Rifleman Archive

Hi all riflemen out there.

I'm currently on my way to Master Doc and juggling only a few remaining skill points. I'm looking to still maintain a pretty rounded character who can hold his own outside of a group, so I've kept Scout and Exploration I, and have a chunk of Combat Medic laid out.

But now, the crux of the matter is - I currently have Rifles IV and Pistols IV and I sadly need to give up a branch. I find the combination of both makes me fairly effective in combat in small groups, but I would like to make sure I'm doing the most damage with my skill points. I can probably make about half the tree of EITHER Pistoleer or Rifleman.

I'm not sure yet way to go - I can try and avoid direct confrontation, laying down fire as the rest of my group go in and follow up with heals - and so go rifleman. Or, if the mob rushes us, am I going to find that rifleman is useless at close range? If this is the case, would I be better with Pistoleer?

Can any of you let me know if it's worth getting halfway through either the rifleman or pistoleer tree, and if there are any skills which might make the rifle useful (not lethal) at relatively close range? If so, what branches are going to offer the best advantage if I can't master the tree?

Any thoughts you guys have would be greatly appreciated. The fate of my character lies in your hands.

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My heart says rifleman, my head says pistoleer

In my opinion do not take rifle unless you are going to master it. If you only take a few boxes the long delays before your next shot willmake healing harder. There are ways of reducing misses at close range, but you will still take 2.5x from melee damage, the only way to avoid this is to change to another weapon....

Pistol on the other hand, you can go up the defence tree (Techniques) and get their best attacks while gaining nice defencive bonuses. Taking Pistol Stances one for the melee knockdown would also be a good idea, the knockdown should give you time to putsome distancebetween you and your target.

Rifles and doctors don't mix.

As a rifleman, you'd be burning mind pool to shoot and also to heal. That's bad. Also, rifles tend to be slower than pistols, and since healing queues up with combat, you can't afford to fire a T21 and then be stuck unable to heal for 6+ seconds.

As a pistoleer, I believe they burn mostly health for their special moves, which you, as a doctor, can heal. Pistols are also very fast, you can get a scout blaster to fire once per second with very little pistol skill, which means your heals are only going to be one second away.

You also just plain do more damage with a pistol. Rifles can't compete until Master Rifleman and even that's debatable.

Also, you take 2.5x damage from melee and heavy weapons (like flamethrowers) whereas a pistoleer does not.

These are huge penalties to pay for the weakest mind attack in the game.

Another idea for you: drop pistols and rifles and pick up Combat Medic. You can get a mind attack there which is not only better than rifles, but cooler and much more difficult to cure.

Thanks guys, this is excellent stuff, and confirms what I was hoping wasn't going to be the case.

I am looking to take CM on top of Doctor, with pistol as defense, but I may rework it all around a bit. Your points about the mind costs of rifles and healing, as well as the stacking of heals and combat, were something I hadn't considered before, so thanks again.

Back to the drawing board, Wil E. Coyote style...