C2077 CP2077 Adventuring Journals [spoilers]

[danutz_plusplus]

Another thing I'm noticing, even with all the polish and fixes I hear the games has received, every now and then there's still a decent amount of jank.

The most immersion breaking is how the AI sometimes behaves, it's really immersion breaking. It just goes from 0 to 100 sometimes. I entered one of those cordoned-off police areas, where there's been a crime, and at first I didn't even notice the aggro-meter on the cops. And when it reached max, they all basically pulled out their weapons and started shooting at me. Very gamified and immersion breaking.

Other things I'm noticing is how chaotic the firefights almost always end up being. Because most characters can take a couple of shots before they go down, they have plenty of opportunities to go sprinting across the pavement while chaos ensues and everyone fires on everyone. And I'm sure there's this sort of dissonance in Witcher 3 also, but for some reason in a modern city setting it really stands out as a game and not a realistic simulation of a city.

And the shooting mechanics, don't really feel as solid as they could feel. And is it me or do the shooting mechanics feel better in Starfield, than in CP2077?

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Another curiosity of mine, I can't get a feel for what counts as a non-lethal weapon.
I've found this weapons list which mentions some clubs as being non-lethal, but from what I've read in the game the item should explicitly say it's non-lethal in the description.
So, is the generic two-handed club non-lethal or not?

I visited my local boxing dude, hoping to get a non-lethal weapon, but I can only see clubs. And again, they're not marked as non-lethal.
I did find a mod that apparently turns weapons non-lethal, but I guess I need to find someone to install that? Mods seem to be different than attachments.

 

[Redglyph]

Another curiosity of mine, I can't get a feel for what counts as a non-lethal weapon.
I've found this weapons list which mentions some clubs as being non-lethal, but from what I've read in the game the item should explicitly say it's non-lethal in the description.
So, is the generic two-handed club non-lethal or not?

I visited my local boxing dude, hoping to get a non-lethal weapon, but I can only see clubs. And again, they're not marked as non-lethal.
I did find a mod that apparently turns weapons non-lethal, but I guess I need to find someone to install that? Mods seem to be different than attachments.

You're right. Before, it used to be indicated below the DPS, at the top, but now it's not indicated any more. They've replaced the clear DPS indication with those stupid bars and apparently forgot about non-lethal flags.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

You're right. Before, it used to be indicated below the DPS, at the top, but now it's not indicated any more. They've replaced the clear DPS indication with those stupid bars and apparently forgot about non-lethal flags.

View attachment 4825

Right. So I should assume clubs are still non-lethal. Anyway, I'll probably try it out and see for myself.
I got a quest that specifically said I need to use non-lethals, so that's what started this.

 

[Redglyph]

Right. So I should assume clubs are still non-lethal. Anyway, I'll probably try it out and see for myself.
I got a quest that specifically said I need to use non-lethals, so that's what started this.

Isn't that explained in the combat tutorial, at the beginning of the first mission in the city? Assuming those tutorials are still there.

I haven't started a new game yet; only tried with an old save. It's not obvious to tell whether the guy I mugged was dead or not.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Isn't that explained in the combat tutorial, at the beginning of the first mission in the city? Assuming those tutorials are still there.

I haven't started a new game yet; only tried with an old save. It's not obvious to tell whether the guy I mugged was dead or not.

I don't remember where I heard that clubs were non-lethal, but it might be that tutorial. But it's been a couple of hours since then.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Did a bit of walking around the metropolis, and fuck me is it impressive. There's very little interactibles, but the atmosphere, size and density of it all is absolutely mind-boggling.
And I love the mood of it all. So badass. Also, there's quite a few very likeable npcs. I especially like Viktor Vektor. That whole augmentation session was so cool. I forgot I had seen that years ago in one of the first CP2077 gameplay showcases.

It's also interesting how they've integrated the phone into the game.
You can basically have the same dialogue interactions over phone that you could by walking to those same npcs.

Also, can I say I'm impressed with the perk tree? Did I understand correctly that the whole perk tree was introduced only with 2.0?
I'm impressed with it because just looking over all options, I have to say I was salivating on most of them. Now I don't know what type of character to build. There's so much good stuff in there, if it works as I imagine it.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

I completed my first, more significant, main quest. The one they also demoed years ago. Taking the Flathead from Maelstrom and Royce.

It was pretty fun overall, but one thing I was surprised is how messy the UI is when you're trying to use your scanner. So many busy UI elements, that I constantly have issues figuring out what I'm looking at.
The other thing was when you're being hacked from a distance, took me a bit to realize what was going on. It's so weird to have stuff happening to you, and you're only hint that something is happening is that your UI says you're being hacked, or something to that effect. But it was also kind of cool.

The fight against Royce was not very fun though. I'm only on Hard, one level lower than the Very Hard, and it still took forever to take him out.
All the while running around trying to get at his back. Thank god for rechargeable health stims.
One weird thing was that the level designers apparently put all sorts of types of ammo in that garage where you're fighting him. All except for what I actually needed. Rifle ammo. I used around 300 bullets on him, I think. And then switched to pistol.

 

[JFarrell71]

And the shooting mechanics, don't really feel as solid as they could feel. And is it me or do the shooting mechanics feel better in Starfield, than in CP2077?

Yeah, I had the same reaction, coming from Starfield. The enemies in Starfield are less twitchy. They don't end up facing weird directions and shit like they do in Cyberpunk 2077. And at least at first, the shooting itself doesn't feel as solid to me. I think probably part of that is just getting used to it again, but that was definitely my first thought.

The perk tree is entirely new, and it's a huge improvement. The old perks were almost all boring, just a bunch of incremental increases to various stats that you pretty much had to take the game's word for it were doing anything.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Yeah, I had the same reaction, coming from Starfield. The enemies in Starfield are less twitchy. They don't end up facing weird directions and shit like they do in Cyberpunk 2077. And at least at first, the shooting itself doesn't feel as solid to me. I think probably part of that is just getting used to it again, but that was definitely my first thought.

The perk tree is entirely new, and it's a huge improvement. The old perks were almost all boring, just a bunch of incremental increases to various stats that you pretty much had to take the game's word for it were doing anything.

Then the perk tree alone is a remarkable addition. As I said, I truly didn't know what to pick, and most of it seemed great stuff.
I decided on a stealth build with acrobatics. My only issue is I'm not sure how I'm gonna stealth kill enemies with my silenced weaponry, when it takes entire magazines to put one down, on Hard difficulty.
And I don't think melee-ing everyone is an option.

 

[JDR13]

The other thing was when you're being hacked from a distance, took me a bit to realize what was going on. It's so weird to have stuff happening to you, and you're only hint that something is happening is that your UI says you're being hacked, or something to that effect. But it was also kind of cool.

That's not enough of a hint?

The fight against Royce was not very fun though. I'm only on Hard, one level lower than the Very Hard, and it still took forever to take him out.

Most of the bosses are a decent challenge, but that's how it should be. Some of them are more chrome than flesh.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

That's not enough of a hint?

I guess I meant to say that when that notification shows up on screen I suddenly feel like a deer in headlights. My issue was knowing who's hacking me?
And I wasn't sure if they can hack me through the camera system, like I can. Can they?
Also, I suddenly got some red lines going through the geometry, that I wasn't sure if the game was trying to point me to something, or if it was a graphical glitch (I had some random graphical glitches on some of the digital billboards).
That particular encounter was a bit of a clusterfuck, since I didn't disable the camera as soon as going into the room, and so everything collapsed on me at the same time: dudes with guns, dudes hacking me, and the cameras.

I think the chaosness of the encounters is also due to the fact that I'm only now getting to grips with the systems and what I'm doing.
My first playthroughs in games this complex are usually a mess, until I do a second playthrough where I know what I'm doing and have planned things properly.

But I do wonder on the feasibility of a stealth build. Maybe it only works as a stealth and netrunner, and not a gunner.
There are some nice perks, one that just got, that gives a 25% damage bonus if you fire out of stealth. Unfortunately, that's only useful once. Since 95% of the time you break stealth the moment you open fire (even with a silenced gun) since the enemy will not die in one hit, and then its open fire from them.
Maybe the more advanced stealth perks allow you go full invisible, and then you can melee most enemies in one hit?

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Ok I've switched from assault rifles to revolvers and sniper rifles (minus the rifle, since I can't find where to buy one yet).
And it's definitely a different feel to the combat. Forces me to be up in their faces, using the slow-time ability and then ducking back into cover.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Yeah, the police AI and police system, while it's there now, it's still very much in a shabby state.
I got my first sniper rifle, and so I started some havok in an underground parking lot/underpass.
And the parking lot had some of those vertical metal bars that stop cars from going in.

I spent the following 15 mins decimating all police that tried to come through that funnel. A lot of them kept trying to bash their vehicles into those metal stoppers.
A lot more came on foot and I kept taking them out, both from a far and using my revolver.
Because of the regenerating health packs I kept staying alive, and just moved a couple of blocks down from them, and kept taking them out.
Checking my minimap I could also see that a lot of the police had apparently gathered on top of the the underpass, but probably due to pathing issues couldn't find their way to me.
And there were two main ways to get at me, not just through the chokepoint.

And so I managed to get up to level 5/5 on the threat level, but I never saw any MaxTac units. Or, I did see some terminator-style robots coming after me, but I don't think those were part of MaxTac.
After clearing them all, and seeing that none were coming anymore, I went up the same ramp I had fought all of them. Still on 5/5 police wanted level, but there were no cops around. And the moment I got into my vehicle the whole police wanted level went away, and it was as if nothing had happened.

Anyway, it might be a bit contrived and the police system is definitely a huge improvement over what it was before, but it's still not solid.

In other adventures I tried to complete my first cyberpsychosis hunt, and got absolutely flattened by the lady I was hunting.
Plenty of heath, always turned invisible, and would demolish my tiny health pool. And would always melee me. Didn't stand a chance. I'll have to return when I'm at a higher level.

 

[Redglyph]

Maybe you didn't see the MaxTac because it was underground? Anyway, it must be fun to see the AI struggle with the environment.

Those police systems never make any sense. Why do they forget about you after you get far away enough or quiet enough for a while, in a society where they know your identity and can scan you at a distance? It's just an excuse to put more filler content (if it can even be called that) but it's so obviously bad.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Maybe you didn't see the MaxTac because it was underground? Anyway, it must be fun to see the AI struggle with the environment.

Those police systems never make any sense. Why do they forget about you after you get far away enough or quiet enough for a while, in a society where they know your identity and can scan you at a distance? It's just an excuse to put more filler content (if it can even be called that) but it's so obviously bad.

Yeah, it's really not that kind of game, like GTA is.
But they at least made an effort. It's fine.

I switched around my whole build and I've decided what my build is going to be like. Basically I'm gonna try to play it as a pure melee sword wielding runner.
I've invested points into the dash ability, that replaces the regular dodge. I'm not able to close the gap in a split second. This also made the fights against the cyberpsychosis dudes absolutely easy. I just dash out of the way of any attacks they have.
But I'm also carrying a shotgun, just in case. Also for up-close blasting of dudes. But that should only be a last resort, if the sword is taking too long.

I'm also going to invest in Cool, just enough to have to ability to sprint while crouched. And then to have the ability to cloak and be invisible while crouched. I think it's gonna be a fun build.

 

[JDR13]

Maybe the devs didn't give as much thought to people going full murderhobo.

 

[Vaelith]

I watched a video about the changes, and I'm not as charmed as I was initially sold. To start with, it appears that they removed the stats from gear and now all upgrades come from cyberware, which I don't particularly like. Also if I'm to believe the video I watched, they blanketed level scaling for all enemies and loot you find in the whole game world, essentially destroying any semblance of challenge or serendipity, and in general adding the typical dullness of games that behave like this, where everything is a flat line of you steadily increasing your stats vs enemies increasing their stats for 100+ hours in fully streamlined exercise of repetition.

People seem to be happy with the skill/perk revamp, but I can't remember having an issue with that when I played previously. It's probably a good thing they changed it, I just don't think that's what will draw me to play it again. A bit disappointed in general for now, which means I will take a "wait and see" approach before I commit to playing the DLC.

 

[danutz_plusplus]

Maybe the devs didn't give as much thought to people going full murderhobo.

Well, to play devil's advocate, that's exactly why they implemented an escalating police system with MaxTac coming in as the final force to put you down.
By going full murderhobo you're exhibiting exactly cyberpsychosis, which they have to put down.

On a another note, am I gimping myself by going with a mainly melee build? I couldn't find any melee weapon stores, at least in Watson, outside of the dude that arranges boxing fights for me.
And I checked online and that really seems to be the only blade seller in this whole sector of NC? And apparently each sector has just one such seller? Do melee options only open up later on?
The blade I'm currently using is the one I got for linking my gog account. So I do wonder what I would've used had I not had this. Not that it's overpowered or anything. But I've not really stumbled on anything noteworthy.

Edit: ok I just checked a video and it seems the seller inventory changes across the game? The dude I was watching had coach Fred selling all sorts of stuff. While mine only sold baseball bats.

 

[JDR13]

Removing stat increases from gear was absolutely the right move. It made zero sense that you could increase an attribute simply by putting on a shirt or a hat.