Abusing the GARU rules...

[Michael]

I recently decided to spoil myself on the GARU-serum story in GH1.  I figured I'd never experiment with it in game, so I may as well look at the code and see what the game does to fools who use the serum.

What the code does is periodically adjust your stats, consuming Knowledge and Charm while increasing Reflexes, Body and Speed.  The algorithm is deterministic -- until Knowledge hits bottom you get one point each in Reflexes, Body and Speed for each Knowledge point lost.  You also lose a point of Charm if it hasn't bottomed.  If Knowledge hits bottom before Charm does, you then trade your remaining Charm points for Body and Speed points.

This suggests to me a possible abuse of the rules.  If you can play a character with minimum Charm and Knowledge (which is the unavoidable end-point with uncured GARU), you can make him rather beefy by throwing all the character points into Knowledge and then going GARU.

If we go the whole hog and start with {Re=1 Bo=1 Sp=1 Pe=1 Cr=1 Eg=1 Kn=54 Ch=1}, we'll have {Re=54 Bo=54 Sp=54 Pe=1 Cr=1 Eg=1 Kn=1 Ch=1} after the transformation ends.  That's equal to a 276 point start.

We can balance things a little better and put some points in the three non-involved stats, giving {Re=1 Bo=1 Sp=1 Pe=15 Cr=15 Eg=15 Kn=33 Ch=1} which transforms into {Re=33 Bo=33 Sp=33 Pe=15 Cr=15 Eg=15 Kn=1 Ch=1}, which is like having 492 character points.

This would present special challenges, the most severe being the skill limit.  At Knowledge 1 you may only learn 6 skills.

I'm not up for the challenge myself -- I'm not actually that good at the game played straight.  But I thought some experts here might like to try such an eccentric character...

[Onisuzume]

Ok, so we'll need to find 6 skills with which you can play for long enough to finish the transformation and subsequently find a cure...
Great...

I'd put one vote in for Martial Arts.

[Michael]

Quoting: Onisuzume

Ok, so we'll need to find 6 skills with which you can play for long enough to finish the transformation and subsequently find a cure...

Curing GARU resets your stats exactly the way they were in the first place.  And this stunt involves having {Bo=1 Re=1 Sp=1 Ch=1} as your natural stats, so you don't really want to get cured.  For this trick you're GARU to the end.

However, there's still point in discussing which six skills one would take to finish the game without Knowledge or Charm.

[Burzmali]

Depends, if you can get 'jack of all trades' first, a flat roll of 7 in most combat skills isn't too bad.

[Ramidel]

One word: Savant. So you can budget for 11 skills instead of 6...

Also: Does GARU take cybered knowledge? And alternately...can you go below 1 when cybering up? (If yes, and no...Optical Spine for the Knowledge bonus to turn into Ref/Bod/Speed, then Predator Reflexes for no penalty...)

[Michael]

Quoting: Ramidel

Also: Does GARU take cybered knowledge? And alternately...can you go below 1 when cybering up? (If yes, and no...Optical Spine for the Knowledge bonus to turn into Ref/Bod/Speed, then Predator Reflexes for no penalty...)

GARU operates on your base stats -- the level at which the numbers are dark green.  Cyberware is treated by the game like a temporary status, so if you boost your Knowledge or Charm with cyberware, those boosts will not be converted into physical stats.

Unfortunately, this won't help with the skill limit, because the too-many-skills penalty also ignores cyberware.

If you take Predator Reflexes, that'll cost you to ability to reach {Ch=2 Kn=2} when you have high morale.  But nothing else, aside from the usual cyberware hazards.

[Ramidel]

Oh well. My recc on Savant still stands; normally it's a junk talent, but vital here.

[Joseph Hewitt]

Beautiful. That would be a really difficult character to play, especially with regard to finding the GARU serum and saving up the money for it. It would definitely be a new experience.

[Erathoniel]

Any chance of starting with GARU, as an unlockable like in DoomRL? That would be cool. Of course, it would be unlocked by getting it honestly.

[Michael]

Quoting: Erathoniel

Any chance of starting with GARU, as an unlockable like in DoomRL?

What would that really mean?

The results of my plan ({Re=33 Bo=33 Sp=33 Pe=15 Cr=15 Eg=15 Kn=1 Ch=1}) are much better than what normally results when an unspoiled player tries the serum.  Do you think the game should just give you those stats?

Quoting: Erathoniel

Of course, it would be unlocked by getting it honestly.

What would count as "getting it honestly"?  Merely having a throwaway character buy the serum is trivial...

[macksting]

Same applies to unlockable content in most games, I suppose. Ever play Star Ocean: The Second Story? It has a huge sound library, with unique sound effects for any of a wide variety of character interactions.
Well, perfectionists have a way of determining their progress; there's a ginormous matrix of them freely available for later play if you encounter them and subsequently save the game. If you really like Ashton, you don't necessarily want to play through a whole game where you've pissed him off... so you could probably just play as far as his presence, anger him to get the sound bytes, save, then start a new game.

Not the best or most concise example, but starting a new character every time you want to unlock some single feature really is a pain.

I will say that "GARU Abuser" might be different from a character who's currently using GARU. Maybe it's an unlockable trait not entirely unlike Idealist Blood.

[Michael]

Anyhow, moving back to the question of strategy for our GARU exploiter, I think we should give some thought to the 10 skills that are Charm/Knowledge-based, and thus ruined by the strategy.

While one's first instinct is to "write them off" and not attempt to develop them, some of them have pervasive influence. It might be necessary to spend some of our 6 (or 11 with Savant) slots on them simply to gain the same ability as a normal character who hasn't bought that skill but has high Kn or Ch.

They are:

* Conversation (Charm)
Maybe.  The influence of pervasive worst-possible conversation rolls might turn out to be too painful not to correct with a high investment in this skill...

* Shopping (Charm)
Can be dropped.  When you fail a Shopping roll, it doesn't matter how badly you failed, you just pay list.

* Flirtation (Charm)
Drop.  It's less general than Conversation, and we don't want to waste two slots buying both.

* Performance (Charm)
Drop.  It's only used when you apply it, and this character is never going to be good at applying it.

* Leadership (Charm).
Okay, this is the hardest one, because it determines your Lance size.  

The formula for Lancemate Points is ({Charm} + {Leadership Skill} + {Renown}/10)/4.  (Note that this is an exception to the general rule that one point of skill equals three points of stat.  However, there's no "unskilled" penalty here...).

This means at Charm 1 and no skill, your lance size is zero if you have less than 30 renown.  At 30-69 you may have one pet.  You need 70 renown points to have a human Lancemate.  And you'll probably want one to make your Mecha Engineering and Science rolls for you.

* Medicine (Knowledge)
It's a repair skill, so it isn't important.

* Bio Technology (Knowledge)
An easy drop, even for normal players. It's a repair skill that is applicable to very few things.

* Science (Knowledge)
Probably a drop.  It's needed for some quests, but a Lancemate can supply this (but see discussion on Leadership).

* Mecha Engineering (Knowledge)
Ouch, but it's a drop.  Not so much because you don't want it, but because it's already painful for normal folks to get this up to a useful level.  Fortunately, you can install stuff based on a Lancemate's ME skill (But again, see Leadership.)

* Robotics (Knowledge)
An easy drop.  Robotics is fun but not necessary. Also, this character can't afford to waste Lancemate points.

[Burzmali]

Quoting: Michael

({Charm} + {Leadership Skill} + {Renown}/10)/4

Should be: ({Charm} + {Leadership Skill} + {Renown}/10)/8

Edit: Oops, didn't notice you were talking about pets.  Ignore me.

[jefftest]

Actually, I think it's a reasonable approach to start with Robotics and Leadership, and start out by making a robot or 2 which can then be used to do the ground combat missions.   Might as well take some advantage of that high Knowledge while it's around.

Just for fun I made a guy with Kn 43, Cr 12, Eg 12 and just with the starting Robotics skill of 5, 4 out of 5 cheap robots started out self aware (3 welding kits, mobile phone, flak suit and scotch tape - I couldn't find any sensors).  At Robo 5 their stats are all around 11, but that *is* 11x better than mine  Also it's decent XP.

My plan would be to take General Repair  and Dodge, and doing a bunch of ground missions with an un-aware robot til enough Leadership could be bought/Renown earned to run with a self-aware one, then two. A third would need LDR 13 even at 100 Renown, debatable but is a nice cushion when the missions get harder.

I'd even think about Medicine - that would allow doing the rescue missions as well as healing early inconvenient hits.

Then General Repair, Robotics, Medicine and even Leadership could be Replaced later...

It would be worth thinking about taking the max of the Knowledge skills to allow even more pumping of the Knowledge stat - getting all 5 to level 10 would be pretty tricky and expensive, but the +9 to all the GARUd stats would be very nice.   4 to lvl 9 for +7 wouldn't be unthinkable though.

Also it is gonna be very tempting to take Awareness as one of the first skills, seeing only 1 square is a major drag...

Edit:  Oops I see Pe isn't one of the Garu'd stats and your plan to start with better Pe - that would help quite a lot

[PotatoEngineer]

Here's my take on it: it's very straightforward, so you won't see anything special here.  Just a straight combat character, who should still be theoretically capable of beating the game playing solo, while taking advantage of those high stats.

The first 6 skills:
*Dodge
*Small Arms
*Mecha Piloting
*Mecha Gunnery
(i.e., taking both mecha and personal combat, but going for the absolute minimum skill investments in both.  Finding a Laser Rifle or other such personal weapon early in the game is left as an exercise to the reader.  Optionally replace Small Arms with Heavy Weapons, and Mecha Gunnery with Mecha Artillery, if you'd like to take advantage of your non-horrific Pe, but making Mecha Artillery work in the early game is tricky.)
*Conversation
*an XP-generating skill.  Code breaking, Mecha Repair, what have you.  Medicine, Mysticism, Performance, or Investigation if you'd like to tailor yourself towards a skill-related mission.

It should be reasonably doable to simply play a straight combat character, starting with the arena and moving onward.  I normally start a game with my combat skills around +2 or +3 and my relevant combat stats around 15-ish, but it should be possible to start with combat skills at +5, and stats at 1, and simply raising your skills ASAP.  You'll have to go for a career as a Lawyer, simply because most careers which include combat skills include too MANY of them for this minimal build.

Of course, you'll probably have to fall back on personal combat and sewer-diving as your mecha is destroyed, but once you've saved up for GARU serum (relatively easy with a Lawyer!), you'll be a combat monster and can play a straight violent game with a bare minimum of non-violence-related missions.

The lack of speed, and lack of Initiative, will make you horribly slow in the early game, but you can overcome this simply by charging at full speed across the battlefield, all the time.  Of course, if you don't like taking advantage of game quirks, then you should replace your XP-generating skill with Initiative, simply to have a decent chance to survive.