Game: Borderlands 2

[Buffalobiian]

I'm almost lvl29 now in Borderlands 2. I'm rather glad that while the characters and skill trees are different to the first game, everything else is mostly the same.

Rocking a turret guy at the moment with rocket pods and a shield for the turret. I'll try giving up the rockets for an extra turret at lvl31 to see if that works out better.

[Animeniax]

Ahh man I can't wait to play Borderlands 2. Was looking forward to it for the past month, then when it came out I decided to wait until the price drops and I finish an exam. If it's anywhere near as much fun as the first game, it will rock.

edit: as soon as I posted this, I went and ordered the game via digital download. Downloading it now.

[Buffalobiian]

Ahh man I can't wait to play Borderlands 2. Was looking forward to it for the past month, then when it came out I decided to wait until the price drops and I finish an exam. If it's anywhere near as much fun as the first game, it will rock.

edit: as soon as I posted this, I went and ordered the game via digital download. Downloading it now.

Just finished one playthrough. I only did a few side quests, finished at lvl31 with 42hrs of play according to steam. It could have taken less time, but I got lost and ended up running around finding these objectives while enemies started respawning. The top-side is that those guys are gold mines.. and I'm now filthy rich.

I might wait for my brother and friends to catch up with their first play-through before playing co-op together. Amusingly enough, this modes is called the True Vault Hunter Mode.

Hopefully I'll be able to find an assault rifle this time with a scope and extremely good accuracy (sniper level). Burst-fire would be a bonus.. but that type of gun would let me snipe from afar better.

Though I couldn't realise that ideal in the first play through, I did find a pretty amazing assault rifle with explosive damage. Each shot effectively does at least 900-1000 damage.


3 things that I disliked about the game:

1) Instant death zones: The game has no falling damage so you can jump off a mountain and live (and they encourage you to do so), but if you so much as touch the outside boundary (which looks the same as any other part of your environment), you die. Annoyingly.

The only way to tell is to read the boundaries from your mini-map, but you don't exactly watch that while you move around.

2) I don't like that the game saves at the beginning of a zone and makes you advance through all the spawned enemies again, when there are save (but not travel) points along the way. There's this one particular mission where a character is supposed to die partway. I was too busy looking at dropped gun on the ground that I completely missed his final words, so I decided to quit/save - then reload to my previous savepoint (I assume that was my last save?). The loaded game kept my "progress" but spawned me at the beginning of the level. I had to grind through all the enemies again, but because my "progress" was saved, the side character was already dead and I tackled the task alone.

3) buggy menus: scrolling/selecting stuff malfunctions occasionally. Vending machines are the worst offenders.

[UChessmaster]

I`ve never played borderlands, will i enjoy part 2?

[Buffalobiian]

I`ve never played borderlands, will i enjoy part 2?

One-liner: Borderlands 1 was a lot of fun, but ultimately no. Enjoyment of BL2 doe not hinge on BL1.

Bumbo-jumbo of me deciding a stance below:



I would say you would (assuming you would like the type of gameplay ofc).

Since it plays out like Borderlands 1 with different characters, I wouldn't say that the prequel is mandatory.

I brought this up with my brother after you asked, and while he argued more strongly about playing Part 1 first, he admitted that 3 of his friends are playing Borderlands 2 without 1, and are enjoying this anyway.

I guess I'll go ahead and buy the Season Pack for 4 upcoming DLCs. Come to think of it, I only got up to 1.5 DLCs from the first game while I paid for all four. Guess I could always go back to that when I feel like it.

[deathnightwc3]

I think I bought Borderlands GOTY edition and it came with all the DLCs. I personally enjoyed it with friends. Borderlands 2 on the other hand, it's great, but I hate the menu system and I don't like when you join a friend's game, if they are ahead of you, your permanently stuck on their quest, so you can't go back and any of the main storyline quests you missed. Same thing if they join you ofcourse.


Edit: Damn you steam! Telling me you can't connect any network so I can't play with friends :<

[Animeniax]

What characters did you guys play? I'm playing the gunzerker. BL2 is a lot tougher than BL1 from what I remember. The enemies seem smarter but they also seem glitchy where they stop shooting or just walk right near you before noticing you and then shooting at you.

I don't want to call this Borderlands 1.5 just yet, but that's what it seems like so far. Still, plenty of fun to play.

[Buffalobiian]

I can't remember which was harder.. and it's partly because I played 2 very different characters (Lilith in BL1 and Commando in BL2). Lilith was all into damage output and quick-striking, while Commando was played as a tank..

My actual playstyle didn't change so much though..

-Snipe from afar if possible
-If critical headshots don't take them out in one or two goes (and I'm therefore wasting sniper ammo), go closer
-SMG/Assault-riffle in their face (for critical hits), hide behind cover to recharge shields, use special ability as necessary.

I've found that when I played Lilith, I used her ethereal ability more to escape/enter combat.. or for the occasional melee attack. It wasn't used so much if I preferred a sniping role because it involved me running in and eventually taking damage.

Commando, on the other hand, begs you to use the turret as much as you can. Not only is it necessary to draw some fire/attention, but it saves you a ton of ammo.

At times, I just run into a bunch of enemies,
set up the turret,
hide under its bubble-shield
... and the fight's over by the time my time's up - all without me having to fire a shot.

I've read that the enemies are supposed to be smarter.. but they're still dumb from my perspective. As you said, sometimes they outright ignore me. Perhaps they'll get smarter on the second play-through...

And as for the quest glitch.. I didn't know about that, and am just glad that it didn't screw me over. I am further ahead than any IRL friends I know who have this game, and I only joined a lower level guy (10 lvls below me) once to see what it was like. Boring.

I like that the classes aren't really gun-type specific since it gives you much more freedom. I had always wanted that in borderlands 1. On the other hand though... it means you're less likely to try out different play styles, so unless you take it upon yourself to play a different weapon, even if you play through all the characters you might just end up repeating the same style/tactic over and over.

[deathnightwc3]

In Borderlands 1, I played as sniper for almost 80% of the time. In Borderlands 2, I play a rogue-like style. Backstabs and melee damage with weapons that increase melee. I've so far hit someone for 16k non crit. They weren't even low hp so I didn't get a 500% dmg perk :<

[Animeniax]

I`ve never played borderlands, will i enjoy part 2?

I think you will enjoy it more for not having played the first one. It's basically a standard openworld/mission-based/FPS/RPG (think Fallout series) with a lot more humor. There's supposedly a large selection of weapons, but they don't vary that much. Fun game overall and worth a play.

[Buffalobiian]

I think you will enjoy it more for not having played the first one.

Do you think so?

I wondered if I would hate Handsome Jack as much for what he's doing to the cast if I hadn't known them from playing the first time.

I'm running through the second playthrough with the intention of completing all the side missions now. I get the impression that the enemies are smarter.. but maybe they're just harder. Who knows.

I decided to try going with 2 turrets (instead of 1 turret that has upgraded rocket pods), and it just isn't as good. The rocket barrage rapes.

I'll stick with the rocket/turrent combo for now. Until I can get two turrets with rocket pods. Now that's badass. ;)

[Animeniax]

Do you think so?

I wondered if I would hate Handsome Jack as much for what he's doing to the cast if I hadn't known them from playing the first time.


I hardly remember the story from the first game. Just his actions and comments in the 2nd game are enough to know he's a jerk and needs to be killed.

But for me, so far, this really has been BL 1.5. Nothing much is different, same mechanics, mostly the same weapons and options. Enjoyable game, but one could easily play the 1st game for cheap now and wait until the 2nd is discounted in a couple months.

You're using the same character class for the second run-through, or the same character? Forgot if they allow that.

[Buffalobiian]

Same character. The whole idea of the second run through is to level up more, get better stuff and unlock more of your skill-tree.

Choosing a new character would start the game anew.

[deathnightwc3]

There are definitely alot more weapon variety in the 2nd, I just noticed that my MIRV nade has homing on it ;D

[Animeniax]

Same character. The whole idea of the second run through is to level up more, get better stuff and unlock more of your skill-tree.

Choosing a new character would start the game anew.

I'm finding that doing all the side missions and quests makes you a little too powerful. I'm mowing down the bad guys in the main quest and nearly indestructible just from doing all the missions available. It's fun, but god-mode does get old after a while.

[Animeniax]

Just finished one playthrough. I only did a few side quests, finished at lvl31 with 42hrs of play according to steam. It could have taken less time, but I got lost and ended up running around finding these objectives while enemies started respawning. The top-side is that those guys are gold mines.. and I'm now filthy rich.

How did you manage to reach lvl31 just doing a few side quests? I did almost all of the side quests up until Angel dies, then just focused on the main story and I'm currently lvl28 with 33hrs of play on Ch 16.

[Buffalobiian]

How did you manage to reach lvl31 just doing a few side quests? I did almost all of the side quests up until Angel dies, then just focused on the main story and I'm currently lvl28 with 33hrs of play on Ch 16.

Maybe I died more than you and had to fight things multiple times.. I don't know.

I capped out at lvl50 around 10 days ago, and toned down my play time due to finals. After I hit that cap, I've been farming the bunker for rare loots. I think I'll move on now, since I haven't gotten anything more useful than what I have already:

-Health/shield combined to give 95K points
-Sniper that gives out critical damage of 121K
-Orange SMG that costs $161K
-3 million in cash
-99 block of eridium after having bought everything from the purple store
-other various goodies

I can wait till my friend levels up to my level before playing with him (lvl20-30), but I'll start a new character as well and try to power-level that.. we'll see which ends up being faster.

I had a look at the Gaige (Mechromancer)'s tree, and I'm tossing up between the Little Big Trouble (LBT: focus on elemental damage, high focus on electrical damage) and Ordered Chaos (OC: pretty damn crazy.. you'll have to read it). LBT is a bit more conventional in playstyle while OC looks risky, but really interesting.

edit:


I'm finding that doing all the side missions and quests makes you a little too powerful. I'm mowing down the bad guys in the main quest and nearly indestructible just from doing all the missions available. It's fun, but god-mode does get old after a while.

Wait till you try True Vault Hunter Mode. Finishing all the side-quests does NOT make you super-powerful. In fact.. some of those "normal" lvl difficulty sidequests screw me up pretty bad already.

And my specialisation is in not dying..

[KrayZ33]

I tried to skip all side missions in TVHM because rewards scale with level (and some rewards are extremely powerfull)

and I stopped playing @ lvl 44 because it got too hard :/, but I don't want to do the side-stuff, meeeeeh

lulz @ rabid stalkers, I hate them

[Buffalobiian]

I'm up to level 11 Gaige atm. Still can't say how LBT vs OC is going since it's only now where I unlock some useful stuff (I don't have a nice electric weapon to utilize LBT with..)..

But the Anarchy thing is interesting. Sometimes I just reload out of habit and lose the entire stack. Mapping the reload key somewhere other than R helps me avoid that. You seem to lose Anarchy when you exit/reload the game, which kinda sucks since it means you have to build it up again every time you play.

You also can't retrieve DeathTrap like you could retrieve the turret, so once you summon it, it follows you around until it times-out, and must wait for the full cooldown before it can be summoned again. It means you've got to use him a bit more carefully than you had to with the turret. He can travel great distances fairly fast, which is a nice plus compared to the turret, which has a limited range and can be blocked by obstacles.

While it's good at approaching slow enemies, it doesn't do so well trying to chase down targets that are ignoring DeathTrap and going for me instead (and I'm running). His travelling speed isn't a problem, but he has to stop moving to attack, which means he often:

1) chase enemy
2) stop and slash
3) miss due to enemy now running out of range
4) chase again

OC's pretty much a shotgun class.. I'm trying to find a decent shotgun that has:

-high damage
-low magazine capacity
-high reload speed
-only uses 1 ammo per shot

[Buffalobiian]

Just finished the game again with Mechromancer this time, and it seemed much easier to kill him compared to when I was using Commando. I can think of a two main reasons for this:

1) I seemed to be taking less damage from enemies. Either I was taking hits from the Warrior better because I had an adaptive elemental resistance shield this time, or I was running around more instead of focusing on staying under my shield. Also, DeathTrap runs around looking for enemies. I think a lot of them (crystalisks etc) always focused on running after him instead of me.

2) I used a shotgun against the warrior. He takes reduced damage from all weapon types, but since he's so big, shotgun pellets him him - which negates the accuracy penalty that generally limits shotguns to close quarters. I was stuck draining my Assault Rifle with Commando, so the more time I spent killing Warrior, the more time it had to kill me.

So yeah.. when a DPS character doesn't take damage.. they kinda rule.

I finished off the final fight with Little Bit Trouble. I used Ordered Chaos for this one side-quest and found it really fun.. but I've heard that there seems to be a multiplayer bug that stuffs it up in multiplayer, so I stayed away from it. You also can't "take it slow" with that build since it's a shotgun build, which I had to do a few times when I didn't have suitable weapons.

[Buffalobiian]

Anyone else with an ATI card getting combat lag after today's update? It seems to be a common problem, but it hasn't happened to me before.

Guess I'll take a break..

edit: btw, did anybody manage to solo Terraphromous? I tried it with my tank and probably got 5% of his health before he kills me. It only takes 2 direct hits to kill me.

[Penner]

Only have one char at level 50 yet, Commando, and have barely played at all since i dinged 50. Haven't even seen Terra or Vermivorous(?)

From what i've read people who solo the "raid bosses" are using some ridiculous overpowered item combo with "The Bee" shield and some weapon, basically killing Terra in mere seconds.

Dafuq is the fun in that? >_>

[UChessmaster]

Decided to play the game, pretty fun, but i`m stucked in an optional quest, i`m supossed to get into a place and destroy some voleyballs and some... gas cans? but i`ve no idea how to get inside this place, can anyone help?

[Buffalobiian]

Decided to play the game, pretty fun, but i`m stucked in an optional quest, i`m supossed to get into a place and destroy some voleyballs and some... gas cans? but i`ve no idea how to get inside this place, can anyone help?

Drive a vehicle up a ramp to land inside. Use the vehicle as much as you can since that part can be pretty difficult.

I've got a lvl50 Commando, lvl34 Mech and lvl12 Assassin. Summoning's so much more fun.

[Animeniax]

Yeah you should see the cliffs look like ramps and you have to drive up them with speed to get into the area to get those volleyballs. There are a couple other areas that are hard to figure out how to get to, but you might have noticed the arrows drawn pointing the way.