Mechalibur

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.

Update 12 I'm level 13 by the end of this update. I forget if it happened in this update or partway through the last update. Barren's Research The serviles let me into their encampment after seeing my cockatrice feather and immediately regret it when I start tearing them open. I'm grateful the guards here don't have inflated hp values like they do in a lot of zones. Ascended Alonzo on the otherhand is an absolute power-house and managed to take out most of my creations before I finally take him out. He has high hp combined with a cure spell, so I have to keep re-applying acid if I want it to stick. He also has the explosive boils abilities that pyroroamers have. Weird. He drops Charge Vestments which I equip. I miss the shaping bonus on the shaper robes, but I think the extra defense and magic damage is slightly more useful. Killing him drops the Bunker key, although I'm not ready for that zone yet. It also seems to cause Yu-La to despawn for some reason, maybe she ran away? The only other notable NPC here is Eroc, who has very high stats and hits like a truck. I talk to Mind Swanwick who gives me the first quest I've ever received since starting the game! I guess I'll get the cockatrice research documents and give them to him when I finally make it to the Geneforge. Power Station I deal with the fyora-pocalypse then take out the annoying drayk. Sadly I'm out of mind nutrients so I can't do anything with the Servant Mind here. Power Core Oh boy, a zone full of environmental damage. I decide to unsummon everything and just power through this solo since keep everyone's hp up is too much of a hassle, and Psychopath has pretty good energy resist by himself. The shades here aren't too tough, so I power through them with essence lances and make my way around the zone. There's a Guardian Claymore here that's a bit irrelevant since I'm not getting 8 melee weapon skill this playthrough. What is important is the Create Drayk canister. I'm finally able to make all the creations in the game, and I shape one to replace my roamer. The Hill I'd like to nominate this for "Most Forgettable Zone" in the game. The only notable treasure is a Charge Vestment, but I already picked one up from Alonzo. No canisters, no interesting enemies, just a gauntlet of spawners. The Arena I encounter a battle beta who doesn't like fighting. Too bad for him I love it. This zone is pretty simple as long as you unlock the rooms one at a time, although one of the special Volatile Thahds that drops a reaper baton actually shoots reapers at you in-battle. I never noticed that before. I can't do anything with Janus due to my leadership deficiency.

The 3 shapers are actually pretty easy. They don't really do much - Thackerzod and Arixy just toss out a few weak spells like firebolt and searer, Kevin just spammed mass energize each turn, which is a lot of buffs, but it meant he wasn't attacking. There's a battle alpha as soon as you come up, but it dies pretty fast and it takes the rest of the shapers 2 turns to reach you. Regarding battle alphas... they aren't useless, but I'd rather have a glaahk mind control a sholai and have it tank for me. Or shoot out a shockwave and stun a bunch of them.

I'm gonna quickly go through zones now. The run is at the point where the challenge itself doesn't matter too much anymore since I hit a sufficient level and can force my way through most encounters with charm, acid, and airshock. Update 11 Refugee Cave There are way fewer Sholai than I remember here and it was pretty easy to force my way through, using charmed Sholai to tank. Killing Mascha gets me the key to her room automatically which is nice. You get a sholai lesson from one of her books, which I think means no matter how many people you kill, you always have the chance to get enough Sholai knowledge to talk to Trajkov. Dock Ruins Nothing really of note here. Roamers are old news, and a single battle alpha doesn't threaten me. Eastern Docks Pylons are always a pain to deal with, so I take a stealth path from the north to disable them, loot the facility, then deal with the Glaahk patrols one by one. I murder Don Jonz, then head upstairs. You'd think 3 fully trained Shapers could take on a single apprentice, but Thackerzod, Arixy, and Kevin are defeated without too much issue. Kevin kept spamming Mass Energize instead of attacking for some reason. East Kazg Kurit would normally offer some canisters in exchange for coin, and it turns out murder is not an acceptable alternative payment. The canisters permanently remain closed. The servile Vleel warns me that I'm not allowed to exit east, which is kind of funny because that's how I entered the zone. He and the nearby serviles are level 13, but thankfully don't have the bloated hp that a lot of guard enemies have. Charm and area damage get me through the fight with only losing a single creation. The facility in the south gets me Battle Shaping +1 but I'm not using any battle creations, so it's kind of a waste (I guess it lowers control levels. Meh). Wooded Valley I'm dismayed to find out that there doesn't appear to be any way to get past the locked door behind Sniff. This might mean Astrov and his Sholai rebels are going to be the only characters that survive the Great Sucia Massacre. Good for them. Peaceful Vale Dorian and the artilas aren't a problem at all, but Syros is a much tougher opponent. Surprisingly his hp isn't very high, but he's level 20 which means my accuracy, even with bless, is absolute garbage. I start the fight by spreading everyone out before initiating combat (I want to limit the damage of his breath), and then just hope I can get a few hits in. It takes a while due to the accuracy issues, but I'm eventually able to land some acid on him and get in enough direct hits that he goes down, although he managed to take down almost all my creations with him. He drops quicksilver boots which are pretty nice - I put them on. Unfortunately the doors he normally lets you access in exchange for skill points don't open and are forever locked to me. Free Place I think this is the first time I've ever fought Aitch before, because he's way sturdier than a remember and gets 2 actions per round. I take him out by applying acid then charming him. While he's charmed he just stands still and waits for the acid to kill him. Easy peasy. The rest of the zone isn't really notable. I gain a canister of Battle Alpha, but they aren't particularly useful compared to Glaahks, who do more damage, have better abilities, and even resist more damage. The only advantage alphas have is their hp pool, but it doesn't make up for all the other shortcomings.

We now officially have a steam page (and trailer) for Geneforge 2: Infestation: https://store.steampowered.com/app/2480560/Geneforge_2__Infestation/ The trailer has some goodies, like Zakary and Shanti's portraits, the creation shaping page (including art for the tier 4 creations and stalkthorn), and tooltips for skills like Mass Madness, Essence Purge, and Chain Lightning. As I understand it, adding a game to your wishlist helps with visibility, so I'd recommend adding it to your wishlist if you can.

All right, back from my vacation. Update 10. Underground River This is a pretty easy zone to get through. Turrets tend to be one of the easiest enemies to deal with and many of them are place in a way where I can take them out one at a time. Of note, this is the only place in the entire challenge that I can actually spend money, since the servant mind here is a glorified vending machine. That being said I'm not particularly interested in the items. The Guardian Cloak would be decent, but I'm about to get a much better cloak, so I don't bother and just clear the zone out. Eastern Mine I absorb all my creations to make this a bit faster, put on my infused robe, and just charge through the path with the fewest number of pylons. On normal mode, I can take about 5-6 hits from pylons before dying, and they'll often use their non-stunning spray attack twice in a row, letting me slip through. Mine Core I use mechanics to slip through the door that leads to the Servant Mind. When entering combat mode at the right time, you can cut a corner to avoid being in the line of sight of any of the pylons. I feed the servant mind the nutrients I looted from Kazg, then have him disable the defenses, letting me explore the rest of the mines in relative peace. There's an essence pool that I can charge up with my mechanics, and I use that to resummon my army and take out the rogue glaahks. Since my creations are all ranged, the glaahks here aren't a big deal to take out, and I grab some nice Tinkerer Gloves for a handy +2 mechanics. Northern Mine There are 3 amazing things in this zone: a canister of Create Glaahk, Danette's Cloak, and the Entry Baton. The biggest obstacle are the two battle alphas that patrol the northern room. Thankfully they're pretty easy to engage one on one and wear down their massive hundreds of hp with acid. I lose an artila fighting them, but there's an essence pool in the previous zone to fix any mishaps. I use it to resummon my army and replace a roamer with an Ur-Glaahk. I'm running at a lot less essence than normal, but the Ur-Glaahk is probably the most powerful creation in the game with easy access to charm and AoE stun, while also being quite tanky to boot. West Mines I have the servant mind disable the defenses here, then go on a rampage against the rogues. The zone is incredibly easy this way and rewards me with the phenomenal Airshock spell. By the time all of the mines are cleared out, I'm level 12. At this point in the game, I think I have all the tools needed to take on virtually any zone. Going forward I'm probably going to gloss over a lot more details.

I'll keep that in mind, but for the most part I'm trying to avoid gradually wearing down groups like that. The way Pentil went kind of left a bad taste in my mouth.