Meow: forum

People just need to understand the nuances of the sheet better… 

I know the default ranking is turns taken, but please please please like read what each column is about before trashing the sheet :/

 

P.S. people should also just remember that the sheet assumes you have BALANCED stats against a BALANCED opponent in MARAUDER gear. It’s a good tool, but don’t mistake it for in combat tests for feel

edit: I’ll post a weapon here that I’m considering changing out so I don’t break this thread’s rules :p
C/O: 9.1b

After an absolutely gruelling, more than 4 day war, Silver Hand has FINALLY beaten our roadblock to the coveted diamond rank!
As far as we know, we have the lowest average stats and lowest level of any diamond faction so far!
[image: i.ibb.co]
Be warned, this is gonna be a long thread XD

After being the first ever faction to hit plat, the ranked war changes meant that we could not enter diamond at that time. However, now, nearly 11 and a half months later, we did it! (I wasn't part of smth at that time, however, I was quite jealous of their achievement XD)

Now, this wasn't our first chance at hitting diamond. Our previous roadblocks included: Damage Inc, Monarch Engineering, PT-Shadowrazers
Hardly a fair enough fight for us to consider fighting. This time though, it was different.

Plata were a formidable foe, with a pretty decent stat advantage at most ranks, however, we had one ace card which we thought, and ended up being, the key to our victory: Our 10b+ stat BEASTS! We had 4 members who outstated their whole faction which meant we could use them as pressure sponges for our assaults, protecting our much weaker mid-range.

As the war started, we felt in control, playing the war out by our previous tactics. However, 17 hours in, things took a turn for the worse. Plata struck us when we were least paying attention, and as a result, took a 1.4k point swing to put them barely ahead, nullifying the work we had done up to this point. Our leadership were devastated and scrambling for ideas in a situation we had never been in before: An almost evenly matched opponent who were not afraid to pull every trick in the book.

This began a 40 hour period of despair as we slowly sunk deeper and deeper into a point deficit. However, with renewed vigour, we conducted a lightning strike at hour 58, turning the tides with a successful push, and initiating chaining, the main strategy we used to get ahead. At this point, with Plata not chaining at all, we felt confident that our new strategy would help provide us the edge that we needed. Indeed, the next 20 or so hours proved our thoughts correct as we swung back the point advantage to nearly 1k.

At this point we had pretty much figured our Plata's activity schedule, so we shrunk down and holed up for the night. With Silver Hand in the clear lead, and nothing about to change, Plata decided to begin their first organised chain to try and claw back the point differential. It was all in vain though, as PT (our mercs) along with many of our sister faction members valiantly defended our offline members, shielding us from a 500 bonus hit at approximately 1 am our time. We expected them to continue through the night and hit the 1k then, perhaps even try a 2.5k. You must have imagined our surprise to wake to a 900 chain by Plata, and enough time to quickly rally all our members to self-hosp and dodge the 1k. Over the following 1-2 hours, 95% of their available targets dried up as we tried desperately to contact every single member. This led to possibly the most tense moment of the war: they had a grand total of 2 targets that were still offline, and about to come out. Plata had 2 attempts to succeed.

The first, Yica. A grand total of 18 people, mercs, plata members, and others went for the kill. We had placed a 5m bounty of his head, and promised assist bonuses to try and get more mercs to try and dodge this. Luckily for us, PT claimed the kill.

Now, they only had 1 target left: XXOO
We scrambled to put a hit on his head: 5m bounty, 4m joins, we had multiple 10m bounties on his head for faction-mates and other muggers. All in all, he probably had over 60m on his head. Everyone had their eyes out for him. We desperately tried to reach out to him through any method we could, one of his irl friends even called him! With less than 2 minutes left, his icon turned green, and he ate the blood bag with 2 seconds of hosp remaining.

Our group chat went WILD!

We had successfully avoided the 1k hit. And now Plata must have been fuming! [image: i.ibb.co]

Anyways, from there, we struck out! Easily winning the push, and securing control. We expanded our lead through the day with another 1k chain, coming to 2k point lead before Plata were active enough again to push us back into hospital. At this point, the target had shrunk from the original 15k to a mere 4.5k, and we were poised to victory.

At 8pm, we once again had amassed a period of activity, and struck out. This time though, Plata had seemingly given up, choosing to cease their merc services, and had nearly 20 offliners available to be chained. We took this opportunity gladly, and rocketed up in points, reaching 4k points for the first time in this war. We knew that Plata had lost. It didn't matter what they did. Even though they chose to battle it out, forcing us back into hosp, we knew that the shrinking target would end this in the night.

WE HAD WON


Now, onto the obligatory thank-yous.

First, I want to thank all the members, I know some of you weren't the most active, but nearly everyone contributed in their own way, whether it was sniping targets or stacking chains, you were phenomenal!

Next, I want to thank all the leadership team here at Silver Hand. All of you were so supportive throughout the war, and even though we had some rough times, I'm sure we all learnt a lot about different strategies and how to employ them in difficult fights in the future!

Onwards! To our PT mercs, you guys did great! From helping us hide from bonus hits to sniping our offliners, it was a pleasure working with you.

Finally, I'd like to give thanks to our opponent: Plata. Thanks for being such a difficult proving ground, and a worthy opponent for our ascent to diamond.

I'd also like to give a few personal thank yous:
ff520, thanks for your contribution and cracking me up in DMs XD, as two members who share an honour bar, its been great :P
htys and Goodluck, thanks for the key leaders we needed for the faction, making big decisions and rallying people at all the key times :D
Cyderize, Aries0N, oreoknight, SevenMk, dadagege, Nodelore, Abigear, thanks for being the reliable chain bonus stackers we needed, all of y'all did great to act fast whenever I gave the command! Even though it was stressful, y'all all did so great to hit 13/14 key bonus hits!
Bingri, Alnh, Alpaca, Newer, you guys were the spear-tip we needed to penetrate their defence and the shield we needed to withstand their assaults, I'm so grateful for all of your participation!

Thus concludes my post :D

-Meow

Mission credits are useful to exchange for 3 things exclusively: Books, Weapon mods and Special Ammo. Nothing else is worth exchanging your credits for.

This guide will cover some basic tips for how to most effectively use these credits as I don't feel like explaining the same thing over and over again in faction chats.

Step 1: Get to 2000 mission credits.

Your first goal is to hit 2000 mission credits. The reason is that the maximum a book can cost in the mission shop is 2000, and books are the number 1 priority. You never want to miss a good book and regret not having enough tokens to buy it. Once you buy a book, stop spending and rebuild your mission credits to at least 2000 to ensure you don't miss a good book. A quick personal tier list (primarily focused on gym gains) on books is presented below, although there are many great guides out there outlining this in greater detail.

Tier 1 (Must buy): Memories and Mammaries, Ugly Energy, Fuelling Your Way To Failure, Ignorance Is Bliss, All +30% stat training books

Tier 2 (Good to have): Get Hard or Go Home, All +5% stat gain books, All +100% stat passive books, Get Drunk And Lose Dignity, Higher Daddy, Higher!, Self Control is for Losers

Tier 3 (Meh): Everything else

Few guides for books: https://www.torn.com/forums.php#/p=threads&f=61&t=16143719&b=0&a=0
https://www.torn.com/forums.php#/p=threads&f=61&t=16225565&b=0&a=0&start=0&to=21546794

Step 2: Spend as necessary

Weapon Mods should start being your focus along with special ammo. I would recommend stockpiling mission credits at this point unless you get low prices on ammo or weapon mods: either those which come with a green special offer tag, or low by the standards on the following guides:
Weapon Mods. Special Ammo

For weapon mods, the ones to look out for are:
Lasers: +crit chance (Best mod for damage output by far)
Sights: +accuracy (Not recommended, defense builds should go for bipod/tripod line with better gains and no loss, ranked much lower since when I wrote this)
Lights: -opponent accuracy, -opponent stealth (Dex builds should consider this, very good mod, but purely defensive)
Recoil pad: -ammo consumption (INCREDIBLY useful for nearly all rifle builds, reload is very harmful to damage output, so the less you need to reload the better. Other than Enfield which has decent sustain, every other rifle needs this as a second mod)

Obviously, for different builds there will be different weapon mods to aim for, e.g. shotgun build may want choke + extended mags; maxing stealth may want suppressor, etc, but for the majority of rifle builds, those are the mods to look out for.

For special ammo, the effects are listed below (Lifted from Mug's guide)
Incendiary ammo: +40% damage
Tracer: +10 accuracy
Piercing: Increases damage anywhere from 0 to 25% (each point of armor is -1% damage, this, when it hits skin, does nothing, when it hits armor turns -40% from a 40.0 piece of armor into a 20.0 piece increasing damage by 20% effectively). This opens room for more damage while the 40% increase incendiary has is reduced by armor, this bypasses armor so if torn ever releases armor that is like into the 65.0 armor value or higher then piercing will become a higher damage dealer.
Hollow point: +50% damage, -50% penetration (Pretty useless outside of the merits)

(With special ammo, usually incendiary will be the highest damage increase, although if your gun has +damage modifiers, e.g. powerful/specialist/etc, piercing ammo may yield higher overall damage. Especially with rw armor having significantly higher armor values when compared to standard)

Step 3: Buy low credit items to restock shop

Any item that's in the single digits should be bought for the sole purpose of restocking the shop with something else. It's another chance at hitting the valuable books, and waiting another week for a reroll is inefficient in terms of time. Of course, this is a waste of credits, but I personally believe the time saved is worth.

[image: i.ibb.co]

DM for offers

Current offer: 8b 9.1b
[image: i.ibb.co]

This whole "we didn't show up like our last wars" line is just so funny to me. Its like saying: congrats, but you know you didn't actually beat us. XD

 

Also to the others thinking the turtle is a pisstake, your complaints are totally valid, but hey, don't hate the players, hate the game.

Vivien offers professional services at a discounted price, 10/10. With her impeccable resume and list of distinguished clientele, I would recommend her to any aspiring property hopeful in this wonderful city. 

Highlights include the San Pellegrino and spa voucher that came with the first consultation, the donut machine in her office, and 24/7 customer service. 

Bro, you lost… 

I know you’re angry about it, but grow up

I'm sorry but if this is real, its the most hilarious shit I've heard all week XD

 

I can't tell if you've just never been a part of a faction or like, struggle with the concept that small factions don't have a lot going for them, so the least you can do is pay people what they're owed. 

 

Sure, I’d like to think I’m relatively senior enough to answer this.

 

Yes, there have been multiple cheaters in the family, as the article mentions, people like Goldenfeel in the distant past did cheat without the knowledge of people in the faction, which did lead to people trying to defend their friends. 

 

More recently, someone like kaleco who I’d known for quite a while was found to have been running multis. We reported them and they got banned. There was no fuss, and although it does reflect that there are probably more cheaters hidden within the faction which persist still today.

 

It is also my wish that staff find out these people, which means we will likely still have feds in the future. That is an unfortunate but true fact.

 

You realise you can just, not give your phone number if you’re paranoid right? Like, no one is forcing you to give up your phone number…

 

Second, the loan system works based on two things, either your WeChat or your phone number. For most people, they just join the WeChat group cause it’s easier. It’s definitely more private of a messaging platform, akin to something like Facebook or instagram, but like, I’m not sure there’s a problem there either…

As someone who joined smth halfway through my torn experience and have been in leadership in both smth and other factions, there’s two factors it all boils down to: trust & community

First,

 

Trust is the reason we’re willing to give what in the community’s eyes are noobs large loans with the understanding that they will reciprocate.

 

Trust is the reason we give out information for running companies openly and have networks built around them.

 

Trust is the reason people give out their phone numbers to people they consider online friends and not worry that they’ll be scam called every night.

 

A lack of trust is also why this does not happen in other factions. People don’t give loans to noobs because they do not trust that they won’t run off with the money. 

People don’t share company info because it’ll increase competition.

 

People don’t give out phone numbers because you’re afraid and don’t trust the person on the other end won’t use it maliciously.

 

Second,

 

Community is why people stick together, there’s no where else to go for a Chinese speaking player other than smth. In other factions, you could steal the armour and run off to join Monarch. In smth though, you lose 95%+ of the social aspect; and in the end, isn’t that what torn is all about?

This builds a strong sense of community, one that simply doesn’t exist in English speaking factions where members are free to move between organisations without losing the fundamental core gameplay loop of socialisation.

 

Now are there exceptions to this? Certainly, as there always will be with any system. But does it describe the vast majority? Yes.

 

Not sure we’re escaping the allegations with this one :S

1. please read the post made earlier about how cloudjumper literally said this was intended
2. no one is comparing this to punc nerf, doesn’t stop it from being a nerf

 

p.s. don’t forget the rage/fury interaction nerf too, genuinely don’t understand how it’s a “bug fix” when other weapon combos can proc in the same turn just fine

assault bonus is like a negative powerful perk, more damage perks dilute its effectiveness. Higher punc bonus goes through the armour multiplier better, thus its net negative. 

e.g. 160 base damage for inc + merit + xp reduced to 125 after assault

I don’t think you accounted for +damage modifiers, ends up worse once u add in inc ammo, mastery merits and weapon xp 

 

only a slight buff against eod