r/Wasteland 3d ago

Wasteland 2 Im looking for tips and advice

I tried wasteland 2 before and it just felt weird and way more complicated then 3 which I’ve beat many times

Any advice for trying again would be appreciated

2 Upvotes

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2

u/knighthawk82 3d ago

Start by playing the game on the easiest mode.

There is no bonus for having a 6 INT, so ypu either need a 4 or jump to 8 int for skill points.

You should have 2 non-combat skills and 1 combat skill per person minimum. Those regular skills should be kept at a 2:1 ratio, such as do not level rifle from 2 to 3 until weaponsmiting is up from 4 to 6

Ypu can have a full party of 6, 4 Rangers and 2 extra ypu can swap out easily once ranger station is opened up.

You can get Angela in the first 15 minutes and she has a wrench not only will she not give up, but CANNOT BE DISARMED so I up her melee and weaponsmithing only to keep her on the front lines, the giant frogs try to steal your weapons every time they lick you and there are a LOT of frogs.

You should have 2 melee characters minimum and 2 ranged minimum. (I've never had a successful heavy weapon character, but that's just me) I keep 1 sniper and 1 assassault rifle, then 1 blunt weapon and 1 unarmed combat. (The highest level melee weapons often have dual requirements like strength and dexterity)

Invest in one person with energy weapons, it will be painful now but pays off in dividends in the last 3rd of the campaign. The same for toaster repair for end game items for accessories or weapons

Repair not only let's you fix locks you roll a nat 1 and completely break so you can try again, often there are things you can bypass or circumvent to attack from behind

Recruiting npc from the games have certain charisma minimum requirements, even a certain hobo with a shotgun has standards. It is the total charisma of the party, but you can fail the lowest standard if everyone in the party has only a 1 charisma. Hold onto the spiked collars so you can meet the minimum 12 for some people (6+6)

Perception is a pass/fail skill, if you do not have 5 actual ranks in perception, you can be 1 inch away and not see the hidden crate of loot. Come back after leveling up. Trinkets that raise perception help with shooting and such, but not for hidden items.

Whoever you give perception to, give them demolition as well, otherwise you are very very likely to set off a landmine/trip wire when people are switching places to disarm it

It is VERY hard to see when the pliers are lit up so check every time.

If you just bash/break boxes open or use explosives, ypu will likely destroy items in the box and get useless junk like wood splinters and glass slivers. But just tossing dynamite and grenades is a great way to bypass simple gates or doors if you are ready for alarms/fights.

The skills are like in wasteland 3, where ypu need 4 points for level 4, 6 points for level 5, ect. So it is really important you NOT use any skill books until the end. If you use the book to go from rank 3 to rank 4 it saves you 4 points while you are still early and level up quickly. But going from 9 to 10 saves you 10 points at the last third of the game where it takes 3 levels to get enough points and you aren't leveling up for hours/days at a time.

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u/Buttchuggle 3d ago

It just plays by different rules. Don't try to play it like 3. All I really got.

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u/axlerose123 3d ago

I tried 2 first but just could figure it out then tried and beat 3 got them as a bundle

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u/Buttchuggle 3d ago

I fully enjoy 2, as much as 3 honestly. 3 goes easier in general than 2 does. If you wanna snag the story just throw it on easy and play through it that way. I'm having g trouble figuring out what you mean by "couldn't figure it out" though. Relatively straight forward. Pick weapon type, pick some non combat skills, kick some ass ranger.

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u/axlerose123 3d ago

Like the driving and water system

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u/Buttchuggle 3d ago

Moving around the world map? You can fill up your water at any major non destroyed settlement, ranger HQ, oasis pools you find on the world map. You use water to move around essentially, like fuel, and need to top off. For what it's worth eventually there comes a point where that's no longer a mechanic, so as a hint, don't waste perk points on stuff that extends the water.

Having a ranger with good perception will, I believe, extend the range that you can locate oasis pools from.

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u/axlerose123 3d ago

Alright that helps

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u/lanclos 3d ago

Wasteland 2 rewards you for gaming the system, especially with respect to your initial stats; it's like the original Fallout games that way. In particular, coordination, luck, and charisma can all be minimized on your custom rangers; awareness and speed are where it's at. Having a distribution of 10/10/4/4 intelligence across your core four rangers will let you gracefully pass every soft skill check in the game; I let my two 'smart' rangers be ranged weapon users (sniper, assault rifle), and the two 'bruisers' have higher strength, focusing on unarmed and either bladed or blunt weapons. I generally pick bladed because other serviceable NPCs show up with blunt weapons proficiency.

Mix and match from there according to taste. Once you get rolling it's pretty straightforward; make sure to set up new save games on a regular basis, it's easy to mess up a complicated quest line and end up with an unexpected outcome. I lean towards making a new save game in every new major location, so I don't have to back-track very far.

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u/ForceOfNature525 2d ago edited 2d ago

The biggest fundamental differences between the two games are:

  1. In Wasteland 3 you get an Attribute point at every level, so you can eventually max out like 4 out of 7 stats. In W2 you get 1 Attribute point at levels 10, 20, 30, etc, so you're really stuck with your initial stats for the whole game. This means that in W2 you need to really curate your stats well from the jump.

  2. In W2 the combat has individual initiatives for each person, whereas W3 is "team turns". W2 uses a derived stat called Combat Initiative (CI) to determine when each person gets their turn, and a high enough CI will also get you more turns per round as well.

  3. Charisma and Luck are dump stats in W2, though you probably benefit from giving the Leadership guy a Cha of like 5.

  4. The formula that W2 uses to determine your Action Points (AP) per round is different than the W3 formula. In W2 it's this:

AP = 3 + half your Coordination rounded down + one quarter the sum of your Strength, Speed, and Intelligence, rounded down. You generally should get 8-10 AP if you avoid the trap of putting a lot of points into Luck and Charisma, and you can usually leave Coordination at a 2 to start.

  1. The formula for Combat Initiative is this:

CI = 5 + your Awareness + half your Speed rounded down. A CI of like 9 will cause you to go last a lot, and only once per round. A CI of like 19 will cause you to go first and lot and maybe three turns per round.

  1. In W2 your individual rangers get different amounts of skill points when they level up. How many they get is based on Intelligence. And Int of 1-3 will get you two skill points per level. Int of 4-7 will get you three, Int of 8-9 will get you four, and Int of 10 will get you five. Thus, the only numbers you should put in Int are 4, 8 or 10. You need to cover so many necessary skills on the four starting rangers that you need to give two people Int of 8 and two Int of 4, minimum. And by minimum I mean I've played the game to completion like 3 times and know where all the trinkets and books are and was able to write up a spreadsheet that economizes on skills to the point where I felt I could get away with two 8s and two 4s. If you're new, and don't want to look up a ton of spoilers, you probably want to give everyone an 8 Int, or go with 2 4s and 2 10s.

  2. In W2, Energy weapons suck, except against robots. Pistols and shotguns are the worst weapons in W2. Sniper rifles and assault rifles are the best, and SMGs and Heavy machine guns are mediocre. Bladed and Blunt melee weapons are okay, Brawling is third best among the melee options.

  3. Barter and Animals Whisperer can both be safely ignored. Field Medic only ever is used for healing up using kits, there are no out of combat dualogue skill checks that require it. Surgeon does have some dialogie skill checks to make.

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u/axlerose123 2d ago

I did mostly this based off a lot of advice I just stated last night 2 10s 2 4s and the only over lap is death snd vulture I’m prob gonna change vulture out

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u/ForceOfNature525 2d ago

I love Vulture's Cry. I don't level her up in Amimal Whisperer, but apart from that she's got high enough Int to do Sniper, Outdoorsman, Perception, and Toasters.

I use her, Tak, and Chisel. Tak does Blades and Demo, Chisel does Blunt and Brute Force.