moqueur

Yep. The third option appears if you gaine enough influence during your campaign and doesn't lead to shooting — I believe it only happens if you try to arrest the Major.

It depends on who's on your team. Some of your mercs may ignore your decision to arrest the Major and kill him instead. I can say for sure it works this way with Ivan and Len. They shoot him all the time 😉

I believe magazines are restocked every week or so. Loot boxes seem to be limited. You just buy the whole stock and that's it. With the junk seller I actually failed to determine cooldowns. They seemed somewhat random.

Not sure there are any other awards. Usually Greasy Basil gives you the rifle after you captured the whole island and decided Pierre's fate. Maybe it is tied to your reputation with Ernie village as well. As for the chip — disassembling Dragunov is definitely a way to get it. Just remember that it is not a guarantee — you may have to save and load several times. Other weapons that may drop you a chip after being scrapped are modified MP5K and Glock 18. Both can be bought at the Fleatown Flea Market. Other ways of getting the chip is to buy a random modification part near the Adjani Museum in Port Cocoa. You will need to pay with a bag of Grand Chien francs instead of real money. Lots of bags can be looted in the same sector though. And again it is kinda random — you may get the pipe, the lens or the chip. So - again - save your game before trying 😉

Same with me. Lynx was the first 'elite' merc who agreed to work for me in JA1. So it became my very own tradition — no JA run without Lynx. Be it JA1 or JA2. Had to break this tradition for now but still hoping for the best 😉 As for the reason of not conquering the mines — I was doing a solo run with Blood who has terrible leadership but low starting salary. So I decided to start with picking lots of easy fights to level him up instead of capturing a mine and spending next week training militia. I mean - it literally takes him a week to train 8 recruits. I did't even try turning them into vets 😁

I don't have access to game files but judging from my experience Biff's mayday event seems to start in about a month after you get hold on your first mine. Might be wrong though but once I decided not to capture any mines in the beginning and to pay my bills by simply intercepting diamond convoys. The event didn't trigger for months.

Finished mine yesterday. And I have to say that those who manage to pull this off with their I.M.P. mercs deserve a separate achievement — on my own first solo run I tried to do it but gave up pretty soon. Choosing an A.I.M. merc makes things much less complicated. You can swap them when you need to mod the weapon or to train militia or whatever — which means your 'combat' merc doesn't have to be a jack of all trades. I went with Blood. Hired him for the first time ever and was going to swap him for Reaper a little further on. Ended up beating the whole campaign with this guy as he turned out to be a brilliant choice. I'm a very mediocre player and frankly speaking I did my fair share of save scumming near magazine vendors and hi-end loot containers but surprisingly I hardly ever had to load my game in combat as it turned out to be not as difficult as it seemed. Still the experience was really rewarding. I thought I had a lot of fun while beating the game for the very first time — but I was wrong. Solo run showed me where the real fun begins. And that even after completing the game twice (a normal run and a speed run) I still have a lot to learn. Like active use of abilities, careful choice of perks to get, high mobility, stealthy approach, knowing my weapons and using right guns in right circumstances. So both Blood and I learned a lot and became much better on our joint adventure. And I'm really glad I actually gave it a try 🙂

I don't really see how FAMAS can possibly qualify for being the best weapon even in its own class. I mean almost every assault rifle of the same calibre outperforms it at least to some extent. Okay, I didn't play much with M16A2 and AR15 but both AUG and G36 have been a vital part of my builds in different runs and on different difficulty settings. Both have the same basic AP cost as FAMAS but boast better range, aiming bonus and damage. And most importantly they accept better modifications. G36 is actually my personal choice. With extended barrel it gets 8 aiming bonus and 36 range. Adding UV dot and vertical grip turns it into a beast. Single shot with 2x aiming bonus for 4 AP means an experienced merc with high agility, dexterity and marksmanship can land 4 headshots in one turn in mid-range combat without save scumming. With stealth bonuses every headshot may be lethal. And even if not — 2 headshots are usually enough to kill an aware enemy so you are getting from 2 to 4 kills with a single merc in one turn. The only downside is that the rifle doesn't accept prism scope to get even more accuracy on your first shot — but it actually doesn't need any more accuracy. AUG is a good backup weapon for a heavy sniper when things go south. Lower damage output and the absence of some crucial modification options are actually balanced by the short barrel option. It means you need only 3 AP for a single shot and 4 AP for a burst resulting in having 5 quick single shots or 4 short bursts a turn. The long barrel build shown above looks interesting as well and I think I'm gonna try it — though I believe the lack of UV dot is likely to prevent the gun from landing headshots as fast and steadily as G36 does. Still everything really depends on your playstyle and skill choice. I personally never use auto fire mode with assault rifles and rarely do bursts but some people may find it boring. And if we are discussing the best long weapon in game — current balance favours LMGs and sniper rifles so I believe the best one is either HK21 or PSG1 depending on your playstyle. Out of assault rifles only I would actually nominate FN FAL. FAL has the same high damage output as AK-74, same AP cost and same aiming bonus. The difference is that its range and aiming bonus can be boosted by installing a long barrel. It also accepts both mod combinations that I find to be the most useful — heavy stock + prism scope and UV dot + vertical grip. Muzzle slot allows you to fine tune the rifle either for loud or for silent use choosing between silencer and recoil booster. The possibility to add an ergonomic expanded mag and a bipod is not that crucial in my books but still those are nice things to have. Last but not least, FAL is available very early and very cheap.

Mercs do become more expensive as they level up and become better overall — seems gaining lots of attribute points also counts. But unlike in JA2 here they do it in silence. By the end of my first run Raven was priced almost $5k a day despite the fact she didn't ask for a single raise in half a year. On my solo run Blood moved from under $1k a day to almost $4k a day at level 10 while asking for a raise only twice because of being bored with his chores. Actually merc asking for a raise is usually a one-time thing — next time they will accept their usual salary (the only exception is Scully — his kids always need something). Triggers may differ. Mercs may be dissatisfied with something (Blood bored with chores, Grizzly not liking too many foreigners on the team) or they may ask for a random raise based on RNG (I believe Raider can ask for a raise for no apparent reason with like 10% probability).

The last one is actually too much of a spoiler to reveal. But you can go through the hidden achievements in Steam — there is one for hiring him. As for Pierre — as far as I know in order to recruit him you need to keep Bastien alive on Ernie, to spare Pierre and to find Bastien again in the Refugee Camp and help him before certain big events take place. I came there a bit too late (about half a year too late to be precise) and Bastien wasn't available any more. Pierre himself can be found in F19. Despite the fact he seems to be a late-game recruit his stats look somewhat mediocre.

At least five of them. You need to complete their questlines to hire them — and all of them work for free by the way. Some may decline to join depending on your decisions. Two RPCs are your adversaries who can be persuaded to join you. I don't know how to use spoiler tags so I'm not giving any names. Three others have quests associated with them and these quests are available pretty early so I believe spoiler tags are not needed: Flay — marksman. Pretty much ok for me. The easiest one to get — though you will need to pass either a Wisdom or a Leadership check (don't remember which one). The easiest way to start the quest to find him is to visit poacher camp in Savanna (sector C5) Larry — explosives specialist and a pretty solid medic. He can be found in sector F7 but you will need to find a certain thing to hire him. Smiley — leader and somewhat decent shooter. The longest questline which can be started in meny ways. He is one of those who can actually decline to join you (his decision seems to depend on your decision in the very last quest in his line).

Not sure whether I should actually write this as I got the info from the footage that clearly broke the embargo. But I believe these two points are pretty harmless as they don't influence the reception of the game while they may help us spend the day planning our first squads: 1. I.M.P. is available from day 1 (there seemed to be some confusion concerning it on Discord) 2. Starting funds on the lowest difficulty setting (First Blood) seem to be raised to 40k instead of 30k

Sorry I'm not on the Reddit so I believe the only option is to write here. First of all thanks for updating the spreadsheet with the new guns — seems now it includes all weapons no matter whether we know the stats or not. If so - maybe you could be interested in adding another two guns to the list: AK-74 seen in Fidel's backpack (it's definitely a 74, not a 47 we've already seen) and AKS-74U found in the "Wider picture" trailer. Gus has a new revolver in his backpack as well but unfortunately I know nothing about revolvers and can't identify it 🙁

From what I've seen M.E.R.C. guys are already in game and at least some of them are recruitable. Without spoiling too much I believe it is possible to say that there is no dedicated M.E.R.C. site (at least in the very beginning) so you have to search for them in Grand Chien. And no, it doesn't seem they became a top-tier brand 😁 Really great suggestion to fill the sea with something worthy like oil rigs. I would also welcome merc packs as well as campaign and map extensions. A new recruitment service (the third one actually) and a new campaign on the same map several years later also sound brilliant 🙂

You're welcome 🙂 As for the profile pic — not sure if it is critical for the forum but definitely not critical for me 😉 Nice to see yet another Lynx fan here (turned out there are plenty of us)