Hi, I just reached level 199 and wanted to share how I got there a bit.
First some stats:
It took me 338 hours and with the last match, I got all the raiders as well. I've got some nice forge 10 weapons (around 6) and I'm soon gonna buy better ones.
How it all started: I forgot how I found out about the game, I think I googled MMO-PVE or something. The Coop shooter aspect of the game intrigued me.
After installing, I immediately joined a match as I wanted to see if the game was to my liking. I got put into a Kuzzman map and the only Raider still available was Alicia. I felt like I picked someone useless, I can mainly remember the low range and that there was a lot happening. I really liked the visuals, that I took cover so flawlessly and since other people played it, I sticked with it for a more thorough review.
Afterwards I tried Konstantin and a bit of Harec. I mainly skipped Lycus because of his shotgun and my bad experience with Alicia. The game soon told me to buy Hans and I’m glad I did. I thought he was “better” since he needed a higher level, and he was a bit faster than Konstantin.
Since I watched a movie next to the game a lot of times, I didn’t get any audio cue of what to do. (my bad, dear game designers)
At first I wanted to level up for the new maps, but I had my difficulty understanding them. Dr Kuzman = no melee (took me a match), another one was lost because I didn’t even see the timer, then I picked up on the timer and people pulling the lever.
Breath of hope was easy but it took my many more levels to understand how to destroy the guardians. Same for finding the old man and realizing it was his health on top. Then I slowly understood that it’s about putting aleph into everything.
On the enemy within I was one of those shouting “out of ammo” in the second part, I had to idea what to do. Somewhere I bought the Tarrasque (didn’t get the hang of it) and bought the heavens bane for Hans, which I liked a lot.
At the point I watched Hihsasukes Youtube videos to see which Raider I wanted. The Barrier of Mikah was the most fascinating, because I didn’t understand when I healed, I think. Stress was still a difficult concept. After Mikah, I saw that Schneider was my thing, because he looked fun and Mikah lacked damage potential (with defensive barrier, yeah yeah)
On the map side: Short fused, I didn’t get the “carry bottles” until 5-6 matches in, I didn’t get the “shoot the thing to save time” until 40 matches in probably. But at least I got “collect aleph and put it in” part.
On no reservations, it took me a match or two to know what that timer was for and way more games to know when/how to grab to pesky sharpshooters that kept teleporting.
A weapon from the past felt okay to understand, I probably got killed by the bomb a bit when someone dropped it.
Marmaleda was tough but I got the hang of it. A bit later, I noticed thanks to Hihsasuke videos that the sidefaces were weak as well. Might have been at that point that I understood that bright yellow things are vulnerabilities.
Somewhere at that point I bought Schneider, his basic weapon felt super powerful and everything got easier. It was mostly because Hihsasuke recommended the “Cold Blood” card and it helped me heal. Still, I didn’t understand the link between healing and pressure.
To skip ahead, Aneskas map was easy, similar to Valerias. On white noise I thought it was a bug that made me levitate to my death for like 2-3 tries and I tried to avoid that map.
On the hanging by the ceiling map, I understood the basic principle. However I didn’t see that we could shoot the spider down before it grabs it’s head and it took my some “come to me”s to know why the head should be put on a podest far away from the spider.
Somewhere there I bought Shae, thought here beginner weapon was crappy, as the enemies hid before it was loaded. Still, I bought her other weapons, including the Aasi Dagan which I liked a lot.
After Schneider, Mikah and Shae, I felt I had all the raiders I really wanted to try. I wanted to level up for better passives until a friend from my guild told me that it was capped. So I got to that level. When I heard that there was a cap for forge level, I got told I shouldn’t waste money on lower forges. I think at that point I joined discord and got some good tips.
When I bought the other raiders, I had the following thoughts (in order of buying)
Ginebra, does VERY little damage except when lucky enough to push someone.
Hive, not good against bosses, not for range, not my cup of tea.
Rak, actually not bad, his pirachas take a bit long to load.
Valeria, looked fun at first but she’s slow and her healing is bad (compared to cold blood Schneider)
Aneska (not very powerful and her mech is blocking my view, low range)
Iune (fun, got mercy, but low health)
Loath (saw him tear down Schneiderbot, which impressed me, love his knockback effect weapon, but 100 hp in high MMR wasn’t enough)
Kuzman (low damage compared to Schneider and slow)
Ayana (ability was better than expected, weapon is so-so, not good against bosses)
Doldren (bought him last, took a bit of understanding to do damage with the weapon, but not active enough)
At the end I understood that most sucked a bit, because I compared them to forge lvl 10 weapons of Schneider and Shae. Now I’m eager to try some of them out.
Hope this helps good players to understand bad players, game devs to understand noobs and perhaps noobs to understand the game 😊
Thanks for reading, and if you have any questions, do ask.
