Noticed at least a couple people have this game.

I would like to start out with the bounties.

$5,000,000,000.00 for Axton for war crimes.
$32,000,000,000.00 for Zer0 for political assassination.
$99,000,000,000.99 for Salvadore for manslaughter, theft, arson, destruction of property, trespassing, cannibalism, public indecency, and profanity.
$720,000,000,000 for Maya for being a siren.

What? No jaywalking? (TV tropes link)

No, and they decided to leave out his crimes of "Mass E-Mail Spamming" and "TV Tropes Linking" as they need enough of the body to properly ID him.

HELLS, yeah.

So far, Mrs. Crit and I have been having a blast with it. We're only up to level 12 each in our co-op game (running Axton and Maya, renamed and appropriately skinned as "Archer" and "Lana"), but just having absolutely a great time.

BRILLIANT!

Yeah, Critias, it only gets better. If anything, the writing for the main and side quests is better than BL1.

*Sighs* And I can only afford XCOM or Borderlands 2.

X-Com... nothing against BL2... but really, that's not a hard decision.

Wait 'til they are on sale and get them both.

Bye
Thanee

Preordered, reached level 16 yesterday. Who the hell puts a sidequest on the most confusing map AND makes you backtrack to an area with TWO bosses? Sure, they are pushovers when you go back there, but it doesn't change the fact they're still annoying.

Which sidequest? I'm a lv20 Zer0 right now. Being extremely vague here, but I noticed that after certain events involving Sanctuary my progress got excessively more difficult. I might be underleveled or have crappy weapons and gear.

I assume he means the Incinerator quest; yeah, that one was confusing until you remember to follow the signs like the first time.

Yeah, I like how the main plot is harder than before, StealthSigma. I tend to do all the sidequests before advancing the plot line, but it's definitely a challenge if you're at/near the mission level. The upside is you get tons of XP on those, so you move fast.

I'm really enjoying the increased variety of gear, esp. shields and grenades. I love the way the grenades can be sticky, transfusion, slag, *and* MIRV, at the same time. And deciding between an absorb, an amp, or a booster shield is a nice problem to have.

Well, it's kind of ridiculous. Constructors. I hate Constructors. GUN loaders are trivially easy. 1-2 shots. Even badass loaders go down with maybe 4-5x that number of shots. Constructors? Stupidly small crit location with a lot of attacks.

Yeah, but they don't move either, so you can just (hurr) go to town on their crit location. I'm mostly playing Gunzerker, so he has the extra DPS when you need it, and the slag/combo option.

One problem with 'overleveling' on sidequests is that slot machines are keyed to the level of your plot quest. It sucks winning a weapon that was good 2 levels ago. And in coop, it feels like overleveling doesn't even help. The game is much harder (or at least, slower) with even 1 other person, even if you're just helping them on quests like 5 levels below you. :/

So, has anyone met the NPC 'vault hunters' who randomly show up at shops, especially Marcus' in Sanctuary? They're loaded for bear and they hand you blue/purple guns when you talk to them… which is cool, but still random.

I wasted my golden chest key by accident.

I still haven't met Brick though. BRICK. WHERE ARE YOU?!

Hmm. GUN and HOT loaders I've found - my Axton is around level 25 now - take 3-5 shots (plus however many times I miss, lol): left arm, right arm, then a couple to the "face". EXP loaders take 3 (arm, arm, finisher), War Loaders take 10+, and god help me if a Badass War Loader shows up.

But, constructors? Eh, it'll take some ammo, but ... I just drop a Sabre dead in front of it, then unload on the constructor's eye with a caustic weapon.






The who, and the what, now? Are you sure someone generous hasn't joined your game, or something??

That's actually Gearbox sneaking in an appearance from a big Borderlands fan who lost a fight with cancer before the sequel came out. He's a random guy in Sanctuary who you have the opportunity to talk to (and whose facial appearance is modeled on this real-life fan), who then just randomly gives you a reasonably rare drop. So not only did they bring the guy back as an NPC in the game franchise he loved, but they made him a totally POSITIVE one, who just gives you free stuff to give back to the community.

The whole thing's pretty awesome of them, if you ask me.

From what I've heard, he's also an Achievement/Trophy. Which is even more Epic, as he'll live forever on your account!

Yeah, you get "Tribute to a Vault Hunter," I think it's called, when you interact with him.

Class act those Gearbox guys! Salute!

Loaders are two shots for my Zer0. Left Arm, Right Arm.

... really?!? Okay, that's just friggin' awesome. WTG, GearBox!!

Yeah well, you have sniper-damage-enhancing skills. I don't.

'course, a dozen loaders at once, in a tight group, is ONE "shot" for me - 'cause that's when I throw out my Sabre. And I I have a singularity grenade, one of those too, just to add insult to the egregious injury the sabre is about to inflict.

Have been having ton of fun with this one, pretty much a perfect sequal(like the original, just better all around)
The gun making engine is pretty damm nice and produces some very funky guns, like bolt action revolver sniper rifles.

I have critical hit damage enhancing skills and a weapon that typically has a base damage about 2.5x the value of assault rifles.

I have also taken out 5 loaders with 2 shots before.... For some strange reason they were all perfectly lined up so that men penetrating shots went through the crit area and into the crit area of the next one and so on.

--



Speaking of funky guns.... I believe I got a Tediore gun with a blade enhancement. I though that to be humorous.

I have a tediore rocket launcher. It's actually rocket powered when I reload and throw it.

My Assault Rifle:
"Flush Rifle", Jakobs
Damage 297, Accuracy 90%, Magazine 23, RoF 19.2, Load 4.2

My Sniper rifle:
"Auditing Policy", Hyperion
Damage 714, Accuracy 96.3, Magazine 5, RoF 0.9, Load 4; Elemental: 30% burn for 150.3

Oh, and my class mod gives 23% Load speed and 18% magazine size to all guns.

I keep jumping back and forth between Zer0 and Axton (both around 20). I'm waiting for the Mechromancer to come out.

This is awesome!

I am only at level 12 as well... I haven't found this guy yet. Do you have to reach a certain level first?

By the way, the game is a perfect sequel. It's not just a thrown together replay of the first like many sequels are. Vast improvements made on a game that already kicked ass, and I am only 12 levels in.

I've seen him most often at Marcus' place in Sanctuary, at various levels.

I have found that rubberized grenades bounce ridiculously far sometimes.



-k

I don't like them much, though, because you can't lob them at all. If they bounced after a lob, that'd be okay. Instead, they're sort of terrain-following. :/ But it's a pretty tiny complaint. Another is that even max backpack and bank can't carry all the crap I want.

I first ran across him right next to the news/propaganda stall in Sanctuary, and then another time he was over close to the hiring board IIRC, and finally I spotted him just standing on a corner in the middle of town. He seems to just kind of randomly appear from time to time, you get a piece of gear from him, and then maybe you run into him on your next trip (maybe not). It's pretty cool of 'em, all in all. For us it's a fun little piece of free swag, for Gearbox it's a very nice gesture that I'm sure this fan appreciates from the other side.

A good place to farm kills for the corrosive and nova shield....

Boom Bewm. Kill Bewm, leave Boom alive on the cannon. Psychos will constantly spawn 2 at a time about every 15 seconds. Find a corner where Boom can't shoot you and the psychos can reach you. Let psychos kill themselves.

This also works for the nova shield but you need health regen to avoid dying.

The nice thing is this will increase at least 4 other challenges at the same time. The ones to kill enemies at day/night, the one to kill psychos, and if you're doing the nova you'll get progress towards the restore health challenge.

There are actually Mine-Craft references in there.

I found a shotgun that seems massively overpowered for my level.

In theory it does only 111 x 19 damage, which should be a little over 2200 damage if all the pellets hit.

But if I hit something with a 3000 damage rocket launcher and it takes off only like a fifth if it's life bar, whereas the shotgun takes off like 80% of the same bar with one blast, and kills it outright on a crit.

I dunno why it's so powerful. And it reloads like in a third of a second.



-k

Mrs. Crit and I hit level 20 earlier. I am woefully underprepared for this, it feels, in that I need a much better assault rifle. I snagged a pretty sweet shotgun not too long ago, but we'd kind of out-leveled the main quest line for a while so we spent several side quests running around getting gear three, four, or more levels below us. We want to do side quests so we don't miss out on the game, but it feels like trying to do them all really kind of gimps you.

Big steps in the last few days' gaming:

1) I got a cooler Commando class mod that not only cuts down my turret cooldown time, but also gives a bonus to the Sentry skill (so that the turret shoots more while I've got it, AND it lasts longer). I've started to really lean on my turret more and more, and I sucked it up and just accepted that it's awesome instead of thinking of it as a crutch.

2) I realized that my skills are just all over the friggin' place. So many of the easy-tier skills just look too all-around useful, dangit. Impact is sexy as hell for just plain "more dakka" in this FPS game. Preparation is a huge lifesaver in our co-op game and the fact I heal like Wolverine means Mrs. Crit gets dibs on all the health (which makes for easier coordination). But the more I like my turret, the more I like Sentry...and what I say for each introductory skill also goes for the totally bitchin' cooler stuff further down each tree. I want them all, and I'm trying to take them all, and I need to admit I'm spreading myself too thin, in trying to do so.

3) Helping with (2) a little, I've got a solo game, also running a Commando, where I'm about three levels behind our main co-op gig. So in theory I should be able to play my two different Axtons very differently, an experience more of what the class has to offer. This isn't the case, though, because I'm retarded. So I'm all "Man, Preparation has been awesome, and it would be totally great for a rugged loner who hasn't got his wife playing, too!" Only I say that about everything I have any experience with, so my playstyle continues to be "shallow but broad," as opposed to "specialized and awesome."

4) We can't get the sacrifice to the Gunbringer Shrine to work. Oh well.

5) Slot machines continue to be awesome and addictive as all hell.

What continually gets me as I play through this game is how many, big, detailed, entertaining zones/maps there are. Even for apparently tiny sidequests, they really put in the effort.

Yeah, I agree that you're always straining for more skill points, especially because everything is useful *and* no diminishing returns.

Also, timed quests suck.

Every single time you're in Sanctuary, check ALL the gun kiosks, and Marcus as well. Turn those trash drops into cash, and then turn the cash into useful guns / shields / grenades / classmods.


First skills I went for, were Sentry 5, Laser Sight 5, then Scorched Earth. Next push, I went with Preparation 5, Healthy 5, and Phalanx Shield. (Though I'm not sure how much good Phalanx Shield really is, yet).

The next 20-odd points will go up the center tree - Impact, Overload, Steady, and split the last 8 points evenly between "willing" and "able".

As you can see, I'm quite happy with my "crutch" being more awesome than I am. Oh, and I love how Axton talks up the turret being his girlfriend, hahahaha.

Of course, one great thing is that you can always respec and try something else, new class mod, whatever. The cost is trivial. It can be jarring, though, when you respec your gunzerker from Brawn to Rampage… and forget that you no longer regenerate.

Oh yeah. We do that -- I just tend to keep finding "something awesome besides an assault rifle," which is what I'm looking for. I've got a really cool launcher, an awesome shotgun, even a super badass two-shots-at-a-time revolver. I'm just using an assault rifle (a purple, in my defense) that's nine levels lower than me. So the whites and greens I'm finding are a little weaker than it, and I'm able to hold my own...but I'm not awesome with it, which is killin' me.



Mrs. Crit is less of a fan, because I've started doing the same thing, despite her sitting on the couch next to me and playing, too.

I tend to roll with whatever the best guns I current have happen to be, but I guess the gunzerker is less specialized than assassin or commando. I notice it's hard to find a decent shotgun, and there's huge variability (compared to BL1) in the number of 'pellets', etc.

Nonsense. If you want to go for turret efficiency, either go for Mag-Lock (makes it harder for melee enemies to reach the turret) and Longbow, or Phalanx Shield (gives you a nice umbrella to dive under when things get hairy) and the first Guerrilla tree skills (for longer turret duration and more dakka). Center tree is pretty much useless - the right one's for tanking, the left one's for turrets and the center one is pretty much BS, well, maybe with the exception of Longbow.

I disagree. [Impact], [Overload], and [Steady] are pretty strong skills, IMO.

I got extremely pissed w/ the level design/poor mapping on this one as well.... 20-30 minutes of wandering around trying to find my way in while listening to each of the other guys I was playing w/ get fragged one by one as they hit the objective area individually had me cursing Gearbox.

Other than that it's been pretty good so far (only level 15 w/ the Gunzerker, who I have a feeling is going to be pretty meh for me as he levels, but we already had an Assasin, Siren, and Commando). Pretty much like the first one but a bit better, which is to say pretty darn fun in co-op, not nearly as much fun single player.

Sucks that they still apparently hate on the AR though...

It all depends on what you find. Currently I'm using a couple good ARs: one of those neat x3-shot ones, and one that shoots non-slow slightly bouncing explosive rounds (it's weird, it's not a Torgue-style, but it's also not a Grenadier-style, which shoot little pokemon balls). Along the way, I've had some solid Torgue-Vladof ones (gyrojets, rotary barrel), which were really fun.

Honestly, it's probably just observer error: I just finished complaining about trouble finding good shotguns, you said AR, the next guy will say SMGs tend to be weak… everything but sniper rifles, really.

My guy is only 15th level so far as well, that could have something to do w/ it. The only AR I can stand the shooting mechanics on so far is a burst when zoomed carbine I found at ~4th level that's 6th level and does pathetic damage w/ a 20 shot clip and massive reload time. I've been far better off using the free burst sniper rifle from the dude at Zed's for what I would usually want an AR for.

Killer pistols, SMGs, and snipers definitely seem to be in abundant supply for me. I haven't really played w/ any shotguns yet aside from the Assassinate the Assassins mission.

It's all luck.

For the longest time, I found only crappy ARs. Then I found a few Torgue ARs that were palatable, but still not super-good (not accurate enough, and slow projectiles - Torgue ARs are apparently "gyrojet"-style weapons).

I've got a new AR now ... a Jakobs, I think it is. Good ROF, burst fire when zoomed, nice accuracy, normal "immediate effect" bullets, reasonable-sized magazine. Main drawback is, no Elemental effect.

...

And that's been the story all along, for every gun: I'll like the gun in every way except one. Those Torgue ARs were "slow inaccurate projectiles" ... but they were AoE due to Blast element damage, so together with decent magazine, ROF, and base damage levels, they worked. The current ones, nice in every way IMO, except that lack of an Element.

Sounds like a Dahl. "Burst fire when zoomed" is kind of their schtick. Jakobs is all semi-auto (aka, "fires as fast as you pull the trigger!"). Jakobs assault rifles tend to have good damage and accuracy and stuff, but lack the satisfying dakka dakka factor.