Greetings, Misfits!
We know it’s a bit frustrating to see these dark silhouettes under the available characters.
Who are they? What do they do? Why do they do what they do?
These are the questions we aim to delve into with this devlog to ease the everlasting itch of seeing unavailable content.
Meet the future outcasts! Their past was full of tales, yet now they have nobody but themselves. And even though the remains of society does not care for them, they struggled enough to acquire skills needed for life in the wasteland. These are the people who could save you or mug you. Maybe even both at the same time.
Mercenary (Support + Elimination)
Ex-guard at Vapor Wave Inc, carrying heavy armor and a Vapor Wave Inc Gun (all rights reserved), capable of both destroying enemies and giving shields to party members. Also his corporate background may get you out of certain situations without making use of brute force.
His past? Morally dubious.
His character? Complicated.
His motivation? That would be a spoiler.
His biggest strength is scaling his power with almost every buff — be it shield, armor or ability power. And he can also buff himself! And his teammates! Sounds overpowered? Well, no.
Given a couple of levels, he can carry his team through the fight, but early in the campaign (and perhaps further, if you make poor choices) Mercenary has to depend heavily on his teammates before his potential is fully unlocked. This guy benefits from being your favorite and getting the best upgrades and gear.
Refresh Ability: Vapor Wave Inc. Gun
Deal 1-2 damage to an enemy line and refresh other abilities.
The only refresh ability in the game with damage to several targets. Scales with Ability Power.
Once given enough buffs, gear and crit luck it can remove a whole line of enemies from the fight in one turn.
Don’t have Ability Power? No problem, after an upgrade the damage can scale with shields Mercenary has. This upgrade has a great synergy with his other abilities.
Stand Your Ground
Give shields to yourself and your ally. Scales with AP.
Should we even explain why an ability that gives shields to two party members at once without drawbacks and scaling with AP is an extremely good ability? With an alternative upgrade Mercenary can give more shields to himself — at the cost of not protecting his allies, you wouldn’t selfishly leave this cute baby lizard without shields, would you?
Shield to the Head
Deal (3 + amount of your shields) damage and null your shields
This is an optional ability that suits Mercenary best. It’s your good old «All-In» ability. «Shield to the Head» can easily disintegrate a completely healthy and strong enemy in one action if Mercenary has enough shields.
Its potential is easily unlocked if one of your support characters has «Safe Haven», that gives an insane amount of shields if nobody plans to attack the target. Additionally, give Mercenary a Shield Generator (gives 5 shields at the start of the battle). And «Shield to the Head» can already deal enough damage to turn a formidable foe into Vapor™!
And it’s just the beginning.
With correct execution Mercenary can even do THIS!
(It didn’t help, he died afterwards anyway, BUT THIS IS NOT THE POINT)
Alright, who else we got?
Rogue (Elimination + Maneuver)
A former gang member, who did not leave on good terms. You bet she holds a grudge. And a knife. Two, actually.
She doesn’t have much HP. To be frank, it’s actually the lowest HP of all playable characters. However! Your HP doesn’t matter if you don’t get hit! And this is the basis for her fighting style. She doesn’t block the hit, she evades it.
And may (insert a name of a deity here) help the poor fools, who decide not to attack her at all. Her main strength is striking when the opponents aren’t looking.
When there is no fight, she exceeds at gambling (by cheating), can guide you through any kind of dirty slums, and occasionally saves you from being mugged by her fellow highwaymen.
Refresh Ability: Sneak Attack
Deal 1 damage to an enemy. Deal 4 if nobody plans to attack Rogue. Scales with Ability Power.
As it can be used every turn, it is her main source of damage. With an upgrade it can also apply vulnerability to enemies. If she fails to oneshot the enemy, her teammate won’t.
Do you know why there is always Savage in the background?
Because he can always provoke enemies, so Rogue can use her attacks effectively.
And do you know why there are so many critical strikes?
Because «Sneak Attack» has 25% crit chance by default. If it still isn’t enough - give her the «Daredevil» personality, that allows her to land critical strikes even more often.
If your damage expectations are insatiable, you can also equip her with «Neverender», with which she will get a bonus action every time she crits. Yes, you can attack 2, 3, 4 times in one turn as long as all of the attacks are critical successes.
“But what if it still doesn’t crit?”
Fret not, there’s always a way to deal damage reliably! For example, let’s take a look at one of the level-up abilities:
Foolproof Plan
Make your next action a critical success, gain +1 Ability Power for it
Although it may look like mere verbal aggression, it is one of the best tools in the game for playing safe. With a proper setup «Sneak Attack» after this ability can deal 10 or more damage. Should we remind you, that most attacks rarely deal more than 4?
Moving on to your defences!
Avoid Contact
Evade the next enemy attack. Gain +1 Ability Power for your next action.
This one is Rogue’s bread and butter. This greatly compensates for her lack of HP and sometimes can be more effective than letting your tank, well, tank the damage. It doesn’t matter whether the attack has 2 damage or 20 if it misses. With one of the upgrades the ability also buffs her if she has full HP.
Playing with Rogue in your team is tricky, but this is what makes it so fun. Her basic skill set makes her self-sufficient, but it’s for you to decide as she levels up if she gets more skills to help her allies — or to hurt her enemies.
Speaking of helping allies, here’s a support character!
Alchemist (Support + Maneuver)
A former member of the Technomancer Guild who has outstayed his welcome in the community for very clear reasons. He also smells funny. Must be his concoctions.
He is weird. But he is neither aware of it nor ashamed of it. As a support character, his abilities consist of buffs and debuffs. He provides great defense for his allies and is capable of applying almost every negative effect in the game. Furthermore, he makes use of all the chemicals you find on your journey! Suspicious mushrooms, barrels of toxic sludge, or any other hazardous substance, it all goes in the soup if you let him do the cooking.
But he’s an alchemist, not a chemist, testing solutions isn’t his thing, that’s why their advantages always come with drawbacks. If you want your Alchemist to be effective, better build the whole party around him. He isn’t your сonventional «buff-you-debuff-them» type of support.
Refresh Ability: Alkaliquor v0.4
Give enemy «Life-Loss 2» and +1 armor for the whole battle
«Life-Loss» deals a little damage to HP every turn, ignoring shields and armor.
But armor reduces incoming attack damage from all attacks. It implies that this ability isn’t the best for quick elimination by collective effort of the whole team, but rather sets up a long fight to wear enemies out.
This combines greatly with Tamer’s skills, one of which can trigger «Life-Loss» one more time and another provides retaliation to enemy attacks, thus allowing you to go for a passive playstyle, focusing on defence and letting enemies die by themselves.
Alternatively, its upgraded variant, instead of giving armor, gives the enemy attack damage bonus, so you can kill him quicker, but he will be able to do the same. Understandably, buffing enemies sometimes can make matters worse, but you may have to use this ability to refresh other ones. If you are lucky enough, you can equip Alchemist with «Stun Baton», an item that allows refreshing abilities with basic attack.
Obviously, if enemies die slowly, they have more chances to make you die. This is when Alchemist’s defensive abilities come into play.
Preventive Painkiller
Give an ally (or yourself) +3-4 armor until the end of turn.
We could’ve just written, «make an ally almost invincible». «Preventive Painkiller» makes any ally, even the baby lizard, withstand heavy and painful attacks without losing too much HP. The more hits the target takes, the more damage is negated. This is why it’s twice as effective if the ally can provoke enemies.
As you can see, there is plenty of room to experiment, combining characters with different personalities, upgrading abilities, or straight up replacing them, enhancing their performance with items and unique traits, unlocking secret abilities with new mechanics…
Honestly, there is too much to fit in one devlog: secret abilities, unique encounters and interactions, countless combinations of personality traits and character relationships. There is no way to describe it thoroughly, only to experience it yourself.
We can go on but it’s time to stop. For now.
https://store.steampowered.com/app/2551970/Outcast_Tales/
We hope this devlog has given you a better understanding of what’s to come when the game goes gold! Before that we will be releasing an update to The First Journey, so you can mentally prepare for the dangers that await you.
If you are as eager to see Outcast Tales in full bloom as we are, feel free to follow our Twitter page and wishlist the game on Steam to be the first to know about all news related to the game. In the meantime, if you haven't already, you should really consider playing the First Journey prologue!
Now that you know more about the characters, who is your favourite? How do you think they might interact with eachother? Who would be the best (or worst) baby lizard parent? Share your thoughts with CRITICAL REFLEX Discord community!
See you soon!
