Welcome, fellow Psychos, to another installment of the Borderlands 2 Live Blog! In the last installment, we made it to Liar’s Burg, fixing Claptrap up and getting ourselves psyched to slaughter Captain Flynt on our way to Sanctuary! But first, we’re going sidequesting!
Actually, before that, some other things of note. Firstly, I have familiarized myself a little more with Krieg’s skills, and let me tell you, I can’t wait for Level 6. Or 5, for that matter! Secondly, it’s worth going into a little more depth on our current location. We’re in Liar’s Berg, obviously, which Hammerlock has described to us as the last location of the Resistance before they had to haul ass to Sanctuary. It’s pretty desolate and frozen over, but was no doubt once much more lively than it is now. Speaking of frozen and desolate, did I ever tell you about the area proper? Well, now I just did, because that basically describes it.
Now, on to the sidequesting. First order of business is to clear out Liar’s Berg of two Bullymong nests. This is easily done; we loot an Incendiary Maliwan pistol from one of their corpses. I’ll refrain from explaining the elemental stuff for now, simply because we’ll have to have it explained to us at a later time. I will say, though, that I feel the game’s trying to tell me something in regards to Krieg's later skills... however, before I forget, Maliwan – they make elemental weaponry solely. As a reward for this quest, we receive a Vladof Assault Rifle. Vladof weapons typically are automatic only, and fire faster the longer the trigger is held down. The speed sortof stacks and carries over if you resume firing as the barrls at the end are still spinning with any degree of extra speed.
The next quest is to raid a Crimson Raider safe house for a better shield. This requires us to open the gate in Liar’s Berg and head out into the frozen lands beyond, running into our fellow brethren at a camp just down the way, Psychos! They’re... well, psycho. They act a lot like Bullymongs, really, except instead of fists and ice it’s buzz axes and occasionally dynamite they suicide with. We also eliminate a flock of Rakk, which are essentially deadly birds. This ascends us to Level 4. We're so close! Moving out onto the ice, we hit up a bandit camp that’s essentially taken over the area we need to go, as this wasformerly Resistance territory. After clearing them out quickly with our oneshot incendiary pistol, we activate the elevator we need to use to ascend to the safehouse proper... or try, as we learn from Hammerlock that Claptrap broke it after attempting to... integrate with it. Dude, really?
Alright, alright, we’ve just gotta hit up a third camp right next to us. This isn’t too much of a problem, except an electric barrier stands between us and the thing we need. We shoot the fuse box after quickly clearing the camp and it's various Marauders and Midgets (Which come in Marauder or Psycho form), angering a pack of large Bullymongs. WHY DOES MY LIFE SUCK RIGHT NOW
Well, it did until I remembered I had the Vladof equipped, and dispatched them relatively quickly. Grabbing the item we needed, it was a hop, skip and a jump back to the elevator, riding it up to the top. I pick up a much better shield and a secret loot chest nearby, although I found nothing of mention. Setting off, we return to Liar’s Berg, but at the first camp, I find an Audio Log I missed. Hm. A female voice plays out speaking about hijacking a train running through somewhere called the Dust, but Hyperion forces seem to find them as it ends. Hammerlock contacts me excitedly, saying the log is one of Helena Pierce’s, a lieutenant in the Crimson Raiders who went missing. Reportedly, so I get my facts straight, these Raiders are the Resistance we’re seeking to find. He asks me to find the rest of these logs he now believes to be scattered through Liar’s Berg, and that we’ll be paid for it. Simple enough.
The first is found in a dumpster. Handsome Jack and something clearly robotic appear (And let me tell you that companion of his sounds scary as fuck going "NOBODY MOVE." in that voice of his); As Handsome Jack asks Pierce to turn around, he begins to be amused at the sight of some facial deformity Pierce possesses. The second is on Hammerlock’s roof. Handsome Jack strikes a deal with Pierce; tell him how she got the deformity and she’s free to go, along with everyone else with her. Her husband, now dead, gave her a skag pearl ring, she says, and it released hunger inducing pheromones. Jack stays true to his word and kills her. The third is in a freezer with a dead Marauder. I won’t describe the contents of that particular log, although we find out the person with Jack is Wilhelm. Hammerlock contacts us again, saddened. We return to him, completing both quests.
Our next quest involves eliminating Bullymongs with melee attacks to rip some fur from their hides. Sounds fun! It’s also incredibly simple, too, once you’re experienced enough. The game gives you three areas to collect four furs; I only need one. I say experience factors in because on any playthrough after the first, it feels much more simple to accomplish this task. While I’m doing so, Hammerlock and Claptrap launch into a session of persuading me to give the fur to them; Hammerlock promises one of his finest sniper rifles, and Claptrap promises a shotgun so fresh off the hands of a dead Vault Hunter, you can still smell the sadness on it! I’m terribly sorry, Hammerlock, but a Sniper Rifle in the hands of Krieg is probably one of the only things in the game that I’d consider a crime against humanity (Watch me shoot myself in the foot as I keep a sniper rifle on me later). The shotgun we get is particularly good, and of the Torgue manufacturer. Their trait is basically explosive ammo at all times.
Our final sidequest tasks us with entering a new area and eliminating Midgemong, a Midget Psycho riding a Bullymong. Entering the area is quick enough, and as we eliminate Bullymongs and Rakk, we ascend to Level 5. Excuse me, fellow Psychos; I’m tackling another route to test this out.
-Several minutes later-
I love Krieg. His Action Skill, Buzz Axe Rampage, is especially rewarding, but I seem to recall vowing to explain what it did once we got it. As the name may or may not imply, Buzz Axe Rampgage is just that - you pull out a huge buzz axe and go to down, chopping enemies to pieces with it or throwing copies of them like tomahawks from Call of Duty for a ranged attack. All your health returns upon a kill, melee damage is much better than how it is now with standard melee (which is especially helpful as it means wight now human enemies are just decimated by it), and I can throw the buzz axes to do ranged damage fairly quickly. In the time I took to test this skill out, we hit Level 6 as well. Now, at this point, we could upgrade a skill, but I’m going to wait until the end of this installment before I do anything with that.
We’re at a waterfront complex of sorts; we could speed this and go for Midgemong or take the scenic route along boats for loot. I go for the loot, using Buzz Axe Rampage religiously as I go. I found myself dying a couple of times at the final bit, though. In the end, we clear the area, making our way to Midgemong. Midgemong is a tough fight for me, right now. I’m constantly dying, but thankfully there’s my Rampage for that. I eventually get him killed, get back to Liar’s Berg, turn in the quest and redress myself in a new head (STAY IN SCHOOL KIDS) and skin (GAUZE IT YOU IDIOT), but it would be rude to not describe the Midgemong fight, wouldn’t it?
Besides the fact that I’m Krieg, which does mean I die a little easier since his entire playstyle can e described as suicidal, Midgemong is an interesting fight. It consists of a Bullymong that typically leaps around to rooftops to avoid you while the Badass Midget on top of him takes shots at you. Killing one frees the other up as a singular identity, and not killing both fast enough reportedly results in the dead one respawning. Eventually, with the use of my Torgue shotgun, I’m able to swap in to my Rampage and get a lucky kill on the Bullymong. From there, my Rampage inexplicably resets and I reuse it to play golf with the Midget. Seriously, that guy flew after one hit.
Now, to start wrapping up this installment, we’re gonna briefly cover the skill trees Krieg has, of which there are three. Hellborn relies on elemental damage he applies to enemies feeding back to Krieg by lighting him on fire, thus adding buffs to him as he burns. I hope he smells like bacon. Bloodlust relies on stacking up Bloodlust Stacks by simply damaging enemies for buffs scaling on the amount of stacks; while Hellborn was more for elemental guns, Bloodlust is probably best use with assault style weapons, especially automatics since those should easily give you loads of stacks (Max is 100). Finally, Mania is all about the melee and Rampage. You can guess which one I’m shooting for; our two skill points, as we did ascend to Level 7 from killing Midgemong, go to bonus melee damage varying with empty shields and magazines (Empty the Rage) and increased health and shield recharge delay (Feed the Meat. The recharge is a negative effect for us, but is a gimmick of this particular tree as having our shields down buffs us. See why Krieg's a pretty suicidal character to play as?). We also redeem a Badass Token for more melee damage.
Alright, that’s the sidequesting in this area done and taken care of. I hope you’re enjoying reading this, fellow Psychos, because I’m starting to enjoy it a lot more. Next time, we’ll be taking on Captain Flynt and hopefully reaching Sanctuary! This is IP, signing off.
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