Borderlands 3

x7

This. And, yes, I have issues with Randy Pitchford, but boycotting the game entirely doesn't outright hurt him and show my displeasure at him being involved. I'm also not the only one who has vocalized displeasure with Pitchford at this point either. Anyway, I have 6 months to decide if I even want to buy it when it comes out so there are other variables that might change my decision between now and 2020. I might. I might not. Or maybe I'll buy it in a $20 super-sale.

Part of buying it also that my boyfriend does really like the series and playing the series with him has actually been a net positive in our relationship, so that factor might just push me towards buying it and we can at least discuss together if we like the game or not.

And, sure, a lot of companies have issues. Dozens of them. But I'm not entirely privy to what ethical issues there are with Steam/Valve and, considering everything that HAS been coming out of the closet about companies like Riot, Bioware, Telltale, Rockstar, and others, near radio silence as far as I'm aware suggests to me that no news is good news and whatever issues there might be are probably not on the same level as the others mentioned.

But, who knows, at the rate we're going with about one controversy every week to a week and a half in the video game industry, maybe Valve will have a big blow up next. In which case I will maybe reconsider some things about them. Or maybe 2k will have some blow-up expose in two months like Bioware had after Anthem released. Who knows?

I would also point out that, while I am going to put my money where my mouth is on my criticisms, trying to cut out every game from every company that has some iota of sordid history would probably mean cutting gaming out entirely. The reality is that it is an industry that has been struggling to mature. The only way to win would be not to play at that point. And that's really difficult to ask of someone who is genuinely passionate about the medium and am fascinated by what it brings to storytelling and presentation.

So, yeah, to an extent I am maybe being hypocritical in which games I play and which I chose not to buy, but that's also the complexity of real life and sometimes there aren't any golden options to pick from and cutting out EVERYTHING is basically impossible and should probably be combated via other means than simply not engaging. Not engaging with something you find toxic is really only a single tool in dealing with something, but shouldn't be seen as the ONLY tool to use.

EDIT: Sorry for a terrible page topper and a lengthy post. Yikes.

Edited by InkDagger on Sep 20th 2019 at 9:13:14 AM

Y'all remember this?◊ I'm starting to worry that this might have actually been true and not a hoax (minus the whole leak threat)

Edited by TheWildWestPyro on Sep 21st 2019 at 9:15:26 AM

I mean that the game has a ton of online content instead of the campaing is straight up not true. I havent seen any content that is "online only". Some of the sidequests do seem geared for coop - one side quest boss in particular is a bitch to fight solo if you're not playing a specific vault hunter with a specific skill tree. But that's about it. Some skills are obviously better if you got a party

"Everything you loved about 1 and 2 is absent in 3" is a straight up lie. The game is, at its core, following the borderlands formula. One might argue it's actually one of its biggest flaw (See previously mentioned bit about how 90% of the guns are not worth even looking at)

Edited by Ghilz on Sep 21st 2019 at 2:04:06 PM

Gearbox Employee 1: I think people didn't use Tediore weapons enough in 2 and the Presequel, so we should buff them. Make them have all sorts of cool grenade mods!

Gearbox Employee 2: Oh, that's cool. Also, I've decided the reload button and the use button should be the same one on controller.

Gearbox Employee 1: Wont anyone trying to open a chest or a door, pick up a quest item, or do anything like that risk exploding themselves if they hold a tediore weapon

Gearbox Employee 2: Oh yeah, for sure.

Gearbox Employee 1: ....... But they can remap the buttons in the options right?

Gearbox Employee 2: Oh yeah for sure. They can choose which button does both reload and use. But the two functions are always linked.

Gearbox Employee 1: Sounds Brilliant!

More power to those who wait for a Steam release (or give into the Epic release). That, plus those who still wouldn't be interested in Tediore weapons wouldn't care anyway.

If I gave BL 3 a try, I'd try to find that Speedloadin' Hellwalker. Walking DOOM reference, me like very very much.

So I hit a wall with Killavolt. He's a level 16 boss hidden in a level 13 sidequest, has massive shields that are immune to shock damage, uses a tower shield, and fight you in an arena with spontaneous floor damage determined at random.

Yeah, Killavolt is the sidequest boss I mentioned is clearly meant for coop.

If you're F L4k and you have the skill where you pet can revive you, he becomes easy though.

I had a rando in my game earlier, but he left before I started the quest. He was playing FL 4 K, I'm using Amara.

Couldn't you just skip that quest and come back later at a higher level?

Of course you can, but that also means your items you get as rewards will be useless from the get go.

Good weapons can be useful for 10 levels or more. Just being a little below your level doesn't mean they're automatically useless. Although I don't recall the reward for that quest being at all useful anyway.

So being lazy and not looking it up for myself: What kind of self-healing skills are there for each class? And does anyone have the capacity to heal others like Roland and Maya? This may also be for the sake of the patterns of vault hunter healers dying in every sequel.

I beat Killavolt as FL4K without the pet-reviving skills because I'm going Master. I have, however, also beat every side mission before doing Killavolt though and I was like level 17.

Definitely needed to do a lot of jumping on against him to avoid all the shock pads on the ground, and try to make sure you use little of the area's health pickups in its boxes around the edges of the arena until the final phase of the fight where him charging at you and shocking the entirety of the ground is unavoidable damage.

Zane and FL4K can heal allies. Zane's got Nanites or Some Shite in Under Cover to heal himself and allies near the skill tree's Barrier. FL4K's Master tree has Burst Aid to make his Gamma Burst leave a Rift at the location that regenerates health for all friendlies in it.

Edited by VutherA on Sep 21st 2019 at 10:25:03 AM

Amara has an equippable action skill effect that heals the entire party for a fraction of the damage it deals.

Pretty much everyone has some sort of self healing, and it's too much trouble to list them out. Moze can heal herself by hitting people with grenades, for example.

Edited by Clarste on Sep 21st 2019 at 7:23:08 AM

That's not my experience at all. I've found this true in the three previous games^note For Playthrough 1 only, but in BL 3 I find weapons a mere 4 levels lower than the enemy feel like throwing crumpled paper at the enemies.

Fl4k has an entire skill tree dedicated to health regen (including a skill that lets him share it with party members), and one his active skills (Fade Away) gives him health regen

Edited by Ghilz on Sep 21st 2019 at 10:32:35 AM

I dunno, I used a purple Co V pistol for like 15 levels and it was still shredding enemies (and better than anything else I found).

I have no idea how you even use a gun for 15 levels. That's almost half an entire playthrough, and not find anything better. Mathematically even a white gun would have better stats than a purple over 15 levels. That's just from the basic maths of values are calculated.

Heck, I own on my character two blue Jackobs Snipers, who are 5 levels apart (28 and 33), and the later one does 173% the damage of the lower one (392 to 680). And the lower level one has a higher damage multiplyer to begin with (75% to 52%) meaning it does more damage for its relative level and it's still SUPER outclassed by a gun 5 levels higher.

There's no way a gun remains effective 15 levels later. That's simply not how the game's math works.

Edited by Ghilz on Sep 21st 2019 at 12:24:55 PM

I shat on the game's plot, but I do wanna give praise to the writing of Hammerlock's romance with Wainwright Jackobs. It's nice to see gay romances in game, but it's rare to see one between older men. And it's never played for a joke, or anything. The logs you fight depicts the two as pretty damn sweet to each other, and it's surprisingly heartwarming for Borderlands.

Edited by Ghilz on Sep 21st 2019 at 2:03:50 PM

I dunno, that was just not my experience. And I'm not the only one, lots of people have talked about being carried by legendaries for 20 levels. Randomly generated parts are far more important than level multipliers in this game.

It's possible that you're looking too much at the item level numbers and not enough at the actual stats that matter? A gun that hits twice per shot deals twice as much damage as an equivalent level gun, for example. And a gun that hits 3 times is very hard to replace.

Edited by Clarste on Sep 21st 2019 at 11:33:07 AM

I'll give that. Video games tend to portray gay women more than men and they're usually fetishized (i.e. Gay Rep not for gay people, but straight men) and gay men are usually non-existent or inoffensive and non-threatening. Wish there was more rep though. What happened to Athena and Janey??? Didn't they get married?

Well neither of them show up in the game so we can assume they're off happily married somewhere.

Also in the ending scroll thing, Wainwright proposes to Hammerlock with a golden Jakobs revolver with a diamond on the sight.

That is the most romantic thing I've ever read.

x3 Are they mentioned anywhere though? Even an ECHO log somewhere? I remember that pairing being REALLY popular back when Pre-Sequel and Tales were coming out. It just feels odd to just not mention them.