Horizon Zero Dawn/Horizon Forbidden West

High tear weapons and ammo are good for breaking off armor and machine parts. High impact is the straight damage part of it an good for exposed weak points like watcher eyes. Just get what weapons you need to cover your chosen element weaknesses of enemies.

Am I just using them wrong, or are slings garbage?

I use the explosive sling all the time. Mostly against larger machines like the Saw Tooth to break off armor and stagger them. I used it on the Thunder Jaw to break off some of its body armor to expose weak points below.

They tend to have higher element damage then most arrows do so I have a few. In general for offensive weapons I have at least three bows. One that does high impact damage, one that does high tear damage, and one for elemental. Slings I use for their elemental abilities. I have the trip caster for disrupting enemies or slowing down fast or agile enemies so I can maneuver away from them if needed.

So... Do lots of quests to get lots of shards?

Hunt every small animal you see. That gets you carry upgrades.

So since I will likely never get a PS 4, I decided to read the plot synopsis on wikipedia, then the trope article. I just want to say that THANK FUCKING CHRIST that the game treats Faro's decision to wipe out ALL KNOWLEDGE OF TECHNOLOGY to "keep humanity from repeating its mistakes" as the utterly idiotic thing that it is.

edited 4th Mar '17 10:19:04 PM by Psyclone

Not just all knowledge of technology; all knowledge that humanity had, period. This including all of human history. It's even stupider when you consider that, but it kinda makes sense when you know that Faro was so Genre Blind that he designed the war machines his company produced to be able to self-replicate and fuel themselves using biological sources. I mean, that is the perfect setup for a Robot War. Even Skynet couldn't have done it better.

I spent 20-30 minutes hunting foxes last night. I cleared Cauldron Sigma, and going through it got me loads of modifications, meaning I had to drop a fair few of the ones I already had because my bag was full. My priority on leaving was to upgrade the bag, which requires bits of fox :P

Sorta leads me to a very minor complaint I have: I would have liked to see more gear on Aloy. At least whatever weapon you have equipped and the spear. Bugs me a little that the spear just disappears when it's not in her hand, and that she's carrying no visible bags. I liked the way Rise Of The Tomb Raider did it; there was no way Lara had enough storage on her to carry all the stuff she had, but she did have visible bags and pouches, and they changed size or appearance as they were upgraded.

Also I would have liked the weapon wheel to have six slots instead of four. It just doesn't feel quite enough to cover all situations, I don't really want to have to go into the menu to equip a weapon I need if it's not already on the wheel.

PS: I know I'm kinda complaining a lot, but these are all quite minor things really, and this happens when I can't find anything else to complain about :P

Agree on the weapon limitation. I never feel QUITE ready in a fight. Having to pop into a menu to reapply weapons is an issue, but it makes you approach encounters with a plan.

Three bows is a bit mad though. But SO MANY arrow types.

The sling, I've found is actually pretty good for shocking things like Bellowbacks or mass applying elements to herd beasts (Grazers for example). It's the environmental stuff I barely use - log piles and the like.

The gun is the one I use least, I've found. Marksman bow with tear arrows, then chop and change with the sling and rope caster mainly. I have had some EPIC fights so far - swarmed by watchers and scrappers, then a Sawtooth. Got into a rhythm of trip wire, roll, tear arrow, snipe. It was amazing.

Human fights are more dull as you can't use the tools as well on them. Basically, if you can stealth an outpost, do it, as it's weirdly quicker.

Just loving it so far. Done the Embrace and the valley and about to head to Carja lands. Found a lot of the collectibles, but not as many data entries. Love the world building.

Can't say I've had much use for the sling, but then, I have a bad habit of skipping status moves for direct damage.

Also, Hunting Grounds guy keeps suggesting I use projectiles my Carja Sling can't use. Still full sunned all three Nora Hunting Ground trials and Blazing Sunned the cannister one.

I'm not entirely sure how to herd Grazers better to smash them in the log trial - whether they go left or right seems to be dumb luck to me, so making sure they flood the valley with the easy log traps is a bit tricky.

Bomb wire trial should be easy to brute force a blazing sun on. I have an enormous amount of the relevant crafting materials and can just lay a huge bomb web and panic the herd with an arrow or two.

I was looking forward to this, but I'm waiting for a price drop. Going to have to avoid reviews until then.

That one's a pain - you need to fire the sling ahead of them to try to get them into that valley, then switch to a bow to hit the log trap. Easiest place to do it from is the rope between the two but you need a perk to fire from there.

I've skipped all the tutorial and Hunting Lodge quests so far. Challenge type things aren't usually my thing, and it seems silly to me that you have to actually activate the tutorial quests to complete them, in a way. Surely I've used the tripcaster and ropecaster enough by now to have 'learned' them.

Go do the weapon tutorial quests. Lot of XP in those.

Can you get back into All Mother Mountain? I found some ruins with a set of armor in them, and apparently I need 2 power cells to get them, one in the ruins from the very beginning of the game, the other in the mountain. Should've gotten them after the proving, didn't. I know the new warchief hates me, so I don't know if I should try to go back.

I did the Hunting Grounds because I was promised phat loot. The loot actually sucked, but the exp and trophies are pretty great.

I full sunned the log challenge by standing in the canyon and using a bunch of shock wires to trap Grazers in places where logs could kill them, though in the end, it mattered more that I got lucky with how they bunched up.

edited 5th Mar '17 10:03:09 AM by Balmung

I saw that armour too, I want it. Didn't know there was a power cell in the mountain though, did you look that up? I assumed there'd be ruins somewhere else with more stuff in them. I also think there's going to be more than just those power cells you need, since I bet that armour is endgame stuff (or at least much later on, based on the quest level). Maybe the power cell is deeper into the mountain, after you pass the facial recognition scan.

Nope, it's actually available from the beginning, next to a locked door, and I feel stupid for having looked at the place before and assuming nothing was inside there (it's in a small passage that ends in some sort of space with candles. The item, as well as the bottom of the place, is hidden, so you can't see it - or even notice that it exists - unless you get inside the passage).

I heard you can get back in there later on, but I haven't confirmed that and am afraid this is Lost Forever.

Shit, I remember a little dead end as well. I guess I know what I'm doing when I get back on the game :P I'll probably do tutorial missions while I'm back in the Embrace too.

To answer the question from like five posts ago, I don't see why you wouldn't be able to get back into Allmother. It would be shitty if that was the one chance you had to get the cell, I don't think Lost Forever is really something that happens any more.

I got in there the first time because I never assume a dead end is empty or a passage doesn't lead to loot.

Yeah, I should have known better :P

Yeah, me too. Well, I thought that dead end was just that. I didn't realize there was a space to the right

But yeah, lesson learned.

I can confirm that you can get that power cell later in the game. Though you actually need 5 of them to get the armor (Atleat that I'm aware of, there might be a third stage to the quest since I've only found 3 cells so far.)

Good to know. I aware that making things Lost Forever is not common nowadays, but who knows, right? :P

On another note, I ended up fighting a mobile Deathbringer yesterday and holy crap, that was hard. I was severely underequipped, though: only had my trusty starting bow to deal damage, so yeah. I really thought I was gonna die, because I got down to my last healing item. But I beat it, then decided to go get some money and buy better gear. Now, let's proceed with the story!

Just as well, I went back there, and the gate up to the mountain was shut. Then I left the village (and I got the sense that this was a bit of a glitch) and Aloy and the watchman had a shouted conversation about how the gate was shut on Resh's orders, no exceptions. And then the gate to the village itself was shut. So that's a bummer.

I'm assuming then that other cells are in other ruins around the area.

edited 5th Mar '17 4:48:46 PM by artfulscruff

Anyone have a list of what the game considers a "small machine"? I need to know what I can and can't one hit. (I can painfully confirm shell walkers are not considered small machines. :( )