Hey,

I see that there still isn't a thread about general strategy, and I'm hoping to get some insight.

Tried the game on Beginner, got about 10 floors in before getting a bit bored, though I might return later. I'm usually low on food, mostly because I get lost easily and backtrack a ton. I wish I had used the knife more on earlier floors, because bullets are starting to become an issue, though I often find a pack of 30-60 of them right when I'm almost out.

When is it a good idea to go down a floor, and when is it better to scavenge around more first? This seems to be a pretty basic issue that I don't have a good grip on. My really inefficient exploring with multiple backtracks is killing my food supply though. :(

What changes when you go up difficulty levels?

Yep, I am usually low on food too and I try to open all containers/doors on current floor before going down, not grinding enemies.

I also have full inventory of ingredients but I do know only cooked food and 'sandwich' recepies. No luck with anything other.

I used knife/blade from the beggining on single enemies with low HP to not spend to many bullets, but now around 11 level I have 250+ pistol rounds (because trap destroyed my pistol :D)

Then the

You can re-close doors? :-o

Also, if Easy is best used to farm recipes, should I have been an engineer? I've ruined two consoles and translated a garbled message on a third. Another one I somehow shot by mistake. :-P Scent gland + raw meat(?) = pungent meat. That's the only one I figured out.

I agree with one phrase the OP used: I've had the same thought. I'm pressing on a few minutes here and there, but I'm not seeing how, even on a higher difficulty, the game will be fun. I guess the game just isn't for me. Nothing ever seems to... happen. There's just repetition. Even on repeated playthroughs from what I can tell (where you keep decrypts apparently). It is just a gear, ingredient and recipe grind without much in between.

Back to FTL!

Someone didn't read the manual... ;^)

I usually play on Normal mode and if I don't do anything stupid or get really unlucky early on, I usually make it to level 13/15. My favorite class to play as is the Engineer because he can open most things right off the bat.

Tips:

*Unless your speed is decreased, you can move AND fire in the same turn. Use this to stay longer out of reach of melee enemies.

*Unlock every door without the aid of tools. You increase your lockpicking skill quickly at the beginning this way, and it will always give you experience. (note if you fail three times in a row the door will jam shut and an alarm will sound)

*Open every item, even if your success is 1%. If you know you're going to fail, clear the level and make sure your health is at least half filled first. Doing this always gives you a chance at more loot and experience if you succeed, and if you fail it can still increase your skill.

*Clear every level. More experience = stronger character.

*Don't use a valuable heal/recharge/repair station if you don't need it and it is close to the level's exit. You can come back up from the next level down and use it when you do need it. If it's far away, and you can still gain skills from activating it, do it anyway.

*Press space in front of a door to close it once it is open. Some monsters can open doors, some can't.

*If robots spawn inside a room, they usually won't leave it. If you're damaged you can duck around the entrance and reload/heal.

*Pick up multiples of valuable weapons/armor. If one gets destroyed you can switch to the second one you have, and you can test the augmentation gems on the secondary suit. That way if it's a negative one, you won't have degraded your only copy of that item, and if it's positive, you can just start using that one.

*Easy food recipes to keep you satiated are scent gland and raw meat. Some times you don't ant to waste the meat, so it's better to hold off, but a lot of times you'll make a few of these for quick food. Also, two bindings and three raw meat are pretty easy to get and make a huge meal.

*Walk through every trap you don't recognize. It's usually better to do this when you know there aren't any enemies around. This will help you identify the beneficial ones for later use. Drop all your items (if it's safe) when you haven't found the "Destroy Random Item" trap yet. If the trap doesn't go off, it's either that one or a "Recharge Random Item" one. Just pick up a sacrificial item like a scent gland to test it.

*I've never bothered with deactivating traps... once you discover one you can't accidentally move onto it, and usually your chances of disarming are less than half.

*Check your map often. "M" key.

*Turn directions without moving can be extremely helpful for tactical positioning during deadly fights. CTRL+ W/S/D/A to turn that direction.

*I always play all the way zoomed out. Tap the "Z" key to toggle between zoom levels. Let's you assess situations better and you can shoot farther than with it zoomed all the way in.

*Get melee enemies to waste THEIR turn coming to you. Press the "X" key to skip your turn.

*Have enough food but no healing items and less health? CTRL + X lets you rest to heal, but you will lose hunger like normal.

*Sometimes I save my Level Up health recharge for when I need it. Just don't press "C" right away. Make sure you don't gain a second level before distributing skill points though, or you will only be able to place one level in any given skill (instead of twice, if you were to gain two levels normally).

*You can usually get away with using your melee weapons for the first few floors, but after that unless you have found or made an awesome one, you are going to HAVE TO rely on your missile weapons.

*The more types of ammo your guns use (rifle bullets, pistol bullets, shotgun shells, energy), the less chance you'll have of running out and being left dry.

*I usually try to keep one pistol, one rifle, a shotgun, and any type of energy weapon I find. I save the energy weapon for dead last resort because there are enemies later on who are only meaningfully damaged by energy.

*Keeping multiple auto pistols won't take up much room, are relatively good at dealing damage, and you can switch between all of them in a fight without wasting the turns to reload--if you keep them loaded that is.

*BASIC ROGUELIKE RULE OF THUMB: Take your time, don't act rashly, and think about your options before you use your turn.

Nice post. I think my biggest remaining questions at the moment are these:

* How do you survive a bout of blindness? (I seem to get this mostly by walking through a door, so keeping notes on which one is which should do, unless there's some other way of getting afflicted. It's an unreasonably long duration to just tough it out, though. :( )

* How do you deal with food? Clearing a whole level is fine for exp, but the hunger meter falls really far, even on Easy. Backtracking to clear one unexplored room or two could cost a lot.

With the blindness if you clear the nearby area first before going through the trapped door you can just wait it out. It's just 30 turns each time. If you hover the pointer over the colored symbol of the trap on the door, it'll tell you what it is if you've identified it before by walking through it and having it effect you. So even if you forget what color a specific trap was the tooltip will tell you. If you haven't activated that trap yet it'll just say "trap". If you didn't notice the trap before walking through the door, and so are blinded when enemies are around because you didn't have a chance to clear the room and nearby area, there are two tactics to deal with them: one, if it is melee enemies, continue into the room one square, then move over into the corner. This only gives three squares your enemies can attack you from. They'll be hitting you, but you can figure out which square they are on easier this way and kill them. If you retreat to the corridor you can attract more enemies, and there are many more squares that they could attack you from, lowering your chances of finding and killing them. If they're ranged enemies, like robots, back out of the room a square, then a few off to the side and wait until the blindness wears off. You'll cut off the line of sight to the room so you can't be shot, and ranged enemies usually won't come out of a room because it will give you a free attack and the AI will weigh this as not worth it. So using these two tactics based on ranged or melee enemies you can normally deal with unexpected blindness. Of course the odds may just be too stacked against you and you die. If you're in a situation like this though, where the chance of death is very high, ALWAYS use all items at your disposal. Since it is permadeath, there is no reason to save them because if you die, all of them are gone for good. If you have to, use all your healing items and grenades, etc. In most games I hoard all consumable items and usually beat the game with tons in my inventory, but with Roguelikes there's no reason to NOT use them. You just need to get good at identifying when you're actually screwed enough to need them.

Food is a little more tricky since it varies much more on the overall game and random elements. I usually don't have an issue with food, but it might be because I play Engineer, and so can open most things and get more food as loot drops. One thing I do though, is always eat it right away if it's not something I can feasibly craft to something better in the near future, and it won't put me over my limit. Food and crafting items I usually save until I'm near starving are meats, breads, scent glands, and bindings. These are all relatively easy to find and can be crafted at low biotech levels to better items. And if you didn't know, you can loot those garbage piles in the beginning level and they'll usually drop food items like pellets that give you a little bonus early on. If you're smart about exploring the map you won't have to backtrack to explore individual rooms, and exploring one room only costs a few food points. Try to keep it methodical and don't stray from the most efficient way to explore, and the only times you'll have to backtrack is when the ladder down is found early. The problem arises when the map is explored randomly and you have to go all the way across it several times. This usually happens when chasing enemies, or going after really good looking rooms that are slightly out of your "efficient" path--you'll get to it eventually.

I've bought game, launched it and started to play straight on Hard as first. I don't know how you can have problem with food on Easy. Because i am finding a lot of meat, bread, cheese etc. The only one problem of mine is poison and low ammo - plus traps destroying knife/rifle/pistol. My record for eight relaunched games till now is 7th floor - Moon Bear killed me with grip.

Tried all three classes at Hard - and my favourite one is Scout - because his aiming is best - so i am using less ammo for killing mobs. Engi is also good, for opening crates/computers/huds and getting more stuff - the worst for me is Marine - cause he is brainless shooter - maybe further in game when he gonna take strong assault weapon or so he is better than.

One of the biggest problems with surviving are bots/frenzied humans with granades or auto weapons - taking a lot of HP with one shot - so you have to kite them or so - when they are two at once. I hope that game taking easier like in Dungeon of Dredmor when you are able to get better gear on top floors/levels. Because at 6-7th floor at Hard i am not suitable for fighting whole area without getting out of ammo and medi kit.



PS: Changed mind - Scout can be very effective when you are passing most of monsters with blade (i found Sword even so i could safe a lot of ammo by using close combat).

What do you guys think of this strategy on character building:
1) When leveling primary attributes (Might, Finesse, Brains), never raise Might. The reason is these each add 1 point to all their matching skills for every 5 point investment, and Might only has 3 skills: melee, mechanical, and blade. The other two attributes have both more skills and more useful skills, no matter which class you are playing.

2) When leveling skills, keep a couple points in reserve if there are no more options that only cost 1 to raise. This is usually the case on levels 1 and 2. Later on you have more skills that cost 1 point per level. Obviously this is most applicable to marine since he gets fewest skill points, and least applicable to scout. If you get more than about 3 points in reserve it is fine to spend them tho.

By the way, does anyone know how the game decides how many points a skill will raise when you invest in it? I know the cost is determined by how much you used the skill, but haven't figured out the increment yet. Is it random?

I normally level Might since ever 10 points in might equals to 8 more inventory slots. and I usually am really low on inventory. Finesse is also great since some weapon need high finesse to even use properly (you will miss 90% of the time other wise. Brain, I don't know, there are some great skills for it, sure, but I'm not sure I would like too use the stat points for that. On the other hand I have heard that higher brain equals to more exp, but I don't know about that for sure.

When it comes to reserving skill points I agree. I very seldom spend points in anything that isn't a 1 point buy. And yes the increment is random.

With the now-exception of Psi skills for Mind Games owners, any skill you've used (successfully for non-combat skills) since your last level-up costs only 1 point to raise. All others will cost 2. And I'm not sure how it decides to boost your skills on level-up, but it's anywhere from 1-3 points.

And I'm also inclined to disagree on the Might matter. As the previous poster mentioned, Might also affects inventory space. There is never enough space for everything you want, but you'll always be glad for more. Lifter Packs, Pocket Tesseract, or Utility Belt are also nice. (But of the last two, PT is better.)

Another point about might: raising it also raises your hunger limit. While this may seem useless, since it won't help much when you're running out of food anyway, but it helps your inventory by letting you store more of your food in your stomach rather than in your inventory. That way, once you finally hit that cooker you've been waiting for for the past 3 levels, you can empty out even more space in your inventory by filling your face with more of the delicious sandwiches you make with it and thus making more room for the ten billion pistol rounds you've likely accumulated by now ;)