Gf3: Battle shaping worth it???

[The1Kobra]

Ok,...

I've played through Gf3 twice, and ive *Never* found a use for battle shaping. Ive tried using plated bugs, and they can't do more than about 40 with a swing (And miss nearly every time). Ive found battle alphas quite useless, as ive found a simple fyora tends to last longer and does comparable damage, and cryoas do *much* more damage. The only *somewhat* useful battle creation ive found is the thahd, as it can soak up shots so your more important creations dont get whacked, but even then, aren't very useful (After all, the thahd trades the fyoras ranged attack for 35 hp and thats *it*.) And simply, ive found Glaahks to be better than *any* of the battle creations, simply for its stun. From my experience (Gf3 only) ive found that battle creations just dont cut it, and I dont think its worth getting *any* points in it.

I'm wondering what other opinions are... (Gf3 only, ive found Battle Shaping to be nice in 2.)

[I_am_a_Minotaur]

It is useful. Rotghoroths are probably the best endgame creation and you can get them as no canister loyalist and rebel.

[Suspicious Vlish]

Bobby:

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Rotghoroths are probably the best endgame creation and you can get them as no canister loyalist and rebel.

The Rotgroth would be good, if he didn't get whipped by acid and magic attacks, which are the main forms of damage utilized by the endgame opponents.

 

Kobra:

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I've played through Gf3 twice, and ive *Never* found a use for battle shaping.

There is one nice use for battle shaping. I'll explain later, but let's continue.

 

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Ive tried using plated bugs, and they can't do more than about 40 with a swing (And miss nearly every time).

Plated bugs used to kick butt in GF1. Then their damage got reduced in GF3, and they are rather frail to boot. So I agree, plated bugs are useless

 

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Ive found battle alphas quite useless,

Agreed.

 

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as ive found a simple fyora tends to last longer and does comparable damage,

Debatable. I really don't agree with that, although I agree that fyora are better value for essence.

 

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and cryoas do *much* more damage.

Correct.

 

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The only *somewhat* useful battle creation ive found is the thahd, as it can soak up shots so your more important creations dont get whacked, but even then, aren't very useful

Actually, the only useful battle creation is the thahd shade, which is why I always sink a point into battle shaping. The thahd shade is immune to poison, terror attacks, and mental attacks. He also has nimbleness, the hitpoints of a battle alpha, and does only slightly less damage.

So does the Searing Artila. However, the Searing Artila doesn't have one thing which the Thahd has, and that is immunity to cold. Having a meat shield which is immune to cold is useful at several points in the game, where Cyroa's swarm you. On torment, cyroa's can do 100+ damage with one breath of cold, which none of your other creations are immune to. Ergo, your Glaaks and Vlish get torn to shreds. It's quite embarassing.

 

So I send a Thahd shade down to take the icy breathe, and fire at the those Cyroas with my Vlish. Problem solved!

 

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ive found Glaahks to be better than *any* of the battle creations, simply for its stun.

The Glaahk is awesome, no doubt about it. Quite expensive, but a sight better than the boring alpha.

 

So, all in all, I think that battle shaping is worth a point. It starts of at 2. You can create thahd shade at battle shaping of 3. So only need to spend 2 skill points on it, to raise it to a level 3.

2 skill points for insurance against ice breathing monsters (one of the most damaging attacks in the game) is worth it in my opinion.

Then spend the rest in intelligence and magic shaping!

[Archaeolagent]

Rotghroths are certainly good and don't deserve to get trashed with the rest of battle shaping. I'm hard pressed to see how they're the best creation, though. There are situations in which they're extremely useful, but their QA is low enough that Gazers will do as much damage on the whole (and more consistently), and the lack of a missile attack makes Rots less flexible. Eyebeasts and Vlish would certainly have to be in the running, too.

[Delicious Vlish]

Rots are practically useless for a Loyalist. I mean that in a very broad general sense. I mean, they are just not all that great. Many of your endgame enemies are rots, or other strong creations which tend to resist the rots' attacks. Rots are much better for a Rebel who will be fighting against "legal" creations in the endgame. Rots are also especially vunerable to magic attacks and reapers.

 

Battle creations have their issues, but they are not useless. Battle creations on torment are not about damage. They are your mobile armor division, a distraction, they are there to run interference, plug up a bottle neck to keep nasties on the other side away from your fragile artillery units, They are there to absorb damage, take blows, and occasionally tag an enemy to keep hostility and agression focused on the front lines where it belongs instead of your rear ranks where it doesn't. Battle Alphas and Betas are not bad creations at all. They have a lot of life and tend to take quite a beating. Thahd Shades do this job quite well too. It takes an awful lot to bring a Beta down. When I create mine, I add points to endurance. Do they do a lot of damage? Some times. Do they save me from taking a lot of damage? Heck yes! I know for sure when I plant a Beta in a doorway or similar point of bottleneck, I know that line of scrimage is going to be held. I know that my rear ranks wont have to waste precious action points repositioning themselves to safety, which means more shots fired, which means more damage done. I know I can plant a pair of Betas or Alphas in to a slightly wider bottleneck and hold the area. There are times when the Alphabet Maulers don't even attack because they are so stunned, but I don't need them to attack, I need them to hold the line.

 

And that's what they do best. I can cast Augmentation on a Beta and use an Armor potion and get darn near 1000 hit points. And nothing in the game can damage him faster than I can heal him.

[I_am_a_Minotaur]

Rots stun. They are like much stronger glahks. Stunning is very useful.

[Delicious Vlish]

Glaahks are cheaper in cost and do a much better job of slowing and stunning. They also do more damage than rots. Glaahks are also highly resistant to magical damage of all kinds.

 

The rot's acid based attack can be resisted by far to many enemies... The Glaahk's attack is very hard to resist. All to often, there are spots where rots do an astouding 1 damage to something, like to other rots. They don't even do enough damage to counter regen in many cases. Which is a real pain in the tentacles.

[Archaeolagent]

ALL CREATURES STUN.

 

ALL ATTACKS STUN.

 

Higher level attacks might have a higher chance to stun, or might stun for more, though if there's a difference it's pretty small. Ice Bolt and I think also Icy Touch have a special chance to stun, 70% if the documentation is to be believed; they also stun heavily. The stun wand, whatever it's called, presumably has a 100% chance of stun though to be honest I don't think I've ever used one. Levels of stun delivered may be dependent on damage type.

 

Stunning is completely separate from slowing, which is caused only by Vlish missile attacks, Glaahk melee attacks, Gazer/Eyebeast melee attacks, and the Icy Touch attack used by ghosts, as far as I know.

 

Slow seems to have the same effect no matter how much of it you have, which is to reduce your AP by 50% every other round only. Stunning, in contrast, definitely does more when you're hit with more of it. Stunning reduces your AP by some proportion based on how many levels of stun you have. In practice, you have to be stunned many times, or be hit by several ice attacks to get below 5 AP -- unless you are also slowed that round, because the AP reductions are cumulative.

[Delicious Vlish]

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Originally written by John Paul v. Jean-Paul:
ALL CREATURES STUN.

ALL ATTACKS STUN.

Higher level attacks might have a higher chance to stun, or might stun for more, though if there's a difference it's pretty small. Ice Bolt and I think also Icy Touch have a special chance to stun, 70% if the documentation is to be believed; they also stun heavily. The stun wand, whatever it's called, presumably has a 100% chance of stun though to be honest I don't think I've ever used one. Levels of stun delivered may be dependent on damage type.

Null Wands are stupidly overpowered because their ability to stun ramps up because of the missile skill and dex. The level of stun caused by a high missile skill level is obnoxious. The length of time spent stunned is amazing.

[Mehrunes]

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Originally written by Delicious Vlish:
Rots are practically useless for a Loyalist. I mean that in a very broad general sense. I mean, they are just not all that great. Many of your endgame enemies are rots, or other strong creations which tend to resist the rots' attacks...

..Battle creations have their issues, but they are not useless. Battle creations on torment are not about damage. They are your mobile armor division, a distraction, they are there to run interference, plug up a bottle neck to keep nasties on the other side away from your fragile artillery units, They are there to absorb damage, take blows, and occasionally tag an enemy to keep hostility and agression focused on the front lines where it belongs instead of your rear ranks where it doesn't...

These two points are in contradiction with each other. If Battle Creations are best used to absorb damage than Rots are actually the best Battle Creation for Loyalists for the very reason that you face so many Rots in the endgame. If enemy Rots are extremely resistant to your Rot's damage, than your Rots are just resistant to enemy Rot's damage. That's been my experience, at least.

[Delicious Vlish]

It has been my experience that Alphabet Brutes hold up on the front lines better than rots... Maybe because I get them earlier and they level a good bit as I travel.

 

It is my experience mind you, that leads me to say this. Rots go down all to quickly to searing orbs and ice bolt attacks of the enemy. Aura of flames eats them up. I am not sure why, but the Alphabet Brutes seem to last longer on the front lines... Just feel tougher. Also, Alphabet Brutes are a lot cheaper to upgrade and customise. I can dump a lot of points in to endurance and not spend as much essence as I would doing it with a rot.

 

Don't get me wrong... Rots are nice and all. I just don't find them all that useful for a Loyalist. Especially with no canisters and jacked up physical stats. I have better ways to spend my limited essence and get better results.

[Archaeolagent]

Something DeVlish alludes to that would also help balance the creations would be to make the cost to improve creation statistics not be creation-dependent... or at least to make it less creation-dependent. The fact that it costs so much less to upgrade a Vlish than a third-tier creation is one of the reasons Vlish are better even at equal levels. Similarly, it costs something like 6, 7, 8... to upgrade a Battle Alpha's scores. It costs 14, 15, 16... to upgrade a Rot's.

 

Or, better yet, it could be related to creation type. Make it cheaper to upgrade Battle creation Strength or Endurance. Make it cheaper to upgrade Fire creation Dexterity. And so on.

[Delicious Vlish]

Yeah. I agree. I can make an Alpha or a Beta with more hit points for fewer essence costs than a Rotter. I mean, you can have a creation with almost a thousand health (properly buffed of course) for just about half of what it costs to make a base Rotter. In one game, I had an Alpha named Timex just to keep me amused. Most of the time Timex couldn't hit the broadside of the barn. He had a hard time connecting with the high level endgame enemies on his own. (Buffing helped) When he did hit, he hit HARD though. He had a lot of strength. Mostly, he just stood there and acted as a punching bag. He never once came close to death, never caused me to panic worrying about if I needed to coddle him along till he got stronger, I created him, and when he leveled, I added to his stats when I could. He started off strong and finished out the game darn near indestructable. Other common names for my Alphabet Brutes are Numbskull, Dimwit, Moron, and Samsonite.

 

And, like you said, that's why I have been saying Vlish are overpowered all this time. You can jack them up and make them in to monsters... I mean real MONSTERS and you can do it for cheap.

[Zeviz]

Talking about meat shields, is it true that maxing out Thahd Shade's dexterity makes it almost impossible for anything to hit it?

[Delicious Vlish]

Yeah, pretty much.

[Zeviz]

In that case would Thahd Shade make better defender than any other battle creation? (If nobody can hit it, you don't even have to heal it.) Or does it cost so much essence to max out dexterity that you might as well make 2 Battle Betas instead?

[Delicious Vlish]

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Originally written by Zeviz:
In that case would Thahd Shade make better defender than any other battle creation? (If nobody can hit it, you don't even have to heal it.) Or does it cost so much essence to max out dexterity that you might as well make 2 Battle Betas instead?

Depends on your character, how you play, and what you need. There are occasions where a Thahd Shade would foot the bill... Some times sheer numbers is an asset. At other times, well, you gotta wing it with what you have.

[Archaeolagent]

Also, it will become very hard to hit, but it will still get hit at least once in a while; if enemies hit for a lot, creations with stronger offenses might be more practical. That said, Thahd Shades do have a very nice base level (= endurance and total HP) and decent base HP bonuses.