I saw the word Johnny and hit close immediately.
R*, plz PC port nao.
R*, plz PC port nao.
GTA V
- Thread starter Serge 13
- Start date
Surf Solar
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Tagaziel said:
Eh, it's probably for the better you didn't read the spoiler.
Yeah, seriously.
I like Trevor, he's a great portrayal of the sort of person who would definitely thrive in the world of Grand Theft Auto.
Thing is, that means he does stuff that is goddamn reprehensible.
[spoiler:3ca5793944]Like what he did to Mr. Raspberry Jam[/spoiler:3ca5793944]
I like Trevor, he's a great portrayal of the sort of person who would definitely thrive in the world of Grand Theft Auto.
Thing is, that means he does stuff that is goddamn reprehensible.
[spoiler:3ca5793944]Like what he did to Mr. Raspberry Jam[/spoiler:3ca5793944]
Surf Solar said:Eh, it's probably for the better you didn't read the spoiler.
Yeah. I liked Johnny, he was pretty well written. The fact that I was watching Sons of Anarchy at roughly the same time helped too.
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
Well said. I myself have 2 gripes with the game, but they pale in comparison to the overall package, which is pretty awesome. I felt that the shooting mechanics took a step backwards from what GTAIV offered (which was a HUGE, unprecedented leap forward from previous titles), and found them finicky and unresponsive, at times. I learned to adapt to them, but I really preferred GTAIV's shooting mechanics. Secondly, on the PS3, you can't upscale the game to display in 1080p which is just... Well what the fuck, really?13pm said:
Anyway, those are just about the ONLY things I really took issue with in all of GTAV. The rest has been a blast. I've long since completed the story and have just spent the past week exploring, sightseeing, playing tennis and laughing at "how violent" the media says this is, taking my wife out on dates and laughing at "how sexist" they say it is, learning more about the incredibly rich story and setting from all of the post-campaign banter and dialog, wrap up what I'd missed, work on collectibles, and so on. GTAV outdid itself in making collectibles a REAL bitch, this time, which isn't necessarily a good thing. Yet, somehow, they didn't bother me quite as much as 200 pigeons, even though I had to find WAY more than 200 collectibles. Somehow, splitting them up into 50 of this and 50 of that and etc makes it a bit more tolerable. Still a real bitch, at times, especially a few specific Knife Flights, Stunt Jumps, and ONE God Damned item hidden on the underside of a bridge that can only be accessed by parachuting to it. The margin for error on that bastard is infuriating. But anyway.... good times.
What I don't get is all the negativity... "GTAIV was too realistic, I didn't like it." Okay? "GTAV is just more of the same, I don't care about it." Alright? You're free to like or dislike whatever you want, but that doesn't make it objective representation of a game's quality. Far from it. I loved GTAIV more than I can express, and if it wasn't for GTAV being so stellar, it would probably remain my favorite sandbox title of all time- even with the absurdly demanding multiplayer. Too dark? If you don't like the artistic direction, that's your business. I personally loved how the realistic setting based on the real world made the characters and their situation much more relatable. I loved Niko as a character, and I won't dismiss that being a Serb left me with somewhat of a bias, but that didn't prevent me from hating Zoran Lazarevic as a character in Uncharted 2. Niko felt real, and if he was dive bombing onto old ladies and slapping gangsters in the face with dildo baseball bats, it would have only taken away from the game. All you Saints Row fanatics need to get this simple truth through your heads already; catharsis isn't everything. Yes, it wasn't rife with tons of amazing things to do, but it was full of really enjoyable activities to entertain yourself with. I personally loved playing darts and going bowling whenever possible. Packie started making fun of Niko as being a deranged, psychotic Eastern European with a bowling fetish because of how often I took him bowling with me... XD
And GTAV honestly topped it in all of those regards. Is it more lighthearted that GTAIV? Yeah, a little. But the characters aren't clowns, nor are they sinister. As dark as Trevor comes off, all too often you see the side of him that hurts and seeks emotional restitution from how he'd been wronged. The more you learn about him, the less he seems like some cranked-out sociopath, and the more endearing he becomes. He didn't become that likeable because Rockstar made the game into a fun-fest. Michael is quite possibly the most disturbing of the 3, and he's the one that players are meant to relate to the most; the midlife crisis family man. Yet when you finally see what he hides behind his outward persona, he's a bone chillingly cold character. Even Franklin isn't devoid of both moments of charm and disturbance. At first you sympathize with his plight of being brought up in a dead-end livelihood surrounded by moronic gangsters that have no motivation to make a better life for themselves. But as time goes on, you start to see Franklin as the shallow, wealth-and-success obsessed person he really is. All 3 of the characters have dark sides and all 3 can come out on top and redeem themselves, if the player chooses to allow them to. Given the choices I was permitted by this game, I can say without a doubt, it can be FAR darker than GTAIV ever was. At the same time, it can be far softer, as well, and it's not even schizophrenic, either. It's a game that provides a really massive, diverse experience, and I've loved every minute of it. Otherwise how else could I put up with those GOD FUCKING DAMNED COLLECTIBLES!!!???!!!???!!! XD
Yep, they pulled a couple "Game of Thrones isms" in GTAV. It's great. That moment was startling to me, too, but when you really take stock of the setting and what's become of the characters, it doesn't seem that bad. Johnny lost his way over the past 5 years. The Bikers that came "as reinforcements" in the following missions for Trevor gave some backstory that the chapter which had migrated over to Los Santos had started using too much of the drugs they were trafficking, and in doing so lost a lot of their direction. Johnny himself went from a strictly anti-meth biker with a strong set a morals and an unbreakable code... to some red-mist junkie. The most tragic thing about his cameo was the revelation of what he's become over the past 5 years, not so much what that led to.Verd1234 said:
Security vans and stores aren't marked on the map, you just have to find them. You can rob liquor stores, gas stations, basically any establishment that you can enter and that has a cash register. Sometimes the clerks have shotguns and shoot back if you try to hold them up, so it's not even that simple and carefree. But you basically just find a place, walk in, and target the clerk, then he'll do the rest. He throws the money into a bag that becomes an object you can pick up, and from there you just have to dodge the police. It's really fun to do, but they pale in comparison to the heists. In a way, store robberies are just that; microscopic fractions of what you can experience in pulling off a heist.Surf Solar said:Where did you find that liquor store? In my game, they are not pointed out on the map, I also tried out robbing gas stations etc. but never found one you can actually enter.
Speaking of heists, that's the subject I wanted to discuss when I came back to this thread... I've done a number of minor experiments with the game, and although my testing is far from methodical and my findings aren't complete at all, I have come up with some solid conclusions. It's the lack of of all the details that I'm hoping asking around here will address. When planning a heist, you choose your method and you choose who you bring along, and those choices affect what scenarios you will encounter and how much money you get away with. The game tells you that if you hire less-skilled goons for a heist that you'll save money on them because they ask for less, but they will perform below what the more skilled alternative offers. What the game DOESN'T tell you is just how badly your decisions can impact your heists; namely that the cheapest help will typically cost you the heist in its entirety. You can walk away from a score with $8million in your bags, and a discount gunner will get himself killed, forcing you to leave behind $2million with the dead body. Having pulled off the first heist of the game several different ways, I found that in "saving" 20% of the take on cheaper help still ended up costing me 90% of the money I could make. In one run, Micheal (who gets the most out of the heist) made off with over $1million after everything was divied up. In another run, Micheal's cut was a mere $100k. I was shocked by the impact of saving a few bucks here and there on quality hired help. But the burning curiosity that left me with was to wonder that if I could make 10% of one attempt, how much COULD I potentially make?
So the question I want to put forth is this: What's the BEST pay-off for each heist? In doing some experimenting, or in simply playing the game how you see fit, what results did you get for each heist, and which payed off the best? I'm curious if a method of picking the middle-ground hired help ends up as the best bet, considering they'll probably survive the earlier heists to make it to the end of the game with enough skill to get the most out of the best-paying gigs, or if opting for the most expensive help from the start is better. Clearly when going for discount help, it costs you in the end, but then again, where CAN you get away with it? Hiring Ricky, the low-end hacker, for the jewel store job didn't impact the heist in a negative way, as far as I could tell, but hiring the cheap gunner cost me the most. Where is it most profitable to skip out on costly help, and when is it imperative to pick guys who are at the top of their game? I'm really curious what my choices can potentially do... =)
EDIT: Well, while replaying more missions, and replaying an actual heist for the first time, I found out that unlike your selection process during the story, when replaying the heists themselves, it allows you to select the method and crew again. So with that, I was able to do some more thorough experimenting without having the make a new game and reload saves made prior to scouting each heist. Using the jewel store as a quick experiment, I ran it with 4 different results, and I think I found the best pay-off for that, but I've yet to test out the others.
Jewel Store Heist- Smart Approach: Contrary to Lester's advice, the most important part of the crew is actually the gunman; you can save on the other 2. (In fact, if you're aiming for Gold Medal, hiring Luke as the hacker is quite beneficial, since he only gives you 50 seconds before the alarm goes off, and one of the requirements is cleaning out the store in 50 seconds.) I saved a tiny amount on the Gunman by hiring Packie, who took 14% instead of 16%, although his skills were easily on par with the most expensive alternative. The most important thing was that Packie could survive the getaway, while the cheaper Gunman would get killed and you'd lose his portion of the take. Picking the cheap driver will make the first half of the getaway more hazardous, but it won't change the actual route, and despite his constant complaints, he'll survive with his portion of the take. I made the least when I saved on the Gunman, I made the second least when I hired the best in all 3 categories, and I made the most when I saved on other roles besides the Gunman. All told, on my best run, Michael made $1.22million for himself, which was roughly 25% better than my next best pay-off.
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
Having considered it, I arrived at the conclusion that, at worst, I allude to spoilers, but I don't really spoil anything. We see Johnny in the game. That much was given up by others bringing him up. I did explain that he's in a different state than the one we left him in, but not much else. I focused on the emotional impact of his appearance, not the details. I don't think it needs spoiler tags- if people read too much into what I wrote, that's really not my fault. I was very careful in avoiding any details when I wrote it, because I want a point to remain undisturbed, and a spoiler tag felt to me that it would detract from the flow of my post. All writer's habits, yeah, but they're habits I'm not giving up anytime soon. =P
Thanks for the compliment about that one paragraph, though. Alas, it merely highlighted to me yet ANOTHER typo that I missed. >_< Ugh, if only I could afford good health insurance, I'm growing convinced that a CT scan would find a brain tumor. My inability to write like I used to just isn't right...
Thanks for the compliment about that one paragraph, though. Alas, it merely highlighted to me yet ANOTHER typo that I missed. >_< Ugh, if only I could afford good health insurance, I'm growing convinced that a CT scan would find a brain tumor. My inability to write like I used to just isn't right...
Surf Solar
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Snapslav, have you seen the different endings? What do you think about the endings?
They really underline how you already described the good dark tone in this game too, IMO.,
They really underline how you already described the good dark tone in this game too, IMO.,
Packie is back!? My favourite Irish red-headed bastard is in Los Santos?
Surf Solar
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Tagaziel said:
He is only a side character, but yep he is in LS.
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
Yes, that's exactly what I was referring to when I described the tones of the endings. For future questions, just assume I know, because I've beaten the game and fully completed every part of it, short of a couple of the random encounters (but those can be tricky to trigger, sometimes, and there's over 50). As far as involvement goes, 2 of the endings (I'm sure you know which) are pretty lackluster, however in spite of their brevity they really pack a punch, thematically, emotionally, and so on. The worst I felt about Trevor was early into the game, the worst I felt about Michael was in the middle of the game, and the worst I felt about Franklin was near the end, so you can imagine with their character arcs reaching crescendos at different points, the various endings could feel very conflicting. I wanted everybody to make it out of this safe and sound, but that was something the game successfully pulled off as feeling impossible... at least up TILL the end, anyway.Surf Solar said:
One of the things I really appreciated about the game was that AFTER you beat the story, and certain characters have their reconciliations, you learn a lot about mentioned characters or character that make very brief appearances, similar to how Packie will reveal to the player what became of his associates. The best example I can think of is you learn what kind of a person Brad really was and how his fall ultimately impacted Michael and Trevor. Little details like that, even if they're just minor exposition from random dialog lines between characters, felt like a really nice touch. The game didn't feel "dead" once the story was completed, and I loved that.
Simply put, yes. I'm pretty sure you can kill him, or get him killed, so I prefer to look out for Packie whenever the chance arises, just to er on the side of caution. For that reason I actually opted to NOT include him in several heists, although as my testing continues, that seems to have been a touch counterproductive to that aim... XDTagaziel said:
Back on the subject of getting the most out of every heist, having done more testing, I'm uncovering a few variables that require some attention of their own to really determine the best outcome for one heist in particular. Without giving anything away, there are 2 separate heists which have linked pay-offs, so I'm trying to ascertain whether ideal performance in both pays the best, or if some queer assortment of success and failure actually results in the most money for each protagonist. Naturally, all you'd really care about as far as crew members goes is their skills, otherwise you want as much money to go to your main 3, and finding that balance has been quite a test of patience and attention to detail.
One thing I'm trying to find out is if one particular random encounter can be triggered as early as the first heist, because it will unlock someone who is arguably the best and cheapest driver in the game. If that crew member could be boosted to max skill as early as possible, that would make for REAL easy experimenting (not to mention incredible profits all around).
How many non-heist ways to get money are there? I wager there's some vital story-related reason for the heists. San Andreas and GTA IV were always stretching plausibility with protagonists portrayed as the bottom feeders of society despite owning major assets and/or enough cash to buy out Microsoft thrice over.
Also, I assume the break-in at the FIB headquarters is a major plot point, not just a generic heist?
Also, I assume the break-in at the FIB headquarters is a major plot point, not just a generic heist?
Surf Solar
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
I am still trying to figure out how to make 150 millions to buy that damn golf club. Seems impossible to me and I dont want to dabble in that darn stock market. 
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
Uh.. I couldn't really answer that question, because the number is quite big. XDTagaziel said:
You can make money the classic GTA way by killing random people and picking up their cash and through missions as well, getting a "refund" by banging prostitutes and then capping them, robbing stores, robbing security vans, taking cab fares, undertaking repeatable jobs such as weapons trafficking, parachuting (yeah, I don't know why or how), making profit off of purchasable properties found around the game, investing in the stock market, getting paid in random encounters, hunting wild game, winning sports bets, collecting hidden packages... It just goes on and on. The most profitable, besides heists, are properties and stocks. If you can combine the potential profit from all 3 methods, your characters can end up with billions within a week (in-game). Otherwise, if you just play the game without much awareness of your moneymaking opportunities, your characters can end up broke for years to come. The fact that some properties required TWO YEARS in-game to pay their purchase price off was startling to me.
And there aren't really any "generic heists" in single player; every one of them has importance to the story (unlike the bank robbery in GTAIII, for example). I'd wager that we'll only see "generic heists" when Online goes live, since it appears to be a pseudo MMO experience, which means tons of opportunity for repetition and grind. I can't imagine GTA Online's heists will be THAT involved, story wise, but I could be wrong. We'll see in a day. =)
[spoiler:a3c4ca6f2a]3 ways. 1) Sheer persistence, which I'm sure you'll agree is too tedious to attempt. But if all else fails, hey, go wild on those taxi fares. =) 2) Make enough money with Michael's property investments, since he's the only character who can buy the theater's across the city, and each pays hundreds of thousands every week, so if property investment is your best bet, Michael will afford the Golf Club sooner than any other. 3) Become a rich SOB through the combination method I mentioned above. I haven't pulled it off yet, myself, although I'm in the process of attempting it. You basically have to put off ANY stock-related encounters until after you get paid for The Big One (which naturally means completing the story), then empty all whopping $35-50million each character has in each guaranteed stock and cashing out when they reach their maximum profit. Done right, you can end up billionaires, so the Golf Club becomes easily accessible.[/spoiler:a3c4ca6f2a]Surf Solar said:I am still trying to figure out how to make 150 millions to buy that damn golf club. Seems impossible to me and I dont want to dabble in that darn stock market.
Stocks in general are also not a bad method of making considerable money. But just like in real life, reckless and uninformed stock purchases can really cost you. The safest stock purchases I found were in Bank of Liberty (BOL) whenever it reaches the $11.5 per stock area, because it hovers between $11-13 all the time. You're sure to make considerable profit with that one, if you're diligent and patient.
SnapSlav said:
So... Gameplay's divorced story again?
Damn, I kind of wish I had a TV and a PS3.
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
Not at all. The game does a pretty incredible job of representing the characters' plights when those plights befall them. They bitch about longstanding periods of financial inactivity and lament being broke when they haven't been making money and sorely need it. The vast majority of methods I mentioned will pay you thousands of dollars, but your characters will be faced with requiring MILLIONS on multiple occasions. Unlike Niko being "on the run" while in possession of a small fortune and never being able to spend it all, your money disappears quickly in GTAV, and if you aren't careful (again, the very reason I'm exploring how to get the most out of every heist) you make very little money for the vast majority of the game. By the time your characters actually become wealthy, the game is over, and they celebrate their success. The game fantastically marries gameplay and story almost perfectly. Obviously, it's anything but divorced. =)Tagaziel said:So... Gameplay's divorced story again?
Damn, I kind of wish I had a TV and a PS3.
Surf Solar
So Old I'm Losing Radiation Signs
Yep, it's the first GTA where money actual matters. Never had to look out for that dollar count in previous games.
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
All the more appropriate, considering the potential wealth you can end up with.
Well, I did some more testing- though I kept it to all possible variations for the first heist that I could account for, and they bore some very illuminating facts. It makes the degree to which I can test later heists trickier, but I'm still investigating to find out what I can. So here's an update of my findings.
Jewel Store Heist- You need to hire 1 Driver, 1 Gunman, and 1 Hacker for this heist. The vehicles you get for your getaway depend on the skills of your Driver. The length of time you can loot the store before the alarm sounds depends on the skill of your hacker. Neither approach will result in an open gunfight, so your Gunman is both there for safety, and for other, less obvious reasons. You'll have 2-3 possible choices in each category (none of them share roles, so if you pick a Driver you won't have 1 fewer Gunmen to choose between, and so on), how many and who depends on whether you unlock more heist members before beginning this heist. By default, every role has 2 members of choose from.
Go in Smart:[spoiler:7e0182e0ec]Contrary to Lester's advice, the most important member of your crew is actually the Gunman. When making your getaway, the discount Gunman will always collide with the side of a tunnel entrance, fall off his bike, and drop his portion of the take. That's approximately $1million lost, however if you're fast, Franklin CAN get off his bike, pick up the dropped take, and continue on with the getaway. The ability of your Gunman ALSO determines how efficiently he empties the jewel display cases. Packie and the expert will collect all of the jewelry, the low-end Gunman will drop anywhere from $100-500k worth of jewelry. Including the lost jewelry and since losing a crew member results in Casualty Expenses, it's still not worth it to hire the cheap Gunman, even if you're planning on getting away with the full score and split it with 1 less person.
To a lesser degree, the overall take can also be influenced by the Driver you higher, though it is possible to make off with 100% of the store's jewels if you have Packie of better for a Gunman, and the cheapest Driver. What your choice in Driver absolutely will influence is the getaway vehicle, which has a small impact of your escape. The route will not change, however. Since you'll always enter a muddy underground section, the speedy bikes that a discount Driver gets for the heist won't handle the slick environment, so you'll have more difficulty making it through the getaway. The dirt bikes brought on for the job by the seasoned Driver will handle all portions of the getaway with ease, and he'll keep everyone updated on upcoming turns along the route so you don't get separated. This whole section isn't all that important if you've memorized the route, or if you're just a very observant driver, but some newer players will feel the adverse affects more strongly than others.
The Hacker is the least important member of the crew. The length of time it takes you to clean out the store should never exceed 1 minute, and the cheapest Hacker will give you 50 seconds to work with. If you take too long, you may need to fend off some chasing police cruisers at the start of your escape, but that's the worst consequence of your low-end hacker. The professional is possibly the worst hire, because she's the most expensive crew member out of the entire selection (and it really adds up).
All told, the best results I achieved were 100% of the the jewels (approximately $4.95million worth) in 45 seconds, using the cheap Driver, Packie (the middle ground Gunman, who has skills on par with the expert, but he charges 2% less), and the cheap Hacker. Michael, who makes the most out of this heist, made a maximum possible $1.22million out of the heist with this combination of crew members.[/spoiler:7e0182e0ec]
Go in Loud:[spoiler:7e0182e0ec]The importance of your crew choices is somewhat inverted compared to the Smart approach, because your Driver's value is much greater. However, the take you get, in all of my tests, will never be as high as what you could achieve in the Smart way, but the average takes for assembling identical crews, as long as you prioritized Drivers, is higher in the Loud approach. Your Driver will still affect the getaway in the same manner as the Smart approach, so taking a cheap Driver will only net a small inconvenience during your escape. The most important thing your choice in Driver impacts, which differs from the Smart method, is that they determine how many jewels you make off with. Their role essentially becomes flipped with the Gunman (hence the inversion of importance), so choosing a better driver means you'll get 100% of the take, while the cheap driver will drop $500k every time.
The Gunman, meanwhile, has very little importance if you take the jewel store by force, which is ironic. Michael and the Driver empty the display cases, the Gunman will watch over the hostages. No one will try anything, so the worst impact of picking the discount Gunman is that it'll be slightly noisier and more roudy. However, just as with the the other method, the cheap Gunman will always collide with the side of the tunnel entrance during your getaway and always drop their portion of the take. Just as before, you can still reclaim the dropped take, and since they don't impact the total score, you lose less if you lose them. However, because you'll incur Casualty Expenses, you'll still lose some money by taking on the low-end Gunman.
The Hacker makes no difference in the forceful heist that he/she didn't in the quiet heist. They'll still provide the same window of opportunity to empty the store out, and taking too long will result in fending on chasing police cruisers when you make your getaway. The least experienced Hacker has always been sufficient for me.
All told, the best outcome I could get from this approach to the jewel store was a little over $1million for Michael, by hiring the Best Driver (for not missing any jewels, which makes the most difference besides crew cuts), the inexperienced Gunman and picking up his bag of jewels that he drops, and the new Hacker. The next best, making it out without losing anyone, but hiring the cheaper Driver, netted approximately $930k for Michael.[/spoiler:7e0182e0ec]
Summary:[spoiler:7e0182e0ec]Take the Smart way, pick a cheap Driver, Packie, a cheap Hacker, and be quick so you don't lose any of the jewels. I figure that the small differences of a few hundred thousand here and there will only be exacerbated by millions lost in later heists, if you don't hire middle ground Gunmen and upgrade their abilities. But even if you didn't, picking the most experienced Gunman never made any difference besides how much of a cut they took, so taking Packie didn't adversely impact the ultimate payoff anyway. Getting $1.22million on Michael is your target, and you should get there if you begin the escape portion of the heist with $4.95million in jewels stolen. It remains to be seen how effective this method works on later heists, but by upgrading the skills of 2 of the low-end members, you have better crew members to choose from later on. It's possible that a maxed Driver early on would more than pay off by several millions even if they cost you a few hundred thousand in this heist, but that's for more testing to determine.[/spoiler:7e0182e0ec]
And that about does it for all the meticulous details to be gone over for simple one of the heists in the game, which most likely no one will really care enough about to read. XD
Well, I did some more testing- though I kept it to all possible variations for the first heist that I could account for, and they bore some very illuminating facts. It makes the degree to which I can test later heists trickier, but I'm still investigating to find out what I can. So here's an update of my findings.
Jewel Store Heist- You need to hire 1 Driver, 1 Gunman, and 1 Hacker for this heist. The vehicles you get for your getaway depend on the skills of your Driver. The length of time you can loot the store before the alarm sounds depends on the skill of your hacker. Neither approach will result in an open gunfight, so your Gunman is both there for safety, and for other, less obvious reasons. You'll have 2-3 possible choices in each category (none of them share roles, so if you pick a Driver you won't have 1 fewer Gunmen to choose between, and so on), how many and who depends on whether you unlock more heist members before beginning this heist. By default, every role has 2 members of choose from.
Go in Smart:[spoiler:7e0182e0ec]Contrary to Lester's advice, the most important member of your crew is actually the Gunman. When making your getaway, the discount Gunman will always collide with the side of a tunnel entrance, fall off his bike, and drop his portion of the take. That's approximately $1million lost, however if you're fast, Franklin CAN get off his bike, pick up the dropped take, and continue on with the getaway. The ability of your Gunman ALSO determines how efficiently he empties the jewel display cases. Packie and the expert will collect all of the jewelry, the low-end Gunman will drop anywhere from $100-500k worth of jewelry. Including the lost jewelry and since losing a crew member results in Casualty Expenses, it's still not worth it to hire the cheap Gunman, even if you're planning on getting away with the full score and split it with 1 less person.
To a lesser degree, the overall take can also be influenced by the Driver you higher, though it is possible to make off with 100% of the store's jewels if you have Packie of better for a Gunman, and the cheapest Driver. What your choice in Driver absolutely will influence is the getaway vehicle, which has a small impact of your escape. The route will not change, however. Since you'll always enter a muddy underground section, the speedy bikes that a discount Driver gets for the heist won't handle the slick environment, so you'll have more difficulty making it through the getaway. The dirt bikes brought on for the job by the seasoned Driver will handle all portions of the getaway with ease, and he'll keep everyone updated on upcoming turns along the route so you don't get separated. This whole section isn't all that important if you've memorized the route, or if you're just a very observant driver, but some newer players will feel the adverse affects more strongly than others.
The Hacker is the least important member of the crew. The length of time it takes you to clean out the store should never exceed 1 minute, and the cheapest Hacker will give you 50 seconds to work with. If you take too long, you may need to fend off some chasing police cruisers at the start of your escape, but that's the worst consequence of your low-end hacker. The professional is possibly the worst hire, because she's the most expensive crew member out of the entire selection (and it really adds up).
All told, the best results I achieved were 100% of the the jewels (approximately $4.95million worth) in 45 seconds, using the cheap Driver, Packie (the middle ground Gunman, who has skills on par with the expert, but he charges 2% less), and the cheap Hacker. Michael, who makes the most out of this heist, made a maximum possible $1.22million out of the heist with this combination of crew members.[/spoiler:7e0182e0ec]
Go in Loud:[spoiler:7e0182e0ec]The importance of your crew choices is somewhat inverted compared to the Smart approach, because your Driver's value is much greater. However, the take you get, in all of my tests, will never be as high as what you could achieve in the Smart way, but the average takes for assembling identical crews, as long as you prioritized Drivers, is higher in the Loud approach. Your Driver will still affect the getaway in the same manner as the Smart approach, so taking a cheap Driver will only net a small inconvenience during your escape. The most important thing your choice in Driver impacts, which differs from the Smart method, is that they determine how many jewels you make off with. Their role essentially becomes flipped with the Gunman (hence the inversion of importance), so choosing a better driver means you'll get 100% of the take, while the cheap driver will drop $500k every time.
The Gunman, meanwhile, has very little importance if you take the jewel store by force, which is ironic. Michael and the Driver empty the display cases, the Gunman will watch over the hostages. No one will try anything, so the worst impact of picking the discount Gunman is that it'll be slightly noisier and more roudy. However, just as with the the other method, the cheap Gunman will always collide with the side of the tunnel entrance during your getaway and always drop their portion of the take. Just as before, you can still reclaim the dropped take, and since they don't impact the total score, you lose less if you lose them. However, because you'll incur Casualty Expenses, you'll still lose some money by taking on the low-end Gunman.
The Hacker makes no difference in the forceful heist that he/she didn't in the quiet heist. They'll still provide the same window of opportunity to empty the store out, and taking too long will result in fending on chasing police cruisers when you make your getaway. The least experienced Hacker has always been sufficient for me.
All told, the best outcome I could get from this approach to the jewel store was a little over $1million for Michael, by hiring the Best Driver (for not missing any jewels, which makes the most difference besides crew cuts), the inexperienced Gunman and picking up his bag of jewels that he drops, and the new Hacker. The next best, making it out without losing anyone, but hiring the cheaper Driver, netted approximately $930k for Michael.[/spoiler:7e0182e0ec]
Summary:[spoiler:7e0182e0ec]Take the Smart way, pick a cheap Driver, Packie, a cheap Hacker, and be quick so you don't lose any of the jewels. I figure that the small differences of a few hundred thousand here and there will only be exacerbated by millions lost in later heists, if you don't hire middle ground Gunmen and upgrade their abilities. But even if you didn't, picking the most experienced Gunman never made any difference besides how much of a cut they took, so taking Packie didn't adversely impact the ultimate payoff anyway. Getting $1.22million on Michael is your target, and you should get there if you begin the escape portion of the heist with $4.95million in jewels stolen. It remains to be seen how effective this method works on later heists, but by upgrading the skills of 2 of the low-end members, you have better crew members to choose from later on. It's possible that a maxed Driver early on would more than pay off by several millions even if they cost you a few hundred thousand in this heist, but that's for more testing to determine.[/spoiler:7e0182e0ec]
And that about does it for all the meticulous details to be gone over for simple one of the heists in the game, which most likely no one will really care enough about to read. XD
T
TorontoReign
Guest
SPOILER ALERT!!!!
GTA V is the best in the serie imo.. I actually gave a fuck about the characters in it. I never cared for Niko much, so GTA 4 lost my interest, unlike GTA V...I somehow feel sad that I beat it so quick though. I never actually beat GTA 4...it lost me once Niko found his nemesis, I never related to the characters in any way. Hell, I can relate to Michael and Franklin in a lot of ways in GTA V. Guys doing what it takes to get by basically. Michael struggles with his guilt over what he does, while Trevor loves every minute of it, Franklin just accepts it as a part of life. Trevor became more relatable halfway into his plot though. He obviously had a rough life.
I'm not too big into collectibles, even thought thats what i'm going for next, but I do like the wide variety of stuff you can find. Anyone see Bigfoot in the Thermal Scope Mission? I loved the Rampage missions although I figured they could have tossed in another 30 of those easy to pad out the game some more. I hate playing tennis and other shit like that. I want to rob shit. I would have liked a way to plan heists on every bank, casino, jewelry store possible, and repeat them over a certain time frame. Like say, you rob a bank, then you can't rob that bank again for so many months.
Because basically, after you pull off your heists, all you can do is replay them for a higher score. Sure you can add your newely unlocked/rescued heist members that you find along the way, but whats the big motive to replay the same heist? I know GTA Online is addressing that, but what about the anti-social people like me?
Most of my guys have well over $500,000 each, but BILLIONS? I didn't play my cards right the first time through obviously. Of course, I do like to pimp out cars, get 'em destroyed, go out in a blaze of glory, and end up in the hospital on a regualr basis. Rob the Pot Farm near Mount Chilead for $30,000 to $100,000 every week. Armored Cars are worth it if you can get away. (Anyone notice how incredibly hard the cops are in this game? Hell, in Vice City I was a one man death squad, well into 5 start territory. Not a complaint just an observation)
Pay attention to the stock advice on the Franklin assasination missions.
Play with the right hesit crew, as Snap said. I used a shitty gunner on the jewelry heist and it screwed me. I've run it several way's, but the heists can pay out in numerous different ways depending on your heist plan, crew, and numerous other factors. Try using Gustavo and that lady driver you rescue on the side of the road.
Heh. Trevor commented on me using expendable, low level heist members that frequently died on missions. I do recall using that LiveInvade Hacker twice and he gave me no problems. Chef worked out pretty damn good too.
The gas stations and other small stores aren't really worth robbing late in the game. I do wish there were more places to rob though. I already want an expansion.
Overall, it's one of the best games I've played in awhile. Now I need to find some PS3 owners to play with.
GTA V is the best in the serie imo.. I actually gave a fuck about the characters in it. I never cared for Niko much, so GTA 4 lost my interest, unlike GTA V...I somehow feel sad that I beat it so quick though. I never actually beat GTA 4...it lost me once Niko found his nemesis, I never related to the characters in any way. Hell, I can relate to Michael and Franklin in a lot of ways in GTA V. Guys doing what it takes to get by basically. Michael struggles with his guilt over what he does, while Trevor loves every minute of it, Franklin just accepts it as a part of life. Trevor became more relatable halfway into his plot though. He obviously had a rough life.
I'm not too big into collectibles, even thought thats what i'm going for next, but I do like the wide variety of stuff you can find. Anyone see Bigfoot in the Thermal Scope Mission? I loved the Rampage missions although I figured they could have tossed in another 30 of those easy to pad out the game some more. I hate playing tennis and other shit like that. I want to rob shit. I would have liked a way to plan heists on every bank, casino, jewelry store possible, and repeat them over a certain time frame. Like say, you rob a bank, then you can't rob that bank again for so many months.
Because basically, after you pull off your heists, all you can do is replay them for a higher score. Sure you can add your newely unlocked/rescued heist members that you find along the way, but whats the big motive to replay the same heist? I know GTA Online is addressing that, but what about the anti-social people like me?
Most of my guys have well over $500,000 each, but BILLIONS? I didn't play my cards right the first time through obviously. Of course, I do like to pimp out cars, get 'em destroyed, go out in a blaze of glory, and end up in the hospital on a regualr basis. Rob the Pot Farm near Mount Chilead for $30,000 to $100,000 every week. Armored Cars are worth it if you can get away. (Anyone notice how incredibly hard the cops are in this game? Hell, in Vice City I was a one man death squad, well into 5 start territory. Not a complaint just an observation)
Pay attention to the stock advice on the Franklin assasination missions.
Play with the right hesit crew, as Snap said. I used a shitty gunner on the jewelry heist and it screwed me. I've run it several way's, but the heists can pay out in numerous different ways depending on your heist plan, crew, and numerous other factors. Try using Gustavo and that lady driver you rescue on the side of the road.
Heh. Trevor commented on me using expendable, low level heist members that frequently died on missions. I do recall using that LiveInvade Hacker twice and he gave me no problems. Chef worked out pretty damn good too.
The gas stations and other small stores aren't really worth robbing late in the game. I do wish there were more places to rob though. I already want an expansion.
Overall, it's one of the best games I've played in awhile. Now I need to find some PS3 owners to play with.
SnapSlav
NMA's local DotA fanatic
*COUGH*TorontRayne said:
=)
I'm pretty sure that many of the things you feel were missing are BECAUSE of Online. I took notice of the short size of the story and I figured it's because the game is half an amazing Offline experience, and half an amazing Online experience, so it's still far, far more massive than GTAIV, just not in the story. (To other readers, that's not saying that the story is short, it's just approximately 80-90% the size of GTAIV's story.) It's funny that you found Trevor remarking on the tendency to pick expendable crew members, I think he said something similar when I played, but only that I HAD picked an expendable goon, not that it was my penchant. XD
Yes, the cops were much tougher to deal with, thus why they removed an entire wanted level in this game (the previous titles went up to 6 stars, not just 5), and it was most likely in response to how piss-easy cops were to dodge in GTAIV. Just drive really really fast in a straight road, really? Giving them more aggressive pursuit tendencies with that conical detection made a ton of difference. They're still not monstrous to take on, but if you don't regularly employ evasive driving and doge into alleyways, they can be tough to deal with. I think their challenge had more to do with the overall rebalance of character health than the cop AI routines. This is the first GTA game where I felt fragile.
I'm pretty sure that Online heists will be what you're asking for. When you rob stores, you can't rob the same place in quick succession, otherwise the clerk will wise up and shoot you, and even if you take him out before he does that, you'll find very little cash. It's not "preventing" you from robbing the same stores back to back, but it is providing heavy incentive against it, which I think is a tactic that works perfectly for this kind of game. I'm sure that some things will inhibit players from tackling the same score repeatedly, unless they want to leave it open to spamming like GTAIV N.O.O.S.E (which, in retrospect, was really really fun). I figure that Online will have some kind of "servers", because while the map is enormous for a single player, I can't imagine it would suit more than 50 players at one time. Anyway, it's a few hours away from launching, so not much need for continued speculation on what it COULD be. But given some of the things Rockstar has shown us thus far in GTAV, I feel like some of my guesses will prove accurate.
Out of curiosity, Toront...[spoiler:625108c866]...how much did your characters end up getting from The Big One? Each of mine made off with $32million, and from asking around, that seemed to be what others were getting as well. So if you saved all of the stock tricks for after you amass $35-50million at the end of the game, 5 returns of 30-300% in a row will get you into the billionaire range. If you perform the method poorly, that's still hundreds of millions to work with. Either way, your ability to succeed or fail at heists can really go a long way. I've been nothing but impressed the whole way through! ^^[/spoiler:625108c866]