Wasteland 2: Director’s Cut – 3 Man Party Guide (Wasteland 2 DC)

Design

 
To make the sharpshooter to his job nicely and safely, we need a leader that offers the 20% accuracy boost and 9% enemy’s accuracy debuff. It’d be supper useful to have a tank that attracts most of the gunfire without getting killed or without getting hurt at all. The 2AC from the Thick-Skinned quirk come into effect from the beginning, plus Hardened and Self Defence attainable in early game, the 4 additional AC makes the leader quite tanky. 
 
Additionally, if possible, some extra damage isn’t bad. However, the leader doesn’t enjoy the above accuracy buff, and he would have no skill points for high coordination. He is particularly poor at ranged weapons. Although this issue applies to melee weapons as well, plus there aren’t as many accuracy modifiers as range weapons, there is an accuracy bonus for melee attacks against enemy shooters behind cover or in a crouch that almost ensures 100% hit. This is useful to drive the enemies out of their cover into our gun fire. 
 
Blunt Weapon is a bit more aggressive (Charge, Slayer: 10% Free attack) while Bladed Weapon is a bit more defensive (Defence + 1 Armour, Samurai +1 Penetration). For pure Melee specialist, I’d choose blunt weapon with Reinforced Plating. For a leader whose attributes couldn’t be optimised for offensive skills, I’d choose bladed build for the leader. Besides, Weapon Smithing level 8 is a bit too costly. 
 
Blades are quite weak in the first part of the game. The blade skill could be delayed and he could use some explosives, which are very powerful in early game. At first sight, it seems ideal for him to learn Demolition and explosive perks. However, hacking (Computer Science) is might be more useful and particularly suitable for this build as he is quite tanky and usually the closest to the enemies anyway. 
 

Perks in the order of priority

 
Basic (6): Hardened – Self Defence – Taunt – Enrage – Infuriate – Samurai 
 
Utility (2): Affable or Know-It-All, Hoarder (+20% Carry weight, saves a lot of trouble playing a 3-man party) 
 
Plus more defence (2): Adrenaline Rush (+2 AP when low hp, AP bonus to kill, run or heal) – Healthy 
 
or more offence (3): Tactical – Roboticist – Overclock 
 

Settings for 14 AC

 
Initial CLASSIC 2 1 3 6 6 4 6+ 
Quirk: Thick-Skinned +2 AC -30% Combat Speed 
AP 8 CI 11 Speed 1.7 (2.4×0.7=1.7) 
 
AC: 10 + 2 TS + 1 Hard + 1 Defence 
 
Final CLASSIC 2 1 4 6 6 4 9 
CI 12, Trinket for Charisma 10 if needed. 
 
Charisma 10 means a radius of 20 meters, or a diameter of 40 meters. The coverage in terms of area is 4 times compared to a Charisma value of 5. The growth of Charisma from 6-9 also means 2 levels in advance at level 30, or 6 skill points more than the others all the time. 
 

Strength vs Speed

 
STR 6 is required for ultimate bladed weapon, and acceptable when using the ultimate heavy armour (STR 7) with an additional penalty of -0.2 combat speed. The final combat speed would be (2.4-0.8)*0.7 = 1.1 
 
Using SSI 8-4-4 would result in the same combat speed (2.2-0.6)*0.7 = 1.1. STR 8 offers a great deal of more health, SPD 6 offers higher evasion plus higher combat initiative. I prefer not to get hit and react not too slow. 
 

Minimum Skill Point Requirement

 
12. points, Achievable at early 30s. 
 
3. Leader 10: 8 + S1 +T1 (Taunt, Enrage, Infuriate) 
 
4. Bladed 10 (Defence 3, Samurai 6) 
 
1. Alarm 7: 6 + S1 (Ghost 3, Reflex 6) 
 
3. Computer 10: 8 + S1 +T1 (Hacking robots and turrets, suitable for melee build) 
 
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Better Trinket choice: for Leadership, Charisma, Evasion, or Computer. 
Probably would need to get either Leadership or Computer Science to level 10 without using a Trinket. 
 
Weapon smithing 7 + S1 for the Reinforced Plating would add the AC up to 15 but it’s too costly for the marginal gain. 
 
1. points for a Minimum Medical 4 and Surgeon 1. This is mostly for self healing too like the sharpshooter. The thing is the leader doesn’t give up much of damage dealing for healing. 
 
Demolition only requires investment of 18 skill points (LV6 + S1 + T3) since there is a trinket offering a bonus of 3 levels. However, it’s late game already. Computer Science seems more important to me. In many cases, failed demolition tries only result in damage, but the obstacles would be gone with the explosion. You could either throw a cheap bomb to clear the traps or heal after you got hurt. It can be solved with $$. 
 
* plus one more non-combat skill choice. There is room for non-combat perk as well. 
For example, Kiss Head or Smart Head only costs 18 skill points each (LV6 +S1 + P2 + T1). With a late game trinket, it takes only 14 points to bring Smart Head up to level 10 (LV5 + S1 + P2 + T2). Each team member can take one Head skill. 
 

Attack of Opportunity

 
Glancing to Strategic Strikes work when the enemies on the tile that your melee weapon can hit moves away or attacks another target at a distance. It could be great if you move the melee ally next to the enemies behind cover. They (the range attackers) tend to move away, which trigger the attack of opportunity, or stay and attack others at a distance, which trigger the AoO as well. However, the mechanism seems broken as the attack of opportunity won’t trigger with two-handed blunt weapons, and those high end blunt weapons that can attack diagonally fall in this category. It works with bladed weapon but most of them can’t attack diagonally. The few that do attack diagonally are weak. Moreover, our melee leader build has no accuracy boost, low AP and low combat speed. It’s not worthwhile at all. 
 
 
 

3. Assault Specialist