Metal Gear Solid 5: The Phantom Pain

[Griddlelol]

The way enemies react is just using equipment to counter your strategies. No AI changes so far as I can tell.

Most of them seemed pretty obvious, like wearing helmets, but one bothered me. A lot now wear gas masks. I used a sleep grenade all of once, and now every chump is donning a gas mask. Granted my sleep grenade took out 6 people in one throw. Something I was super proud of, but now they've completely countered that.

However, I do think gas masks and night vision goggles are mutually exclusive. Not confirmed that, but it'll be really interesting if they are!

A cool thing is that helmets don't stop you from getting head shots. Ether quiet can pop the helmet off, and you can then shoot them before they react, or you can shoot guys in the face!

[thefncrow]

Yeah, I had a bunch of guys start wearing helmets, and it meant I just had to hold up until they turned and I could shoot them in the face.  Problem solved.

[namman siggins]

Wu talks about Femsnake:

 

http://www.polygon.com/2015/9/8/9275393/metal-gear-woman-lead-character-secret

[Dewar]

There are helmets that have plastic face visors as well. No problem for bullets, but blocks sleep darts.

 

Also, mission 28 and 29 suck. I did a stupid and brought Quiet on mission 29 despite possible save-corruption. I don't think anything broke for me, but I guess we'll see tomorrow.

 

Regarding mission 29 does anyone know how...

to get a total death count? I really fucked up the quarantine stuff twice over so I think I did probably the worst you could do. Only like 60 people who were eligible for the sickness survived

[Brett E]

I think the enemies do change up in more than just gear although the difference is subtle. For instance I've noticed more are taking wide arcs to investigate corners and avoid being easily grabbed.

 

Regarding Mission 29:

I failed that at least 3 times and found it rather frustrating because in classic Japanese design is very trial and error. You have massive chunks of something thrown at you (maybe reflex on those would have improved it) and dudes just jumping you left, right and centre, it's nasty. So I took to the net and saw that others had trouble, the advice given was take Quiet and hide, letting her deal with them or take the Walker. Given the bug I chose Walker and after another failure I managed it with relative ease and got S rank. Not a mission I'll be returning to any time soon.

 

Also for anyone further than Mission 29:

If you find the concept of the disease interesting, check out a film called Pontypool, I wonder if Kojima saw it.

[Griddlelol]

Oh, I just got to mission 29 this morning. I've not done anything yet though.

I really liked mission 28, I got a B rank because it took me 40 minutes since I could not find where the damn prisoner was. Didn't get spotted once in 40 minutes, despite some of the guards I tranq'd waking up again. It was one of those messy missions that I lucked my way through the whole thing.

29:

While I've not done it, you'll probably have to fight off skulls, and if it's anything like mission 16, grenades and a recoilless rifle do the job fantastically. I'll bring a shotgun too, since the assault rifles don't really do much to the skulls.

I wonder if there's the option to just drop in a tank than I have back at mother base? That'd make short work of them.

Edit: I just realised why I love this game. It's ghost recon. I played that for hundreds of hours on the original Xbox. I played it so much i knew everything about it, to the point I wouldn't go into a mission with anything other than a pistol to make it challenging. Mgs5 reminds me of it so much. It's got all the things I loved about that game, but with all the awesome anime bullshit from metal gear, and the crazy interacting open work stuff of far cry.

It's great to just pin point exactly what it's been reminding me of this whole time.

[Polish Hill]

Worth noting that there's a difference between STUN weapons and ZZZ weapons (as there is a difference between enemies who are in the STUN state, the ZZZ state and the --- state). Some kinds of STUN also last longer than others.

 

Welp I'm an idiot and after seeing this switched from the STUN SMG back to the ZZZ pistol.  I was able to down the bear finally.  Did everyone use the tranq sniper rifle to take down Quiet or is it reasonable to do with the tranq pistol?  I did extremely will in the battle with her but headshots from the STUN SMG only chipped away at her meter so I'm assuming it was because I was using the wrong weapon again.

 

I'll chalk it up to being my first Metal Gear, womp womp.

[Nappi]

Did everyone use the tranq sniper rifle to take down Quiet or is it reasonable to do with the tranq pistol?

 

I was not in the mood to shoot her with my regular sniper (even though it wouldn't have mattered when it comes to acquiring her as a buddy), and dealing with her using the tranq pistol felt way too laborious, so [cheap trick for Quiet encounter]:

... I just ordered supply drops on her head.

 

I might replay that mission at some point.

[Mike Danger]

I was not in the mood to shoot her with my regular sniper (although I think that does not matter in terms of acquiring her as a buddy), and dealing with her using the tranq pistol felt way too laborious, so [cheap trick for Quiet encounter]:

... I just ordered supply drops aimed at her head.

 

Yep, was literally just about to post this. I did this to myself earlier by accident and then thought "hmmm...I wonder..." I was only able to do it right once, but that brought her low enough that I could finish her off with the tranq pistol at a distance (it seems easiest if you lure her over to the right side of the map as you enter, where the pillars are)

[Polish Hill]

Thank you both, will probably just do that tonight and replay at a later date.

[Brett E]

That's an amazing tactic

 

Are vehicle drops blocked?

[Dewar]

Welp I'm an idiot and after seeing this switched from the STUN SMG back to the ZZZ pistol.  I was able to down the bear finally.  Did everyone use the tranq sniper rifle to take down Quiet or is it reasonable to do with the tranq pistol?  I did extremely will in the battle with her but headshots from the STUN SMG only chipped away at her meter so I'm assuming it was because I was using the wrong weapon again.

 

I'll chalk it up to being my first Metal Gear, womp womp.

 

I did it with the tranq pistol. It took a while, but it wasn't that bad with DDog around to spot her.

[Dewar]

Oh, I just got to mission 29 this morning. I've not done anything yet though.

I really liked mission 28, I got a B rank because it took me 40 minutes since I could not find where the damn prisoner was. Didn't get spotted once in 40 minutes, despite some of the guards I tranq'd waking up again. It was one of those messy missions that I lucked my way through the whole thing.

29:

While I've not done it, you'll probably have to fight off skulls, and if it's anything like mission 16, grenades and a recoilless rifle do the job fantastically. I'll bring a shotgun too, since the assault rifles don't really do much to the skulls.

I wonder if there's the option to just drop in a tank than I have back at mother base? That'd make short work of them.

Edit: I just realised why I love this game. It's ghost recon. I played that for hundreds of hours on the original Xbox. I played it so much i knew everything about it, to the point I wouldn't go into a mission with anything other than a pistol to make it challenging. Mgs5 reminds me of it so much. It's got all the things I loved about that game, but with all the awesome anime bullshit from metal gear, and the crazy interacting open work stuff of far cry.

It's great to just pin point exactly what it's been reminding me of this whole time.

 

More mission 29 spoilers

 

Any vehicles will insta-rust, like the helicopter does. I was told that Walker does as well, but apparently that's wrong? I beat it with a rocket launcher and assault rifle, though I would have been screwed if quiet wasn't there since I ran out of ammo and it's not a situation that's very conducive to supply drops. Once I learned that I didn't actually have to stay next to Code Talker and protect him, it got a lot easier.

 

And mission 28 spoilers

 

I made it in only tranqing 4 people, and really only did that so I could drag them off and interrogate them. The perennial problem in the game then struck me, when I had to try and get back out with all the guards that were there, plus additional patrols, plus carrying someone. The added time sensitivity to the situation made it even worse. It would have been a lot easier if I'd just shot my way in. I was on tilt just running out and getting shot repeatedly and I finally went full Rambo, called down two airstrikes and two aerial assaults, and killed everyone. I did learn that Pequot doesn't handle tanks very well, even with seeking missiles. The second time I called him in, he got insta-killed the moment he came in, before he could even lock missiles, by a single tank shell.

[Mike Danger]

That's an amazing tactic

 

Are vehicle drops blocked?

 

I haven't unlocked them yet, assuming they're a thing. The other tip that I have is to, if possible, try and wait her out for a sandstorm. It's much harder for her to see you then, it seems, but you can easily pick her out with the NVGs.

[Nappi]

I got through the entire Hellbound mission without alerts on my first try. It was stressful and took a long time and some luck, and I was super glad when I jumped on the truck and escaped the enemy. I drove away from the base and was about to call in the chopper when I hit an invisible wall exiting the mission area. Mission aborted and I have to do the whole mission again. I actually feel sick now.

[manny_c44]

Yeah I used the supply drop trick too, got the idea from usgamer.net

I was able to get Quiet along with cargo+2 Fulton at the same time, before the difficult mission, so I should be all set. Also was able to access the medical platform room after that as well.

[Dewar]

Interesting, just from doing more Side Ops?

[Architecture]

For the record, there are combat deployment missions which disrupt supply lines for enemy equipment such as helmets, NVGs, gas masks, body armor & specific guns.

[manny_c44]

Interesting, just from doing more Side Ops?

 

Yeah. My feeling is that Quiet in the cell is like any other 'time progression' aspect like building platforms for Motherbase. Though the timer for quiet isn't shown. Could be attached to some other stats too, who knows?

[Brett E]

More mission 29 spoilers

 

Any vehicles will insta-rust, like the helicopter does. I was told that Walker does as well, but apparently that's wrong? I beat it with a rocket launcher and assault rifle, though I would have been screwed if quiet wasn't there since I ran out of ammo and it's not a situation that's very conducive to supply drops. Once I learned that I didn't actually have to stay next to Code Talker and protect him, it got a lot easier.

 

And mission 28 spoilers

 

I made it in only tranqing 4 people, and really only did that so I could drag them off and interrogate them. The perennial problem in the game then struck me, when I had to try and get back out with all the guards that were there, plus additional patrols, plus carrying someone. The added time sensitivity to the situation made it even worse. It would have been a lot easier if I'd just shot my way in. I was on tilt just running out and getting shot repeatedly and I finally went full Rambo, called down two airstrikes and two aerial assaults, and killed everyone. I did learn that Pequot doesn't handle tanks very well, even with seeking missiles. The second time I called him in, he got insta-killed the moment he came in, before he could even lock missiles, by a single tank shell.

 

Mission 28/29

I think the walker will insta-rust but it's only in the clouds they create so it's not too hard to avoid them since it's reasonably manoeuvrable, unlike say a tank

I killed everyone on the way in and it seems they were all re-animated so it's just as hard either way. Quiet was invaluable for taking out the zombie dudes, I don't think them seeing you counts as an alert so I don't think I got any in that mission, I was just happy to avoid the skull snipers.

[Dewar]

Responding to Brett:

 

I counter-sniped the skull snipers, and there were no zombies or mist for me on the way out. I didn't leave any dead bodies around either, so I guess I might not have noticed? That would have made the tank a lot easier to deal with.

[Nappi]

I got through the entire Hellbound mission without alerts on my first try. It was stressful and took a long time and some luck, and I was super glad when I jumped on the truck and escaped the enemy. I drove away from the base and was about to call in the chopper when I hit an invisible wall exiting the mission area. Mission aborted and I have to do the whole mission again. I actually feel sick now.

 

I replayed the mission immediately after this bullshit (having rage quitted first, of course), because I feared that otherwise I would not pick up the game tomorrow, knowing what was waiting for me. I failed a couple of times, but it wasn't that bad.

 

Still fucking mad about this kind of stupid shit in an otherwise exceptionally well crafted game.

[Dewar]

There are a smattering of missions that seem badly conceived for various reasons. That was the first for me, but there are a few others later as well. The solution for me has almost always been "fuck it, I'm going to start using all these call-ins that limit you to an A rank and just destroy everything."

[Gwardinen]

Well yeah, once you get to the point in a mission that you know you're not going to get more than an A rank you might as well. Which actually feels kind of realistic - if everything's going perfectly there's no reason to expend a bunch of resources. But if you're threatened, call in the artillery. Just like the big boys!

[Nappi]

Just to be clear, I did not care about the rating at all. I was forced to replay the entire mission because of a stupid invisible wall.