Wasteland Wasteland 3 + Battle of Steeltown and Cult of the Holy Detonation Expansions Thread

[LJ40]

Do you really have to pay $10 just to have access to the manual!? If true, that's a scummy move.

Apparently so. If you just want access to it, there is a copy on the archive(.org).

Other than that, yes, this is a quite frankly impressive level of dick move.

 

[Luckmann]

Do you really have to pay $10 just to have access to the manual!? If true, that's a scummy move.

I wanted to believe that the "Ranger Manual" was some kind of in-universe point-of-view booklet for ranger recruits or something, but checking it out, nope.. that's the game manual alright, with a layout reminiscent of the console UI of the game itself, even. It's 42 pages that when not designed by someone with a pathological fear of PCs would've been no more than 20 pages.

Edit: The art book is also pathetic. It doesn't look like it was designed by someone with terminal consolitis, but it's basically just a collection of assets with very little commentary or process notes, or even examples of stuff that didn't make it. It's a pretty sad piece of work and it feels like something some intern was put in charge of. Would it have killed them to have some of the artists spend a day or two each contributing and commenting?

 

[Infinitron]

Oh hey, there are more lowdown videos after all:



https://www.inxile-entertainment.com/post/the-battle-of-steeltown-combat-mechanics

The Battle of Steeltown: Combat Mechanics

The Battle of Steeltown (live now on PC and coming June 9 to consoles) brings with it some of the most dynamic and challenging tactical combat seen yet. Thanks to ingenuity of the Steeltown workers, your squad of Rangers will be put to the test as they attempt to quell the rebellion and get Steeltown running again.

The workers of Steeltown are fighting for better working conditions, the bosses want them back to work, and they’re in a volatile stalemate as neither side is budging. The Rangers are stepping in to try to resolve the situation but are going to need to deal with trigger-happy workers. Whether you choose a non-lethal approach or not, the Steeltown workers come packing new weapons and tactics that will challenge your team’s combat prowess.

Here’s Game Director David Rogers to give you a brief overview of what you can expect.

Elemental Shields

First up is the Safety Chief, who deploys elemental shields to keep workers from succumbing to the dangerous environments of the Steeltown factory. Unlucky for you they’re turning their tools against the Rangers and deploying shields in combat situations.

These shields expel almost all damage, but they do have a weakness. Each shield is attuned to a specific damage type (Energy, Fire, Cold) and hitting it with that damage type will cause it to overload and disappear. Without doing matching elemental damage, you can also wait the shields out as they’ll naturally drop off after a few turns. Taking out the Safety Chief, especially if you're not equipped to deal with the shields, should be a top priority.

Spoiler

Oh It’s Goin’ Down

The Foundry Workers bring their strength-enhancing exoskeletons into battle, allowing them to charge up and slam their fist down to cause a massive electrical explosion. But it takes a full turn for the attack to charge up, giving you a chance to take them out or get out of the blast radius before they turn you into a fine red mist.

Tar Thrower

Used by the Construction Workers to continually expand the massive factory complex of Steeltown, the tar thrower is now being turned toward continually reducing your health bars.

When hit with hot tar, your squad members will take some damage, but worse, they’ll be subject to a stacking debuff that increases the AP cost of movement on the battlefield. Setting yourself up well before an oncoming fight, and taking workers out before they weigh you down with tar, will be a priority to keep your positioning options open.

If you’re biting your nails over how to deal with all of this, the Rangers have a way to deal with these stacking effects by way of a Steeltown-specific consumable called the Chemical Neutralizer spray. It’s like an eye-wash station, but for your whole body.

Luckily the tar thrower doesn’t require a complex operating manual, and the Rangers can find and equip them, turning the gooey-tides of battle against the workers. That’s especially useful when coming up against a Power Loader.

Power Loader

The Power Loader is a hulking machine used for lifting and moving the masses of steel and raw materials used in the Steeltown fabrication process. The Power Loader drivers are focused on the task at hand, and that means when they identify a target, they’ll stop at nothing to reach it.

The Power Loader’s mark ability with show who in your squad they’re coming after, and it’s up to you to move and position yourself to avoid their devastating attacks. That’s an even more difficult proposition if you’re covered in hot tar, but if you’ve equipped a tar thrower yourself it’s especially useful for controlling how far the Power Loader can move each turn.

And you can use their single-minded focus against them, as they’ll run through fuel-filled barrels and their own workers to get to you. But if they do get to you… game over, man.

The factory workers are fed up, and they’re going to use whatever means necessary to get the respect and treatment they deserve. It’ll be up to the Rangers to decide how best to handle a situation already soaked in blood.

Jump into Steeltown now on Steam, GOG, and the Microsoft Store, and on Xbox and PlayStation June 9.

 

[Acrux]

The descriptions of the enemies in that video make it sound more like a puzzle game than tactics - telegraphing attacks, predictable behavior.

 

[Luckmann]

The descriptions of the enemies in that video make it sound more like a puzzle game than tactics - telegraphing attacks, predictable behavior.

"OOOOOH HERE COMES THE LAZORS LOOK OUT MOVE OUT OF THE WAY BRRRRRRRRRRRRRR ha ha xD"

 

[Fedora Master]

And there goes my good will towards the devs.

 

[undecaf]

I like the game but jesus fucking christ I can't get past the deterministic checks that don't allow my characters to fail.

Who thought that was a good design choice.... should be hung up from their neck until they beg for their lives.

 

[FreshCorpse]

Working through the new expansion. Early doors but it's good so far - though I've only just gotten the non-lethal weapons and curious how they work out.

Seriously though, there is some visual scene effect which is reducing it to a slideshow on my RX 580. It's new for the expansion and I haven't yet riddled out how to switch it off, whatever it is. It's like a softglow or something. If anyone knows, speak up.

 

[IHaveHugeNick]

Yikes. Arguably the biggest criticism of WL2 was all the halfassed filler content that existed only to make WL2 seem like a bigger game than it really was. But with 3 hour DLCs they're kind of went extremely in the opposite direction of quantity-quality spectrum.

 

[Haplo]

I like the game but jesus fucking christ I can't get past the deterministic checks that don't allow my characters to fail.

Who thought that was a good design choice.... should be hung up from their neck until they beg for their lives.

The extremly random checks from WL2 were a nightmare. I consider it a huge improvement.

 

[lycanwarrior]

Do you really have to pay $10 just to have access to the manual!? If true, that's a scummy move.

I wanted to believe that the "Ranger Manual" was some kind of in-universe point-of-view booklet for ranger recruits or something, but checking it out, nope.. that's the game manual alright, with a layout reminiscent of the console UI of the game itself, even. It's 42 pages that when not designed by someone with a pathological fear of PCs would've been no more than 20 pages.

Edit: The art book is also pathetic. It doesn't look like it was designed by someone with terminal consolitis, but it's basically just a collection of assets with very little commentary or process notes, or even examples of stuff that didn't make it. It's a pretty sad piece of work and it feels like something some intern was put in charge of. Would it have killed them to have some of the artists spend a day or two each contributing and commenting?

It also includes skills that are not even in the game that you can upgrade, like scavenging and crafting. Although crafting has now been incorporated but not as an upgradable skill.

 

[Fedora Master]

 

[Desiderius]

I liked it. Like to see more stuff like this from devs.

Excited devs make better games.

 

[Luckmann]

I liked it. Like to see more overpriced piecemeal DLC's with level-scaled content.

 

[Antigoon]

Seriously though, there is some visual scene effect which is reducing it to a slideshow on my RX 580. It's new for the expansion and I haven't yet riddled out how to switch it off, whatever it is. It's like a softglow or something. If anyone knows, speak up.

Try lowering the texture pool size, that did it for me.

 

[FreshCorpse]

On the subject of crafting it might have been an idea to put what stats the thing affects on the screen where you craft it.

You know, so that you don't have to quicksave/quickload to find out. Just an idea...

 

[Luckmann]

On the subject of crafting it might have been an idea to put what stats the thing affects on the screen where you craft it.

You know, so that you don't have to quicksave/quickload to find out. Just an idea...

Are you seriously playing this shit with a controller?

 

[FreshCorpse]

On the subject of crafting it might have been an idea to put what stats the thing affects on the screen where you craft it.

You know, so that you don't have to quicksave/quickload to find out. Just an idea...

Are you seriously playing this shit with a controller?

lol, trust randos on the codex to get triggered by that. Yes I am...try to just carry on with your life though, without this fact causing you too much trauma

 

[Alienman]

Been a while since I played, but I think I played with a controller because there was no walk button for PC. For some reason it's a common miss on PC games...

 

[Infinitron]

Non-lethal attacks:



https://www.inxile-entertainment.com/post/the-battle-of-steeltown-less-than-lethal-weapons

The Battle of Steeltown: Less than Lethal Weapons

The only thing more valuable than what’s produced in Steeltown is the workforce that’s cranking it all out. As such, the Rangers are going to have a hard time resolving Steeltown’s dilemma without having to make some more hard choices. You’ll be encouraged to subdue, not kill, the workers involved in the rebellion, but whether that’s appropriate in the heat of a firefight is ultimately up to you.

To this end, the administrators of the city will provide you an assortment of less-than-lethal weaponry specifically designed to overload the workers’ cybernetic augmentations. They’re hard to miss; they emit an electric blue glow from the backs of those workers who are implanted with them.

To be successful with the Disruption Tech, cybernetically enhanced opponents will need to be hit with ten stacks of Disruption before their systems are overloaded. Successfully concussed enemies may be more willing to see things your way, or they just might make more problems for you down the road. Put the rebellion down for good or bring ‘em back alive, it’s your call.

Outside of Steeltown, these weapons will still hurt like hell and do a number on non-implanted humans who get debuffed with the disruption effect. Health bars won’t be hit as hard as with conventional weaponry, but taking a hard-to-kill enemy to 10 stacks will still stun them. In this way, disrupting and stun-locking a high HP boss may be faster than killing them, letting you control the biggest threat in your immediate vicinity while you mop up any nearby minions.

In Steeltown, you can take comfort in knowing that your previous cache of weapons will end your altercations much faster than with a non-lethal approach. That said, Rangers who take the more merciful route will be treated with a special achievement if they are successful without shedding the blood of Steeltown’s workers. Still, you might find the greatest difficulty is in holding yourself back from sending an enemy to the grave who deserves it.

Make no mistake, the situation in Steeltown is dire. There’s no knowing exactly what you’ll get yourself into there, or how high the stakes will be once you descend into its smoldering depths. Wasteland 3’s first DLC, The Battle of Steeltown, is now live on PC and releases June 9 on Xbox and PlayStation.

 

[Antigoon]

I don't think besides that one NPC Synth complaining, there are any consequences for killing workers. At least I killed some and it was just fine. Of course, any real enemies/bosses became trivial by using disruptive weapons. That whole stacking system is just garbage. Rifle gets 3 stacks, Gloves 1 so you can take out any boss within one round with Betty alone.

 

[Old Hans]

Working through the new expansion. Early doors but it's good so far - though I've only just gotten the non-lethal weapons and curious how they work out.

Seriously though, there is some visual scene effect which is reducing it to a slideshow on my RX 580. It's new for the expansion and I haven't yet riddled out how to switch it off, whatever it is. It's like a softglow or something. If anyone knows, speak up.

that's the unity engine magic at work

 

[soulburner]

that's the unity engine magic at work

I haven't played an Unity engine based game that didn't have performance issues. Hopefully InXile goes fully Unreal Engine now.

 

[jackofshadows]

I haven't played an Unity engine based game that didn't have performance issues.

ATOM RPG.

 

[Nifft Batuff]

I haven't played an Unity engine based game that didn't have performance issues.

ATOM RPG.

Final Fantasy XV.