Anyone still playing this classic series? I picked up JA2 Gold at the store and I'm addicted to it. I thought about getting a standard RPG because the store had Morowind and some collection of Icewindale 2 /Buldor's gate 2/other RPG collection but I knew I wouldn't have the patience for them. So I took the classic.
I'm having a whole lot of fun because the game punishes you if you don't play well. I'm learning how to play strategy games all over again. I'm discovering tactics by trial and error and reading vague strategy guides.
On the first mission I once turned my mercenaries into a squad of goons and go beat up enemy soldiers instead of shooting them. When they are knocked out I try to stealing their weapon(like some guide suggested) . In a recent mission I used hand to hand to finish off someone (ran out of patience) - I sent Conard hit him in the head with a crowbar.
I'm raiding Alma fairly it's geographically close to Drassen. The Enemy has a very strong foot hold in that town so I had a very tough time (and numerous save/loads) winning. Now I got full Militia cover of Drassen and 50 % rookies in the 3 sectors I control in Alma. I just started the fight over the Alma mine and finished off about 40% of the soldiers got 2 groups left 1 got some cover the other has 1 elite but blew them up with a grenade before I went to bed yesterday 
.
I'm thinking of maybe starting over and do things a little different and have better organized squad. I've tested a quiet a few weapons so and a lot of tactics. my soldiers keep getting seriously wounded in battle which causes a lot of downtime which costs a ton of cash..
In the beginning get some night ops mercs and stick to night fighting. This way you will see the enemy before they see you, and all your weapons are close range so this is to your advantage. You should be able to take Alma in one night with little difficulty with your custom and 3 other mercs.
Also you can choose which traits your custom starts out with by answering the questions just right.. look for a guide at gamefaqs.com and it will explain how. I would go with auto weapons and night ops, but that is just me.
Welcome to the turn based addiction BTW 
On your custom Merc, the two stats to maximize are Marksmanship and Wisdom. Every stat except Wisdom can be increased and Wisdom effects how quickly you learn every other stat. Maximum marksmanship will give you an MP5k (a weapon I still used until I found two ultra rare P90''s in the infamous M9 sector.)
I prefered Auto Weapons (Expert) or Auto Weapons/Martial Arts. The Expert was more important to me because as you get to better weapons like the C-7, you will consistently hit with all 5 rounds in a burst and will require less AP when firing bursts. (Oh... and a CAWS with an Auto Weapons Expert is devastating.) Additionally, Auto weapons will help you in most of the heavy weapons department, including the auto rocket rifle. It will not help you with mortars, LAWS, or single fire from a machine gun.
The Auto Weapons/Martial Arts is fantastic if you keep your strength pretty high (75+), it lets you immobilize enemies and dispatch them at your leisure without expending significant amounts of ammunition.
If you have someone with night ops, it will extend your effective night vision by one square; a night vision expert will go two. Night vision goggles or UV goggles will extend it by one and two respectively. I believe these stack with night ops. Stealthy and night ops are nice for your merc but impractical. Mercs you can hire will have better stealth and night ops than you and will consistently win their rolls against enemies.
JA2 is a great game. I picked up JA2: Wildfire a while back and loved it. I played the standard JA2, but I mean to go back and play Wildfire, which is like a ""revision"" of the original JA2. Anyway, that''s my understanding.
I had actually planned to review Wildfire for this site but I gave up after trying the first encounter like 20 times. It made me very sad.
I had actually planned to review Wildfire for this site but I gave up after trying the first encounter like 20 times. It made me very sad.
That tough huh? Do I need to expansion to install it or just run of the mill JA2? I saw it at EB a few weeks ago and was thinking of trying it.
Will JA2 run on the computers of today without a bunch of workarounds? If not, are there any more recent (good) games that fit into this mold? I never played JA, JA2, or any of the X-Com games and I feel like I am missing out.
I thought Wildfire was a massive waste of time. There are a number of free mods out there that are much better. Unfortunately I am not at home so I don''t have the URL''s. I know there was a Vietnam based one that was actually quite good. There was another complete conversion called Urban Chaos that was very good and is free.
I think the creator of Wildfire missed out on things like ""gameplay balance"" and I questioned some of his changes in the name of ""realism"". I also don''t see the point of cranking up the difficulty of a game that many people had trouble with on ""easy"" already.
I agree completely, Botswana.
Will JA2 run on the computers of today without a bunch of workarounds? If not, are there any more recent (good) games that fit into this mold? I never played JA, JA2, or any of the X-Com games and I feel like I am missing out.
I''ve run JA2 on Windows 98, ME, 2000, and XP without any problems.
I''ve even played it on NT once, even though the game claimed to not support it.
JA2 is one of my all time favorites. You can get Urban Chaos and find dedicated forums at http://www.ja-galaxy-forum.com/.
Try out nightstalker character using blades only. My main character was femme fatale who used mostly throwing knives. They seem waste until you realize that you have to aim for head. Instant death.
In prison map she sneaked sneaked into the centre of prison yard and took out nine guards until she was out of knives and had to resort to fiream. At which point she was noticed of course and all hell broke loose
Ah, good times.
Wife prefers snipers. Cowards, the lot of them. You have to hear their last breath up close to know they`re dead for sure.
I loved this game, save for the fact that as the game progressed, I found that I needed to shoot my enemies in the face a few more times than one might''ve hoped for to put them down.
That tough huh? Do I need to expansion to install it or just run of the mill JA2? I saw it at EB a few weeks ago and was thinking of trying it.
Wildfire is a separate game, not actually a mod. The box also comes with regular JA2, which installs in a different folder.
I had actually planned to review Wildfire for this site but I gave up after trying the first encounter like 20 times. It made me very sad.
Wait, YOU couldn''t get past it? Well, I better not go near it, lest my gamer-ego be struck to tiny bits.
I''d love to get into JA2 again, see if I can still get around it. I remember it being very tough tho.
I''ve try 2 new games. the first one was with a stealth expert character it was fun sneaking up on stuff but i usually get spotted fairly fast because i had no camo kit and i''m clueless about hiding. I once had spider( stealth/night ops doctor) in a good position behind a baddy i had to keep reloading till i got it right and knifed his neck which didn''t kill him right away.
after that I made an automatic weapon expert following reaper''s sugestion. my new character is a killing machine the only problem is feeding him with enough bullets in the begining of the game.
I love what each character say in different situations i hired Hitman(i think it''s him ) and his line when he detects enemy in the area : "" let shoot in the air a few time to let our enemies know they are going to die"" (or something like that). I''m starting to figure out who hates who and what combo of people not to hire ( that red hates the german lady and she hates gumpy).
btw where can i get camoflage kits ? i couldn''t find any refferances to that. I need to figure out how hiding works haven''t found a way to turn map and didn''t try that top down mode i saw in the help. still need to master those keybindings.
I really wanted to love the game, but I could never get the hang of the overworld management. I loved the actual tactical combat, but when it came to managing my little army I would get crushed every time.
ARISE!
I know Stylez and I have gone back to the well of Jagged Alliance 2 goodness. The 1.13 fan patch expands the game a bit, mainly in terms of items and inventory management. Instead of having 8 different Kalashnikovs available, now you get like 30 to choose from! (Using the Tons of Guns setting, at least.) The amount of attachments has exploded. You've got folding stocks, telescoping stocks, foregrips, various battle scopes/ACOGs, flash suppressors, laser sights, silencers, and of course, grenade launchers.
Too much? Could be, for some. Me, I love it. I do think the early game is still a bit iffy, going up against enemies with better sight length and better weapon ranges, unless you know to briefly hire a skilled merc that comes with a decent rifle in the very beginning. Which I didn't do. So it's possible to win, it's just a bit of a pain. I'm at the point now where I generally just porcupine and rely on my superior sight radius to nail enemies with headshots before they get close enough to see me.
I'm still seeing the occasional bug and I even got a dreaded CTD during a quicksave (remember not to rely entirely on quicksave, despite its convenience).
Anyone else playing right now?
Being such a huge X-Com fan, it's a series I always wanted to get into but it just never really clicked for me. How does it hold up in terms of modern expectations for interface and, to a lesser extent, graphics? Playing Diablo, for example, is a pain because they're missing so many little things we take for granted these days.
Anyone else playing right now?
Not yet, but I've been thinking about digging it out again since I put it on my top 15 list.
Also, the scroll speed on X-Com is driving me insane.
Jagged Alliance 2 is and always will be one of my favorite games. There's nothing like the feeling of a well executed night mission, leading the enemy around like heavily armed puppies by the sound of gunfire is fantastic fun. One of my favorite tactics is to set up a funnel for the baddies, finding a choke point, setting your mercs in a v shape and then having the guy at the top (usually my custom with a sniper rifle) start shooting. They'll come running to flush out the sniper and all you have to do is toss a nightstick into the middle of the group and open up. It's so satisfying to cripple an entire zone with one clever trick.
There's such a dearth of quality turn based squad tactics games, it's sad that they are not made more frequently.
edit: Another great but sometimes overlooked turn based squad game is Fallout: Tactics.
Resolution, with the 1.13 patch, can go as high at 1024x768. Graphics are not great, though the 1.13 patch has redone most (if not all) of the weapon tiles. Here's a screenshot. It's still a 2D game and there are times where it's hard to see something on the "far side" of a structure's wall. There's no mousewheel support, which would sometimes be nice to have. Mass equipment management is still a bit of a chore, though with 1.13 you can instantly sell stuff from the sector inventory at a deeply discounted price if you want to avoid the hassle of lugging it to a fence. In 1.13, vehicles can carry equipment (score!). Hotkey support is generally pretty good.
Anyone know if it's possible to shuffle your merc order on the tactical map? Sometimes (especially when going in and out of vehicles) the order gets moved around, so I can't just instinctively hit F1-F6 and get the person I expected.
One of my favorite tactics is to set up a funnel for the baddies, finding a choke point, setting your mercs in a v shape and then having the guy at the top (usually my custom with a sniper rifle) start shooting. They'll come running to flush out the sniper and all you have to do is toss a nightstick into the middle of the group and open up. It's so satisfying to cripple an entire zone with one clever trick.
The other day I was on the junkyard map (Estoni) when it was invaded by soldiers. I hid just inside the walls waiting for them. A few popped their heads around, I shot them, and I waited. And waited. Finally, since the level was not clear, I sent a guy to look around the corner. There were about 20 guys standing just on the other side of the wall. My eyes bulged and I finally had a chance to really use those mustard gas grenades I've been carrying around. A couple gas grenades and a couple frag grenades and they were all dead.
I found 1.13 to be better and worse at the same time. While you get cooler/better weapons, so do the bad guys. All four thousand of them...
I found no matter what my tactics, I would almost always be overwhelmed by obnoxious numbers of enemies. The wedge tactic described by tatterdemaliot stopped working, as right after the first shot my entire team would be illuminated by around five light sticks, then shot by the other dozen nearby soldiers from nearly all directions.
Now I'm thinking of installing it again. Tons of memories with this series. In fact, the first one was one of the main titles that got me into PC gaming in the first place. I always loved the RPG-like integration into the game through the personalities of mercenaries. Playing other turn-based strategy games back in the day just didn't feel as memorable as the one where someone on the team would quit because he got injured too often, or would demand a raise because he hated a teammate, or would disobey an order I made because he didn't like swimming.
Being such a huge X-Com fan, it's a series I always wanted to get into but it just never really clicked for me. How does it hold up in terms of modern expectations for interface and, to a lesser extent, graphics?
Interface, it actually holds up really well. Point and click and some obvious hotkeys, although you can do the majority of things with just the mouse if you wanted to. You can do pretty complex things, like increase your chance of hitting a guy based on how many points you want to give to it.
Graphics, not so much. It was considered dated even when it was originally released. Does anyone know what the maximum resolution on this game is? Last time I played this game, my monitor was 7" smaller.
I suggest avoiding all night fights until you've got night vision goggles. And then be sure to stay ahead of the tech curve. I've just recently upgraded 2 of my mercs to type IV night vision tech, the rest have type III. The enemies I encounter, when they have NVG, don't often have better than type I.
I suggest avoiding all night fights until you've got night vision goggles. And then be sure to stay ahead of the tech curve. I've just recently upgraded 2 of my mercs to type IV night vision tech, the rest have type III. The enemies I encounter, when they have NVG, don't often have better than type I.
Heh. Our RNG's must have been out of sync. I think I pulled my Type III's off of recently perforated enemies. Even with the night vision specialty, type IV's, and crawling, I was still almost always surprised... They really cranked up the AI.
It is also possible that I'm just not talented enough at the game...
I love me some Jagged Alliance. I dug it out of mothballs back at the end of May when I was taking a road trip to Atlanta for a week. It is still tons of fun and I can't believe I missed the mod scene on this. Time crank it up one more time!
Games like JA2 and XCOM are still a blast to play today. This is why I don't understand the industry's refusal to allow turn based strategy and RPGs to be produced. That rant is for a different time, though.
Heh. Our RNG's must have been out of sync. I think I pulled my Type III's off of recently perforated enemies. Even with the night vision specialty, type IV's, and crawling, I was still almost always surprised... They really cranked up the AI.
It is also possible that I'm just not talented enough at the game...
Huh. What's your calendar at and what region are you hitting? I'm just at 60 days and started on Grumm. My type IIIs and IVs just recently came in from Bobby Ray's. These guys I'm now up against in Grumm are definitely better armed than my previous opponents and I'm not sure what level of NVG they've got.
LilCodger wrote:Heh. Our RNG's must have been out of sync. I think I pulled my Type III's off of recently perforated enemies. Even with the night vision specialty, type IV's, and crawling, I was still almost always surprised... They really cranked up the AI.
It is also possible that I'm just not talented enough at the game...
Huh. What's your calendar at and what region are you hitting? I'm just at 60 days and started on Grumm. My type IIIs and IVs just recently came in from Bobby Ray's. These guys I'm now up against in Grumm are definitely better armed than my previous opponents and I'm not sure what level of NVG they've got.
I haven't fired it up in over a year. They might have tweaked it since then.
I do remember that by the time I could purchase something from Bobby Ray's, I had frequently already picked one up. Felt like I was always behind the curve.
I eventually gave up on it, because I was always getting completely suppressed. Even if I was technologically superior, I could only take out so many enemies per turn, and they were pumping dozens of shots my way while getting lucky a suspicious number of times. I remember the mod forums being quite full of "What's with the insane number of enemies" at the time.
I haven't fired it up in over a year. They might have tweaked it since then.
Could be, there's been 2 releases in the past year.
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