by Hey choomba, whether you’re from a corporate fuck, the streets, or you’re a nomad, I’m gonna show you how we do in Night City. Militech taught you to hold a knife and shoot straight? Don’t worry, I knew how to do it when I got out of the crib. Me, I’m going to teach you how to survive and make the right choices, your life is going to be nova, you’ll see… and that’ll save you from making a flat line because of the first bastard you come across.
Note: This is not sponsored by Arasaka or Militech and even less by the Trauma Team. In fact, it’s not sponsored at all!
Stats and Perks
If you want to survive well, you will need to have real assets to get by. You have 6 possible branches, you can climb 2 to level 20, and dispatch the rest as needed. You can only go up to level 50, which means that your number of points is limited. However, your advantages are not! You can find them in missions, on shards, by using weapons and tools that you are not necessarily used to using in order to level up, up to the limit. Because yes, you will not be able to increase a level more by using the exp specific to each branch beyond the level of stat assigned.
You will be able to see a charcu-doc to modify all your perk points for a reset shard at the price of 100000 euro-dollars. A nice sum that you would rather slam into a crate or a Nekomata of the finest asset… but when it is necessary, it is necessary. On the other hand, your stat points, they don’t move one iota, so that’s totally and irremediably definitive, you have to choose well from the start what you want to do, don’t scatter yourself everywhere.
I’m going to talk to you from experience, but today it’s only for beginners, I’ll give you a deeper course a little later, you’ll see, you won’t be bored. I’m just giving you two very brief, non-detailed examples of what can be done!
Personally, you see, I tried two ways. In another life, I must have been an engineer who liked snipers and stealth, so I honed my technique and my composure to be a real snake that slaughters my targets from afar and in melee. Do you know the mono-cable? It’s like butter-slicing wire, except it cuts limbs. A real butchery when you start whipping it up.
But the funny thing is that I managed to make all my weapons myself and at low cost by taking the right perk points in my engineering branch. It’s a good thing to know how to make your weapons, but being able to make better, higher quality ones, and for less, is priceless! Finally yes, it sometimes costs eddies to buy the blueprints from vendors here and there. And when you find “unique” weapons, you can even increase their quality!
I worked on my technique so much that I was specialized in weapons using my know-how. At the top of my game, I’ve learned to ignore my enemies’ armor and optimize my weapons’ charged shots. Did you imagine you could shoot through obstacles with a charged shot and the right perks? Well now you know it. You always have to be wary of someone who knows how to mount a weapon, there is a way that the person knows how to use it too…
And knowing how to keep calm to show off your knowledge during discussions is always useful, you’ll see, you’re going to have more than one person stuck.
Recycling is green
Your equipment is important, you can customize it as you want with mods for armor, crit, and much more. But, if there’s one thing you should do choomba, it’s recycle everything that’s useless to you. You can sell junk, or certain weapons, but recycling gives you free materials to improve your equipment. On the other hand, you will have to be careful, certain advantages will directly recycle your junk, but will make you miss out on objects that are resold at high prices. I sold a shipment of filthy necklaces and brooches for 750 eddies a piece. Too expensive for shit, you really have to want it… but the tastes and the colors, it’s not to be discussed. Well, yes, but it never ends well!
With the right perk, you can even recycle armor and weapon mods to prevent them from getting lost. Being able to keep the best of each equipment to make it a really powerful one is everyone’s dream. Moreover, the rarer a piece of equipment, the more space it will have to put mods in it. Do you see it coming the jacket that makes you immune to poison, burning and electricity? Because I do!
It’s all about the benefits and what you want to do with them. Besides, recycling foolishly is not recommended: if you want to make a higher “unique” weapon, you will first need to have the version below. It’s not easy to integrate everything basic, but once it’s done, it’s too nova!
ICE CREAM is not for children!
You can hack anything related. Computers, some doors, cars, enemies and sometimes even toasters. It always has a use, with a good ping you want to discover all the usable machines and all the enemies connected to the network. But it consumes RAM, and it needs to be recharged like any resource… but you can fry the brains of corps, bastards and other mercs for not much by breaking the ICE. It’s a kind of firewall that, once started, will allow you to save money, a monster of RAM by using the right protocol. Certain advantages increase all this even more and make it possible to make enemies connected to a network vulnerable or to launch automatic protocols!
Once hacked, you’ll be able to wreak havoc on these poor suspecting buggers. Whether it’s overloading their brains to make mush, or causing short circuits, or even creating total madness… it’s up to you, you’re the boss, you’re the one who know what sauce you want to eat them. However you are limited by the RAM available which will require more effort if your enemy is more powerful.
It can also help to modify your cyber equipment at a charcu-doc to increase your implant. Your fast hack count and RAM will be conditioned by that too, but if that’s not your thing, you can also find implants that lean more towards combat, again it’s up to you. But choose well, eddies don’t grow on trees.
Summary
Nothing is final, you can always change your advantages, even if you can never change your stats unless you change your life. It doesn’t matter where you come from, you can do anything, it will only change the way you see the world, and a few odds and ends. There’s no wrong choice as long as you don’t go for absolutely anything and everything. Think carefully about where you want to go, and what your strengths are, and what you hate doing. You will have a start!
If you liked this little basic tutorial, wait for the next one, we’re going to get to the heart of the matter with more explanation and detail, you’re going to break out of the chain, or the body… it’s you who see. We will talk about fixers, talents, the NCPD, and your life choices, among other things. You’ll see, you’ll love it!