Ampersat – Ranged Combat Guide

Effectiveness of Ranged combat is actually a fusion of your Ranged Weapon and your Primary Spell. Much like different ammo in a gun, you can use any combo of spell and weapon, and some are more synergistic than others. For example:

• Match the Damage % modifier of a weapon with the primary damage element of the spell, e.g., a staff that adds 20% Ice damage, use with an Ice spell, and avoid using a staff that deducts 20% Fire damage with a Fire spell. Obvious.

• A high-damage spell may benefit more from a staff with high attack rate than one that adds a bit more damage. Do the math.

• Use a weapon that increases speed or range to make for a spell that has poor inherent speed or range.

• If you’re not adept at handling overheat, use a high-burst/cooldown weapon to help with a low-burst/cooldown spell.

You can load in an Alternate Spell so that you can switch between it and the primary one on the fly. This is useful to match elemental damage to creatures’ elements, which makes a huge difference with higher-tier enemies (can result in more than double the damage being dealt). You can also use spell switching to start with a weaker spell that adds a status effect such as Vulnerable or Poison, then once an enemy has the impediment switch to a high-damage spell to finish it off.

Managing Rapid Fire Overheat is critical. If you hold the fire button it fires at a faster rate than bashing the button; however, it fills up an Overheat bar while holding the button, and once full, it reduces your fire rate by 50% until you allow it to Cooldown (by simply stopping holding the button for a moment). If you start firing before the overheat fully resets, it pauses the Cooldown. The trick is to simply to get into a rhythm of hold and release before the Overheat bar hits maximum. As long as you haven’t hit Max Overheat, you don’t need to wait between letting go of the button and holding it again; you can do it instantly without penalty. When you use a new ranged weapon or spell for the first time, just glance up at the Overheat bar a couple of times until you get your timing down.

Ranged weapons that add knockback to your shots are quite useful, as it can interrupt enemy attacks very briefly. With a high rapid-fire rate, you can keep a charging enemy such as a Xenophage at bay long enough to kill it.

Early on, a higher attack rate is the best improvement you can make to a ranged build, whether from your weapon choice, armor that has a buff, or perks.

A note on creatures that dodge your shots – there are three main ways of dealing with them:

a) Improve your shot speed/rate and spray in front of their dodge path – the problem is they can dodge left or right randomly, so you need to adjust quickly.

b) When they dodge, there are a couple of seconds grace where they won’t dodge again – so send off a warning shot, wait until they dodge, and then shoot them before they can dodge again.

c) Just dash in and Melee them to death.

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