most threshold’s require some degree of sacrifice and Specialization. To list some of the more powerful ones:
Alpha: 15 in all stats - no real downsides - can wear everything
Elf: +4 to all stats (+5 dex) - perfect night vision - sleeps once a week - can wear everything
Medical: Heals ultra fast - Immune to everything including pain - can develop schizophrenia and some wierd addictions - main drawback is that the best mutations are post thresh and it locks you out of other thresholds.
Squid: Requires dex build - boosts dex to absurd levels (20+ potentially) - gets like 11 attacks per turn - breathes under water - needs alot of water - needs warm climate - can’t wear anything.
Slime: Requires int build - boosts int to absurd levels (20+ potentially) very resistant to toxins and radiation - can spawn minions - can’t wear anything - can potentially get genetic chaos mutation.
Bear: Unkillable super tank- very strong - big boost to combat skill learn speed - can hibernate - has trouble fitting in cars - can wear very little
Spoiler: Huge quality of life improvements (food and water issues completely resolved) - Can insta eliminate the more powerful undead enemies (at the expense of giving basically no advantage against non zombie enemies and gimping the loot drops of the undead in question) - fire resistant - slow - can wear everything - can potentially require a long world spanning journey to acquire.
In my opinion these are the only mutations that are worth it to cross the threshold in. Alpha, Elf, medical, and spoiler are basically human+. They give good benefits without severe disadvantages. Squid and Slime have crippling disadvantages, and require you to adjust your playstyle around them, but they can be absolutely gamebreaking when paired with the appropriate martial arts and stats. Bear is the only “beast” type mutation who’s strengths compensate for it’s weaknesses.
The rest have very serious issues:
Lizard: gives inferior versions of other mutation lines
The Beast Variations: crappy combat bonuses in exchange for the inability to wear armor
Bird: Dies in one hit, makes late game content hard to experience
Insect: Literally can’t eat during the winter. Nuff said.
Plant: Can’t raid underground facilities without suffering ridiculous penalties and most likely starving to death.
Troglobyte: Disintegrates in sunlight (has great pre thresh mutations though)
Spider: Mediocre abilities that are all over the place
Chimera: Requires you to do nothing, but kill, eat, and drink nonstop.
Raptor: Hits hard but dies in one hit and wrecks armor slots.
It’s worth noting that despite theoretically being able to wear everything, a complete Elfa mutation has both Bad Back and Hollow Bones, which together nerf your total carry weight by 75%, at which point wearing power armour becomes very difficult, if not impossible, at least not without significant strength improvements beyond what the tree gives you by itself. Heavy survivor armour or Rivtech low-profile power armour is no problem though.
Awesome summary SpadeDraco!
I’d consider pre-threshold feline to be on par with bear. It has only two traits that lock out armour (Paws and Long Tail, for gloves and “inflexible” torso armour respectively), and possibly Carnivore if that’s something you find annoying to deal with. These can be avoided with luck or repetition, or if you get them all, you’re at worst limited to basic Survivor armour and no gloves/XL gloves. In response, you get a huge dex bonus, a good bonus to dodge chance, and good nightvision. It’s not ideal for every build, but if you’re already focused on light armour, unarmed combat or both, it’s a very solid choice with only minor downsides. Lupine is very similar, but it has the extra limitation of not allowing facegear (though it has slightly more bonuses, combat wise.)
I agree. I didn’t get into pre threshold stuff because if I did then my post would have been 3 times as long. Mutations are one of those things that you can write a bloody doctoral dissertation on and still only scratch the surface. They along with bionics (now that bionics are getting limits) represent the point where you truly start to get specialized character builds.
GRORIOUS NIPPON PIG IRON FOLDED 10,000 TIMES
PIG IRON SO STRONG AND SHARP IT CUT TANK IN HALF[/quote]
[–]McLown 19 points 2 years ago
You forgot to mention being folded millions of times so they can hold an edge so microscopic that the blade splits atoms and can cut through a tank.
Part of the problem isnt how weak mutations are (they are though), its how strong the alternatives are.
Power armor, mycus, alpha are all powerful for the sake of being powerful.
Mycus should be weak to fire, alphas should be morons or have several maladaptions that result from vestigial organs or clinging to old lifestyles, and PA needs its own overhaul to include it being a burden on the user when unpowered. Sorry, but 50 encumbrance is a fuking joke to a midgame character with 70 armor on.
mmmmm actually I might propose alpha be a surname for ‘Neanderthal’. Make them more capable of surviving the wild but trounce their intelligence.
Part of the problem isnt how weak mutations are (they are though), its how strong the alternatives are.
Power armor, mycus, alpha are all powerful for the sake of being powerful.
Mycus should be weak to fire, alphas should be morons or have several maladaptions that result from vestigial organs or clinging to old lifestyles, and PA needs its own overhaul to include it being a burden on the user when unpowered. Sorry, but 50 encumbrance is a fuking joke to a midgame character with 70 armor on.
mmmmm actually I might propose alpha be a surname for ‘Neanderthal’. Make them more capable of surviving the wild but trounce their intelligence.[/quote]
Alpha is supposed to be peak human traits, analogous to super soldier serum that empowered Captain America. Plus if we are talking about how generally useless mutations are why are we nerfing the only tree that is worthwhile?
We should be looking for ways to buff the other trees instead.
That involves introducing weaknesses in the ones that are overempowered.
There would still be no point to making a lizard man if he could not wear power armor and couldnt hope to match the power of an 18+ allstats character.
P:
Superman and Lizardman cannot exist as two choices within the same universe -> who would want to pick lizardman unless it was for a challenge?
Well, lizardman could have, say, a poison bite with some heavy armor from scales, ~22 str and dex, claws, a tail thrashing attack, thermal vision (maybe?) along with some bonus HP. Toughness and power of a crocodile, speed and nimbleness of a snake, some bonus things to even out. Maybe make them Robust to make them even more durable.
Alpha would then just really be… Raw stats with a couple minor bonuses thrown in, right? Oh, and disintegration, which is really just annoying. While strong, it’s also the least flavorful. I love my power-armored slime girl with her slimespring swarm keeping her content as she destroys a school. I loved her before she found the power armor, too. Purifier helps get rid of nasty traits.
Question: How does farming work these days? I’m on a ninety day season world and have a vast expansion of forest next to my mansion where I can forage for all the veggies I need but it’s getting to where I have to walk more than three map tiles away from bed to get food and I’m feeling like farming veggies will make it alot easier to be lazy
Farming times scale to seasons length. Takes about a season and a half for crops to mature. Yields don’t go up with longer season lengths though. But, if you farm grains, wheat and flour doesn’t rot. So once you get enough tiles going, yer good practically forever.