Technologist Ideas

Wow, its been a long time since I've thought about Arcanum. I came on this forum a while ago looking for a good mage build and I finally beat the game with him (I stopped playing for a long while just before getting to Loghaire.) Anyway, now that I'm done with that character, I want to try playing through as a technologist, but am stumped for how to create a good one. Thanks in advance for any help.

 

Depends on what you want to focus on: explosives, firearms, melee technological weapons?

 

That's the kind of thing I was hoping to gain some insight on. I don't really know much about tech characters, as the closest thing to one that I've ever played was a dwarven warrior who could make his own weapons and armor. Firearms seem the most fun, but from what I've heard, they're not very good, so maybe I'll try going with technological melee.

 

Smithy + Mechanical is pretty fun. You can craft your own melee weapons and armor + arachnids and automatons to further aid you in the battle.

Whatever you do, though, don't play a pure gunslinger, they're awfully underpowered. Put at least 3 points in ether Melee or Throwing.

 

For allies in battle I'll probably put some points into Charisma and Persuasion to get followers (somehow, I find Virgil, Magnus and Raven more interesting than a person made of gears). So I'll probably go with Smithy and then something else (Is electric any good?). And also, what would be a good way to arrange my points and background in the beginning?

 

Electrical is awesome. Charged rings boost Dexterity, making it easier to increase your fighting skills and kick butt in general. The Healing Jacket may or may not appeal to you, but it causes you to automatically regenerate some health which can be really handy. The Tesla Rod is a great weapon if you want to get into Firearms (it uses that skill even though it looks like a staff).

Electrical attacks work quite well on a lot of opponents who are resistant to regular physical attacks.

And there are all sorts of neat electrical weapons you can learn how to make from schematics you can buy.

Spoiler

Electrocution Grenades are cool. They don't do as much damage as the Lightning spell, but they work on multiple targets and they'll help you kill some pretty tough enemies. Charged Swords make mediocre fighters surprisingly effective at close range. The Charged Axe is even better. There are a couple of electrical guns that can be cool if you don't mind the ammo requirements.

As far as backgrounds go, Mad Doctor or Miracle Operation can be good if you're going to use guns (bonuses to Intelligence and Perception in exchange for annoying physical penalties). Miracle Operation also gives you higher Charisma. Sickly can be good because you get high Intelligence in exchange for physical penalties that aren't so bad. Raised By Monks has some charm because of the Perception bonus.

If you want to be primarily a Melee guy, that's harder for me to say because you also need some Strength and Dexterity. Sickly could still work, especially if you wanted to play as a Half-Orc (a Half-Orc with physical penalties is still tougher than a lot of the Half-Elf and Elf characters I've played). I had a lot of success with a female Sickly Half-Orc gun smith (I bought the fancy dress at the character creation stage and wore that when shopping for components).

You could go with something like Beat With an Ugly Stick, I suppose. Being ugly comes with some annoying drawbacks during the early parts of the game, but there are ways to get NPCs to react better to you.

 

Spoiler

Only as long as you have Strength ≤ 12. For a character with Strength ≥ 13 the Charged Sword provides better performance.

Unless we'll talking about followers, that is - for them the Charged Axe is better up to the time they achieve Strength ≥ 20 (difference caused by the lack of Melee training).

 

Thanks for the clarification, Muro.

Spoiler

I actually prefer the Charged Sword, so it's nice to know that there's a reason for that other than my gut instinct.

In addition to looking really cool, it's a great weapon for followers because it's right on the cusp of being "too good". They become much more effective without poaching all your kills and making it harder to level up (like how it can be sometimes if Sogg has a decent sword).

 

Okay, I decided to flesh out my idea for a character a bit more to get some more guided advice.
For RP reasons, I'd like to play as a human. I'd like to be able to have a party (probably my usual party of Virgil, Magnus, Raven and Dog, maybe Loghaire if I can get him this time around) so I'll need a few points in Cha and Persuasion. Combat-wise, I'm thinking of going with Drog Alt's idea of a gunslinger/melee character, which would probably mean I'll be putting points in Melee and Firearms. And for tech disciplines I'd be taking Smithy, Gunsmithing and Electrical, as well as one point in Herbology so I can heal myself.
Would something like this be a valid character , or would it end up being spread to thin across too many different skills?

 

I'm glad you're finding this useful.

Let's see...

If you get up to Expert in Persuasion, that would require you to spend about seven points (three in Persuasion, plus whatever it takes to get your Charisma up to 12). Call it six if you get the Gypsy blessing.

Then you're going to want three points (plus Expert training) in Melee. Which means getting your Dexterity up to 12. But Charged Rings can do that, depending on which background you use.

You're going to want at least three points in Firearms, which means investing up to four points in Perception to get that up to 12.

One point in Herbology for healing salves is totally reasonable.

So far, that's 17 character points.

Up to 15 points in tech disciplines sounds like it could work, but that might be tough because you'll also need to boost your Intelligence up to 18 to earn your doctorates. Call it 25 points.

So... It looks like you need about 42 Character Points. Eye Gear would drop that down to 40. Unless I'm overlooking something, you could do everything you want by level 30. Then you could decide if you wanted to get serious about mastering Firearms or go in some other direction.

Miracle Operation would help with most of that stuff, but then you would need to put some points into Dexterity and possibly Strength, depending on what armor and weapons you wanted to use.

On the other hand, you would start with the following stats:

Intelligence: 11
Perception: 13
Charisma: 11

... which would let you get up to Expert in Firearms without spending any points on Perception, get up to Expert in Persuasion without spending points on Charisma (after the blessing) and let you make a lot of stuff without spending points on Intelligence.

 

Well, thus far I have a level 12 Human with Miracle Operation who can shoot pretty well as well as build the first three Electrical tools, Pure Ore, The first two guns, and Healing Salve. I have Virgil, Magnus, and the half-ogre from Shrouded Hills in his party, and I'll pick up Dog if he hasn't died yet. I'm going to start putting points into melee as a backup for my firearms, after I build up a few stats (namely Strength, and Int.)

 

I've always considered gunslingers OK with everything else overpowered.

It just makes a more interesting game to me to have a party that has to carry around the resurrection thingies and salves and such rather than a party that can bulldoze the game.

Feels like more of an accomplishment to me to stumble into Dernholm at level 4 half dead after using a boatload of items to win that fight with a pack of putrid rodents. Of course, I play Ironman style and it can be a nailbiting experience watching your party move cross-country while praying to the Arcanum gods not to put golden bears, wererats, or dark individuals in your path...

 

And now the student has become the master.

That's cool that my ramblings have actually helped you.

I forgot for some reason that there are more than five things in each tech discipline, so that might get a little rough if you want to make everything.

With Gun Smithy, you can cope without learning how to make the Hand Cannon or the Elephant Gun. They're good weapons, but you can also obtain at least one of each in other ways. And once you get or make a Looking-Glass Rifle, that's probably going to be your main gun anyway.

 

This IMO is one of the biggest problems balancewise in Arcanum when you're discussing Tech VS Magick.

With tech, you devote your character points into raising Int and getting the disciplines for the express purpose of using one time to build that cool gun or armor or whatever (or maybe 3 or 4 times if you're armoring your entire party). Once you've built your tech item, that's it you never actually USE your skill again. This applies to about half the disciplines.

Now with magick, you devote your character points into raising willpower and get spells that (with a few exceptions) you continually use as you move through the game. Plus you can buy or find a bigger variety of better (or at least comparable) items throughout the game with no CP investment at all.

 

Mage is very powerful but techno have powerful party. It's hard to find anything better for followers than balanced swords, charged rings and elite plates.

 

Elite plate isn't something you can get early so its being powerful is fine.

Charged rings trade 2CP of yours for 2CP for every party member so it's nice but not unbalanced.

Balanced sword? Yeah, the fact that you can make one of the most effective weapons in the game with common materials at level 1 does make it an unbalanced sword.

I didn't say there weren't good tech items. Just that your tech disciplines do nothing but allow you to have these items (besides raising TA). With magick, you get useful spells you rely on all the time and can buy or find great items that are in the ball park (if not quite as good) as tech weapons/armor.

They should have severely gimped magick items and made more distinctions between weapons (like chances of stun or whatnot on various weapons) so there's a choice beyond simply how much damage/turn you can output, or added "powers" that use your tech discipline level (even if they were just a passive bonus to using tech items in that discipline).

Anyway, outside the herbology, electrical, and explosive lines, tech disciplines are just a lot of investment for stuff that's at best slightly better than what you can buy with no invested CPs.

 

I'm not sure but electro armor seems to scale it's stats with ta.
Same with feather chain weight. Elite plate is totally must if you have chukka and sogg, getting their plates is HARD. And chainmails probably don't exist.
Also, therapeutics is not replaceable by anything else in the game but it get less and less useful as you and team gain levels(therapeutics can save you 2 st,dx,int and con points if you REALLY want to save points).

 

It sounds to me like you need to do more quests before you leave Shrouded Hills. You should be able to get to at least level six before you're ready to move on to more interesting places.

 

For RP purposes, I do things a little differently:

I don't explore the crash site because I just agreed to go to Shrouded hills not run around killing wolves.

Also as a technologist, I don't want to destroy machinery to help a mage.

I don't take the backdoor out of town either.

Because of this, I'm generally level 3 when I take on the bridge thieves (unless I do something like make spike traps and kill every animal in town).

I consider it cheesy enough using a haste potion to win the bridge fight (which a gunfighter pretty much must unless you drop shitty weapons for the thieves to use (which is even cheesier)). Again as a RP thing, I refuse to use a haste potion after TA > 50.

Games are just a lot more fun to me if there's a chance my guy will die. Even save scumming takes the edge out of it for me.

 

I'm usually a big gun smithy fan, but my character also always has Sogg with him, along with a mechanical arachnid, Dog, and Virgil (all strong parties need a dose of useless). I RP'd him as being a gentleman adventurer (read: mildly soggy fop). Which meant that my love of the long barreled pistol had absolutely no bearing on the party's ability to deal out pain.


...actually, that character above described is the only one I've enjoyed enough to complete the game with. Though I wish I could've gone to the end with my half ogre, to read the dumb dialogues. I would've loved to see that deep, intellectual conversation absolutely bounce off his skin.