The Complete Neocron Guide for New Players

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10-01-08, 22:39
Deno

The Complete Neocron Guide for New Players

This guide should hopefully teach you almost everything you need to know to survive in NC. I will try to cover as much topics as I can but due to the nature of the game I wont be able to provide every grain of knowledge. I wont go into extreme depth on every single topic, as there are already guides for that. Instead I’ll try and condense everything you NEED to know into one guide.

Ok lets get started!
The first thing you will encounter in Neocron is the character creation process. If you’ve played other MMO’s you will understand it quite easily as it is rather typical. As you go through the process, you will have to make choices regarding your character. The most important is the player class. There are four main classes in Neocron. The class you chose not only decides how you physically look, but also how your skills are distributed, and in some cases what items/weapons you can use. The four classes are called ‘PSI Monk, GenTank, Private Eye and Spy. Each one has their own distinct physical appearance, and also, more importantly, each class has a different skills layout.
PSI Monk is not too dissimilar from spellcaster types in other MMO games. They basically cast ranged spells, but in other aspects they are quite different. For one they don’t wear pointed hats or use wands. They manipulate their surroundings and use their mental power as their main weapon. Due to their inherent physical weakness, you will not be able to become a successful fighter in the traditional sense, i.e. they do not have the skills to weild heavy weapons or even small arms like pistols. They’re main skills are Intelligence and Psionic Use. Due to this they excel at using spells and can also be very good researchers, although they would never become successful constructers, as construction is governed by your dexterity level also.
PSI Monks have two classes available; APU and PPU. APU = Aggressive Psionic Use, PPU = Passive Psionic Use. PPU is basically your supporter class. A good PPU can make themselves near invincible, and also heal other players and at higher levels even ressurect them. Due to this PPU’s are in huge demand for levelling, and even moreso for clans. If you want to stand a chance of winning a clan VS clan fight (OP war) a PPU is a must.
APUs are the nukes of NC. They deal a lot of damage in a small amount of time, and can do this for prolonged periods of time. On the other hand, they are very physically weak and have no self-support spells. Due to this they are commonly referred to as ‘Glass cannon’ – They deal a tonne of damage but also take a tonne of damage. This means you will rarely see an APU unaccompanied by a PPU. A good APU supported by a good PPU can be a lethal combination, although as of lately APU’s been nerfed and aren’t as effective as before, although if used skilfully, are still very potent. Due to these reasons I personally wouldn’t recommend an APU or PPU as a starting class.
GenTanks. These are the frontline soldiers of Neocron. They can take a pounding and also deal significant damage. This sounds great, but their main drawback is that they are completely reliant on other players for support. They don’t have the intelligence to construct or research, and due to their focus on combat, any skill in repair would be wasted, although it is quite usual for a tank to spec around 25 recycle, as this means they can be self sufficient ammo-wise, without removing too much from their weapon skill. GenTank is a brilliant first character choice, but you really need to love combat, as that is all a GenTank can do. Their main skills are strength and constitution. They have no PSI use whatsoever, and minimal intelligence. They have a reasonable level of dexterity, but not enough to make it worthwhile speccing a dexterity combat skill. GenTanks weapon of choice is either a heavy weapon (the big brother of rifles) or a melee weapon. Melee weapons have no significant bonus over heavy weapon combat, and is therefore not a wise choice as your main weapon skill. With melee you have to be up close and personal to the mobs, and that means you take a severe pounding.
PE’s, Private-Eyes, are the typical citizens of Neocron. They go by the mantra ‘Jack of all trades – Master of none’. This is precisely true, and although PE’s have a balanced skill layout, they will NEVER be as proficient as the other three classes in their relative main skills. I.e., a PE will never be as good as a tank at Heavy Weapons, nor as good as a spy at dexterity based skills. Their best skill though, is dexterity, so nearly all PEs focus on DEX based combat skills like pistol or rifle. A HC (Heavy Combat) PE is not unheard of, but they are at a significant disadvantage as they don’t have access to the higher level rare weapons (Ill come to rare weapons later in the guide). They are a good starting class, as you can experience quite a few aspects of all the player classes, and they are also more self sufficient than Tanks or Monks.
Spies. These are the rogues of Neocron. They use their superior intelligence and dexterity to gain advantages over other classes. They are natural marksmen, and also are the only true tradeskiller class. They have 100 Dexterity cap and 100 Intelligence cap, which means they are perfect as either researchers/constructers, or as rifle/pistol wielders. Their main disadvantage is that they are very physically weak. They have very low constitution, and this means they use every possible thing to increase their effectiveness. These things include nanites and stealth tools (I will cover those later.)
OK, you will by now have chosen your desired player class. Next you will be asked to decide on your player profession. New players often overestimate the importance of this choice. In truth it only decides what starter mission you will have, and it doesn’t in any way affect your abilities. Due to this all I can say is chose something that will be useful to you, ie, the Jones mission for drivers rewards you with a quad. A vehicle can be very useful, and as you get it for free it saves a tonne of cash. Other than that I would just recommend chosing the profession related to what skill types you want. So, if you are a Tank, a good choice would be soldier. The only other effect this choice will have on you, is that when someone searches your name in a citycomm, you will be labelled as that specific class. It is not uncommon to see people with the profession driver, who don’t actually drive at all.
The only other options are your faction (very important) and your physical appearance. Your faction is going to play a big role in your future in Neocron. Although it is very important, don’t worry if you end up disliking your faction, as you can change factions later in the game. Some factions are more popular than others, and you may want to chose a faction that has a larger playerbase. Tangent Technologies is a popular choice for PRO-City runners, and less often chosen faction is City Mercs.
I wont explain physical appearance, im sure you can work that out yourself ;)

OK Great! You are now ready to enter Neocron. Upon logging in, you will find yourself in area MC5 proccessing facility. This is supposedly where criminals are taken to be mind-wiped and released back into the general population as new citizens. It is highly advised to leave area MC5, as there are better ways to learn the game if you just skip straight to the main city. If you go up the gravlift, and go straight ahead until you find yourself outside, you will see conrete structure on your left. Inside is a GenRep. If you walk up to this and right click, you will see a list of GenReps you can ‘teleport’ to. Genreps are the quickest way to travel in Neocron. This is how it works; if you see a genrep, you can ‘activate’ it. This means at a later date you can actually teleport to that GenRep again. This cuts down travel time considerably, but obviously you have to have already visited that place before and activated the GenRep. For now all you will have available is ‘Appartment’. Click on this and you will find yourself in an apartment. Welcome to your first runner housing. It will most likely be small, and modestly decorated, but is nonetheless equipped with very useful stuff. You will find cupboards to store stuff, and a CityComm/Wireless R.N. Link. This is basically a computer and you can use it for multipile things. The main thing you will be using it for in the near future is for accepting quick missions. OK, you may have already noticed a man standing in your apartment. He is called MR Jones, and he will give you your starter mission. I highly advise you take this and do it, as you will receive a useful reward for completing it, and it will provide you a good bit of XP (experience).

OK, you’ve made it past a few significant hurdles, and im sure your starting to understand the basic features of Neocron. Now you will want to learn about things that maybe aren’t so obvious or well explained inside the game. Im going to cover a few miscellaneous topics, and explain them to the best of my ability,

Skills
There are two types of skills in Neocron. Mainskills and subskills. The 5 mainskills are Intelligence, Strength, Constitution, Dexterity and PSI Use. Every class has a different maximum value for each of these. I.e. only a tank can reach 100 strength. Each time you gain a level in your mainskill you are rewarded with 5 points to spend in subskills. Subskills are the things like ‘weaponlore’ and ‘Agility’.
Unlike other MMOs, the subskills have a more dynamic effect on how you perform. For example, a weapon may require 112 PC (pistol combat), but you will actually do significantly more damage if you have above the minimum requirement. It isn’t uncommon for capped players to have over 200 points in their main subskill. This is one of the reasons why it is not common to specialize in more than one combat skill. In my opinion it is best to have just one combat skill, as this means you will do a lot of damage with one weapon type, as opposed to mediocre damage, but with numerous weapon types.
Another thing to note is that, as your base level in a subskill gets higher, you need to put in more points to increase it. From level 1-50, it only requires 1 point per skill level, but after that it requires 2, and so on. After 100, it requires 5 points to increase your skill by one. This is why it can be counterproductive to overspec certain skills.

Your Level
You may have noticed that there are two different levels you have. It is displayed as **/**
An example would be 37/26. Ok lets work with this example. The first number is called your combat rank. This is calculated from things such as; what weapon you have, how much damage you do, what armour you have and how much damage you take. This can change dynamically and is easy to increase or decrease. This has no real advantage, but gives you an idea of you or your enemies toughness.
The second skill number is called your base rank, This is what people usually refer to when they ask what level you are. This is calculated by taking the average of all your main skills. This is why capped players (without implants) have a rank of **/60. This is because you have 300 total levels distributed between 5 main skills (300/5 = 60)

Important Skills
I often find that new players don’t spec, or are even completely oblivious to certain important skills. This is quite understandable, as they are not technically required for anything, but once you know what they do, you will understand their importance.

Agility/Athletics: This dictates your runspeed. You will probably be infuriated at the slow speed of your character when you start out. By increasing your skill in these two areas you will be much faster and be able to jump higher. This isn’t as important for levelling up, but is extremely important for PvP.

Resists: Resists are skills that reduce the amount of damage you take from certain damage types. It isn’t as important at very low levels, but as you start to level up you might want to spec some points in these areas. There are two strength related resists; Pierce and Force. Force is usually done by things like rockets or explosive weapons. Pierce is done by weapons that use ballistic bullets, such as lowtech pistols or shotguns. There are four in constitution. Energy, Fire, Xray and poison. For some classes it is hard to spec points in all of these, and often you might have a weak area, but for tanks, it is important to have equal skill points spent in each. The only exception is if you plan to do a lot of levelling in an area where only a certain damage type is done.

Transport: This dictates how much you can carry in your inventory. It is also affected by your strength level, but for non-tanks, you might want to spec a bit in this skill. It really helps if you don’t want to have to keep running back for more ammo etc.

LOM Pills: Often, you may come to regret certain places you spent skill points in, or you may even wish that you had chosen a completely different mainskill! Luckily there are these amazing things called LOM Pills. Basically what they do is remove a skill from an area and reward them back to you, so you are free to spend them as you like. The downside is that they remove a certain percentage of your overall XP. So occasionally you may even lose a level due to LOMing. Due to this, it is best to LOM at low levels when XP is easy to get, or after you have capped, when you may actually have more XP than is required for the maximum level. It is actually very common for players to level to cap as a certain skill type then LOM to a completely different one! A good example is spies levelling as a droner then LOMing to construction or even pistol/rifle.
10-01-08, 22:41
Deno

Implants
You may have noticed the implant screen in the Neocron tab menu. This shows you the slots for implants, and what bonuses, and side affects they have. Basically, there are numerous implants for each slot. It is up to you to choose what you think will benefit you the most. You may also hear about MC5 chips. These are rare implants, and are quite expensive, so don’t worry about them until you are capped.
When you remove implants, or when they ‘fall out’ when you die, they incur damage. They can be repaired, but will eventually be destroyed.

Law Enforcement Chip
Commonly known as the LE, this chip basically stops you participating in PvP (player VS player combat). It also stops other unLE’d runners harming you. Also, a lot of people returning from NC1, may remember that removing your LE increased your XP gains, well fortunately/unfortunately that has been changed, as of now, there is no difference in XP gain between having an LE chip or not. Another thing to note is that you cannot join a clan if your LE is still implanted

Getting Weapons Built
OK, you’ve probably been using your weapon that you started the game with quite a lot, and you’ve more likely than not come to realise how bad it is. As your main skill increases you will also probably want to make an upgrade to a better weapon. There are two ways to do this. The most simple is to visit your local Archer & Wesson store and buy a gun from their large selection. This is good because its simple and quick, but there is another way to obtain a new weapon that will be significantly better than anything you can buy in a shop. This, is the process of having a weapon built by a player. Here’s how to go about doing it. Firstly you will need a blueprint of the weapon you want built. You can simply buy the weapon you desire from the shop, bring it to a researcher, and he/she will make you some blueprints. These blueprints are the plans to the weapon, and allow a constructer to build it. It is polite to buy the parts required for the constructer and then just bring it to him/her. The price of parts shouldn’t be too high for lower level weapons, and you can probably buy them from Crytons. Once you bring them to a constructer, they will build it and give it to you. You will notice that the stats are much better on these player built weapons. There is also a chance of getting ‘slots’ on these weapons. Slots are quite important In NC. You can tell if a weapon has slots, by the white boxes that appear in the top right hand corner of the weapons icon, when it is placed in your inventory. These slots can be filled with modifications.
There are numerous modifications available. There are ones that effect the stats, and ones that allow you to use an ammo variant. There are also mods like flashlights or silencers that you can turn on/off with the numpad numbers 1-4. Except from the lasersight, these do not affect the performance of a weapon, and are therefore a waste of slots. Id advise modding in this order. 1. Damage stat. 2. Ammo Mod. 3. Frequency and so on. So if you have a weapon with 2 free slots, you might want to add an ammo mod and enhance the damage stat.

Synaptic Impairment
This is something everyone has to deal with in Neocron. Basically you get this when you either die, GenRep or in the case of droners, your drone gets destroyed. For GenRepping you receive 20% SI, dyeing gives you 40% and losing a drone gives you 5%. Synaptic Impairment basically temporarily decreases all your skills. So if you have 100 base rifle combat, you genrep, you will now have 80 rifle combat, as 20% is removed due to SI. Don’t worry! This is only a temporary thing, and it will go away in a matter of minutes. SI has no permanent effects, and is simply a nuisance for most NC players. A thing to note is that if you GenRep to an Outpost that your clan owns, you wont suffer any SI.

Epic Missions
These are missions that are specific to each faction. Once you reach a certain level you will be able to accept a new mission in the epic quest line. For the last mission you need to be **/45.
Upon completion you will receive a reward and some cash. You will also now have the title of Master, Tangent Technologies (or whatever faction your in). The reward you receive is specific to each faction and may range from a weapon or an implant, to a special apartment.

Clans
Clans are like factions within factions. If you have played other MMOs they will be very similar to other games, although the clan system in Neocron is more indepth than most. Most people will simply join a successful existing clan, but if you want to start one yourself you simply have to have finished your factions epic mission, and have a certain sympathy with that faction. You can then activate a clan key, and it will provide you with certain parameters such as clan name etc. A clan apartment also comes with the clan key. The only difference between normal apartments and clan apartments is that in clan apartments, all clan members can access the cabinets, and all clan members can open the main door. So don’t be offended if a clan you have just join doesn’t give you the clan apartment password straight away, you usually have to earn their trust before they let you in. Clans also can participate in OP wars (Outpost wars) I will cover these later. Clans also have a ‘bank’ within the clan, and members with the sufficient rank can withdraw and add cash to the reserves. This can be very useful as there is no limit to the amount of money able to be stored in a clan bank (player limit is 20 million).
There are also 15 different ranks in a clan, these can be changed and customised by high ranking members.

Outposts
You may have noticed that on the world map there are a number of places like ‘McPherson Factory’ or ‘Ceres Mine’. These are known as Ops. They are basically places that can be captured by clans. Once a clan owns the OP, they can use it, and it usually carries a benefit. Labs increase your research skill, factories increase your construction skill. The others give less useful bonuses so that is why factories and labs are the most sought after.
To capture an OP it is quite simple. There are 3 ‘layers’ of security you need to hack through (each needs to be done by a different person in the same clan) and then theres a final fourth layer in hacknet. Once you have reconfigured the security settings in hacknet, the OP is yours! This sounds very easy, but don’t expect the clan that owns it to let you take it without a fight! OP fights can last for hours, and as soon as an attacking clan begins hacking, the clan that owns the OP is alerted to the attack. The defending clan will then GenRep to the undergroung (UG) where they can group up and get ready to make a counterattack. A good OP team will include all classes, as each has their part to play. Often, a clan can dominate the entire map for months on end, until another clan overthrows them. There is therefore great demand for talented fighters in a clan.

Rare Weapons
You will probably already have heard a lot of people mention rare weapons. Rare weapons are essentially the same as the weapons you have already used, but with a few key differences. Their stats (damage/frequency/handling/range) can be built to 120%. That is to say, unlike non-rares, which are built to a maximum of 99%, these rare weapons can hit 120% without a single mod. They also do a significant amount of damage compared to non-rares. Their only different physical characteristic is the presence of a pulsing orb of energy/light that rotates around the barrel of the weapon, this is often referred to as a ‘swirly’. Any weapon that has a ‘swirly’ is a rare weapon. Also, rare weapons have distinct names, a few common ones are ‘Cursed Soul’ or maybe ‘First Love’. The CS (nearly all rare weapons have an abbreviation) is the rare version of the plasma cannon. The First Love is the rare version of the plasma rifle. An interesting thing to note also, is that nearly all rare weapons have a story you can read which explains the history of the weapon and supposedly how it came to be. The exceptions to this are rare PSI spells, and Ion Shotgun weapons.
Rare weapons are really the only choice for capped players looking to participate in PvP. When you have saved a bit of cash and are high enough level, you might want to invest in a rare weapon. A 1 slot version with average stats can actually be bought for relatively cheap, and is a good buy for a player that is nearly capped. You will notice a massive difference when you make the step from non-rare to rare.

Power Armour
You may have noticed high level players running around in what appears to be an exoskeleton or armour suit. These are referred to as PA’s. These are high level armour suits that not only give significant armour bonuses, but also increase your physical skills. For example, a Heavy Combat PA might give you +2 strength and +15 Heavy combat. The downside is they usually have negative effects too. For tanks, this is a decrease in speed, and for other classes it’s a decrease in another mainskill or a subskill (usually the opposite of the PA type, so a HC PA will have a negative effect on melee).
These armour suits are quite expensive, but they aren’t actually used by everyone. They are a choice you may have to make when you decide to take part in PvP. Many PvPer’s choose not to use them due to their disadvantages. This is particularly noticeable with tanks, as roughly half use them and half don’t. For classes like PE’s they are much more advantageous, as they don’t nerf your speed.

Wisdom Of Ceres
WOC is an extra skill above cap. Usually there is only one or two WOC skills available to each class. For Spies this would be dexterity and intelligence. Basically this skill allows you to use certain rare weapons. Usually these WOC weapons are very similar to modern day weapons, i.e. you will probably at some stage see someone using an AK-47, or a ‘Bazooka’. Unfortunately, as of now, there aren’t WOC weapons for every skill. Only HC, Rifle and Pistol.
To gain WOC skill, you need 150million XP on top of your capped XP, so this means a total of exactly 267million XP. Due to this, obtaining the XP is quite time consuming. Once you have the XP you will need to obtain a ‘WOC Disk’. This is possibly the rarest item in game (apart from items that no longer are possible to obtain, or are only given out by GMs). You can either try and get one yourself, or buy it. They are very expensive and regularly sell for 20million or even more.
Once you have the XP and WoC disk, you need to speak to a ‘WOC Savant’. These NPCs will give you the WOC skill of your choice, if you have both the XP and the WoC disk. They will also ask for a one time fee of 2million. Now that you have WoC, you can use WoC weapons, and also wear WoC PA. This PA is black in colour with silver stripes. It is more or less identical to ordinary PA, but with slightly better armour values, and +5 to your main skill. To obtain this you need to bring a tl 110 PA, and 2milliom to a WOC Armour NPC. They will then ‘upgrade’ the tl 110 PA to WoC PA.
There are 5 WoC levels in total, and each one requires more XP and more WoC disks. It requires 15 WoC disks in total, and over a billion XP to obtain. Very few people have WoC 5. There are no weapons with requirements higher than WoC 1, so it is pointless to go higher than WoC 1. The only reason you may want to obtain a higher WoC level, is to get WoC 3 PA. This PA has gold stripes instead of silver stripes, and can only be handed out by GMs, so is very rare indeed.

Common Abbreviation/Slang
When you first enter Neocron you will probably be bombarded by slang and abbreviations that you simply don’t understand. Heres a list of the most important things.

Pokes/Pokers
A ‘poke’ is the slang for getting an implant inserted into your brain. Most people don’t have any implant skill and need another person to do this for them. You will probably see things like ‘Need tl 115 poker at ……’.

PK’er
This is someone who actively searches for someone to kill. This may be used as an insult, or simply used to describe people who partake in PvP.

Conster/Resser
You have probably guessed this one already, it means a constructer or a researcher. Repairer is often shortened to ‘repper’ too.

Techs
These are the rare parts required to build a rare weapon. You will probably often see someone advertising in trade’WTB undressed techs’ and so on.

Drugflash
This is the sideaffect of using drugs ingame. Your screen will go blurry (similar to static on a TV).

WTB/WTS/WTT
Wanting to buy, wanting to sell, wanting to trade,

You will discover more, but they are mostly easy to guess. I haven’t included common internet abbreviation, as you can just do a google search for them or else wikipedia them.

Thanks for reading my guide, and I hope this has cleared up quite a few things in Neocron for you. There is much more, but it would be impossible to include them all in one guide. Read the numerous other guies on the forum if you want information regarding a specific area. Also, if any of the details in this guide are wrong please tell me ;)
13-01-08, 03:26
danmalone

nice guide, im tempted to say this should get stickied as i think it could explain alot of things to new players aswell as maybe attract new players (hopefully :p )

v nice job, a lot of effort put in... keep up the good work. As they say on ebay, A++++ guide :lol:
28-01-08, 19:37
Darkana
Hah, a good start :D What's most important at the start is to explain the basics about the chat system and how Navray works. These two "tools" can be real lifesavers. Besides that, let me add a few notes (and yes, I'm nitpicky at times :p):

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The class you chose not only decides how you physically look, but also how your skills are distributed, and in some cases what items/weapons you can use.

Lets say it this way: They limit the choice of useful items/weapons.

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Due to this they excel at using spells and can also be very good researchers, although they would never become successful constructers, as construction is governed by your dexterity level also.

Unless someone actually proves your statement, I would be careful to put up such an example (DEX 10%, INT 20%, CST 70% influence to construction). A more obvious example as in "never be able to use the good heavy cannons" would have been better IMO.

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PSI Monks have two classes available

... and there are hybrids, which combine the aggressive and passive side. They won't excel in either, but can stand their own and have more focus on solo play than purely aggressive (APUs) or passive (PPUs) monks. They do even have their own profession, called "Preacher".

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APUs are the nukes of NC

You hinted at their current state. Lets clarify that a little bit: On single targets they deal high damage per hit, but with rather slow frequency, so the overall damage is ... ok-ish. The fun part about APUs is the AoE damage, which I think is still superior to what other classes offer. Anway, APUs may seem weak, but they can hold their own, if played right, even without healing backup.

Another thing to mention here: PPUs are totally team dependent. You just cannot level a PPU without anyone else. Their profession is "Field Medic", which means that's a real bad choice if you have noone to start playing with or who is leveling with you.

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New players often overestimate the importance of this choice.

I'd be careful with this one. For so called alts (any additional character beyond the first/main one) it doesn't matter, true. For absolutely new players the choice of profession makes the difference between getting stuck or being able to progress. As mentioned already, "Field Medic" is a terrible choice for someone starting out alone. "Hacker" sounds like a good deal, but you don't get anything bar a Stiletto to stand up against the "real world" monstrosities. And so on. That makes the choice of profession an important one, unless you know you what you are getting yourself into.

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Tangent Technologies is a popular choice for PRO-City runners, and less often chosen faction is City Mercs

Tangent Technologies, or short "TT", is the current popular choice, but that changes every now and then, as said. Especially those who take the time and read up about the background of the factions usually pick that what they can identify best with or what sounds fun in a (loose) RP sense. I'd actually encourage this way to pick a faction; as written you can change it later on if you really end up in a "dead" faction and want to be part of a clan.

More important than that is the location you start in, which is defined with the faction. All but the City Mercs start somewhere in Neocron City. The City Mercs start in Military Base (aka MB), which I wouldn't suggest to pick as a complete newbie, unless you like to break through concrete walls headfirst (and that can be taken almost literally in MB ;)

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Another thing to note is that, as your base level in a subskill gets higher, you need to put in more points to increase it. From level 1-50, it only requires 1 point per skill level, but after that it requires 2, and so on. After 100, it requires 5 points to increase your skill by one.

Well, you could aswell have listed the missing part :) The boundaries are 50, 75 and 100 which divide the payment of 1, 2, 3 and 5 skill points to the next skill level. For example, to increase a subskill from 75 to 76 you need 3 skill points. Subskills are usually just refered to as skill, while the "skills" or mainskills as you put it are also called abilities/attributes (which is the more common term in RPGs for them).

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The first number is called your combat rank. [...] This has no real advantage

Unless it has been changed it affects the way how XP is spread in a team. Only players with a "similar" combat ranking (short CR) share XP when teamed (and are not too far away from each other, aka team pointers must be visible). The possible spread of the "similar" CRs becomes broader the higher level it is. So yes, no real advantage, but important in a way, still.

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Important Skills

(As you see, subskills are generally just refered to as "skill") I would add body health here, which everyone should get up to at least 50, unless you plan to stand around in the city as a tradeskiller forever.

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LoM Pills

It's advised that you take care of what you are doing, deleveling can render weapons unusable again, for example. It wouldn't be the first time someone steps into that trap ;)

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Law Enforcement Chip

It renders all damage from and to other players naught. Additionally, you can only receive/apply buffs, heals and such from/on other LEed players. Same goes for players without LE, they can only receive/apply buffs from/on their non-LEed fellow players. That doesn't affect trading and such, only combat related things to prevent exploits in one or the other direction of any kind. The XP malus, among other things, has been removed a long time ago (somewhen in 2003). It took some time to eradicate the "old" workings of the LE chip out of the brains. :) Anyway, you can still do PvP inside a NeoFrag sim, even with LE chip installed.

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Getting Weapons Built

A couple things here:
- While most researchers do have empty datacubes handy, not all may have. You can buy empty datacubes at Crytons, among other places. Buy as many of them as blueprints you want to get made of your weapon. Also keep in mind that everything beyond TL (TechLevel) 25 needs lube, so tip the tradeskillers accordingly.
- The blueprints (BPs) the researcher made out of the data cubes and your "prototype" weapon/item contain the information what parts you need to get that item build (right click the BP to get to the info). Higher TL weapons will need weapon parts you cannot buy in stores (WP8, WP9 and WP10). These can either be recycled (out of lower weapon parts, e.g. 2x WP7 = 1x WP8), found on mob corpses or also researched and build like other items (which is IMO the prefered and cheapest way to do it).
- Slots appear first as white empty boxes, which means they can be filled with something. The weapon name shows how many free slots are still available as well. Filled slots are shown as filled white boxes. Once added, mod[ification]s cannot be removed anymore!
- Rule of thumb, at least used to be: First mod is the ammo mod. Back in the days it added like 50% more damage using the matching advanced ammo with it, contrary to the damage mod ("barrel"), which increases the damage, but not that much. I doubt this has changed even with the new combat system.
- The so called weapon stats are listed in the item info screen you can see if you right click a weapon, and are listed under "object stats": Damage, Range, Handling and Frequency (and Condition, but that is not relevant here). These stats can go up to 120%. Normal weapons, as described further below, can go up to 99% out of a constructors hand, before the mods are applied.
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Synaptic Impairment

Maybe a couple more things here. GeneReps, or Gene Replicators, short GRs, are spread throughout the entire game world. Most GRs can be activated aka "tagged" or "grabbed" (costs 150 creds each time). You can only use activated GRs as teleportation targets and respawn points after death (if no PPU is around to resurrect you). Due to game rules, outpost GRs may not be accessible all the time. The clan holding the OP can decide who can access the GR and who not (based on faction, enemy status and clan membership). The GRs in the cities as well as a number of GRs in the wastelands are freely accessible all the time, though.

Teleportation is usually refered to as "GRing", as in "let's gr to DR" (Desert Racetrack), for example.

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(Epic Missions) You will also now have the title of Master, Tangent Technologies

"Tangent Technologies, Master" :) This is also denoted by a "*E" or something like this in the faction relation screen (aka F6-screen, reachable by pressing F6).

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Rare Weapons

An important note here is the (original) way to obtain such weapons: They are dropped as so called rare techs from 3-star mobs like Warbots, Doom Reapers etc. These rare techs come as L, T and E, which have different TLs and thus are used for either lower or higher TL rare items. To find out what they are good for, a researcher has to uncover what rare tech item it is exactly. Once you've collected all the parts necessary to build a certain rare item, you can deliver these to a constructor who will hopefully build something cool out of it :) There are lists and websites (e.g. http://techhaven.org/) where you can enter the different parts you've collected so far and if these are enough to build an item.

There are more things, e.g. I dunno if 25 recycle skill is really enough, but the above stuff is what caught my mind immediately.
28-01-08, 20:25
Deno

Thanks for all the feedback darkana, Im going to get it updated as soon as possible, but im having problems editing the thread :\ I may have to get it deleted by mod and make a new updated thread.
14-06-13, 18:35
Konjah

Great guide! I just signed up, downloaded and had a quick look around. I'm very grateful for the time and effort you've put into this to help new players like myself get started.
01-07-18, 05:27
jvasquez33

Someone asked me if weapon type affected certain stats while leveling. Example, a Spy starting off killing with that lazar noob gun is painful, but killing with a constructed knife is a whole lot faster. Since being a Spy, would killing with a knife effect the stat gains differently to that of the lazar gun? Or do stats go up the same regardless of the weapon?
01-07-18, 09:30
AlvaroT

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Originally Posted by jvasquez33

Someone asked me if weapon type affected certain stats while leveling. Example, a Spy starting off killing with that lazar noob gun is painful, but killing with a constructed knife is a whole lot faster. Since being a Spy, would killing with a knife effect the stat gains differently to that of the lazar gun? Or do stats go up the same regardless of the weapon?

Stats that go up depends on the weapon you use. Lazar gun is a pistol, that governs P-C subskill in Dexterity category. Killing stuff with pistol will gain you Dexterity. Knife use M-C subskill, so it will level Strength. Speed that you gain the exp should be the same, class has nothing to do with that. Class only determine what skill cap you have.
But there is one thing. If lower TLed weapon kill things at roughly same speed as you highier TL, using lower TL weapon can give you sligthly more exp, because your rank decreases.