Val Start

I realise this is a massive wall of text, so there is a TL;DR at the end for the more adventurous types. Ctrl+F if you need specifics.

This strat is for Valadin (henceforth known as V) users. Which should be everyone, because rangers have now become obsolete when not basing. It is a more or less a 'vanilla' strategy that should get you to Talsia at around 15k kc used. Feel free to simply use this for some information, or to change things up at certain points; this strat is fundamental and fairly flexible in nature.

Setting Up

To begin with, go to the Buy New Bot link in the Workshop (WS) page. (Here you can also sell gear/bots, manage squads, and check their outfitted gear). Click on V, and give it a name. Buy 1 Argon Laser weapon, and 1 Ion V2 reactor, and then click on Manage Squads in the WS. (If you buy a weapon/reactor/shield/module and your bot has an empty slot for it, then it will automatically equip itself. However, at other times you will need to equip them manually by clicking on them.)

Next, create a new squad, and then assign your new bot to it. Scroll down and next to “Withdraw When:” select “Never Withdraw (fight to the death).” This is something players often forget to set, and can lead to bots leaving battle as soon as they have low armour just when it's vital for them to stay.

Click on Take squad into battle>Patrol Outlands>CCU Training Deck. If you are a new player then I suggest you enter training; however if you know how to play then enter the Combat Sim, and fight general enemies until your V reaches AI 1. Withdraw if the enemy squad has a sentinel (snail-like bot that shares its shields) in it.

Once it reaches AI 1, exit patrol, then click on your bot. Go to Upgrade/Repair, and add 5 upgrades to its Weapon Tech Level. Next, go to Fitout, and click Remove All. Click on Sell Gear from the WS, and sell the Argon Laser. This is so you have enough money to buy: 2 Baron Laser weapons, 1 Motion Tracker module (mod), 1 Phase Modulator, 2 Baron shields, then re-equip the Ion V2 reactor last.

First Patrol (getting 3 reapers and AI 6)

You are now ready to take on Vulcore! Send it back into patrol, this time to the Vulcore Plains. Now because it takes 50 KCharge (kc) each time you enter Vulcore or Talsia, it's important that you try not to leave patrol too much. This includes doing your best not to die (dying also means the bots that die lose some exp). Once in Vulcore, just keep wandering around avoiding everything you can (remember you can withdraw), unless it's a destroyed outpost (attack Scaven in that case), until you find a mercenary outpost.

Acquiring Mercenaries and alignment

Outposts are rather like a base for you to recharge/repair, hire additional units, and go on missions. For now, just go on a Banking mission. Do these until you reach 12 mercreds. While you do that don't attack anything or explore anywhere except the aforementioned Scaven at destroyed outposts, as well as destroying a squad if you get a distress call. This gives you 5 negative (NEG) alignment (align), which comes in handy soon.

Once you reach 12 mercreds, hire a Praetor (assault type), which greatly boosts your firepower. From now on start doing crystal missions, and search only caves that the Surveyor indicates contain crystals. Do these until you have another 10 mercreds, then hire a Centurion (assault) reaper, which drains the energy of enemy bots (all bots and shielding units rely on energy to fire weapons and keep modules/shields active; however Scaven, and later Federate, units don't need energy, except for shielders, because they're humanoid. If your Praetor or V get armour damage, then repair them ASAP at an outpost. Shields can be recharged, but once a bot loses all its armour it dies and is sent back to the WS - mercs just disappear.

Keep doing Crystal missions until you have another 12 mercreds, which you should use to hire an Orbie (support), which holds what many call 'utility' mods. These give you non-combat benefits, help you avoid dangers, and just general goodness :P Very important as they can save you a lot of time, especially the Anomaly Detector.

You can now do the Matriarch (Mat) hunting mission, which is the only way to get to the Scaven Territories. Don't worry - although these can be very hard and annoying you don't actually have to fight the Mats to stay in Scavenland. First thing to look for once there is a Scaven settlement. In the meantime, only investigate farms and demand tribute then attack workers if possible (for NEG align); don't fight any squads. In fact, try not to fight anything in scaven for your first patrol unless it's warriors defending a burial mound, or you have Exp x3 or higher active.

Another thing to avoid first time round are Scaven Forts, as they are the places where you find Matriarchs, and Towers, as they have Fort Walls which take a lot of time to break through. Not worth it until you have better bots with better weapons. At a Scaven Settlement, contact them and then help them. Click Yes, and keep going until you face off against their enemies. If it's the mission where the Scaven want you to attack a Mercenary Outpost, then be warned; you will lose 4 mercreds (2 for each battle you win against them) as well as gain 2 NEG align. This is a mixed blessing, as negative alignment is a good thing, but of course losing mercreds sucks. Take it or leave it, it's a good mission in my opinion.

Choose Mercs as your reward the first time, but as you can only get one set of mercs at a time, in future just get Exp, or continue patrol if you have Exp x10 already (the maximum). Experience and Cash Multipliers (multis) last for a limited time, although there are two special versions of Cash x10 that last quite a while (around 600 kc used); Greed and Enrichment. These are the fallen/angel reqards for getting negative or positive alignment. Believe me, getting negative is much quicker and better. That said, it's up to you :)

Now keep wandering around Scaven territories attacking burial mounds, checking out farms for terrified workers, and helping Scaven at settlements, until you generate -25 align. Destroying a Burial Mound usually gives you -5 align and 2-4 crowns (don't return them now or you will have to lose your Scaven mercs; however they are worth 10 mercreds each when returned to an Outpost), although if you find a Miniature Model, then you get nothing. If you get the option to Demand Tribute at a farm, do it and then Attack Workers to receive -2, and then -5 align. The -25 align is so that you can get Greed later on.

Leave Scavenland once you get at least -25 align (you can check by clicking Info during patrol), and wander around Vulcore Plains with the same set of rules as before, hoping for a Fallen Encounter. Fallen encounters are random, but they only appear in the Vulcore Plains, not Lava Fields or Scaven or anywhere else.

• As a side note, Battle Merit (BM) is determined by base values for bot types, plus equipped gear, shared mods and shields (calculated, or at least shown, differently on enemy squads). The higher your BM, the stronger enemies you will face, thus also increasing the amount of exp and cash you earn from battles. In addition, it is the primary factor in deciding your Azra payouts, along with serving as a trigger for many events or 'situation availabilities' within the game.

Fallen

Once you do meet them, their 'prices' are as follows: -25 align or higher and you get the options of Greed (you lose 20 mercreds, you lose 10 NEG align, and gain a special Cash x10 that is immune against storms for 600 or so kc used) and Azra coordinates (you lose 10 NEG align, and you are transported to the Azra's tournament in the Lava fields).

Azra's is a wonderful location where you can tear through the enemies and get cash prizes each round depending on your squad BM. It's pretty easy with mercs; even without them, you can usually get near to or finish the final round. However, you can only find it once per Lava Fields discovery. In general, buying Azra's coords through Fallen aren't worth it as Greed can net you a lot more cash, although it does take a bit longer.

At -50 alignment, you have the added option of getting Imps (3 orbiters with baron batteries and 3 or 4 Tc7 mods, which means they are fast and deal good damage with high chance of getting critical hits). That being said, they SUCK (for most situations). Not worth the 30 NEG align you lose for getting them at all. My reason for this is that in Vulcore, most enemies can be rendered inert through reapers and their energy drain, but are otherwise quite dangerous.

While Imps can deal decent damage, they can't really kill the harder ones like base or magma lords safely without draining them anyway. So try them out if you wish (or have excess NEG align), but the best part about getting NEG align is really Dark Union. You have this option at -100 align, and they are definitely worth it (don't get them without a plan or objective in mind though, or you'll waste the 70 NEG align they cost!

Although they have a curse attached, which starts off low (depends on your exp earned and your squad BM) and gets slightly higher each time you Continue (the curse takes off a bit of exp [but not bot exp] and cash), their firepower and module uplink is awesome. They also provide good shielding; I believe you get 1180. The total uplinked stats (what your bots receive from their Overseers [seers]) is 180% enhanced firerate (FR), 16% enhanced critical chance (crit), 80% energy saving (the maximum), and 50% enhanced accuracy (acc). This means that your weapons will fire 2.8 times the base amount, have additional 1/6 chance of critting, will only spend 1/5 of the energy they normally would, and 100% accuracy (only 3 weapons have lower than 50% base accuracy, and they are all high-end ones).

Awesome right? They also provide 2 Bulwarks [buls] (4 weapon slots, 2 mod slots, 2 shield slots, 650 armour, 5% enhanced accuracy and damage) with 4 heavy-damaging weapons each, and a Leviathan [levi] (EIGHT weapon slots, 2 mod and 2 shield slots, 3000 armour, slow though at only 15 speed) with less advanced weapons, but who cares when there's eight of them? :)

Greeeeeed

Anyways to get back on track ... while in Vulcore looking for Fallen to get Greed, you might get a screen where apparently some sort of ritual is going on. This is the Scaven Sun Ritual, where if you break up the party and kill everything then you receive 4 Mat crowns and a Sun Rune (see Rune Guide for more details). Now this is easy at low BMs like your first patrol, but gets very hard if you don't find them now and leave them till later. Like everything else though, it's optional (and randomly encountered) so play as you see fit. This is after all a -guide-.

Once you do find Fallen and get Greed, then focus on attacking Tag Droids, as they give good amounts of cash which is now multiplied by 10! In fact, try not to attack anything else, especially not Renegade Bases, as you still don't have the weapons to overcome deflection yet (see Misc. Tips section to see how deflection works).

If you see Angels, which are your enemy, then ask for forgiveness and tribute Magma segments to them so they won't 'rebirth' you back to WS (however, this option means your align is reset). Only do this if you already have Greed, but if you don't and are still looking for Fallen, then fight them, and then Withdraw All. You may lose a merc or two, but hopefully it won't be too serious. You can go back to an outpost, get rid of what's left of your Scaven mercs, and get them again at a settlement if you do lose any.

Don't explore Canyons/Plateau/Firewells while you have Greed, as they aren't worth the chance of finding a Tag Droid. Especially don't check out Consoles or Plateaus, because Consoles have a chance of giving you normal Cash Multis which causes you to lose all good effects of greed (long lasting anti-storm goodness), and with Plateaus it's automatic. Lava (to hopefully find Azra's) is optional; 1 run of Azra's is equal to around 2 Tag droids worth of cash while on Greed.

Keep it up till you have 500k cash/credits (if your Greed ends before this, then hang around and try to find Lava Fields, and fight Azra's then leave Lava and find them again, since you can only fight the tourney once per Lava, until you get 500k). The precise amount needed is actually a bit less, but better safe then sorry! You can also sell the stun lasers you've no doubt amassed to get closer to 500k - they're pretty much novelty 'weapons' that aren't all that fun :(

First Upgrading Session

If you have any crowns, go to an outpost and remove Scaven to hand them in, then leave patrol. Upgrade your workshop to Hydraulic, then buy 3 Reaper (reaps) bots. Outfit each of them with 2 EM Syphon weapons, 2 Baron shields, 1 Ion V2 reactor, and if you have the spare cash for them, then 1 Phase Mod each.

Your V should be at least AI 6 by now, so upgrade its Weap Tech to 63 (don't just keep clicking +5 forever, because later on that can give you trouble. Do it one by one if you aren't familiar with the levels, and only ever upgrade to what you need >for the immediate patrol<. Spending ups on random areas like Energy Distribution for a Reaper or Armour for a Valadin isn't so smart :P Just leave the upgrades there to be used later if you can't get to a specific level you need something to be.

Second Patrol (reapers to AI 5, to drain base commanders)

Now, add the reaps to your squad, and go back to Vulc. You can now take on Angels; just drain the Arch Angel until its reactor is at -2000, then withdraw your bots 1 at a time until they're all out (reaps last). You can also defeat the first level of Renegade Bases now, although not the Commanders. However it's best to leave them alone until you have mercs with you. Again, try not to attack anything until you reach a merc outpost.

Now, if you had mercreds left over from last patrol, then hire an Orbie, a Zodiac (defence), which is a Sentinel giving 540 shielding, and a Copius (assault), which is an Overseer (module-sharer) giving 14% enhanced accuracy, and 25% enhanced firerate. If you don't, then go do crystal missions with the one or two you can afford until you have enough to hire the rest (47 mercreds altogether).

Matriarchs

After that, go to Scaven and get Scaven mercs, just like before. You can now take on towers and forts in addition to the previous targets, and that means being able to earn mercreds from killing matriarchs. However be warned: Matriarchs come in 3 types – Matriarch, Dynast Matriarch, and Malevolent (Malev) Matriarch. The first has 200 armour, Dynast 700 and Malevs have 1600. They also have increasing amounts of amour deflection, from 2% to 10%. Now with only 1 Val and 3 Reaps, your BM will be pretty low (around 200k or lower), which means you will most likely get Matriarchs. It is still very possible to get the other two, and you need to withdraw from Malevs - Dynasts are fine as long as you can drain the shielder in the first turn

To kill them, first target the shielding unit(s) with the Reapers, or you can just click All Attack on the shielder. You should drain the shielder on the first turn, and be able to All Attack the Mat on the second turn and kill it, but if you don't drain the shielder first turn then stay on it until you do (get the reactor under 0). Then kill the Queen. Voila, a crown worth 10 mercreds.

Ok, now get at least 6 crowns (8+ is better), and then go to Vulc. From now, your main goal is to find as many Azra's as possible, which means don't go to plateau, and try not to fight too many things other than tag droids and bases (to hopefully find a cy-hangar for bot retrieval, or a console).

Second Upgrading Session

Once you have around 230k cash, and your reaps are at least at AI 5, then deposit any crowns at the first outpost you see, and leave patrol. Upgrade Weap Tech to 54 on your reaps, and reactor level to 10. Buy 2 Syphon Elites and an Ion Flux reactor for each, do not use any spare upgrade points. Your V won't need any outfitting this time unless it just got to AI 10, in which case upgrade Weap Tech to 142, and buy 2 HR100s (you'll need over 100k more cash for this).

Third Patrol (reaps to AI 8 to drain Magma lords, and more bots)

Now you can kill base commanders! Find an outpost, same deal as before, try not to attack anything that wont be useful like activating firewells which can give you coords to outpost. Hire a Copius, a Zod, and an Orbie. Go to Scaven, get the mercs, but this time don't attack forts, there's a much higher chance of getting Malevs :/

Now once you get your mercs, as long as you have -35 align or more, go to vulcore and get Greed. Kill as many Base Commanders as possible now as well as Angels, but remember not to access any consoles with Greed active - just leave if you get that option. Also, once your greed runs out, get it again, and same deal until it runs out. Now, you should have at least 1.4 mil cash and AI 8 reaps; if you don't, then stick around concentrating on going to Lava Fields and Plateau to get your cash up and preferably get Bulwark tech. Once you have the cash and AI, deposit any crowns you have and leave patrol.

NB: This, the previous, or the next patrol is a nice time to get Storm Shield if you haven't already - it costs 200 mercreds, and is a life-saving, essential mod for Vulcore, especially after this. Needs 15 mod tech to equip, so put it on a seer. You buy it from the Outpost in the 'For Sale' section - only need the one.

Third Upgrading Session

Upgrade to Powered and Tectronic workshop, then buy a Sentinel and an Overseer, or 2 Seers if you are going to get CySent, or don't mind missing a sent for now. Buy a Comwave Scanner, Security Countermand, and Anomaly Detector (the 'utility' mods). Put all those on 1 seer. If you're using 2 Seers, which I recommend, send the other one into training with an Argon Laser, Ion reactor and Baron shield. Get it to AI 1, then leave. Upgrade its mod uplink to 27%, and buy 3 Targeting Subroutines (Tsubs). If you're using a Sent and Seer, then put an Ion V2 on the sent, and send it on its own to the personal squad viewer.

Load up the Virtual Battle Simulator, send it to test radius damage on shield and energy targets. Auto the fight, and you lose 75 kc but it's now AI 2 (since updates, need to do this twice, so best to couple with the other seer). Much faster than sending it to training for Sents/Seers only. Anyways, put 9 upgrades into shield tech, and buy it 3 Baron II shields. Also, put the Motion Tracker on it; better mods can be put on val/reaps, eg Phase Mods on Reaps and Tsubs on Val.

As for your Reaps, upgrade their weapon tech to 78, and reactor to 15. Buy all 3 of them 2 Syphon Disruptors, and 1 Ion Flux Plus reactor. Put Phase Mods on them, or a Motion Tracker on the first one if you don't have a Sent. Leave the val as is, or if it's AI 10 then upgrade as aforementioned.

Fourth Patrol (getting align, mercreds, Nanomatic WS, pre-MC)

Now, go get to an outpost and hire a Copius and 2 Zodiacs. Head to Scaven, get mercs, and if u have a Scaven assault squad among them, you can kill Malevs safely! Once you have about 12 crowns, and at least -110 align, then go to Vulc and get Greed. As usual, go for Tag Droids, Angels, and Bases only. When using Greed, if it lasts around 700 kc then you can go to Plateau then before it runs out, and start getting Bulwark tech if not gotten already.

Once Greed finishes, aim for Lava Fields for the Azra's and to get Magma tech, as well as attacking Phoenix Fortresses and Magma Lords if you have the seer with 3 Tsubs. Mag Lords give 20 mercreds each, as well as 3 Magma segments. Awesome, but make sure you have 100% accuracy on your 3 Reaps, or else you might not fully drain it, and lose a bot or two.

Once you have at least 255 Mercreds worth of crowns and mercreds, -100 align minimum, have Bulwark tech if you plan on using Buls, have Magma tech or are close it, Reaps at AI 10 or higher, and at least 3.6 mil cash or so (4 mil preferably, get Greed again if you think it's necessary), then go to an Outpost, deposit any crowns, buy a Storm Shield if you still need one, and leave patrol.

Ahh MC's dont you love them. I assume you are going negative alignment here. Hopefully you have -100 align or more, if you don't, umm...stay in the patrol from before and farm scaven territories, hunt for align. Personally I get -170 align or close to it because I go on 2 Fallen (Dark Union) sulphur runs later.

Once done, upgrade workshop to Magnetic and then Nanomatic workshop.

Fourth Upgrading Session

Reapers first, since they're most important. I like to use 2 Immobilisers (immobs) on 1 reap and Immob/Pulse Streamer on 2 others. You can use 2 immobs each on all three, or 1 with a Streamer if you want, they all work.

Reap 1 - upgrade weap tech to 122, reactor to 20, and add 2 upgrades onto weight (payload). Buy 2 immobs, then Sub-Nuclear reactor and Phase Mod for it.

Reaps 2 and 3 - upgrade weap tech to 158, reactor stays at 15, and add 2 to weight. Buy a Syphon Immobiliser and a Pulse Streamer on each, make sure the Immob is equipped before the Streamer. Phase mod on each.

Now if you don't have a Sent already, buy one now. If you got it last patrol, then upgrade shield tech to 60, reactor to 10, and save the rest. Motion tracker on it still (for the rest of the game, really).

For Bul if you're using it, equip any baron lasers/auto cannons you may have in inventory, and send it to training. Leave when it hits AI 1. Upgrade weap tech to 22, and mod tech to 15. Put a Storm Shield and Comwave Scanner on it, then a Shield Disruptor and 3 Avengers. Best reactor you can afford or just a spare since any will do, and 2 Baron Reflective shields.

Personally I get another Seer instead of keeping the Val, because Vals suck (and you won't use it for Talsia). Nonetheless, if you want to keep it, put your upgrades into weapons. If you have 142 or higher, then equip 2 HR100 Rocket Packs. If you don't, that's OK, just leave the Weap Tech as is - doesn't really matter :P Get to 10 Mod Tech and put a Security Countermand and Anomaly Detector on it.

Seers - upgrade their mod tech to 40, buy 3 Mechanical Obviators each, and put the rest of the upgrades into mod uplink. If you got 1 Seer and 1 Sent last patrol, then buy another Seer or two and put Sec Counter, Anomaly Detector and Target Sub on one, and 3 Tsubs on the other. If you got 2 Seers last time, then just buy 1 more.

Now, take the squad into the Personal Squad Viewer, and take a look at the stats of any Reaper. The speed of it should be higher than 70.4 (28%). Over 70 means it will outspeed the CyRanger in the MCs, quite important. Now check the firerate. If it isn't over 20%, then keep that in mind.

Fifth Patrol (hammer [MC] time, Crusader tech, sulphur run)

With the squad set up, head into Vulc and find an outpost. Hire 2 Zods and an Adverse (defence) IF your firerate was 20% or more earlier, but hire a Copius instead of 1 Zodiac if it was less than 20%. Now, leave the outpost without doing anything, and wait for a Fallen Encounter to get Dark Union.

Don't attack anything. Don't explore anything that could lead to combat. If you meet Angels, just drain them carefully by manually selecting the targets (Angels first, then Arch Angels) by clicking on your Reap and selecting from the drop-down list, and then either withdrawing everything slowly, or spending a bit of kc but killing them all slowly.

Once you do get Fallen, do your best to find Lava Fields and Azra's tourney. Buy the coords from Fallen if you find them again first. Once you find it, attack the Master Controllers.

Master Controllers

Turn 1 - set the Reap with 2 Immobs on Tammygotchi, the Fallen Leviathan Baal (he has minor drain) on Opto, 1 Reap on Crimsons, and another on Hextra. If you are a 2-Reap user, then put 1 Reap on Tammy, and 1 on Crimsons.

Click continue. If any of Tammygotchi/Crimsons/Hextra aren't drained, put 1 of the Immob/Streamer Reaps on the undrained bot, the 2 Immob Reap on Opto, and 1 on stonehead 2. If the 3 bots you targeted the 1st turn were all drained past -1500, then set the last Reap to drain Fridge. Click continue.

From now it should be a cinch, set your Reaps to drain anything that moves (isn't drained), starting with j4f. Priority goes as follows: Tammygotchi, Opto, Crimsons, stonehead 2, Hextra, Royi, Fridge, j4f, Berkley, and Sacdaddy 1357 in descending order. Be careful until you win :)

Select your Cy-Reward: CySent (a pretty safe choice), CySeer (offers higher risk and higher reward), or CyMara (more for basing players), and leave Lava Fields.

Sulphur Pits

Look for an outpost, and go to take the Sulphur Pits mission when you get there. Basically, get Crusader tech now, which you do by Examining Tech at Renegade Workshops. Once you do and have gotten some exp along with a nice stash of mercreds, I advise you to go to outpost and buy Azra coords, go to tourney and rake up the cash, then leave patrol.

If you plan to patrol in Sulphur (or anywhere else) with Fallen for some time, it's a good idea to buy up bots or equipment whenever you get some major cash during the patrol. This allows you to 'save' 40% of the money you receive (gear/bots sell at 40% of base price) that would otherwise be lost to the Fallen curse. Obviously start by buying bots or gear that you will use in later patrols, but otherwise anything will do.

Please note that when you fight Enforcers, go straight back to outpost after killing the first squad, and then re-enter sulphur. They get a lot harder each time you fight them, but since they only appear after around 90 mercreds, the difficulty resets after you re-enter. Also, if your reaps aren't 90 speed or higher (64% enhanced speed), then try not to attack Annihilators (annis) - sooner or later you get screwed by crits (defines Cybots really :p).

From there on you can take another Fallen run if you have the align, or go straight to Talsia. See my Upgrades post for more information, or the other posts.

A typical Tals entry squad is 1 reap, 4 seers, 1 sent (including 1 cysent/cyseer), 2 crus (some take 1 crus, and 1 crus/bul/marauder). If you are taking a second sulph run with Fallen, which I think is best (at least until your crus and cyseer/cysent are AI 10), then that is the squad you should take - just don't attack annis at all with only 1 reap and try to keep your bm under 1.5 mil.

TL; DR

Start with a Valadin.

Get cash to buy Hydraulic and 3 Reapers plus outfits (500k).

Level them up to be able to take on base commanders/magma lords to farm mercreds (AI 5/8 for Syphon Elites/Disruptors).  [Optional]

Earn mercreds and align for Storm Shield, mercenaries and Greed, Dark Union.

Earn Cash (mostly with greed, some with Azra's tourneys) for all the workshops and the bots plus gear to fill your squad with.

End up with a squad of 8 ideally/commonly seen as: 3 AI 10 reapers, 3 seers, 1 sent/another seer, 1 bulwark/val/crusader/marauder.

Have Storm Shield, -100 to -170 alignment, 55 mercreds or more, plus utility mods.

Fight MCs after getting mercs and then Dark Union, then get crusader tech, exp and some mercreds for next sulph run/dax pods in sulphur.

Do another sulph run with prospective Tals squad to prep them for battle.