gadget use?

[Necro]

i haven't got far into my first run but im wondering about the utility of gadgets, other than the use of some grenades and first aid i can't really see a use for gadgers - reason i bring this up is i had originally planned my second playthrough to be a character that focused on gadgets but from what i've seen so far they seem lackluster.

[zkylon]

The flashbang's cool if you have a room with 2+ enemies in it. You just pop a flashbang and do silent takedowns on everyone. It's not 100% effective but i've found it useful. The non-lethal grenade is kinda sucky though. It'd be a lot better if it were a silent mine or something like that but instead it's noisy, inaccurate and has low effect radius.

[Starwars]

One of my future playthroughs will be the Tech Specialist where I will just load up on grenades and everything else, should be fun.

 

One of my pet peeves about the grenades though is that I find them a bit hard to manage. The fact that they show the path for the grenade is really nice, but I still find the controls here kinda wonky. I've gotten better at it though.

 

One thing I kinda liked that I did was when I wanted to hack something in a room but there was a lotta enemies outside and the alarm was blaring. Didn't feel like going out and clearing everyone out so I stuck a fire grenade by the entrance to the room so I could hack in peace. Sure enough a guy went in there during my hacking and got set on fire by the grenade. Fun.

 

But yeah, I think they are mostly for novelty really. Aside from the first aid kit I've never found myself relying on a gadget I think or thinking "god, I wish had <insert gadget here> right now!". Unfortunate, but they're pretty fun to play with.

[Shinaju]

Its really fun to overload a flame and burn everyone. Flashbang + martial arts are very effective as well. Tech are not really lackluster, their just lacking in resources. You would have to buy a lot of generades and stuff if your going to be using them strictly, also they lack range. When against bosses, tech is pretty much useless.

[zkylon]

I've found grenades to be a good way of circunventing my lack of pistol skill and still get ranged non-lethal take downs. They're also a great way to get enemies that are above you and that would be hard to headshot. I always pack as many non-lethal nades as i can and end up using 3 or 4.

[Metal_Guitar]

I've found the gadgets to be most useful on the second play through. I roughly remember ambush parts and set up traps accordingly. It is greatly satisfying when you can just stand there and people are dying around you with your intervention.

 

If you could use shadow operative and place traps it would be good.

Edited May 31, 2010 by Metal_Guitar

[Deng]

Can be very useful depending on your style.

 

For stealth flashbangs/h2h are great.

 

Otherwise, they are quite useful as crowd control.

[Inxentas]

Incendiary Bombs are a great way to destroy boss' armour. They are a must for SMG oriented builds.

[fkldnhlsdngsfnhlsndlg]

Much better than you'd expect. It's easy to clear a room with a grenade or two provided you don't mind killing people.

[Spydude]

Incendiary grenades FTW. I got Marburg and Sie down with 5 grenades alone. Since I am playing with a shotgun Sie is too far away to use it and I didn't want to use cheat shot.

[Starwars]

Did a Tech Specialist run and found it a lot of fun. Also, if you upgrade the gadgets and use Overclock you can really wreck some havoc. With upgraded, Overclocked flashbangs you can stun a room and then run in and just slice everyone up calmly, it's pretty awesome.

 

I also kinda wish there were more ambushes in the game where you get to set up a defense. It's fun as hell to watch people blowing up left and right, or getting set on fire. Hiding behind something and seeing all the red arrows go out one by one is very satisfying.

[Tigranes]

Gadgets are really really fun, and yes, quite good if you invest upgrades and skills. There is nothing more fun than watching a marburg man run towards you, then the remote mine explodes and he catapults sideways into the air.

 

Incendiary grenades next to trucks and other flammable objects is also a great way to cause large scale explosions.

[JamieKirby]

I never see the point in gadgets, i have done 2 playthroughs and besides the tutorial part, i never used any gadgets, besides the health things.

[Guest]

My rule of thumb for tech play:

 

Explosive grenades are for trapping and Incendiary bombs are for throwing.

 

Boss fights aren't that bad. The good news is that bosses tend to want to run around a lot. Easy to run up to a pillar, set a trap, run away again. The exceptions here are Darcy and Yancy at the end. Can't get in range for Darcy and Yancy will dodge the hell out of anything you throw at him. Ended up resorting to my tertiary weapon (pistol with chain shot).

[Luckmann]

For my first entire playthrough, I rarely used most gadgets.

 

After a playthrough as a non-sneaker, I learned the value of all gadgets, since I could no longer rely on stealth and silent takedowns, leading to a liberal use of grenades, first aid and the sound-maker-thingymajig.

 

Then, when going back to playing yet another sneaker, I carried the experience of liberal gadget-usage with me, not only making the game much easier, but it also felt a lot more tactical, for some reason (you'd think that it'd be less, really).

 

Explosives are a bit lackluster, but flashbangs and incendiaries are nothing short of amazing, capable of clearing out entire rooms. When you know an ambush is coming, or quick spawns of enemies, it's extremely gratifying to fill an area with incendiaries attached to walls or the floor. The sound-maker-thingymajig almost feels exploitative, to a good sneaker, allowing you to make enemies come out from cover at great distances (allowing sniper takedowns, for example) or to have them turn around, allowing you to sneak up for a backstab.

 

I'd like to see more gadgets and more inventive gadgets, but the truth is that if you can learn to use gadgets, they are amazing and will make your life much easier, even if they aren't an absolute necessity anywhere in the game.

[Luckmann]

Gadgets are really really fun, and yes, quite good if you invest upgrades and skills. There is nothing more fun than watching a marburg man run towards you, then the remote mine explodes and he catapults sideways into the air.

 

Incendiary grenades next to trucks and other flammable objects is also a great way to cause large scale explosions.

It's just extremely annoying that they don't persist through saves, making it hard to justify using grenades as traps, since you never know if you're going to have to reload. This hit me in the end of the ruins in Rome. Trapped the entire place and had so much fun watching everyone burn to death, with flashbangs covering my back (allowing me to pick off the last two as stealth attacks). Had to reload, and not only were my mines gone, but also my grenades (which I had used as mines).

 

Had to go the old and boring way of manually shooting them all down. Booo-riiing.

 

That said, those are great suggestions.

[razgriz_1400]

I'm on my second playthrough but I'm the type to rarely rely on gadgets. The only exceptions are first aid, regular 'nades and incindiary 'nades. I found that the nades helped me out when defending Surkov and again when assaulting Brayko's mansion. To deal with Brayko, I chainshot him with pistol, switched to SMGs with bullet storm and kept spraying him til the cool down timer on chainshot ran out. Rinse and repeat. My only bitch is that I'm a stealth-oriented player and using many of the gadgets seem to blow your cover faster than firing an un-suppressed pistol shot.

[NightShadow]

My first play was mostly stealth, pistol and gadgets (14 dead)..

 

I love the shock grenade..

Downside is 1 target limit they start with but this can be increased by upgrading (2) and then unlimited at lvl 3..

Well thrown shock trap is priceless..

 

In the end I had 18 shock traps (3 slots and perk for +1) though I never used them all

Also they are cheap with around 250$ a piece..

My 2nd play's goal is 0 dead and since on hard trq darts cost 20k I think ST are going to get even more usage.

 

Flashbang is cool as well, especially until you upgrade Shock trap to lvl 3..

After that its much simpler to throw the ST then to bother with flashbang + melee ko..

Upgrade isn't worth it I think, original duration is fine.

Edited September 8, 2010 by NightShadow

[obliviondoll]

I've only really started to appreciate gadgets on my current playthrough. Previously I'd occasionally invest in a few first aid kits, but that was all.

 

This time around, Grenades, Incendiaries, Radio Mimics (so much use out of these), EMPs...

 

Grenades are good for traps, and for throwing against enemies in corridors, but Incendiaries... I think I enjoy them a little TOO much...

 

You know the "ambush" in Brayko's Mansion that Awareness kind of ruins? 3 Incendiaries, no more ambush.

 

Brayko himself? 2 Incendiaries, spiked cocaine, and 4 Steel Core Bullets from my Pistol. A fifth bullet in the custscene, of course, and that doesn't count my insane SMG blasting when his goons were surrounding me.

 

I mostly take EMPs for bypassing minigames that get a little too tricky, but they make turrets and well-placed cameras a lot easier to get past as well.

 

I haven't really played with Flashbangs and Shock Traps so much, but I'm planning on using them both a lot on my no-kills playthrough (After this playthrough, I'm running SMGs only and slaughtering everything that gets in my way, then I want to try and go without a single kill. I wonder how many non-lethal hits Marburg can take?).