So any tips for a new player? I thiiink I'm pretty lucky because I got Browning and a ton of stens, and a two type 58's to dummy link, and I'm making pretty balanced teams that synergize (I think). Mostly 2smg, 2ar/hg and one other.
Any tips on deciding who's good actually? So far it's 60% appearance and ability names for me (ppk's being 'annihilation command' will never not make me cackle madly).
Especially unsure how to judge rifles against each other. Should I be prioritizing better ROF on them?
And I'm not sure what sort of balance for logistics vs missions I should be doing.
1. Rush through the story using supports to carru you until you clear chapter four. This unlocks the unique Anti-Rain Team, four high class 4* assault rifles who are pretty much the protagonists of the game. Use them.
2. Save up gems to unlock at least five Echelon slots, ideally seven.
3. Make three teams: first a 3 Assault Rifle/2 SMG combo team, then a rifle/handgun team, then finally a second 3AR/2SMG team.
Guns you should be focusing on early on: NOT FOUR/FIVE STARS!!! Five stars are VERY expensive to max out. It might not seem too bad right now, but later on you will regret it. Dummy linking, which is the main source of power, gets expensive at around X4/X5 and higher rarity dupes are hard to come by. Raise only 2-3 stars with the occasional 4* for now. Once you start rolling in cores from disassembling unneeded 3 and 4 star guns, then you can start raising 5*s while cycling your now-obsolete (but high level) lower rarity gun waifus on to logistics duty.
Handguns: PPK is the goddess-queen of budget handguns. You will probably find her useful even in a team of 5*s. Makarov, Astra, and M1911 are all workable.
SMG: Skorpion and STEN will be your go-to gals for SMGs, since you'll be getting lots of copies. M38 is also decent, having shitty buff tiles but the ever-valuable stun grenade skill. If you roll either of the UMP sisters, especially UMP45, use them. They're amazing.
Assault Rifles: F2000, Galil, and Type 63 are the best 2* ARs, the rest are all some degree of trash. The Anti Rain squad are all great, especially M4A1 with her unique buff tiles.
Rifles: M14 is fucking incredible, matching or sometimes outclassing her 5* equivalents, and the best part is she's completely free. SV-98 is decent enough, as is Springfield. If you're lucky enough to roll WA2000, THEN USE HER. She's easily one of if not THE best gun in the entire game. Same goes for her 4 star equivalent, SVD.
Machine guns: due to their operating costs it's recommended to avoid them for a while, but M2HB and LWMMG are the standout winners from what we have.
In general: anyone with stun or smoke is useful. Pair stun and smoke for a phenomenal combination. Flares are likewise invaluable for night missions.
You can usually tell whose good or bad by looking at their buff tiles and skills. SMGs or Assault Rifles with side buff tiles are almost exclusively trash, for example, since they're demanding that you put your tanks in the back row or squishy DPS in front - both of which are very bad ideas.
If you're lucky enough to get high rarity dupes, there's no harm in dummy linking them with a few exceptions - WA2000 is good enough that you'll want two of her, for instance.
Levels aren't actually levels. Sure. They increase your HP and some other stuff, but it's best to view them as a level cap. Your real 'levels' come from Enhancement in the Factory, since that's what increases your actual stats. A 4000 team can rocket up to 8000 simply through enhancement.
So what the hell, because people have been asking this here and then, behold Whiskey's personal guide to handling Exp Sim 3. Disclaimer: this works for me, but may not necessarily work for you, but I've used this with good effect on CN and EN.
There are two ways I'll be discussing how to clear Exp Sim 3: the single-squad method and the double squad method.
Solo Squad Shenanigans
Single Squad clearing is high risk, high reward. Pull it off, you get the full 240,000 exp going to 5 girls - that's 48k exp a girl. Screw it up, and you're only getting 90-108k exp (and so you'd have been better off doing Exp Sim 2 :/). To do this, you're going to need a few prerequisites for your squad:
- All girls minimum Lvl 80 with the best equips in all slots
- All girls dummy linked to x4
- All girls enhanced as strong as possible
- All girls' skills trained to minimum of lvl 7, skill lvl 8 preferred to give you more margin
- minimum Combat Efficiency of 18500, 19500 or higher preferred for greater margin of safety
- Team Composition: M4A1, 2x AR, 1x SMG, 1x MG (preferably M2HB on your first run)
My formation when I ran this was:
Pro: 3 AR 1 MG puts out a lot of dakka, especially when one AR is M4A1 and your MG is M2 with her passive. Con: Lots of pressure on your SMG tank - you'll need to play with SMG kiting.
Enemy comp is 4x AR mook squad (6.7k), 3x SG/RF squad (7.7k), 1x elite SG/RF squad (9k) and 2x boss MG/AR squad (13k). So:
1. Start from either the left or the right, it doesn't really matter. Proceed to hit all the AR mook squads first: your formation comp will allow your squad to start shooting as soon as the mooks show up, allowing you to shred them without taking damage.
2. Once the AR squads are down, go for the SG/RF squads. This is where you need SMG kiting: keep your SMG in the front soaking damage from the advancing SG squads. Keep her there until the enemy RF units setup to fire, then kite her back to stand next to M2HB. With a little practice you can time it right so that the RFs are being shredded as they reposition to fire on your SMG. This should only lose you a few hundred combat power worst case; best case, no damage at all (but that's like a level 90+ DLx5 squad ).
4. Rinse and repeat until the rest of the 7.7k SG/RF squads are down. Your SMG should have taken some damage but still have 4 bodies on the field
5. Send your squad to fight the 13k MR/AR squads first, then the 9k SG/RF squad afterwards. This time, leave your SMG in the frontline; kiting memes will just let the MGs unload on your AR firing line, killing your DPS. You want your SMG drawing fire and soaking damage in a slugging match.
This is highly counterintuitive - you'd think you'd go after the weaker squad first - but the 9k SG/RF squad's SGs are going to soak your damage while the RFs pick you off, and by the time you deal with them your squad is going to get pretty shredded and is in no shape to go after the two 13k MG/AR squads. I learned this the hard way: take the MG/AR squads first.
6. By the time you get to the 9k SG/RF squad, your squad is going to be a bit chewed up. Keep an eye on your ARs; once your MG shoots her load, reposition her to stand behind the squisher weaker AR who's eaten more damage, you don't want the enemy to charge through a hole in your lines.
The end result is a battered, yet victorious squad (the SMG will have probably died at this point, but she's still getting the full exp, thank god) with 48k exp for each girl. You do need to be careful and paying attention, but you can make this method work and it's how i shot up so fast.
Double Squad Deliciousness
Switching to a two-squad setup loses on the pure concentrated exp per girl that the single squad gets you, but it does give you a larger margin of safety. Depending on your squad comp, 2 squads weaker than the single squad above can have an easier time fighting the enemies above.
Prerequisites:
- Everyone at least level 60 and x3, Level 70 and x4 for higher margin of safety
- Minimum combat power of 15k for the dakka squad and 13k for the hunter squad
- all girls enhanced as much as possible
- all equip slots full with the best equips
- All girls' skills at Lvl 4
You're going to need to build 2 squads. The first is the dakka squad: this can be either the standard 2 SMG 3 AR squad, or r it could be my preferred generalist squad, 1SMG 1HG 1MG 2AR:
(ok fine I basically swapped out M4A1 for a HG. Actual MG positioning will vary based on the shape of the HG's buff tiles.)
The second squad is what I call the Buster Squad, which is a 3RF 1HG 1SG squad in Dong Formation (alternately, you could also run 3 MG instead of the RFs because there's no ammo consumption):
Ok, setup done? Good, let's get that exp.
1. The Dakka Squad will sweep from one side of the map to the other, focusing on the AR squads only. 15k CE is just enough power that they can take the AR squads with minimal damage, so no SMG kiting is needed.
2. The Buster Squad goes after the SG/RF teams and manfights them. This will put a fair bit of pressure on the SG, but given that at 12k the Buster Squad has almost twice the CE of the SG/RF team, they'll get through with minimal damage.
3. Elite killing time: Dakka Squad goes after the 13k MG/AR squad, Buster Squad goes after the 9k SG/RF squad.
It's a lot simpler and easier, and while you don't get the sheer concentrated exp boost, you are leveling 2 squads, so it's not all bad. I've actually been using DSD for the last month to level my C-team and my RF squad.
And that's how I Exp Sim 3.
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This guide brought to you so that I don't have to keep typing it out all the time in discord, lol. (And if @ARBITRACOM likes this, maybe sticky it? )
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