Tiny Tina’s Wondrous Boutique of Bunkers, Baddasses, and Butt Stallions

Do you like (not really) board games?

Do you like Borderlands?!

DO YOU LIKE BUNKERS AND BADASSES?!?!

Join me, fellow Fatemakers! Flourish fierce fisticuffs in the fabulously foolish and quite possibly fatal function of falling fathoms of freakish fiends!!!

Who’s with me?! ROLL FOR INITIATIVE, SUCKERS!!!

Co-op is cross platform. I will update the top post with Shift names for interested parties. Just comment your name in the thread and I’ll add it below.

Shift Names List (Goojers open to co-op):
Vypre_

FYI for anyone not already aware: Wonderlands is cross platform and Borderlands 3 will be going cross-platform in the near future.

What's a Butt Stallion? Should I Google that?

A character from Borderlands 2 and 3. Also, the most perfectest and beautifulest ruler in the land.

IMAGE(https://cdn.2kgames.com/ttwl/Game+Guide/Characters/buttstallion-small.png)

Played through the tutorial area and some of the overworld. It's a nice break from the bleakness of Elden Ring.

It's definitely Borderlands. Still have the guns. They're somewhat disguised at times, like the first gun you get is a pistol, but it looks like a crossbow. But during the benchmark test it showed a scene with people firing actual guns. New, I think, is the melee weapons. You could always melee in the series but it was more of a quick punch/kick that didn't do much damage. Still don't do a huge amount of damage with melee but there are a bunch melee weapons you can pick up - the guns will still be the focus. Then there's a spell slot where you can pick up different types of spells to cast - they're on a timer. But basically, so far, can only cast the one spell you have equipped.

The overworld (the boardgame style part) is mainly just to get you from one area to the next. There are some random encounters on there that throw you in a small arena area where you have to clear out all the monsters before you move on. There's some minor exploration of the on the overworld map too.

Character creator is pretty decent. Lots of options as far as looks go. Ended up choosing a necromancer type where my main power/spell I lose health to do area damage.

The graphics do look very nice but not a huge step up from B3 - imagine it's still the same engine.

The highlight is the Tiny Tina character playing the DM. Great dialogue and you look forward to her popping in to say something.

Will so how it goes but seems like its going to be a fun romp.

I’m enjoying the weird pseudo-fantasy more than the normal Borderlands setting but it really makes me want a proper Skyrim-style open world rpg with this art style and mechanics.
I’m playing the Spellshot class which unfortunately starts off with the sort of useless special ability to polymorph an enemy- it might be useful in other games but incapacitating a single enemy for a few seconds isn’t super helpful when a dozen enemies are attacking you. It looks like the class eventually gets the option to swap out polymorph for a 2nd spell slot though.

Your opinion of polymorph will change once you use a big damage spell in your other slot. Shooting a polymorphed enemy has a chance (on crit?) to cast your equipped spell for free on it. So you can rain down a handful of comets in a row on your enemies.

Here is my Wonderlands hot take: It is filled by awesomeness and bogged down by the half assed elements.
------------
-Spells are all awesome and powerful aside from sigil which I haven't tried yet but looks like an awesome slow bubble.
-Spells are so much better than grenades aside from grenades having no cooldown and upgradeable ammo count.
-The game relies on guns too much which fit half assed into the theme.
-Some guns fit a lot better into the theme than others but they mostly shoot cool looking spell effects.
-The gun spell effects belie how effective they are and it can be hard to tell who you are hitting and how much with all the chaos.
-The enemies are about 80% more spongey than other Borderlands games which makes it all the more important to find a gun you gel with.
-The hardest hitting enemies are the spongiest by default.
-Aside from the graveborn, there are no real healing abilities early in the game which compounds the sponginess of enemies, the difficulty in finding a better than "I guess it will have to do" gun
-Difficulty doesn't seem to matter as it just involved the road to 40 where you get selectable difficulty with chaos levels (it varies between +/- 15% damage taken and received)
-I played a grovewarden for the pet to make the early game less bouncing in and out of second wind. You have to wait 2-3 hours into the story to unlock it
-The overworld is largely a neat idea mired by old school drudgery. People state the unskippable cut scenes will be the biggest deterrent to replaying the game but it will definitely be the overworld.
-The overworld has neat secrets and interactions but the forced fights will get repetitive and old extremely quickly.
-There are secret areas in the overworld that you have to enter a combat arena to access. That is pretty cool but the sad thing is once you complete the battle and get to the secret area, you have to go back and fight the same area again in order to get back on the main quest
-I started with a spellborn because I wanted to focus on casting but got frustrated with how much I had to use guns. I rerolled as a grovewarden and skipped a secret because I didn't want to really do that fight in the first place, let alone doing it a 3rd and 4th time after rerolling. (to give you an idea of how annoying it was from the getgo)
-You would think the skills trees since they are condensed, would be more interesting. They are not and might even be worse in regards to having to wait to get to the cool stuff. The kicker is that there is some really cool stuff like the spellshot's chance to remove spell cooldown on crit.
-Enemies have the biggest palate of actions of a Borderlands game to date. I wouldn't exactly equate this to AI but I was impressed by things like leaping punches when you get too close or try to melee them.
-Sadly enemies also annoyingly run around in circles for 4-5 seconds making them really difficult to hit and magnifies their sponginess.
-Where I am in the story, (4-4.5 hours in) it really started to gel. But then they took a right turn and forced you to go back to the overworld to talk to someone first for REASONS. And that is where I quit for the night last night

Again, TLDR the game has the potential to be A+ but is dragged along by annoyances and inconvenience. Hopefully it continues to pick up steam despite them.

Thanks for playing for me, fang!

Sounds like I'll dig it but shouldn't make it a priority. I've got four other new games in my queue that I really should get to something new.

-I think the developers might have in the back of their mind that the backlash to BL3 was genuine so they had to throwback to BL2. Way back then, it was more of struggle because the only healing in BL2 for several hours was trying to find a shield with hp regen. (each class in BL3 had a tree dedicated to healing with easily accessible low level healing passives)
-On top of that, add the increased spawns of BL3. And then sprinkle the hardest hitting enemies having 4x the TTK of fodder (which take 3-5 hits rather than typical BL's 2-3)
-Basically, my favorite weapon is the SMG. Crossbow pistols are my second favorite but they have strong recoil and the crossbow attachment obscures LOS somewhat to make lining up sequential shots harder. I can kill 2-3 fodder in one SMG clip. It takes 2 clips of ammo to kill a skeleton mage who can definitely 2 shot me if not 1 shot and fire dot me down.
-It really becomes, if you are downed by a skeleton mage, you'd better hope there is a fodder around to save you or you will likely die. You have a chance if the mage is half health or below.
-Trolls take 3/4 of your hp in a large radius at extreme range with their rock. Their TTK is a bit longer than mages but they are slow and their critical spot is large. They can also be interrupted by repeatedly hitting their critical spot.

-All that being said, players who like Borderlands will enjoy this game. For all its struggles, it is still obviously very much on my mind. It still has that "I can't wait to get back to that" drive.
-It could be that a graveborn and brrrzerker and their tankiness make the early game less of an issue. (mind you that streamers are listing spore warden and spellshot as S tier but they never consider anything before the nth degree of end game) It is always the danger of increasing character customization/stats.

-The level design is exceptional as is the voice acting. The story was really gelling up to the point where I am at. I also have pretty darn high expectations of this very mature franchise. So other's impressions will probably be less focused on numbers and details. It is not a negative "review" by any stretch.

Just picked up my copy and am getting started, but I believe my Shift name is “Vypre_” if anyone is interested in co-op at some point.

I will update the top post with Shift names for interested parties. Just comment your name in the thread and I’ll add it up top.

Dominic Knight asked a question about stuttering issues over on the PS5 thread. FYI, the stuttering and constant dropping of the Shift service is a known issue with the Shift service itself that is currently affecting ALL platforms, as well as Borderlands 3.

After a few hours of playing, my take is this is dumb, goofy, fun, and absolutely what I would expect. It's more Borderlands, except now it has a whole lot of Tiny Tina. As a huge D&D nerd, the constant jokes and references are great, and it's nice falling back into the old loot-and-shoot gameplay loop. I mean, it's a game where a sparkly unicorn named "Butt Stallion" plays a prominent role; at some point, you just shrug, accept the goofiness, and start shooting. Sure, the weapons are just a skin on the usual Borderlands array of guns, but enjoying the melee attack, the Spore Warden so far has been pretty engaging to play with, and, well, Tiny Tina.

It's Borderlands. I wanted more Borderlands. Perfectly happy so far.

The story has picked up even more by the point you can pick your secondary class.

Clawbringer might be the best starter class due to its defensive traits and its action skill.

Enjoyed playing with Jmnitup and Kazaar! Looking forward to hanging out with more folks in this lovely, silly game.

I just wanted to note that as you get to your teens, weapon selection opens up and separates into a few camps:
Weapons that follow the theme cosmetically
Weapons that don't even pretend to not be at home in BL3

I think around level 12 I started getting stuck gyrojet weapons. I also got more traditional shotguns that lacked magical blasts coming from their muzzles and incense sprinkling but actually did damage.

I started getting pistols without crossbows and my current favorite is a Tediore one of those. (I think the in game name is Feriore?) For what it is worth, Tediore weapons are as powerful and cool in Wonderlands as they are in BL3. The one I have throws the weapon and on impact splits into 3-4 fairies that fly around and shoot enemies for a few seconds. It is a 10 shot clip but consumes 2 ammo so its special fires regularly. (and consumes not so much ammo to limit its effectiveness but still a lot)

Another pistol of note does 2.5x the damage of other pistols but has a clip size of one. If this isn't a fluke weapon, stacking reload speed, chance not to consume ammo and clip size increases could make these pretty godly.

I wish I could say I had high hopes for weapon types other than pistols, SMG's and to some extent assault rifles. I have seen some footage of shotguns with unique spell like projectiles. If any of you have found interesting ones, post your impressions here.

I have never used rocket launchers in any BL game as best as I recall, ever. And snipers, which are super easy to play with in every other BL game are absolutely bland and neutered in Wonderlands. (burst fire elemental headshots in BL2 were insane)

Also, DO NOT SKIP the Punchfairy side quest area. It is absolutely some of the most creative level design in the BL franchise. The crazy thing is I know I missed so much of it because of missed secrets and optional goals...

Enjoying the game - just killed the first boss and reached the Overland map.

There's something weird about the sound levels. The music over powers Tina's commentary, making it hard to hear. I'll dip into the setting tonight and see if I can adjust those seperately.

It’s fairly old, but this morning in a moment of Tiny Tina fanboi-dom, I stumbled across this clip of Ashly Burch singing Seal’s Kiss from a Rose in her Tiny Tina voice. If you haven’t seen it before, it’s pretty great:

I also learned that the Ashly’s relationship with her brother, Anthony Burch - who is a video game writer - has always been steeped in trying to find ways to make him laugh. One such moment led her to create Tiny Tina’s voice and then later, he wrote a story around it and gave it to Gearbox. After that, he encouraged her to audition for the part and the rest is history… Anyone interested can see more about it here:

fangblackbone wrote:

I just wanted to note that as you get to your teens, weapon selection opens up and separates into a few camps:
Weapons that follow the theme cosmetically
Weapons that don't even pretend to not be at home in BL3

I think around level 12 I started getting stuck gyrojet weapons. I also got more traditional shotguns that lacked magical blasts coming from their muzzles and incense sprinkling but actually did damage.

I started getting pistols without crossbows and my current favorite is a Tediore one of those. (I think the in game name is Feriore?) For what it is worth, Tediore weapons are as powerful and cool in Wonderlands as they are in BL3. The one I have throws the weapon and on impact splits into 3-4 fairies that fly around and shoot enemies for a few seconds. It is a 10 shot clip but consumes 2 ammo so its special fires regularly. (and consumes not so much ammo to limit its effectiveness but still a lot)

Another pistol of note does 2.5x the damage of other pistols but has a clip size of one. If this isn't a fluke weapon, stacking reload speed, chance not to consume ammo and clip size increases could make these pretty godly.

I wish I could say I had high hopes for weapon types other than pistols, SMG's and to some extent assault rifles. I have seen some footage of shotguns with unique spell like projectiles. If any of you have found interesting ones, post your impressions here.

I have never used rocket launchers in any BL game as best as I recall, ever. And snipers, which are super easy to play with in every other BL game are absolutely bland and neutered in Wonderlands. (burst fire elemental headshots in BL2 were insane)

Also, DO NOT SKIP the Punchfairy side quest area. It is absolutely some of the most creative level design in the BL franchise. The crazy thing is I know I missed so much of it because of missed secrets and optional goals...

That type of gun existed in BL3 and there was some serious builds built around it.

I think you're not far enough in the game to give it fair shake on some of your criticisms, sure some may hold up but this feels like a more improved effort over BL3 with regards to gameplay and storytelling. Just overlayed on top of an older engine. The power and build diversity is definitely there and as deep as BL3 was, and very excited to try a handful of different builds. FYI totally disagree with the assessment of the Spellslinger. You go down the tree and and pair it up with the Graveborn and you're a spell slinging powerhouse. If you want to go the gun route it's also super powerful in buffing your guns when mixed with the Stabbomancer

For me the biggest criticism is the ui and controls... If anything it's a step back from BL3. One thing too and BL3 was guilty of this, but it didn't seem so drastic was the power curve from leveling up. Everything levels up with you so as soon as you level up all your gear is now crap. So you have to rekit yourself asap to feel that you're above the curve. Of course once you get to end game that's no longer an issue.

I don't necessarily want to say I've warmed to the game since it has charmed me from the start. (Hello? Tiny Tina!)
But I've come to the conclusion that it just has a slow start since it holds on to the reins a bit too much with guns, skills, and spells. Not that they should change anything really, except to make sure that in the first areas, there is an adequate level of competency for one of starter guns and/or you aren't repeatedly surrounding the player with overly potent enemies.

Take skeleton mages for instance, in the first 40 minutes of the game you not only encounter them, but they come in pairs or even 2 + 1. They teleport. They hit hard. Their projectiles leave damage pools. And they take 4-5 times longer to kill than a grunt. They are also typically surrounded by 4-5 skeletons plus 2 more waves of 3-4. Oh and of course there is a couple of rock trolls...

Sadly, this is a bit of a wall of text so I'll try to sum it up here. They don't NEED to change anything. I just know that tweaking a few of those things would make the first couple of hours smoother to when you then start unlocking more class features, more skill points and open up the variety of weapon types and their magical properties.

I agree with you regarding the level up power curve except for one very BL trait. You find that one weapon. On my main, (my fifth character) a clawbringer graveborne, I was able to incrementally upgrade a trusty thorn (crossbow pistol) nearly every level or 2. But, there have been 3 standout weapons that have been either my main weapon, or a strong side weapon (mostly due to high ammo consumption) for 5-6+ levels. There is an SMG I got from a boss fight with unlisted properties that make it amazing. (it doesn't read anything special initially)
There is that fairy firing tediore shotgun. And there is my absolute favorite, Scalywags. It is a pistol that fires magic missiles but is the weapon type that has no clip size and overheats after continuous use. But, as the gun heats up, the magic missiles it fires gets more powerful. I've tried to find replacements for it. I've found some fun candidates but nothing beats it yet. I've had it since 15 and I am almost 20 now and it is still going very strong.

10 minutes and going of unskippable credits?!
Really?!

I'd close it but fear that I'll lose my progress.

Also someone listed as Unity engineer or something. This was Unreal engine, right? It has to be.

edit: still going....
well over 15 minutes now...

edit2: so apparently they are 30 minutes long but you can hold down on the dpad or the down arrow key to speed up the credits...

I picked this up yesterday (after finally finding a physical copy locally) on XB Series X. Did they not release a lot of copies last week?

I believe my Shift cross play name is also edison like Xbox live.

I'm honestly surprised that they still do physical copies at all...

It either pre-sold REALLY well or there aren’t many physical copies. After running into a deadend at my local GameStop and then discovering no GameStops nearby had any unreserved copies, I immediately discovered the same for all the local Walmarts and Targets (I live on the east side of Dallas-Ft Worth, so there are A LOT of all of the above). I finally found a single copy at Best Buy.

I’m super tempted by this game. I have been playing Elden Ring. I binged it for over 40 hrs over a few weeks but haven’t had the chance to play in a few weeks. I’m really busy (full time job, 20 hr a week internship, a class for my masters). So I often don’t have the bandwidth to jump into something as intense as Elden Ring. A new borderlands where I can have some mindless fun and maybe put on a podcast sounds really appealing. My hesitations are BL3 was a disappointment and I bounced off it after 15-20 hrs. $70 is kind of steep. Especially since Borderlands games get discounted relatively quickly. I’m not sure how well it will sell. A lot of people seem pleasantly surprised when they give it a chance, but it seemed to fly under the radar, which might lead to a quicker discount.

Anyone want to enable me? How would you compare it to BL3?

Way more accessible than BL3. The campaign is shorter. It is broken up more into digestible chunks. There are a lot more waypoints and save points.
You can spend a lot of time just wandering around the overworld discovering secrets.
The overworld has many areas that are 3 staged fight dungeons that can be perfect if you only have 15 minutes to play. (they scale with your level so if you find one you like, you can use it to level all the way to 40)

That being said, BL3 games do get discounted frequently so it will be just as great a game at 50% off ;P

I played through Borderlands 3, finished it, and never bothered with another character; it just didn't stick with me, and it was kind of boring. I am absolutely loving Tiny Tina's. It's mechanically very solid, you can tweak your characters in all sorts of ways with abilities and an easily-swappable spell slot, mutliclassing opens up a whole new set of things, the constant D&D references are hilarious, and it doesn't have two of the worst villains ever created like BL3 did. It's really good, easy to pick up and play, and it's just fun. Highly recommend it.

I am a very sad panda.
Wonderlands is crashing on me shortly after loading.
I've updated drivers. I've restarted windows.
I've reduced settings. I've verified. I've reinstalled.
After it crashes, I can go play Borderlands 3 with no issues.

fangblackbone wrote:

I am a very sad panda.
Wonderlands is crashing on me shortly after loading.
I've updated drivers. I've restarted windows.
I've reduced settings. I've verified. I've reinstalled.
After it crashes, I can go play Borderlands 3 with no issues.

At what point? Before or after shaders? Main menu or loading into a game?

All of the above.
Sometimes during shaders
Sometimes on character loading screen
Sometimes after selecting character and first loading into game

2k support showed me a way to force dx11 but I was using dx11 anyways
I tried dx12 and nothing
Sometimes I get a "your don't have enough vram"
Sometimes it is a random error that tells me that I can't show debug text

I typically choose send and close on the crash report screen.

edit: I suspect the latest windows update had something to do with it since the problems started happening around that time...

So it looks like it may be the resolution scaling.
I had it set to 1440p and set the upscaling at 75% and then 50%
I turned it off so that it is native 1440p and didn't notice a dip in performance so perhaps there is a conflict with AMD drivers and Unreal trying to do upscaling at the same time?

I'll have to double check fps because with resolution scaling on, I was getting 45-49 fps.

all you had to say was AMD