Mechalibur

Can never go wrong with more essence mastery

Ascended Labs is a pretty tough zone early on since you're fighting some high-tier enemies. I usually do it around level 10 or so.

Update 18 Great Temple A Battle Gamma Greeter asks me to go see Goettsch. I instead greet him with a Searer to the face. What makes this zone manageable is that triggering the alarm from fighting (or stealing the gloves without mechanics), causes all of Goettsch's bodyguards to run after you, even Tomato the drayk. Goettsch, on the other hand, remains in his chambers with his level 1 servile servants. The zone is filled with Cryodryaks and Battle Betas/Gammas, but they mostly run around in patrols which means they're easy enough to pick off one by one. The guards to the Shaper Gloves are level 20 gammas, which make them a bit trickier, but my Ur-Glaahk can tank them with an essence shield while the rest of the squad covers them in acid and fire. There's also a Quicksilver Plate up for grabs behind some red mines, which I disarm using the spore baton I picked up in Trajkov's quarters. Goettsch himself is... kind of a nightmare to fight. He gets a whopping three actions per turn and can cast all manner of spells including Terror, Dominate, Fire Blast, and Acid Spray. He's also over level 20 which makes accuracy a crapshoot against him, even when blessed. He summons a high level Vlish and Clawbug during the fight as well, but they aren't nearly as big of a threat as he his. The key to beating Goettsch is to turn his greatest strength into a weakness. Those 3 actions he takes every turn? Every single one of them can trigger acid damage, which, being based on his max hp, ends up dealing around 115 damage per tick, or 345 per turn. I essence shield and mass energize my creations before charging in, put on the Quicksilver Plate and Boots for maximum haste chance, then run in. With innate haste and a haste buff, my artilas have a pretty good chance of inflicting acid on Goettsch on their turn. Meanwhile, Psychopath is on full healer mode, spamming Mass Restore each turn, with a good chance of following up with Essence Shield if he got haste off. Goettsch takes two of his turns in between my creations and Psychopath, which also means mass restore can cleanse any debuffs he inflicts during those turns, which is especially helpful for removing dominate and terror. Eventually the acid takes its toll, and Goettsch drops dead. He has a Shaper Belt which is decent enough for some extra resist on my creations. Only one obstacle left. The Geneforge Trajkov is a fool. He thinks he can still negotiate with me. Despite slaughtering every Sholai (and Servile, and Shaper, and creation) that has come across my path, he is somehow under the misguided assumption that Psychopath can be reasoned with. Trajkov is guarded by Battle Gammas and Cryodrayks and can release some fast-moving Clawbugs when his hp is low enough. Despite his guards, this fight is easier than Goettsch - Trajkov is basically just an augmented sholai with a higher level. He doesn't even take multiple actions per turn until his hp gets low enough. The battle is a slaughter. Psychopath and the Ur-Glaahk start the fight by dominating the two nearest Battle Gammas who do an admirable job tanking damage for me. Trajkov himself is then coated in acid and bathed in fire from my dryaks, while Psycopath rains down Airshocks on the cryodryaks in the rear. Trajkov and his guards die before the clawbugs can even enter the fight. They too are dispatched without much difficulty. Trajkov kept a book near him explaining how to use the Geneforge. Psychopath reads it with glee. Psychopath uses the Geneforge. He is no longer a threat to just Sucia Island, soon the whole world will suffer his murderous rampages. Then, for good measure, he destroys the Geneforge on his way out. This gets him to level 19, and provides a massive bonus to all his stats. Next update will be the final one, clearing out the Barrens Bunker, Inner Crypt, and Guarded Docks. Maybe I should have done those before using the Geneforge, but what good is power if I'm not going to abuse it?

Compared to the Front Gates it's a breeze! The Sholai's pitiful mental resist makes things not so bad

Update 17 West Gate This is the easiest way into the Geneforge facility if you don't have Trajkov's amulet. The Speed Sentinels aren't a pushover, though. They take multiple actions per round and can summon a bunch of turrets and creations when they get to low hp. As a result, it's important to have enough AoE when fighting them. 2 Drayks with fire breath and an Airshock is enough to put them in their place. At the end of the zone is the side entrance which can be opened up with an Entry Baton. This lets me sneak into the Geneforge without having to go through the Front Gate. The Front Gate But who wants that? The Front Gate is what Psychopath has been preparing for his whole rage-fueled life. The path to the Geneforge is short and bloody, with reaper turrets and patrolling Sholai across the road. When I get to the gates themselves, I'm facing 5 reaper turrets, some sholai warriors (included one who is augmented), and a wizard, with several more enemies in the back that charge forward when they hear the sounds of combat. I start by working with my Ur-Glaahk to dominate the front line warriors who get almost immediately ripped apart by their own reaper turrets. The Augmented Sholai are the biggest obstacle here, and only myself and my Ur-Glaahk can even survive a round of attacks from one, so it's important to keep enough dominated fodder in front of them, or keep essence shield on at all times. Airshock and the stun wave help keep the reinforcements under control while my drayks and artila blast them with waves of fire and acid. It still ends up being pretty close, with only Psychopath and my Ur-Glaahk left alive after the final reinforcements. There's also an inn at the northwest end that's filled with Inn Ghosts. I never really understood that. Oh well, there's a nice canister of Mass Energize here. I hit level 17. Central Labs It doesn't take long for an alarm to be sounded, sending waves of Sholai warriors and researchers (and Battle Betas) after me. Compared to the Front Gate, however, this isn't much of a challenge. Two of the mages, Serabryakov and Vershinin put up a bit more of a fight with their stronger spells and bigger hp pools, but it's nothing I haven't handled before. There's an upstairs room with an augmentation pool that triggers an ambush after you inspect it. The ambush patrol includes all kinds of various sholai I've fought before, including augmented sholai. However, their crippling lack of mental resistance makes it a simple matter of forcing them to kill each other. There is also a cluster of pylons in the Northwest section of the map. I can't be bothered to kill them all, so I just break a few that are required to get the Shaper Boon ring which gives a nice bonus to all my creations' stats. The Vats It's much nicer going through this room from the east instead of the west. It means I can immediately head south and demand the servant mind turn off the toxic air. I don't have enough leadership to convince it to shut itself off, however (and there's no option to just stab the servant mind for some reason). Most of the zone is just easy Glaahk fights, but there's also a corpse with a Mica Band... not that it's particularly useful for shapers. An Airshock canister is always appreciated at least. There's also a library sub-zone here. The ghosts attack you if you don't wear the special gloves before reading the records. Unfortunately, Psychopath respects books about as much as he respects the sanctity of life, so I end up killing all the ghosts. Holding Cells There's a fun variety of enemy creations here, including cockatrices, but none of them are too challenging. The important thing is making my way to the controls console to open all the side doors. One of the unlocked rooms has an Experimental Glaahk which is a beefed up Ur-Glaahk. I have more than enough firepower to take him down, however, and I pick up the amazing shield Agent's Shelter which is a welcome boost to my spellcasting. Research Quarters This zone is pretty similar to the Central Labs with waves of Sholai and Drayks attacking me. They don't come in large enough numbers to really pose a threat. Logu Kau is another suped-up mage with a nasty fire cone, but is fought alone, which makes taking them down pretty simple. There's also Akkat, a drayk that is friendly despite me killing all the other drayks on this map. Looting his nest pisses him off, and he makes a futile attempt to stop me. Trajkov's room is only defended by a few reaper turrets which go down fairly quick at this point. The Guardian Claymore would be better for a Guardian but Psychopath is still able to read Trajkov's journal and take his red spore baton. This zone has some cockatrice research which lets me return the research to the servant mind in the Barrens Research zone and get another point in Create Cockatrice. I don't think they're especially useful, so I stick with my existing squad. Next update will be the Great Temple and the Geneforge itself! Then I'll clear the Barrens Bunker and Inner Crypt and be done with this slaughter.

Yeah, it's exactly like that. A decision has to be made regardless of whether there's evidence or not.

Update 16 Near the finish line... Crossroads Gavrila would steal my Taker amulet if I had one, but I don't. I kill him anyway. The Sholai here aren't anything I haven't seen before. There are also some agent/guardian/shaper specters in the southest, they aren't any different than the ones in the Sealed Labs and South Workshop. An Airshock canister here is pretty nice at least. I hit level 16 here. Valley of the Wind This zone is probably easier than its predecessor, the Western Wastes. Wind Walkers do standard ghost stuff, but they fight one at a time which makes them very easy to pick off. The north exit has a higher concentration of ghosts, but it's nothing Airshock and Ur-Glaahk shockwaves can't keep in check. There are 2 very nice items here, the Arcane Band which I put on, and the Protection Icon which just gives free passive resistances to my creations while it's in my pack. Neat. The Sentinels First up is the ornks. They have a headbutt charge similar to Battle Alphas, but they do way more damage. They don't have much in the way of defenses at least: 0% in everything, except stun which is 100%, which lets my Drayks cook them nice and crispy. The Ornk Lord is a bit more of a challenge, but goes down without too much trouble with enough acid. The gloves it drops are pretty bad for shapers. Next is the guardians themselves and I honestly don't think I've ever faced them before. They all are high-hp shades that can take double actions. They hit for pretty hard and have different AoEs that daze or stun. They also occasionally cast Wrack - it's lucky when that happens because it doesn't deal any damage and the debuff isn't that bad. The second guardian also resists fire, ice, and magic at nearly 100%, so I make my Dryaks go into melee range to deal physical damage. Thankfully acid still works. Heustess is the final guardian and an absolute beast with over 1000hp and the same fire/ice/magic immunity that the second guardian has. His least threatening attack is hitting a single target with his baton, but it still typically does over 100 raw damage. Huestess can also do a spray shot that does similar damage except in a cone. He also has an absolutely brutal AoE charm attack that I don't think I've ever seen before. It's incredibly nasty. I beat him by running Psycopath behind him so that his spray attack only hits one target, then spam heals. I keep an artila coating him in acid which eventually pushes through his massive hp reserve. It still ends up being tight with all my creations other than an Ur-Glaahk dying in the end. Spirit City The Wastes Ghosts are massive pain. They take double actions, are reasonably tanky, and love inflicting stun and daze. I decide to have psycopath tank their leaps with Essence Shield since his magic resist is so high, then stun them all with Airshock when they bunch up. Goetsch's creations on the northeast end are easy peasy by comparison. Just dominate the alphas and blast them while they fight each other. I also go back to Drayk's Vale and start touching the pylons in order so that Psycopath can get past the Spirit City barrier. He learns the horrible secret about the Shapers... or at least he would if he didn't immediately attack the Shade Priest. Fun fact, the priest seems to be in a separate aggro group as his guardian shades who just watch as I kill their leader. The "sacred bedchamber" has Crystalline Plate which is nice if I ever need the 60% stun resist. Okay, almost done with the game! All that's left are the Geneforge zones, Goetsch's Temple, and the post-game dungeons (Ascended Bunker and the Crypts).

There are 4 types of mines Color-coded: The game will usually mention if a mine has a tip with a certain color. Those can be disarmed using a spore baton of the same color. Switch-activated: Some mines, like in the Hill of Jars, can be disabled with a switch and enough mechanics skill. Crystal mines: Some mines (like in Ancient Crypt) are near a big yellow crystal and will be disarmed if you activate the crystal near them and have enough mechanics Screw you mines: Some mines can't be disabled. You can often still survive them with high magic resist and/or essence shield.

I usually do the reverse to make managing reputation easier. Start with anti-servile opinions, feed Control Four, then join the Obeyers. Get all the stuff you want from them, then go to Learned Darian to make your opinion pro-Servile (and going forward just say pro-servile stuff). Then tell Ellhrah you want to join, kill Control Four (he doesn't care that you fed him earlier), and get all the training from the Awakened. After that join the Takers using either leadership or killing Ellhrah if you really want. I've never really found mind nutrients to be an issue. With leadership there's enough for everything, and even without leadership, one of the uses for them is almost pointless (the Guarded Docks servant mind)

Update 15 Icewalls Pretty simple zone overall. The regular enemies are extremely easy to deal with, the only issue is the spawner cluster in the center. Nothing Airshock and Drayk Flame bombing won't solve. West Workshop Cryodrayks hit pretty hard but are fairly squishy and vulnerable to mental effects. The nice thing is their level is pretty high, so I still get decent XP for taking them out. Mass Restore helps with keeping everyone topped off long enough for me to disable the spirals in the center of the map. This zone has an excellent Mass Energize canister, giving me access to the final spell I'm missing. I pretty much have the answer to all my problems now. I'm forced to ignore the entry baton since I already have one, which avoids another trap, adding the ambush sholai to the small group of characters that will survive my rampage. The Servant Mind here required 3 leadership and the game insults me by saying how crappy I am for not even being able to convince a weak shivering servant mind This zone also have the Vampiric Lance which is nice I guess. It doesn't require any missile skill, surprisingly, so I figure I might as well equip it. Kantre's Realm I'm not really sure why I put this zone off. Fwee warns me about Kantre's creations and gets killed for her trouble. I slowly eliminated all the battle alphas and glaahks that plague this zone. Apparently pissing Kantre off causes a spawner in the center to summon a few waves of battle alpha constructs. Never triggered that before, but they're pretty easy, so no big deal. The Charmed Plate is here, but I think I'll stick with my robes. Diarazad I. Hate. Stealth Sholai. They get 2 actions per round and have 2 different AoE stuns for some reason?! Ugh, at least their hp isn't too high so if I initiate combat with good timing, I can typically take them out before they get to go. I do the silly pyro-roamer bomb for the ghosts on the west exit, since they're otherwise pretty annoying with their daze-leap + stun bolt combo. Western Wastes This is another zone that's really annoying if you try to take it on early, but by this point in the game it's not too big of a deal for me. I have to take 2 trips since I forgot support pylons explode when they die, wiping out nearly my entire team. I happen across the special Thahd and take his Spiky Orb for the Inner Crypt. Drayk's Vale More cryodrayks! Rhakkus tries to extort me for safe passage, but instead of gold, I give it a fistfull of acid. The Cryodrayks are still good sources of XP and after clearing the zone I manage to hit level 16. One of the pillars has a Fiery Ruby which is an extra 5% magic damage for my creations. Not a game-changer but it's a nice free bonus. The zone also has the second Spiky Orb and the corpse of Learned Halm who somehow thought she could teach me Leadership.

You don't need the taker amulet for that canister. I killed Gayev in my latest run and that unlocked the door.

I seem to have stunned a pylon. So apparently 100% stun resist isn't always enough!

Yeah, those are fine to use.

Ah, those are sarcophagi. In the Tombs and South Bridge map you can get +1 to the following skills if you have 0 in them: Missile Weapons Quick Action Evasion Mental Magic Blessings Magic Spellcraft Battle Shaping Magic Shaping Healcraft So if you want to optimize, you can wait to increase those skills from 0 until you do those 2 maps. If they're already higher than 0, there's no point waiting.

Increasing skills outside of canisters is very rare in Mutagen. You're expected to use them, there aren't really any penalties for it in Mutagen, it's later games in the series where canisters have more obvious downsides. The only thing canister use does is slightly change one of the endings and add dialogue with a particular NPC.

Well really it's 230 from acid, right? Since Goettsch takes two turns per round.

Update 14 - more slaughtering! Patrolled Bridge The first few sholai are pretty easy - they patrol the map one-by-one, so they can be picked off fairly easily. That leaves a bridge with Sofya and an Augmented Sholai who are much meaner than their unaugmented brothers and sisters. Thankfully they're mental resist is low, and I dominate one, causing the reaper turrets to do all the work for me. Unlike the other bridge, this one has a few goodies for clearing out, a canister of Create Roamer and Battle Shaping. Unfortunately I've kind of graduated past those by this point. Sealed Lab The Sholai at the front aren't even worth mentioning. The actual specters inside the lab are pretty nasty, though. The Guardians will use Mass Energize to give everyone Bless, Shield, and Haste, and have a leaping stun attack that deals decent damage. The Agents have a really painful stunning wave that will damage and stun in a cone as well as Searer for bonus acid damage. The spectral shapers aren't so bad, they just seem to have a fire cone attack that hurts quite a bit, but doesn't stun or anything. And of course, being spirits, they are immune to all mental effects (although stun and acid are still fair game) The stun vulnerability means my best bet is to use my Glaahk's shockwave and my own airshock to keep as many units stunned as possible, while my drayk and artila keep the damage up. Tek and Zavor aren't too bad with these strategies in mind, and I dispatch them without too much trouble, although Tek makes me split up my forces by having reinforcements attack from behind me. I equip Zavor's band due to no other good rings by this point, and while I'd like Tek's dagger for the defensive stats, you need too much melee skill for it to be practical. I get enough XP from the shades here to hit level 15. South Workshop Normally this map is pretty easy thanks to the pylons, but I figure if I turn them friendly, the challenge requires me to kill them afterward, so I keep them neutral so they aren't attacking me or the shades (which are the same as the enemies in the Sealed Lab). The shades ambush you by spawning in different corners of the room. This is pretty annoying, but one thing that really helps is staying in combat mode the whole time - it gets you basically an extra round of fighting before the enemies get to go. I make sure to prioritize the Agents with my stun attacks to prevent getting blindsided. There's one extremely good canister here that will make life easier going forward: Mass Restore. Finally I've got AoE healing for my army and don't need to rely on healing spores! The servant mind here is unhelpful due to my non-existent leadership, so I take his nutrient goo and ignore him. Corata isn't too bad, even without the pylons helping me. Everything he summons is vulnerable to stun, so between the Shockwaves, Airshock spells, and airshock crystals, I don't allow his minions to take many actions. Fun fact: enemies get +40% stun resist after recovering from stun (and +40% mental resist after recovering from dominate, although that's not relevant here), so I can't keep Corata stunlocked, but his minions die fast enough that it's not too much of a concern. (after getting the nutrient paste, I give it to the servant mind in the Power Station for some more loot, including another level in Mass Restore) Kazg Time to eliminate the last bastion of serviles. The servile champions are actually pretty spread out, so with sufficient mind control, I'm able to keep them fighting each other as they slowly pour in, instead of hitting my creations. Gnorrel's chambers have a bit deadlier enemies, with Eko Blade in particular having a lot of hp and damage. All the takers have 65% stun resist as well, making that an unreliable tool. It's nothing acid can't solve, however, and by keeping two of the takers dominated at any given time, I can deal most of the damage I need from a distance, only taking occasional shots from stray spray batons. Gnorrel dies from one of her dominated lackeys and drops the keys to her backroom. Arixy would be proud (if she wasn't dead). I get an extra level in Vlish and Speed. Eh. Eko Blade has a Shaped Breastplate, which I suppose could be nice if I need the high armor.

Yeah, even as a searing artila apologist, 3 seems like a bit much 😄

Yeah that probably wouldn't help. Almost nothing is resistant to acid in Mutagen.

Yeah, I keep one in my party pretty much all game, regardless of what class I'm playing.

I'd still call acid massive - it's how I killed most high level bosses (Goettsch, Oroboros, Trajkov), generally ending up being about 80% of the total damage I dealt. Typically I find the hardest fights to be the ones against enemies with super high hp totals (like trying to kill Ellhrah in the early game), while the fights against multiple opponents tend to be pretty easy. I guess we value AoE vs single target damage differently. For most of the beginning of the game, I'm a big believer in Daze + picking off individuals, so I tended not to use the AoE attacks as much. And regarding Searing Artilas specifically, I love having a single one of them in my monster group. They're definitely not useful to spam, but having a single one is a huge boost in my experience.

Most seems about right, but my biggest disagreements are on: Searing Artila: Getting acid on your attacks isn't a minor benefit - it's massive in Mutagen. The % based damage will destroy high hp enemies without you having to do anything. They also seem to have a bizarrely high base accuracy relative to their level - I can't find this in the scripts anywhere, but according to the text console, they regularly have ~20% more accuracy compared to the main character when at a similar level (on a character with no equipment penalties to hit). While the main character can also apply acid with Searer, that's at the opportunity cost of using any other ability (and their accuracy will be lower, making it less reliable against higher-leveled enemies). Roamer: I usually replace my fyoras with them in the early game due to Roamers having better resistances (often letting them survive a one-shot attack in the early game) and better base damage. I can see the argument for overcharge spamming fyoras/drayks in the late game due to mass healing access, but by that point you have so many tools to beat most encounters that you can pretty much do whatever you want and win, so I tend to value early/mid game performance a bit more than late game. Why is that? The HP from endurance is also multiplied by the HP multiplier, so theoretically the value per point should be about the same. I guess if anything, creatures with high base hp get less benefit from endurance since it's a smaller % increase to their hp.

Err, isn't the beta testing under NDA? Probably shouldn't give too many details, even though I'm sure we're all curious.

I'm not sure off-hand, but I think you can read the instructions on how to use the Geneforge even if you attack Trajkov instead of talking to him. I guess we'll see. Anyway, updates have been slow due to work, but here's the next one. Update 13 Ancient Crypt I figure it's time I start advancing through the wastes part of the map, and this one has a decent amount of XP from the high level ghosts. The first and last parts are fairly simple, just disable the crystals to stop the mines and turrets from going off. The ghosts, on the other hand, deal fairly high damage and can teleport, making them a bit annoying to fight without Essence Shield. Thankfully they're not immune to stun, so my Ur-glaahk can keep them crowd controlled with its stun wave. The biggest issue are the level 18 Crypt Guardians. They don't have too much hp, but they can deal around 100 damage per hit and enrage themselves. They're also not immune to stun, but due to their high level, accuracy is a coin flip against them - I make sure to keep everyone blessed to minimize the miss chance. There's a Girdle of Leadership here which I immediately burn since I'm not allowed to have more than 0 leadership. Finishing the zone gets me enough XP to hit level 14 Dry Wastes I think I'm finally able to take out the Sholai here, so it's time to give this zone a shot. The clawbugs are a nuisance at worst. The support pylon is a little annoying, but I can lure most of the clawbugs away from it, then force through it with all my creations. They have 0 armor, so my baton does a surprising amount of damage despite me being a weakling shaper. Zinaida and her sholai are the bigger threat in this zone. They're only level 11-12, but they have hp in the 300-400 range and can hit fairly hard, with 2 of them being mages. My strategy is to keep at least one sholai dominated at all times so the sholai will focus themselves down while my creations attack from a distance. It works pretty well, and Psychopath provides support with Spray Crystals and Airshock. Unlike a lot of friendly NPCs, these guys actually give XP when killed. Nice! Patrolled Dell The Sholai patrols are pretty tame. The enemies are all standard without extra hp, so the typical strategies work against them. Gayev and Borkin on the other hand are a pretty formidable duo, being a high level sholai warrior and mage respectively. I try to keep Borkin stunned due to his lower resist, and keep all my creations except an Essence Shielded Ur-Glaahk in the back. I'm able to wear them down with acid, and luckily the Create Drayk canister they block opens up when they die. A lot of optional canisters that you can get with a leadership are locked out if you kill the NPC, so I'm glad this one isn't the same. Sofya on the other hand is pretty easy since she's by herself. She has a Shielding Knife on her, which could be useful for a Shaper if only it didn't require 3 melee skills. I have 1 right now, and I don't think it's worth 9 points to get to level 3... Winding Road More Sholai - same story. There are also 2 "friendly" serviles that I have to kill. They normally give a quest to kill a battle beta, if you kill them first they never open the path to it, so I guess that battle beta gets to live. This is another zone with essence pools, so I get to take my time killing everything and staying at good essence/hp. Trepelev isn't too bad after I distract him by dominating his clawbug guards. The servile cultists in the east have some annoying AoE damage, but they aren't especially hard to kill. This zone has a Symbiotic Cloak - a reasonable pick over Danette's Cloak if you aren't running much of an essence buffer. There's also a canister of Dominate which means I don't have to rely solely on my Ur-Glaahk any more. Even better, my version doesn't have a cooldown. It's hard to overstate just how powerful dominate is in this game. Guarded Bridge I've had access to this zone for a while, but the sholai blocking it (and their 4 reaper turrets!) are pretty tough, and I wanted to go through the Mines anyway. This time, however, I have Airshock and Dominate which absolutely decimates the Sholai. The turrets deal massive damage, but mostly attack whatever is closest, which in this case happens to be dominated Sholai. I like to think the river also makes for convenient body disposal. No good loot, alas.

"Clearly barring wasn't enough, we need to burn the island to the ground" Although, naturally I'm going to try to end by using the Geneforge, so I think the Shaper Council is going to have bigger issues than an investigation into Sucia.