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| I want your thoughts on soloing[message #205372]
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Fri, 02 January 2009 02:26 
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 Blood Axis |
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Messages:8
Registered:August 2007 |
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I want to hear your thoughts on soloing through the game. Now, there are some different variables to take into account:
IMP or otherwise?
Allow other mercs as mules?
Start out with lots of money and equipment (using cheats)? Basically, whether to care about the strategy part of the game.
Stealth or more aggressive tactics?
Vanilla, Wildfire, 1.13, or some other mod? (I currently play 1.13 with HAM 2.
Whether to camp and train yourself up for like a year, or to blitz through the game?
Allow help from roaming militia or not?
Basically, I want to know all there is to know about soloing! What kind of merc should you use, what tactics, what strategy (if logistics are an issue)? Also I want to know if it would be possible at all to take Meduna solo? I am thinking it would be completely impossible to do it with overt fighting, but could you sneak past all the soldiers and just take out the Queen?
My thoughts are that you could basically go with 2 different mercs, either a really strong guy with EOD armor and modded MG (Ameli with rod&spring can do 90 rounds with 25 AP, possibly more) or maybe sniper rifle (depending on mod) and just try to avoid having your stamina sapped too much. I feel this could work for some of the earlier maps. Another approach would be a very good sneaker equipped with VSS or somesuch. The Milkor, loaded with mustard gas, would probably also be a good option (mortar would probably be too heavy for one guy to manage). The approach would be to just try and avoid combat, and go straight for the objectives. If money is an issue, then you would have to try and do a lot of creative things, such as sneaking into cities and decapitating the terrorists, as well as taking out Kingpin early. Selling weapons to Tony would be limited a lot by carrying capacity. If you got a vehicle, gas would be very scarce since you probably couldn't get Shank out of Tixa.
Your thoughts on all this?
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| Re: I want your thoughts on soloing[message #205374]
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Fri, 02 January 2009 03:34 
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| Headrock |
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Messages:1757
Registered:March 2006
Location: Jerusalem |
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I took Ivan on a fully solo campaign in JA2 (Expert... was much easier then) and 1.13 (on Experienced). Did the same with an IMP, but with attributes set rather high (played with the INI settings a bit). Here are my tips:
Choosing a merc
Pick a merc who has either great shooting and agility, or high experience level, or both. It's usually recommended that it be a very good AIM merc (like Shadow, Ivan, or even Lynx). Magic and Scully are a tad too expensive although if you're good, taking either would work great. Money WILL be a serious issue, unless of course you took the IMP, in that case you'll be swimming in cash but may have a harder time fighting before you get up to speed.
Make sure that your merc has at least one of the following:
A) Night Vision
B) Stealth
C) Lockpicking
D) Knifing or martial arts, if you like melee
All other skills are not very useful in a solo campaign. Forget camouflage (although Shadow can still solo because he's damn good).
Starting strategy
Your best option is to head to San Mona first, do the Angel quest if you can, and thus get enough money to continue to Chitzena and take the mine there. Of course you could also spend some of that money on Tony's stuff, which would probably really help. Chitzena is relatively easy to conquer due to the large amounts of cover there. Of course, you'll want to attack by night (see below). There are only two sectors to take, and a single merc can reinforce the town relatively quickly, although there's few places to retreat to should the queen overwhelm your militia. If the enemy takes the mine, reconquer it as many times as necessary until the situation is stable. Without a working mine, you'll have issues with your merc pretty soon. Unless you've got a great IMP, of course.
Alternately, you could go for Drassen first. The advantage here is that if you've played the game a few times (or, many times), you'll probably know Drassen's layout by heart, and can effectively fight there with just one merc, weaving in and out of buildings and over rooftops to take the enemy out in small bites. This is the best option if you've got an IMP, because if you can hold the town for a few days, you might have enough money to buy some great equipment from Bobby Ray's. If you've got an AIM merc however, you'll need every bit of money you can get, so Drassen may not be the best option (take it second, after Chitzena.
Oh, and don't bother with the helicopter or SAM sites AT ALL, until you've got at least two cities under your control. Your only use for the helicopter is to quickly take you to a city that needs to be reinforced with militia. In all other cases, travel on foot to gain strength (and in 1.13, health). You'll need both. Try to find really heavy objects to carry around with you. Accept the fact that the campaign will be SLOW before you even begin playing - it'll be slow even if you use the helicopter all the time. At least this way you're improving your character.
Additionally, you could always choose to practice for a hundred days before you start conquering, but of course this is subject to your own perspective on cheating or exploiting the game. It's not really necessary anyway, as a solo merc would gain experience and skill levels VERY quickly even without practice.
Progress
Consolidate your holdings. Take as long as necessary to clear enemies from town vicinity, and if necessary take sectors one by one. A good idea might be to start training militia as soon as loyalty goes over 20%, because defending an entire city like Cambria or Alma can be extremely difficult with just one person. Defending two or three sectors is considerably easier, especially if you have a few militiamen to help. Again, do NOT fight a battle that is unfavourable (like daytime). Retreating and counter-attacking yields much better results.
Do not leave a town until you are absolutely confident that the militia can hold it themselves. If you're training mobile militia, it would really help to get a strong contingent of patrollers before moving on to attack someplace else.
As for Meduna, it would probably work best to sneak through the entire city, if you can, and hitting the queen at her palace by blasting open the outer and inner walls on the southwestern side and taking the bitch out before she can reach the fireplace. This may feel like a bit of cheating, but hey you're ONE GUY, you need to be smart if you want to win. Taking out the entire palace without any help can easily end your career, and Militia are REALLY bad at helping in meduna palace anyway. If you still want to slog through it, I would suggest taking the tunnels into the throne room instead. sneak into the maze sector, run the maze to the remote control and go into the tunnel ASAP. Inside the tunnel, use explosives extensively. Pop up in the queen's bedroom and waste her.
Tactics
Obviously there are many ways to fight, but I'll give you what I've got.
My best tactics so far have been to fight ONLY at night if possible, going so far as retreating from day battles if they occur. Engage enemies with a silenced weapon, then withdraw and change location (that is, move to a different part of the map and attack from a different side). This may be tedious, but it works fine for at least the first parts of the game. Never let the enemy draw you into a shooting battle, always try to get him to follow you, then try to lose him and attack him from a different angle or retreat to a safer location. In JA2 vanilla, there comes a point where your merc gets so good that he can engage enemies continuously as they don't even get a chance to respond. In 1.13 this is different, because enemies will try to surround you and keep you from getting away. However, in 1.13 you have the potential of acquiring silenced ranged weapons (like a VSS or even a silenced M21 EBR, plus a silenced P90/Magpul for up-close and personal encounters), which basically makes you the king of the night-time battlefield. Obviously, night-vision goggles are a must. Also forget armor, anything that gives you penalties to AP. You need speed and stealth, and enemies won't often get the chance to fire back at all.
Also, forget break lights - you'll want to keep the battlefield dark so you can move around unhindered. If you want to carry grenades, carry SMOKE, as it will greatly help you in situations where an enemy is holed up in a dark room and the only entrance is through a well-lit doorway. Consider carrying at least one high explosive to bust open walls.
Finally, again, never let the enemies outnumber you in combat. If you're engaged by two or more, flee. Always try to engage in one-on-one fights and end them as quickly as you possibly can. If this fails, consider killing one, retreating, and coming back to kill more. This works too, but again is a bit exploitative.
1.13 Specific tips
In 1.13, roaming militia can be the greatest asset for the Solo Merc. Why fight alone when you can get 20 elite helpers? Of course, this isn't REALLY soloing it, but on Expert it might be impossible to fight without them... Of course, do remember that unless you have Roaming Restrictions turned off, there will be many cases when the militia don't help.
In 1.13, you may want to consider the Sniper skill instead of stealth/knifing. This will help at first with a small bonus to CTH, and later will really help when you've got a silent sniper weapon - for those nice 100% CTH headshots in the dark.
And of course, in 1.13 there's always the counterattack to deal with. If you're going to solo the counterattack, I would personally recommend to NOT FIGHT IT. Let the enemies attack and even capture a few city sectors, then counter-attack them and wear them out. Remember to keep scrounging their ammo as you do, so that in case you need to retreat, you have something to come back with. Keep "stinging" them until you can take whole sectors from them, it's far easier than taking a stand against 60+ enemies at the same time.
Soloing in HAM??
Part of the idea behind HAM is to kill various exploits in the game. It doesn't achieve that goal completely, but I did manage to make some of the normal tactics unfeasible. Due to this, I'm not sure you could Solo effectively in HAM. At the first sign of trouble, enemies will suck out your APs with a good burst, which can put you in a serious problem and unable to retreat. Additionally, HAM's suppression system is built so that teamwork is almost obligatory; this is due to the Cowering Penalty which makes it harder to shoot suppressed enemies. Therefore, in HAM if you cannot take an enemy out while they're still standing, they're going to get really hard to hit. A character with lots of Agility and lightly armored may be able to kill one enemy while that enemy is cowering, by suppressing, then closing the distance very rapidly and taking some snap shots for the kill. However, this would require some great tactical work, and on the whole would get you killed if the enemy's not alone. I don't think HAM is strong enough to negate night-time silent sniping though, but I do think that with the sniping restriction systems I've installed, it would be much harder for a single merc to take on enemies in the second half of the campaign while using the night-sniper strategy, than in vanilla or in unmodded 1.13.
In other words, with HAM you might have to consider having militia reinforce you whenever possible, which works well because of HAM's dynamic militia restrictions. However, this means your merc can't take advantage of slow deliberate tactics and smart maneuvers. As to soloing purely in HAM, if you're going to try it I would absolutely love to hear the results.
Quote:(if logistics are an issue)?
No, the game is really easy logistically, especially if you're playing Drop-All, but in either case you'll have plenty of equipment and can always buy great stuff from BR once you start raking in vast amounts of money (you're only paying one guy, remember?)
Quote: The Milkor, loaded with mustard gas, would probably also be a good option (mortar would probably be too heavy for one guy to manage).
Not really. Too many enemies have gas masks, plus they know how to avoid the gas, at least in 1.13.
Quote:(mortar would probably be too heavy for one guy to manage)
There's a reason such weapons are called "support weapons", otherwise all soldiers would have a mortar. Area damage is great when the enemy is massed up, and to mass it up you need several people working together. A solo guy would get surrounded REALLY fast.
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| Re: I want your thoughts on soloing[message #205382]
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Fri, 02 January 2009 12:13
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| cougar |
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Messages:254
Registered:March 2000 |
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Blood_AxisI want to hear your thoughts on soloing through the game. Now, there are some different variables to take into account:
How nice, one of my favorite subjects. I have taken three insane solo campaigns the last year, working on my fourth now. I have been playing solo since a story on this board came out in 2001 (sadly most of it is gone) that inspired me. It is not as hard as one can imagine. Yes you will have to face drawbacks but you have several advantages too:
You will not have to worry about morale (unless in very extreme cases).
Your entire team will have the best weapons. 
It is much easier to retreat or avoid confrontation.
Blood_Axis
IMP or otherwise?
Definitely an I.M.P. I usually go with automatic weapons and night vision. Lower every skill to max out your wisdom, health, agility and strength. Marksmanship can be put all the way to the bottom if you want but be advised that this will be a bit harder in the beginning, I usually put it at 45-50. As you won't lose any money standing around feel free to put medical and mechanical at a fairly low number (unless you want to lockpick).
Blood_Axis
Allow other mercs as mules?
No. One of the biggest challenges (and one of the best part) is to get all the items to your base of operations.
Blood_Axis
Start out with lots of money and equipment (using cheats)? Basically, whether to care about the strategy part of the game.
Yes and no, I suggest you hire a reasonably merc from AIM on the first day and grab his or hers equipment. You can even hire more if you want specialty items like tool boxes. Just remember that you have to carry everything yourself.
Blood_Axis
Stealth or more aggressive tactics?
Both. I can tell you that after I get to level 5-6 I often drop everything suppressed except a pistol as backup and a couple of throwing knives. The thing is that you always want to fight on your terms (i.e at night when you are fully rested) and I don't feel that suppressed weapons are good enough. But that's just me, it might suit you.
Blood_Axis
Vanilla, Wildfire, 1.13, or some other mod? (I currently play 1.13 with HAM 2.
1.13 with 100 AP and Wildfire maps. Be prepared for a tough challenge if you do this. I wouldn't go with HAM for a solo game actually, the thought of being suppressed while alone is scary. Besides I doubt you will be able to use suppression to great effect either.
Blood_Axis
Whether to camp and train yourself up for like a year, or to blitz through the game?
No that is boring. Just adjust the values in the ini or proedit.
Blood_Axis
Allow help from roaming militia or not?
No, they are crap and you have to invest time and money to train them just to have them screw up a battle.
Blood_Axis
Basically, I want to know all there is to know about soloing! What kind of merc should you use, what tactics, what strategy (if logistics are an issue)? Also I want to know if it would be possible at all to take Meduna solo? I am thinking it would be completely impossible to do it with overt fighting, but could you sneak past all the soldiers and just take out the Queen?
Yes it can be done either way at any difficulty. The palace is pretty easy if you know what you are doing.
Blood_Axis
My thoughts are that you could basically go with 2 different mercs, either a really strong guy with EOD armor and modded MG (Ameli with rod&spring can do 90 rounds with 25 AP, possibly more) or maybe sniper rifle (depending on mod) and just try to avoid having your stamina sapped too much. I feel this could work for some of the earlier maps.
Don't take the EOD armor, if you are taking that much damage to need it soloing might not be for you. I usually find myself using a burst capable 5.56 or 7.62 NATO assault rifle with specialty weapons such as sniper rifles. In my latest game I skipped leggings except for leg protectors and I have found that it is actually a viable alternative.
Blood_Axis
Another approach would be a very good sneaker equipped with VSS or somesuch. The Milkor, loaded with mustard gas, would probably also be a good option (mortar would probably be too heavy for one guy to manage). The approach would be to just try and avoid combat, and go straight for the objectives.
I believe this should be clear now, I am not a fan of sneaky combat in any configuration. Yes it does have it uses but I don't like it as a primary fighting style so I can't help you here.
Blood_Axis
If money is an issue, then you would have to try and do a lot of creative things, such as sneaking into cities and decapitating the terrorists, as well as taking out Kingpin early. Selling weapons to Tony would be limited a lot by carrying capacity. If you got a vehicle, gas would be very scarce since you probably couldn't get Shank out of Tixa.
If you play with Wildfire maps gas will not be a problem. Even without it you can go quite a while with the few cans you can find.
My five main points when soloing a game:
1. Time is your friend, you have nothing keeping you from resting up for two weeks once in a while.
2. You decide when you want to fight, not the enemy.
3. Know your surroundings, play the game a few times the regular way before you embark on a solo campaign. Take note of cover, blind spots and items.
4. Steal items.
5. Know your limitations.
Feel free to ask more specific questions. Note that I didn't read Headrocks post in full so I might be repeating it a bit.
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Master Sergeant
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| Re: I want your thoughts on soloing[message #206145]
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Mon, 12 January 2009 04:16
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| sphinx |
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Messages:42
Registered:February 2007 |
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Heh... I happen to be a longtime soloist too. With 1.13 you can do pretty much what you want so it's up to your conscience how much "cheating" you wanna do. You can probably get away with the default settings too. Up to you. I always tweak down the militia training a bit. But as for practical tips:
1) Use a gun with high rate of fire, with at least normal reliability, not-too-high draw cost and maybe most importantly pick a calibre that the enemy uses a lot. The HK 416 series is my personal favorite here. They can mount all the good stuff, they use the 5.56mm ammo which is plenty later on and they require only occasional repairing (remember, your gun is going to see a LOT of use). If you're swimming in money, order some other fancy-ass gun, the one that uses that superb ammo that enemy never drops and restock between fights. This however adds up to traveling time. Or balance between the two: use that cool weapon only occasionally. Also, consider guns that can hold 100 rounds or more. Reloading take APs. On the other hand, you might pick a new gun after every fight and never repair one... No MEC skill for you then though.
2) Since your merc is going to be a very versatile character he will need the best LBE gear to carry all that stuff. Medical Pouch is good for all those essential syringes and the FA kit, then there was this patrol vest (combat pack) which name I can't remember. It had two large slots and four smaller ones (good for wire cutters, flares and lockpicks). As for the other vest, try the utility vest which has two medium pockets, each one big enough to carry a C4 charge or a gas mask. Buy one of each from Bobby Ray and experiment, LBE gear is cheap stuff.
3) Sniper rifles, machine guns and mortars: only during town defense. I'd recommend carrying that commando mortar with a single round in it. Use that round well during that major fight. Use sniper rifle if there's a lot of open space and you'd fancy some sniping. Machine gun fire is best directed at clusters of enemies, if you don't have that mortar ready... Oh, and use tracer ammo for that machine gun.
4) Since the way how line of sight now works, you can totally sneak up on almost any enemy during night. Here's how the exploit goes: start sneak-running towards the enemy who has his back facing you, leave few APs and stop, look the other way so that your merc can't see the enemy anymore, hit End Turn and instantly turn to look again at the enemy's direction. Voila, first turn and full 25 APs again at your disposal. This way you can stab most enemies during a night-op. Avoid turn-based mode for as long as possible.
5) Daytime attacks can be survived... if you're facing only 8-10 enemies or less. And have a decent assault rifle or a sniper rifle. And your merc can shoot.
6) Mustard gas grenades can deal a lot of damage, especially in realtime. If you get detected during a night-op, run back and lob a mustard gas grenade at your previous position and hide until the gas has dissipated. If you're lucky, the grenade ultimately takes out 5 enemies or more. Try landmines in this similar fashion too.
7) Consider using only generation 2 or 3 NV-goggles. Too big viewing distance makes you spot the enemy earlier, which means he's farther to shoot at or it takes longer to reach him by running...
When traveling on foot out there in the wild, keep your gun loaded with HP or Glaser ammo for those bloodcats. Consider a shotgun with buckshot ammo too.
9) You can travel with a lot of stuff but you really don't need to carry that repair kit in combat. Drop all the heavy non-combat stuff at the beginning of the battle. Choose your entry point accordingly (so that you won't be forced into turn-based instantly).
10) If you go for the Crepitus, consider bringing two guns as well as a lot of ammo. You'll be shooting a LOT. One gun might not last, depending on the gun.
11) If you don't have a silenced gun in a night-op, don't stay still too long after firing the gun. Take down enemies one at a time and run away with the remaining APs, and hope you're not running into the arms of a blackshirt....
12) Since I play with Drop All enabled, hauling all the stuff is pretty much impossible. Only carry around the stuff that is rare to come by. Energy boosters (which are sometimes essential), grenades in good condition, possibly the other accessories to your gun that the gun can't mount at the moment, a crowbar... you'll figure this stuff out
13) Remember HK 416? It's a semi-decent silenced gun if you have cold-loaded ammo. This is why I lug around the AR silencer, the ISM-V-IR scope and bunch of cold-loaded ammo with it wherever I go.
14) Grenades are stealth weapons. They make no muzzle flash nor muzzle sound. Use this information well.
15) You can build your MED skill a lot by healing up dying militia. Carry a medkit or two during that town defense. Let them fight, you be the medic in training...
16) You can carry a seemingly infinite amount of stuff in backpacks since backpacks can hold other fully loaded backpacks... Should this little oversight be fixed in the future, you're going to have to make multiple trips to sectors with tanks due to those all those space-hogging LAWs. Fill your backpack with LAWs, leave them at the tank sector and retreat to get more LAWs. They'll probably be still there when you get back. Fight when you have enough to take out all the tanks in the sector.
17) Don't start using Energy Boosters unless you're sure you won't pass out in the middle of the battle. Either that or have multiple boosters ready. It's fun to have 40+ APs and start beating up a guy... unarmed attack AP costs don't scale like gun or knife AP costs...
18) As for the IMP himself, invest in AGI, Health, WIS and MRK. High STR might be tempting too if you don't mind that "big guy" appearance... Leave LDR as low as possible, it'll soar after you start training the militia. High enough MEC might be tempting too, for that initial repair kit and guns that don't misfire... For skills, you can do fine without Auto Weapons. This is because there are attachments that eliminate the burst penalty. There are, however, no items that compensate for Electronics or Teaching. I've currently taken a liking to Martial Arts and Camouflage.
19) During town defense, pick your spot carefully beforehand. Think about the weapon you're going to use. Is it long range? Short range? If it's long range stay back and take careful shots. If it's short range, stay close and duck behind cover between shots. Sure, this might risk interrupt but it's war, there are always risks. Or crouch behind a door and close it at the end of the turn. You'll never get interrupted after opening a door.
20) Do NOT carry a backpack in combat. Ever. It eats up your AP. If your backpack and combat pack are incompatible, like most are, carry the combat pack in your hand when travelling.
21) Use match ammo to compensate the lack of effective gun range. Use AET ammo in guns that can withstand its abuse.
22) Your torso will get hit most often. Protect it accordingly. Meaning, order that Dyneema vest, plates and a single tube of Compund-18 from Bobby Ray if not anything else,
23) Avoid loading over 100% of your carry capacity. Your stamina is as precious as your health. In fact, aim at 80% so that you can "afford" to take a hit or two. Speaking of which...
24) Do NOT get hit. You can't afford that. APs are your lifeline. Stamina loss hurts your AP as much as health loss. This is why stun grenades thrown at you are lethal. You pass out, you die. Probably. Also, doctoring takes a lot of time. Welcome to the city of Reload Savegame. Population: you.
Whew....
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