Atom RPG - Starting Guide for Snipers

Baldur’s Gate, Wasteland and Fallout — old school isometric classics. Do you feel the goosebumps, when memories of these RPGs come to your mind? We certainly do. This genre may not be so popular but obviously has an audience. So Atom Games decided to make their own falloutish game inspired by the legendary products — Atom RPG. At first, there was a Steam Early Access edition — Atom Games are independent developers, so they needed a start to feel confident. And on the 19th of December, 2019 the game has been released. To be honest, the price tag is sweet — $14.99 for a game with at least 40 hours of plot gameplay and high user ratings (84% positive reviews in 30 days). Those who have played Atom, greet a careful old-school mechanics usage, an elaborate atmosphere of a post-Soviet apocalypse, and a complexed RPG system. Let's take a closer look at this system. 

So we have a classic golden age RPG. Character's starting characteristics and passive skills are vital in Atom. In this guide, we review the hero generation system through the prism of the most efficient Sniper build. 

Characteristics

Being a sniper is not an easy life. If you want your character to become a killer-machine, distribute your starting points this way:

• Strength — 7. Sniper rifles are heavy and we need our character to carry them through life (but honestly, all sniper rifles require this parameter). Heaviest gun in the game requires 8 points of Strength from 10 possible so 7 is enough for now. You can get the eighth point without any troubles in the Roaring Forest location, but much later. With this Sniper build, there's no need to level this characteristic higher.
• Endurance — 6. That's a 'living wage'. If you have fewer points — at certain stages it will be almost impossible to survive.
• Dexterity — 10. All your enemies have a starting agility level set to 10, quite unfair, isn't it? 
• Intellect — 10. Intellect affects your experience gaining and how quickly your character can get the next level. That's why shoot 10 — otherwise be ready to spend time grinding.
• Attention — 9. Set to 5, the additional 4 points will be added with your hero's abilities — we'll explain below. 
• Personality — 1. Useless in this build. 
• Luck — 1. Same as Personality.

Distinction 

Cursed sniper is a, well, very obvious pick regarding its name. Boosts aimed shot with 7% accuracy but lowers ordinary shot accuracy by 10%. Also, adds 2 points to Attention, reduces Luck by 2 and Sequence by 7. Players discovered a very interesting bug after the release — when the character's Luck is set to '1', it didn't work correctly and, on the contrary, added extra points. If this is still not fixed — the negative effects will be less.

Lone Wolf / Glutton. Pick from two — both have pros and cons, but we think that Lone Wolf suits the build better. +2 Attention points, +5 to Sequence and the ability to stack 10 more kilos to your bag. But all this is relevant only if the character travels alone. When an ally appears, there are some serious downgrades: -2 Attention, -20 Survival and -7 Sequence points.

Glutton is an alternative. Adds 2 points to Endurance, but characters hunger comes twice as fast. Pick this one if you like buddy-movies. 

All 20 skill points available you need to spend on Stealth.

So after all the manipulations, your character will look like this: 

New game

Now you are ready to start. Go through a series of 'help poor locals' quests at Otradnoye — once completing it you'll get a sniper rifle and bonus skill points, which you should burst into Stealth. After leaving the settlement, you have to attack the encountered group of three opponents. Tear them apart — there are a hunting rifle and some ammunition as a prize. You can buy 5.56mm ammo in one of the gun shops (for example, at Krasnoznamenny). 

Next thing you need to do is unlocking Praetorian and Manhunter abilities — these are very important for the build! Once you do it, feel free to upgrade your character as you like — we've made a basis, now it's up to you and your personal preferences.

Tell us in the comments below, what's your favorite specialization — or your overall opinion on the game.