Not a guide to starting up

[dark]

So I was following the advice in this thread...
BB took me to Mars, then I TR'd which took me back to BB, which then took me back to Mars, where I got the 5/5/-2 armor. As I'm not elite, I can't get the rifle, but I couldn't even afford the gloves without doing a bit of stuff for the Rat anyway. I'm lurking around the three SW zones at the moment, waiting until I get 6 Athletics as per the advice, which leads me to the question of how everybody spends their points.

To prevent "wasting" xp, I only increase skills up to their linked attribute. Further, I level up Body to 6 before leveling Strength to 6, which is 4 points cheaper than alternating Body and Strength.

Is that a good idea? It will take 130xp to get to 3/6/6 - am I taking too long? Should I just focus on getting Athletics up to 6 ASAP, even if it costs more XP in the long run (as I'd be going over the linked attribute)?

[absimiliard]

I'm not sure on that one Dark. Not at all.

Currently I'm like you. I try not to buy in-efficiently. So my Athletics and Brawling can take a long time to skill up, because I'm buying Body and Strength. I do throw a fair amount of points at Mind though. IIRC AP are based on the combination of Body and Mind.

I too am interested in what other people do.

-abs

[Slide87]

It depends on which class(or game style anyway) you use...i usually confront in friendly faction sectors,and evade in enemy zones,and in combat i often move from point to point to not be in enemy range...so raise up athletics ^^ for what i think 'bout mechanics ,when i must defend myself from firearms,i choose "defend" option, 'cause i have dodge 0 and it's better defend(0 ap) than dodge(2 ap), with a high Ballistics value armor(that it often has a negative dodge value)...
For xp distribution....ehi men,if u make many XPs,there's no problem where to allocate them ;D
The important thing is to make XPs,then jobs jobs jobs ^^ and if u are a combat class,battles battles battles ^^ raise up ATH, FIR and BRA,first(yeah trying to earn xp => first raising stats),make jobs,buy a solid rifle(mk251 is a wise choice,anyway a rifle with good power/accuracy) and a solid melee weapon(stunna,or better taser,these weapons are good and they dont kill enemies,wise choice for heat control),then collect xps...

Yeah,this post will be grammarly explosive,i know...sorry ^^

[Slide87]

And for these advices,copyright would be given to gravling(especially for weapons) i have heard from her =) yeah,she's a badger,but a wise badger xD

[absimiliard]

"Badger Animal Spirit Guide:

Spirit Badger's influences include:

Badger is a keeper of stories. Badger interests itself in observing the environment around it. Badger doesn't witness to share stories, for Badger doesn't have much interest in sharing things or 'networking' but only has an interest in experiencing each moment. If anything, Badger has a protective stance over the stories being collected for self enjoyment and finds sharing with others much to complicated. When you have Badger influencing your life, there is a part of you that has to be aware of personal boundaries and to uphold a sense of guarding ones precious experiences so they are not distorted by others.

Badger energy is that of a sensible wisdom and cunning approach to dealing with daily events.

Badger doesn't have any problem though, expressing itself and can quite bold about it's needs and preferences."

I think badger is a totem of wisdom as well. And if you look over the bug forum you can see Gravling is not shy in reporting bugs, or expressing her preferences. I do think she's far more social and giving than the normal interpretation of the badger-spirit, the amount of salient advice and good tips she hands out are plentiful.

So I'd say that while all badgers are wise, we are winners in that our badger is both wise and giving.

-abs (can't stomach too much sucking up, but Gravling really has helped his game a lot with her hints)

[fela]

Feb 3, 2012 14:25:45 GMT -5 absimiliard said:

I'm not sure on that one Dark. Not at all.

Currently I'm like you. I try not to buy in-efficiently. So my Athletics and Brawling can take a long time to skill up, because I'm buying Body and Strength. I do throw a fair amount of points at Mind though. IIRC AP are based on the combination of Body and Mind.

I too am interested in what other people do.

-abs

AP are based on secondary stats (dex+int+cha)/2, so if you raise stats evenly, 1 mind will eventually get you 1 ap via int+cha, while 1 body will get you 1/2 ap via dex. So ultimately raising mind is the way to go for AP.

Regarding the athletics vs strength: for a shooter i will always raise STR to 5 , ATH to 5 and THEN raise ATH independently, so i can save raising STR, which will not only save me the points used there but also make raising DEX cheaper.

The reason for raising STR to 5 is that this allows me to theoretically raise ATH to 10 for double cost (i never took or needed more than 8 so far, so STR 4 might be an option) and avoid spending triple exp to raise it.

[absimiliard]

Fascinating. I had no idea what the formula was for AP. I also find your logic regarding strength and athletics compelling, I may well be a but less efficient next time I'm spending xp.

Thanks fela.

-abs

[LordofSyn]

The More You Know

[fela]

Feb 4, 2012 10:01:55 GMT -5 absimiliard said:

Fascinating. I had no idea what the formula was for AP. I also find your logic regarding strength and athletics compelling, I may well be a but less efficient next time I'm spending xp.

Please don't misunderstand, i'm talking about a char that will STOP developping Str at 4/5/6 (question of favor, really), so we're not talking about less efficient development as in raising skills and later raising the corresponding stat.

[AeroD]

I'm trying to complete a job where I'm supposed to capture a target. How do I do that without killing him?

[grävling]

You need to buy a pair of cyan blue gloves. The best ones are the Tasers and the Stunna, and you can buy a Taser from Back Bay Importers in Old Kenmore. Then you have to either kill or stun all of the body guards, and then walk up to the target and stun him. (Then put him in a bad and carry him home to your Connector.

Happy capturing, and Welcome to the forum!

[absimiliard]

Well, I think I'm set with this thread.

Lia eventually died. She had enough cash and was getting XP at a good rate. I'd gotten her to the point that she could dance around in Yak and Corp lands. However I was starting to spend money on runners and was developing them. I was also busily keeping to my goal of hacking at the start of every day, but I was finding that while the cash was welcome the Real Life Time (RLT) involved was pretty high. So Lia found herself and her team in a firefight. I let her get stuck in because they were targeting one of my runners. They switched targets, and Lia bought it.

No more rogue agents from my experiments get to run around the NBZ, thanks.

Lessons Learned:
"Runners are expendable. I AM NOT."
"I like the cash in hacking, but I think I don't like the RLT."

---

I say I think I'm done in this thread because Slider is my new Cybersword. And it's all worked like a charm for Slider. I pushed the runs early on, far more than I should have, and got a ton of cash. That bought me a 3 job comp. That comp let me roll in the XP from jobs at Tuckamore's. It was a pain managing rep, no doubts, a lot of refusals are involved in racking up three pickup jobs. But the XP went first into Mind and mental stats, to get more AP. I then took Athletics up, and Brawl. The odd job to southern Yak-land, followed with jobs back from the Yakuza Gambling Den, got me enough cash to buy low-grade cyber upgrades over time and the cash from the pickups paid for lodging and my daily stim-regimen.

Slider is currently Athletics 8 and runs around 11-13 AP in a fight. He's pretty much un-killable anywhere at the moment. If I'm not stupid I'm pretty sure he'll stay that way, provided I don't try keeping a runner alive at my own expense.

(The ability to kite by running out the bad-guys AP and then running in, hitting, and running out is just really nasty.)

So I'd like to thank everyone for their help, and especially Gravling (of course). At this point I think I've learned enough to have figured out how to survive the early game with a sword, and probably a hacker too. So from here on in I'll do some experimenting; testing out that hacker, checking on how get runners going, seeing if I can play a gunslinger, you know . . . stuff.

But I think I've finally figured out starting up.

-abs

[Cory Trese]

abs -- what difficulty are you on?

[Slide87]

@abs wise name for ur char =P

[grävling]

abs was looking for help at playing Brutal, so I assume this is precisely where he is.

@abs -- You are most welcome. Great to hear!