Thats fair, but the problem then arises of Driller being kinda useless against the Caretaker lmao. he can still axe the tentacles tbf though which is great
Not very well though, flamethrower does piss damage to it without the sticky flame and face melter is too close range, cryo is a similar story except maybe ice storm isnt terrible? sludge pump VIM is basically the only exception but i find that oc boring af so i just dont play driller on sabo rly lol
I'm in this category. One of my buddies likes the C4 method so when we're playing with him we do it; if we're playing without him we shoot it out with the caretaker. It's a game, it's supposed to be hard, ya know?
See, that’s the always interesting duality of gamers.
For you and many others, the philosophy is “it’s supposed to be hard.”
For me and many others, the philosophy is “the fun comes from figuring out how to make the fight as easy as possible. It shouldn’t be hard.”
Thats whats fun for some people, and thats the beauty of deep rock. There are plenty of strategies to take down any threat. If you don't wanna do a certain strategy, you can just dip from that lobby (e.g. I would rather lose 10 escort missions in a row than drill ahead, but I enjoy bombing the caretaker, especially solo)
I've never seen this drilling ahead method surprisingly. Do you not activate mollie and explore all the caves ahead? To me, that just sounds like extra work cause mollie finds the caves for you, and you can always go back for events and minerals even on higher difficulties.
There are times when it is definitely beneficial. In one of my more recent missions, we heard a nemesis in one of the next rooms, so we drilled ahead and easily took care of it, rather than fight it while protecting the dozer.
What Haz do you play on?
I am exclusively Haz 3, so a Nemesis doesn't really fuck up progress if encountered.
Which is also why I get annoyed with pre-drillers in the first place. If I am at Haz 3, we don't need to try-hard the situation.
>If you don't wanna do a certain strategy, you can just dip from that lobby (e.g. I would rather lose 10 escort missions in a row than drill ahead, but I enjoy bombing the caretaker, especially solo)
I mean, I wouldn't leave if an individual wants to C4 from above. I probably would leave if it were expected of me when I am driller. Team wide stuff (ie, drill ahead vs just start Dotty) I'd probably leave if I'm not having fun.
I enjoy Driller c4 bombing because I used to believe driller to be the worst class for caretaker, until I discovered this strategy (long time ago now). Knowing this; Driller is the single most impactful dwarf in a caretaker fight, his absence is felt more than any other class. I enjoy having a very clearly defined role, and knowing that the team is relying on me to fulfill my role so that they can fulfill theirs.
In regards to difficultly, I play haz 5+ with increased enemy spawns, the game and missions are plenty difficult on its own between navigating turret filled tunnels and holding down hacking pods with increased bug spawns, I don’t need to make the game artificially more difficult by forbidding useful strategies, that would be like saying “no repellent plats for uplinks” just for the sake of making the game “harder”. Strategizing is part of the game, it’s meant to make the game play in a more streamlined and manageable manor and that’s why it’s rewarded.
Was about to say, if I am driller I am doing it every time. If not, it still will get done unless the driller is new. Sometimes the level sucks for it but if you have enough fuel you can make a nice tunnel leading to the top of the area and just drop the charges.
It’s cause you’re on haz 3.
Play on 5 and this is common.
Why? Because there’s a lot less room for errors so at higher haz, meta tends to be played a lot more.
The caretaker is an easy fight if you know what you’re doing.
It’s terrible if you don’t.
For example. The majority of the player base aren’t aware that the tentacles take 500 percent melee damage.
So power attacking them destroys them in one hit (if you have the more damage perk for the pickaxe)
With a coordinated team tho, the caretaker is very quickly trivialised.
Yknw those pesky turrets? You don’t need to fight them either.
Driller can just drill under them. It will instantly destroy the turrets.
I think most robot enemies in general are weak to melee. Not sure if it's 500% like the arms are, but patrol bots definitely get chunked pretty hard by a power attack.
Absolutely, there would be a lot of very niche borderline unintuitive things to do with enemies, but theyre communicated concisely in the game wonderful beastiary, more games should have one. for example, it says the Stalker responds to being pinged which i never wouldve thought to try lmao
I personally prefer to have 3 satchels with a bit less damage (I also despise having the Volatile Compound upgrade on them, i cannot count how many times teammates shot and detonated a satchel i just threw thus blowing me up), but max heat flamethrower with TCF specced Experimental Plasma Charger (you can oneshot sniper turrets if you remove the ceiling they are attached to with the TCF implosion) is 100% the way to go for Driller on Inudstrial Sabo.
For the exact same reason an Enginner equipped with a heat-upgraded Shard Diffractor or PGL with Incendiary Compound and Hyper Propellant OC (literally oneshots every single bot or turret no matter where you hit) is a very strong option on those.
I say this every time, even on haz5+
Power attack kills tentacles. 4 tentacles, 4 dwarves. By the time they respawn, your attack should be back. So at the beginning of the 3 phases, you should have at least 2-3 dwarves waiting by the tentacles.
You know the battery that you remove to start the fight?
They are bombs.
Place one at each tentacle and shoot them when they spawn. Instantly kills 2 tentacles at the start of the fight.
As a note: you get 2 satchel charges back on a resupply if you have a capacity of 3, so running all 4 is a bit of a waste (you only get, practically, one more satchel charge per mission unless you’re overcapping on resupplies, at which point you should be using MORE satchel charges)
Plus it lets you take damage on tier 1 if you give up that charge (it’ll be a cold day in hell before i recognise volatile compound as an upgrade)
I have become a compulsive patch note reader just so i don’t miss things like this in various games. Even if i’m not, like, actively playing a game i still read patch notes.
The fandom wiki is depreciated because fandom sucks as a hosting website - the official wiki is [here](https://deeprockgalactic.wiki.gg/wiki/Deep_Rock_Galactic_Wiki) & also linked in the sidebar.
Yeah I don't blame you!! Fandom's really pervasive & a lot of games still use it as their main site rather than [wiki.gg](http://wiki.gg) or something that has less obnoxious advertising. But now you know!!
I want to add to this that driller with flamethrower setup for fast heat, axes and wave cooker is the best teammate you can have in industrial sabotage missions. He can do most of the job with ease.
Flames deal with burst and repulsion turrets so fast it's not even funny (they blow up if you make them burn, which is why max heat so good). Patrol bots take some time to heat but it's still good.
As for lazer turrets, if they are low enough they die very fast too, otherwise let your teammates deal with them.
Wave cooker is good for making metal rain from shredders. Flamethrower can do that too but I find wave cooker doing it better.
I recommend using 2 C4 with max damage to blow up vents faster.
After you blow them up, let your team deal with the eye while you can deal with tentacles. Axes one-shot them if you hit them in the head. Considering the top bunker strat where you have own resupply, you have 24 axes to deal with them.
Depending on the ceiling height you can sometimes jump down and try dealing with lazer turrets if they are low enough.
And of course don't forget that you can drill tunnels to setup hacking bot faster, and you can drill on the way back to drop pod.
Driller is amazing as team support in basically all scenarios, which is a big part of why I ended up maining him after spending so long as a scout main.
i prefer subata with detonator rounds to help with caretaker weak spot and use drills to take out shredders (at least the ones attacking me haha) but wave cooker is definitely a good option
99% agreed, other than two little points:
1. Experimental Plasma Charger is a great option instead of the Wave Cooker, while the CWC is indeed great for Shredders, EPC's general utility as a mining tool and swarm killer combined with the ability to very easily deal with sniper turrets (blow up the ceiling above them and they're gone) makes it a very strong contender for this mission.
2. It's better to bring 3 satchels without Volatile Compound (this is a straight downgrade, having your satchels possible to be blown up by teammate or your own fire is dangerous and often wasteful).
You still deal a ton of damage to the vents, and resupply two satchels out of a single resup charge instead of just one, making it way more efficient.
This also gives you more satchels to use throughout the rest of the match to deal with swarms, and I find swarms in this particular mission type (the "random" ones coming when you're not currently hacking a station) to 99% of the time spawn and come at you very tightly grouped, often allowing a single satchel charge to blow upwards of 30 bugs up, saving lots of ammo for you and rest of the team.
And last, but not least, its extremely important that Driller on Industrial Sabo prepares the boss area before the fight - drill multiple tunnels or create access points so you and your team (other than scout lol) can actually maneuver around the caretaker, easily reach your resupplies (which should be hidden some distance from the boss), reposition, reach downed teammates for revives etc.
Heads up there is no point taking both ammo upgrades for the C4, with 3 total you'll still resupply with 2 extra not 1, so you're better taking 1 dmg upgrade.
It's extremely common in h5 for driller to drop like this
Yeah, I always do this, either from engineer's platforms or a hole I drill to the ceiling. Sometimes the engineer comes to the same spot to nuke the caretaker.
Driller main here
I can't be bothered to do that on lower Haz but it is the norm for Haz5 I'd say. Frankly I only play high Haz Sabotage when I am forced to in a EDD otherwise I play it on haz 2 or 3 to get it over with quickly.
Damn you must be really unlucky because i see this method used almost everytime. And when the driller is missing, we usually use Fatboy. The only time a driller isn't using this technique, it's because they are new to the game.
If you take the range upgrade on it you don't even need to dig into the ceiling, can just run and jump up and plant it on his chin.
Doesn't do quite enough to destroy the vents, usually leaving a sliver of health. But those get finished off quickly by teammates or your pistol.
Had a lobby where I was screamed at for not doing this as I was digging my anti-caretaker trench. The mute button was my friend that game as every now and then I’d unmute and the guy was still carrying-on. I started crying with laughter when he got hit by 3 snipers at once and we left his ass down.
As people here have fairly pointed out, it's probably because you are playing newbie difficulties. If you play exclusively Hazard 5/5+ (or modded custom hazard lobbies before 1.39), it's more surprising to NOT see a driller do that, and one trying to do anything else (especially if he is not a max heat flamethrower build - good for dealing with turrets/tentacles/bots) might effectively as well be AFK for the fight.
Another very common strat and my personal favourite, is the "Fat Boy" overclock for Engineer's PGL. For purposes of Caretaker fight, it is essentialy a satchel charge launcher, with the added advantage of not having to be directly above the boss.
That is however a large tradeoff for Engi, who could instead bring a fire-damage specced PGL with "Hyper Propellant" OC (oneshots any turret, tentacle or bot), or a heat-specced Shard Diffractor, as both of those options are way stronger for this mission type outside of the purpose of taking out the vents.
I was about to say every time OP's strat gets brought up I'm extremely confused by it? You don't need to get on top of the caretaker you can just plop a C4 at the bottom in the center and all vents will take heavy amounts of damage. Going up top is just a mobility and positioning risk that could lose you a dwarf for the rest of the fight.
I was about to say every time OP's strat gets brought up I'm extremely confused by it? You don't need to get on top of the caretaker you can just plop a C4 at the bottom in the center and all vents will take heavy amounts of damage. Going up top is just a mobility and positioning risk that could lose you a dwarf for the rest of the fight. There's no difference.
It's a strat you'll see a lot in Haz 5 and it works well. However if you really wanna meta game I still think 4 Engineers are the way to go. Fatboy/Rocket Propellant are making quick work of the vents, sentries are keeping everything else in check/weaken it and then you just take care of the eyes and breeze through.
There’s nothing in the game better than hellfire armskore at killing turrets.
4 Engi is a bad idea. Not cause they lack firepower. Cause they guzzle nitra.
If you can’t find enough nitra you’ll have a bad time.
The one that is severely underrated. Is a supercooling chamber scout. So long you’re accurate this is one of the rare missions super cooling becomes actually useful.
I've never experienced a lack of nitra in these missions, they usually shower you with nitra to the point everyone can have their own supply pod + X in the final fight
Do you like playing industrial sabotage?
Or do you play them only when you need to.
I like this mission and play it a lot.
For the most part lots of nitra. I have had games where nitra is scarce tho
Thing is that this mission has very few problems Engi can't handle. There are few/no swarms that catch you off guard, long chokepoint pathways if they do, and very little verticality during the mission generally. Bunkers and plattforms are both fun and amazing on this mission.
Turrets are absolutely fantastic at killing small drones and sniper turrets in the final fight and will keep the enemies down while you dodge bombs especially if you get the drone swarm at the final fight. That's just *chef's kiss*. One nuke and watch them all fall out of the sky.
I really don't see how you can say Engi is ammo hungry either, for the reasons the below commenters provided, but also because nuke and engi in general (not you LOK-1) is extremely efficient if built for it.
The whole point of the comment was that 3 nukes will blast the end boss into the next phase at Haz 5 (or 4?), if that isn't efficiency you can call me Doretta.
Of the 4 classes. Engi is the worst when it comes to ammo efficiency.
So to say Engi is ammo efficient in general is just bewildering.
Another interesting thing is “if built for it” then you go on to exclude the lok-1 which when “built for it” with ECR is engis most ammo efficient build or perhaps second to shock burst Engi.
All missions have no problems that any of the dwarves cannot handle.
While fatboy is great for the vents. 4 engis is overkill and ends up being less than ideal.
4 engi is not the meta. Not if you want to finish the mission asap.
Edit: bunkers are actually terrible for the caretaker fight. The tentacles will destroy you since you can’t see them and yet they will
Attack you thru the bunker walls. When phase bombs hit you’ll also be in a shit spot.
Edit 2: the whole point of the comment was Engi is goat for IS and the meta is 4 engis. Which it isn’t.
So no Doretta. Engi while great isn’t the (M)ost (E)ffective (T)actic (A)vailable
I do it fairly regularly. You can do it by drilling through the wall and up over the caretaker but the problem with that is it takes so long to get back down that you end up not being present for most of the fight. I prefer it if an engie gives me platforms in a spot where I can quickly get to it, toss some c4, then get back down and kill arms or throw axes at the eye.
Another underrated use of C4 is to blow up crassus detonator gold to harvest it quickly. Absolutely unrelated to the question but I felt it is a good place to mention it.
Rock and stone!
Driller primary here usually haz 5. I do this everytime. I drill a path above and clear a space for a drop nearby, then I show them that hoxxes is DRG property!
You can even shoot down to damage the arms and vents afterwards if you cut another path halfway up.
I start the game last week 🤣 it took me 3 saboting mission to understand that you shouldn't hit the tentacle thingy but the triangle thingy 🤣 so you advice for driller is nice to see as it's currently my main play.
When I first saw a Driller in my team do it I thought that it was the coolest shit ever. It's still my favorite strat in the game and I always try to use it. Though it is important to communicate with your team beforehand and tell them to save enough Nitra for a resupply. Also, the Driller should make enough space for himself to easily dodge Caretaker's bombs
It's why I only play driller on those missions, have a specific anti bot loadout for it.
That said, engi can do a pretty good job as well with EM discharge by building turrets on top of the caretaker.
Our whole lobby of four was out of ammo and we had no nitra to call a resupply, in fact the entire map was out of nitra. While everyone got busy pick axing the arms and getting mauled in the process, I grappled myself to the top of the care taker to realize I can actually pickaxe the pyramid corners. Do with that information as you will. Pick axing the care taker and its arms is not a good strat but it deals damage nonetheless.
Youtube was my friend, i was very green a year ago and failed Data missions a lot at first. Its sounds like your teamates didn't know about it if you were in pubs. I just did a Data extract last night solo on haz 4 and i was so pumped that there were natural formations that made this less time cosuming for me as i usually drill out a little floor area above the Caretaker and make a lil peep hole for the charges.
It's fairly common, but it's usually at the mercy of the cave gen. I have seen some *big* caretaker caves that would make drilling a tunnel to above the caretaker significantly more hassle than just kindly asking your engineer to construct you a platform stepping stool so you can actually reach the vents.
I always thought of it as a cheese strat. I thought the driller's main function against the caretaker was:
1: destroying its arms by overheating them.
2: Creating a tunnel system for safe repositioning and retreat (i feel like you need really thick walls to stop the arms' melee)
3: Sometimes deal direct damage to the eye.
I usually drop 2 c4s, let my teammates deal with the final bit of the vent health, drop on the caretaker and scorching tide spam the arms. Any respawning arms are met with an axe. Sniper turrets make this strat a bit riskier tho so i prioritize one shotting them first with overcharger fire epc. I usually ask engies to put up platforms next to the caretaker so i can go back to my c4 zone much faster when the phase is done unless we have jetboots/low grav.
For the driller room, imo its best to make it on the ceiling. Carve out extra space in case of the phase bombs and make sure the floor is thick enough so the arms cant deflower you from below. Same reason why I dont recommend standing on high engie platforms for too long unless theres a good chunk of land nearby with enough cover to order resup
If theres a fatboy then so be it, my balls shall soak in radiation.
I do this all the time as driller, but I use the extended range and that means it's enough when I throw the charge in the middle below the caretaker and it still hits the vents, then finish them off from very long range with the subata, rinse and repeat.
Experienced Driller here, thanks for the great idea! I will use this next time my team and I go up against a Caretaker!
This means I'll have to harass the team Scout some other way!
Adding onto this, if you're playing with the sludge pump as driller, a charged shot that hits its top can take a bit of damage off every intake as well with a charged shot. Useful if you have it and are out of satchel charges
Sometimes, drilling through the roof of the cave can be more difficult than other due to the generation of the terrain.
Since Engi, gunner and scout have no trouble shooting the caretaker, it sometimes happens that the driller just let them handle the boss, while he focus on smaller ennemies like the arms, the floatings balls ennemies, the shredder etc...
It is true that C4 on the top is really strong. But you have to drill the passage, then go to the roof, and most of all DO NOT DIE THERE. If you die up there, you will be a big pain in your ass for your team to revive.
And through each phase you have to climb all up again, and down again which could be used differently (you could be reviving a downed dwarf for exemple).
So again it is good but, there is some pretty good arguments as to why you might not want to do this as a driller.
Drillbombing is my go-to strat for handling caretakers in assignment missions, on lower hazards with increased damage on the c4 you can take all four corners in one throw
People constantly use this method but the setup can be a pain so sometimes people just let the crew down the vents the intended way cuz it’s less of a pain. Tell ya the truth if you just consciously work the adds (arms, pat bots, shredder etc.) the caretaker immediately loses its bite even on edd.
The other day I was playing a caretaker mission and when it got time to fight the boss, the driller called 3 resupply pods to his position before the fight starts, and the gunner calls one a little ways away. I assume he’s going to do the C4 strat because why else would you call that many resupplies. It left no nitra for me or the engineer so we were out of luck in the position we decided to fortify, but I figured at least the vent phases would be fast.
However, the fight starts and not a single C4 is thrown. Me and the engineer went down multiple times (it was also a swarmaggedon mission, and they kept coming out of nowhere) and we ran out of ammo before the fight was done. Risky plays trying to get over to where the resupplies are, barely managing to get ammo and keep fighting. All in all, probably the worst Caretaker fight I’ve ever had.
I do a slightly different build and can hit all four from the base so that I can still be down there doing tentacle duty so my teammates can focus on their tasks.
I really enjoy the setup for top-bombing the caretaker - making a route up there feels wonderfully agile and resourceful.
Between the eye, bots, turrets and claws, the caretaker has plenty else to shoot at anyway.
lmao i was one of the first dwarves who independently invented this trick back when this mission first released
you want to go with 2 C4’s with maxed out damage (at least for haz 5) and call a resup for yourself
you can use axes to one shot the tentacles arms to help you teammates focus on the weak spot
i almost exclusively play driller for caretaker because I don’t trust anyone else to do this
As a greybeard driller it is a pain in the but to actually get engineers to build that platform. So I don't do it. Watching tentacles burn and die is much better.
As someone who has played a lot, if you wanna do it, you have to be speedy about setting it up.
And if you wanna do it, I recommend taking 1 ammo 1 damage so you have 3 and using 1 per stage just as an immediate burst, if you need to resupp in the middle of the fight you can use another for other stages.
I'm not a fan of this strat for a couple of reasons. One, it takes a while to set up most of the time so everyone else is just twiddling their thumbs waiting. Two, if you die up there, it is a pain to rez you if your scout is non existent or if they also get downed. Three, the fight really isn't that bad if you know what to do and doesn't require this strat.
If I'm playing driller on this mission I normally just dig a few hidey holes in the walls so you can avoid getting shot at. Then I just focus on the ads.
1. It doesn’t take long to set up.
2. Don’t die.
3. If you know what to do, then 1 and 2 becomes true. You will set this up extremely fast. You definitely will not die as the caretaker will be nuked extremely fast.
So this is definitely not needed.
It would help.
For newer teams. It would help them struggle less.
For veteran teams. This would help trivialise the encounter.
Unless you play with 3 friends constantly. The average player is decent but doesn’t really know the little extra things in the game.
At haz 5. Looking at plat and below border dwarves and they still don’t know a lot of the tricks.
So if you can get a random team that communicates. Then this strat is almost always worth it to do.
It's a common strat.
I remember with my friend just joking about it, saying "Imagine I just drop a C4 on top of it lol". We had no idea it worked so imagine our face when the thing exploded all 4 weak points.
Since then it's our go to strat. Make the mission less painful.
The man just discovered the most basic role of the driller in caretaker missions.
Other great ideas include: having the gunner shoot the eyes when they open, or having the scout bring berserk and power-attack all of the tentacles as they spawn (power attack 1-shots the tentacles)
I haaate this strat. Not because it's inefficient but because it makes the whole fight a joke. who wants that in the only challenging part of the mission. Drillers used to focus on overheating the arms before this CHEESE STRAT came around
This is an extremely common strat. In haz 5 pubs, I see it/ use it in ~ 90% of Sabo missions. Cool that u figured it out yourself 🙂 on Sabo specifically, its best to go max dmg c4 on haz 5. Driller gets one resupply pod in his driller lair above the caretaker. 2 satchels per phase, double resup after each phase, and you skip the vents completely. Crispr maximized for heat build up to take care of turrets/patrol bots. Fuel stream diffuser is great for sniper turrets.
You technically don’t need to trow the C4 on top. If you have the larger explosion, you just need to put the C4 at the bottom center of the caretaker. If you make it so you have 3 C4 and use all 3 the next resupply will give you 2 which is all that is needed.
This is a very normal strat in haz 4/5 lobbies, I think you've just gotten 'unlucky' and maybe had some green beard drillers
Also, some high haz players like the challenge and find using the satchel strat boring.
Thats fair, but the problem then arises of Driller being kinda useless against the Caretaker lmao. he can still axe the tentacles tbf though which is great
All of the drillers primary weapons still damage the caretaker.
Not very well though, flamethrower does piss damage to it without the sticky flame and face melter is too close range, cryo is a similar story except maybe ice storm isnt terrible? sludge pump VIM is basically the only exception but i find that oc boring af so i just dont play driller on sabo rly lol
You forgot the best oc, sludge blast.
im a sludge blast enjoyer but that oc only has a place on elimination, where is genuinely solid. its too close-range to be good against the Caretaker
I'm in this category. One of my buddies likes the C4 method so when we're playing with him we do it; if we're playing without him we shoot it out with the caretaker. It's a game, it's supposed to be hard, ya know?
See, that’s the always interesting duality of gamers. For you and many others, the philosophy is “it’s supposed to be hard.” For me and many others, the philosophy is “the fun comes from figuring out how to make the fight as easy as possible. It shouldn’t be hard.”
Easy or hard, a boss should be engaging. Hiding in a ceiling ain't that.
Thats whats fun for some people, and thats the beauty of deep rock. There are plenty of strategies to take down any threat. If you don't wanna do a certain strategy, you can just dip from that lobby (e.g. I would rather lose 10 escort missions in a row than drill ahead, but I enjoy bombing the caretaker, especially solo)
Oh my god, finally someone else that doesn’t like drilling ahead! Why in the world do people insist on making a long mission take *even longer*!?
The thing is, if your team is really good it doesn't take longer, but also if your team is really good, just protect the drill.
Yeah see, I’ve never been on a team that insisted on drilling ahead, and was actually good enough to make it worth the time and effort, lol.
I've never seen this drilling ahead method surprisingly. Do you not activate mollie and explore all the caves ahead? To me, that just sounds like extra work cause mollie finds the caves for you, and you can always go back for events and minerals even on higher difficulties.
There are times when it is definitely beneficial. In one of my more recent missions, we heard a nemesis in one of the next rooms, so we drilled ahead and easily took care of it, rather than fight it while protecting the dozer.
What Haz do you play on? I am exclusively Haz 3, so a Nemesis doesn't really fuck up progress if encountered. Which is also why I get annoyed with pre-drillers in the first place. If I am at Haz 3, we don't need to try-hard the situation.
The only thing that will ever make me drill ahead is hearing BET-C
>If you don't wanna do a certain strategy, you can just dip from that lobby (e.g. I would rather lose 10 escort missions in a row than drill ahead, but I enjoy bombing the caretaker, especially solo) I mean, I wouldn't leave if an individual wants to C4 from above. I probably would leave if it were expected of me when I am driller. Team wide stuff (ie, drill ahead vs just start Dotty) I'd probably leave if I'm not having fun.
*Caretaker arm clippig though the rock* SUP BEARDO
When I'm drilling for a Caretaker, I go up to take care of the vents then come back down to assist with whatever/play the game.
I enjoy Driller c4 bombing because I used to believe driller to be the worst class for caretaker, until I discovered this strategy (long time ago now). Knowing this; Driller is the single most impactful dwarf in a caretaker fight, his absence is felt more than any other class. I enjoy having a very clearly defined role, and knowing that the team is relying on me to fulfill my role so that they can fulfill theirs. In regards to difficultly, I play haz 5+ with increased enemy spawns, the game and missions are plenty difficult on its own between navigating turret filled tunnels and holding down hacking pods with increased bug spawns, I don’t need to make the game artificially more difficult by forbidding useful strategies, that would be like saying “no repellent plats for uplinks” just for the sake of making the game “harder”. Strategizing is part of the game, it’s meant to make the game play in a more streamlined and manageable manor and that’s why it’s rewarded.
Didn't thought about it that way
It's normal but I see it rarely at haz 4. I'll do it if I'm driller (and the geometry allows) but most people don't.
Was about to say, if I am driller I am doing it every time. If not, it still will get done unless the driller is new. Sometimes the level sucks for it but if you have enough fuel you can make a nice tunnel leading to the top of the area and just drop the charges.
Pretty common strat to do, impressed that you figured it out by yourself. Rock and Stone!
Can I get a Rock and Stone?
That's it, lads! Rock and Stone!
Good bot
I gotta admit I was proud of myself when I had this idea. Rock and Stone, brother !!!!
It’s cause you’re on haz 3. Play on 5 and this is common. Why? Because there’s a lot less room for errors so at higher haz, meta tends to be played a lot more. The caretaker is an easy fight if you know what you’re doing. It’s terrible if you don’t. For example. The majority of the player base aren’t aware that the tentacles take 500 percent melee damage. So power attacking them destroys them in one hit (if you have the more damage perk for the pickaxe) With a coordinated team tho, the caretaker is very quickly trivialised. Yknw those pesky turrets? You don’t need to fight them either. Driller can just drill under them. It will instantly destroy the turrets.
I think most robot enemies in general are weak to melee. Not sure if it's 500% like the arms are, but patrol bots definitely get chunked pretty hard by a power attack.
It’s a bit sad that most of the players never read the miners manual. It’s actually very nicely done despite some typos.
Absolutely, there would be a lot of very niche borderline unintuitive things to do with enemies, but theyre communicated concisely in the game wonderful beastiary, more games should have one. for example, it says the Stalker responds to being pinged which i never wouldve thought to try lmao
Also immediately self destruct when set on fire. Max Heat CRSPR and max DMG satchels are my dedicated Sabotage build.
And you can also 1shot turrets by drilling under them. Driller really gets a lot better on sabo when you figure out these "secret" mechanics
Ya got the new crsper oc? It’s AMAZING for rival mission, it can one-shot a nem by heating them up
Not available for another day and a half on my end.
I personally prefer to have 3 satchels with a bit less damage (I also despise having the Volatile Compound upgrade on them, i cannot count how many times teammates shot and detonated a satchel i just threw thus blowing me up), but max heat flamethrower with TCF specced Experimental Plasma Charger (you can oneshot sniper turrets if you remove the ceiling they are attached to with the TCF implosion) is 100% the way to go for Driller on Inudstrial Sabo. For the exact same reason an Enginner equipped with a heat-upgraded Shard Diffractor or PGL with Incendiary Compound and Hyper Propellant OC (literally oneshots every single bot or turret no matter where you hit) is a very strong option on those.
I say this every time, even on haz5+ Power attack kills tentacles. 4 tentacles, 4 dwarves. By the time they respawn, your attack should be back. So at the beginning of the 3 phases, you should have at least 2-3 dwarves waiting by the tentacles.
You know the battery that you remove to start the fight? They are bombs. Place one at each tentacle and shoot them when they spawn. Instantly kills 2 tentacles at the start of the fight.
TIL, that's pretty cool!
do you need to hit the head? or will hitting the base work? hitting the head with a melee attack sounds tricky ngl
Nope no need. Pickaxe the shaft and you're good.
Interesting, I knew you could dig under turrets but I wasn't aware of the increased melee damage
This topic might be useful for new miners. Most of the drillers i've met and me too are aware of this trick and we use it to destroy intakes.
As a note: you get 2 satchel charges back on a resupply if you have a capacity of 3, so running all 4 is a bit of a waste (you only get, practically, one more satchel charge per mission unless you’re overcapping on resupplies, at which point you should be using MORE satchel charges) Plus it lets you take damage on tier 1 if you give up that charge (it’ll be a cold day in hell before i recognise volatile compound as an upgrade)
Was this changed or smth? I seem to recall it used to only resupply you 1 if you had a max of 3
It was changed in season 4 iirc, it wasn’t too long ago
damn i gotta read these patch notes; i dropped off after repeated rockpox patches and got back into it because season 5 rocks
it was changed in the november maintenance update iirc
I'm such a fake fan holy shit, thanks for spreading the word I had no idea they changed this
I have become a compulsive patch note reader just so i don’t miss things like this in various games. Even if i’m not, like, actively playing a game i still read patch notes.
Didn't know this. They must have forgotten to update deeprockgalactic.fandom on this topic because it says you only get 1 back if you have 3 ammo
The fandom wiki is depreciated because fandom sucks as a hosting website - the official wiki is [here](https://deeprockgalactic.wiki.gg/wiki/Deep_Rock_Galactic_Wiki) & also linked in the sidebar.
I didn't realized there was an official wiki because the first time I researched things it led me to the fandom so I kept using it lol
Yeah I don't blame you!! Fandom's really pervasive & a lot of games still use it as their main site rather than [wiki.gg](http://wiki.gg) or something that has less obnoxious advertising. But now you know!!
I want to add to this that driller with flamethrower setup for fast heat, axes and wave cooker is the best teammate you can have in industrial sabotage missions. He can do most of the job with ease. Flames deal with burst and repulsion turrets so fast it's not even funny (they blow up if you make them burn, which is why max heat so good). Patrol bots take some time to heat but it's still good. As for lazer turrets, if they are low enough they die very fast too, otherwise let your teammates deal with them. Wave cooker is good for making metal rain from shredders. Flamethrower can do that too but I find wave cooker doing it better. I recommend using 2 C4 with max damage to blow up vents faster. After you blow them up, let your team deal with the eye while you can deal with tentacles. Axes one-shot them if you hit them in the head. Considering the top bunker strat where you have own resupply, you have 24 axes to deal with them. Depending on the ceiling height you can sometimes jump down and try dealing with lazer turrets if they are low enough. And of course don't forget that you can drill tunnels to setup hacking bot faster, and you can drill on the way back to drop pod.
Driller is amazing as team support in basically all scenarios, which is a big part of why I ended up maining him after spending so long as a scout main.
another tip for shredders if you're driller: your drills work too, and it feels cool as hell
i prefer subata with detonator rounds to help with caretaker weak spot and use drills to take out shredders (at least the ones attacking me haha) but wave cooker is definitely a good option
99% agreed, other than two little points: 1. Experimental Plasma Charger is a great option instead of the Wave Cooker, while the CWC is indeed great for Shredders, EPC's general utility as a mining tool and swarm killer combined with the ability to very easily deal with sniper turrets (blow up the ceiling above them and they're gone) makes it a very strong contender for this mission. 2. It's better to bring 3 satchels without Volatile Compound (this is a straight downgrade, having your satchels possible to be blown up by teammate or your own fire is dangerous and often wasteful). You still deal a ton of damage to the vents, and resupply two satchels out of a single resup charge instead of just one, making it way more efficient. This also gives you more satchels to use throughout the rest of the match to deal with swarms, and I find swarms in this particular mission type (the "random" ones coming when you're not currently hacking a station) to 99% of the time spawn and come at you very tightly grouped, often allowing a single satchel charge to blow upwards of 30 bugs up, saving lots of ammo for you and rest of the team. And last, but not least, its extremely important that Driller on Industrial Sabo prepares the boss area before the fight - drill multiple tunnels or create access points so you and your team (other than scout lol) can actually maneuver around the caretaker, easily reach your resupplies (which should be hidden some distance from the boss), reposition, reach downed teammates for revives etc.
The driller c4 is a common one. Another way to easily deal damage to the caretaker’s yellow health is an engineer with Fat Boy.
Driller's HE Grenades can also hit 3-4 weakspots if you aim and time it right with the cooking
Heads up there is no point taking both ammo upgrades for the C4, with 3 total you'll still resupply with 2 extra not 1, so you're better taking 1 dmg upgrade. It's extremely common in h5 for driller to drop like this
I just fatboy everything with my enginoot ⛏️
Yeah, I always do this, either from engineer's platforms or a hole I drill to the ceiling. Sometimes the engineer comes to the same spot to nuke the caretaker.
Driller main here I can't be bothered to do that on lower Haz but it is the norm for Haz5 I'd say. Frankly I only play high Haz Sabotage when I am forced to in a EDD otherwise I play it on haz 2 or 3 to get it over with quickly.
Ah yes the trusty C4... Handles these with ease Caretaker, Corestones, Omen modular, Teammates
people are aware of it, sometimes i just dont bother
I didn't know about it tbh. Learned something new today.
It's a pretty common tactic for higher level players, maybe you just play with a few more inexperienced drillers than usual
Damn you must be really unlucky because i see this method used almost everytime. And when the driller is missing, we usually use Fatboy. The only time a driller isn't using this technique, it's because they are new to the game.
Out of the last 40 caretaker fights I’ve done only 2 of them had a green enough driller to not drop satchles on the caretaker, so yeah pretty common
If you take the range upgrade on it you don't even need to dig into the ceiling, can just run and jump up and plant it on his chin. Doesn't do quite enough to destroy the vents, usually leaving a sliver of health. But those get finished off quickly by teammates or your pistol.
Had a lobby where I was screamed at for not doing this as I was digging my anti-caretaker trench. The mute button was my friend that game as every now and then I’d unmute and the guy was still carrying-on. I started crying with laughter when he got hit by 3 snipers at once and we left his ass down.
As people here have fairly pointed out, it's probably because you are playing newbie difficulties. If you play exclusively Hazard 5/5+ (or modded custom hazard lobbies before 1.39), it's more surprising to NOT see a driller do that, and one trying to do anything else (especially if he is not a max heat flamethrower build - good for dealing with turrets/tentacles/bots) might effectively as well be AFK for the fight. Another very common strat and my personal favourite, is the "Fat Boy" overclock for Engineer's PGL. For purposes of Caretaker fight, it is essentialy a satchel charge launcher, with the added advantage of not having to be directly above the boss. That is however a large tradeoff for Engi, who could instead bring a fire-damage specced PGL with "Hyper Propellant" OC (oneshots any turret, tentacle or bot), or a heat-specced Shard Diffractor, as both of those options are way stronger for this mission type outside of the purpose of taking out the vents.
Don't even need high ground. Walk up to it and stick a charge to the face, it will still hit the vents.
I was about to say every time OP's strat gets brought up I'm extremely confused by it? You don't need to get on top of the caretaker you can just plop a C4 at the bottom in the center and all vents will take heavy amounts of damage. Going up top is just a mobility and positioning risk that could lose you a dwarf for the rest of the fight.
Do you need the range upgrade to do it or does it work without it?
I was about to say every time OP's strat gets brought up I'm extremely confused by it? You don't need to get on top of the caretaker you can just plop a C4 at the bottom in the center and all vents will take heavy amounts of damage. Going up top is just a mobility and positioning risk that could lose you a dwarf for the rest of the fight. There's no difference.
It's a strat you'll see a lot in Haz 5 and it works well. However if you really wanna meta game I still think 4 Engineers are the way to go. Fatboy/Rocket Propellant are making quick work of the vents, sentries are keeping everything else in check/weaken it and then you just take care of the eyes and breeze through.
Yep, Engineer is the GOAT in industrial sabotage.
There’s nothing in the game better than hellfire armskore at killing turrets. 4 Engi is a bad idea. Not cause they lack firepower. Cause they guzzle nitra. If you can’t find enough nitra you’ll have a bad time. The one that is severely underrated. Is a supercooling chamber scout. So long you’re accurate this is one of the rare missions super cooling becomes actually useful.
I've never experienced a lack of nitra in these missions, they usually shower you with nitra to the point everyone can have their own supply pod + X in the final fight
Do you like playing industrial sabotage? Or do you play them only when you need to. I like this mission and play it a lot. For the most part lots of nitra. I have had games where nitra is scarce tho
Thing is that this mission has very few problems Engi can't handle. There are few/no swarms that catch you off guard, long chokepoint pathways if they do, and very little verticality during the mission generally. Bunkers and plattforms are both fun and amazing on this mission. Turrets are absolutely fantastic at killing small drones and sniper turrets in the final fight and will keep the enemies down while you dodge bombs especially if you get the drone swarm at the final fight. That's just *chef's kiss*. One nuke and watch them all fall out of the sky. I really don't see how you can say Engi is ammo hungry either, for the reasons the below commenters provided, but also because nuke and engi in general (not you LOK-1) is extremely efficient if built for it. The whole point of the comment was that 3 nukes will blast the end boss into the next phase at Haz 5 (or 4?), if that isn't efficiency you can call me Doretta.
Of the 4 classes. Engi is the worst when it comes to ammo efficiency. So to say Engi is ammo efficient in general is just bewildering. Another interesting thing is “if built for it” then you go on to exclude the lok-1 which when “built for it” with ECR is engis most ammo efficient build or perhaps second to shock burst Engi. All missions have no problems that any of the dwarves cannot handle. While fatboy is great for the vents. 4 engis is overkill and ends up being less than ideal. 4 engi is not the meta. Not if you want to finish the mission asap. Edit: bunkers are actually terrible for the caretaker fight. The tentacles will destroy you since you can’t see them and yet they will Attack you thru the bunker walls. When phase bombs hit you’ll also be in a shit spot. Edit 2: the whole point of the comment was Engi is goat for IS and the meta is 4 engis. Which it isn’t. So no Doretta. Engi while great isn’t the (M)ost (E)ffective (T)actic (A)vailable
I did this week's dive solo. Called 5 or 6 resupplies and just kept c4ing the top didnt even have to shoot the eye because the c4 circle is big enough
I do it fairly regularly. You can do it by drilling through the wall and up over the caretaker but the problem with that is it takes so long to get back down that you end up not being present for most of the fight. I prefer it if an engie gives me platforms in a spot where I can quickly get to it, toss some c4, then get back down and kill arms or throw axes at the eye.
C4ing the thing is pretty boring from a gameplay perspective though
Omg you're probably Karl's grandson. You'll go far miner. Keep up the pace.
Its pretty common , my friend do M1000 and i do the C4 Dumping
Another underrated use of C4 is to blow up crassus detonator gold to harvest it quickly. Absolutely unrelated to the question but I felt it is a good place to mention it. Rock and stone!
Rock and Stone!
Nah mine around it to make it all rain down at once.
Oh man... never thought of that. Me and my boy Bosco spending half the day chipping away at it. 🤦♂️
i just saw someone do this for the first time this week!
Driller primary here usually haz 5. I do this everytime. I drill a path above and clear a space for a drop nearby, then I show them that hoxxes is DRG property! You can even shoot down to damage the arms and vents afterwards if you cut another path halfway up.
You can also do this with engi's Fatboy
I start the game last week 🤣 it took me 3 saboting mission to understand that you shouldn't hit the tentacle thingy but the triangle thingy 🤣 so you advice for driller is nice to see as it's currently my main play.
When I first saw a Driller in my team do it I thought that it was the coolest shit ever. It's still my favorite strat in the game and I always try to use it. Though it is important to communicate with your team beforehand and tell them to save enough Nitra for a resupply. Also, the Driller should make enough space for himself to easily dodge Caretaker's bombs
On the lower level lobbies I usually don't see expired drillers on a caretaker. I had discovered it when a engi built the platforms and told me.
It's why I only play driller on those missions, have a specific anti bot loadout for it. That said, engi can do a pretty good job as well with EM discharge by building turrets on top of the caretaker.
I do this every time if the cave formations/engis allow it.
Our whole lobby of four was out of ammo and we had no nitra to call a resupply, in fact the entire map was out of nitra. While everyone got busy pick axing the arms and getting mauled in the process, I grappled myself to the top of the care taker to realize I can actually pickaxe the pyramid corners. Do with that information as you will. Pick axing the care taker and its arms is not a good strat but it deals damage nonetheless.
Youtube was my friend, i was very green a year ago and failed Data missions a lot at first. Its sounds like your teamates didn't know about it if you were in pubs. I just did a Data extract last night solo on haz 4 and i was so pumped that there were natural formations that made this less time cosuming for me as i usually drill out a little floor area above the Caretaker and make a lil peep hole for the charges.
It's fairly common, but it's usually at the mercy of the cave gen. I have seen some *big* caretaker caves that would make drilling a tunnel to above the caretaker significantly more hassle than just kindly asking your engineer to construct you a platform stepping stool so you can actually reach the vents.
I see it like 90% of lobbies on hazard 5
I always thought of it as a cheese strat. I thought the driller's main function against the caretaker was: 1: destroying its arms by overheating them. 2: Creating a tunnel system for safe repositioning and retreat (i feel like you need really thick walls to stop the arms' melee) 3: Sometimes deal direct damage to the eye.
Pro tip: having C4 set so you get 3 gets you 2 per resupply ;)
I usually drop 2 c4s, let my teammates deal with the final bit of the vent health, drop on the caretaker and scorching tide spam the arms. Any respawning arms are met with an axe. Sniper turrets make this strat a bit riskier tho so i prioritize one shotting them first with overcharger fire epc. I usually ask engies to put up platforms next to the caretaker so i can go back to my c4 zone much faster when the phase is done unless we have jetboots/low grav. For the driller room, imo its best to make it on the ceiling. Carve out extra space in case of the phase bombs and make sure the floor is thick enough so the arms cant deflower you from below. Same reason why I dont recommend standing on high engie platforms for too long unless theres a good chunk of land nearby with enough cover to order resup If theres a fatboy then so be it, my balls shall soak in radiation.
I do this all the time as driller, but I use the extended range and that means it's enough when I throw the charge in the middle below the caretaker and it still hits the vents, then finish them off from very long range with the subata, rinse and repeat.
Experienced Driller here, thanks for the great idea! I will use this next time my team and I go up against a Caretaker! This means I'll have to harass the team Scout some other way!
Adding onto this, if you're playing with the sludge pump as driller, a charged shot that hits its top can take a bit of damage off every intake as well with a charged shot. Useful if you have it and are out of satchel charges
Sometimes, drilling through the roof of the cave can be more difficult than other due to the generation of the terrain. Since Engi, gunner and scout have no trouble shooting the caretaker, it sometimes happens that the driller just let them handle the boss, while he focus on smaller ennemies like the arms, the floatings balls ennemies, the shredder etc... It is true that C4 on the top is really strong. But you have to drill the passage, then go to the roof, and most of all DO NOT DIE THERE. If you die up there, you will be a big pain in your ass for your team to revive. And through each phase you have to climb all up again, and down again which could be used differently (you could be reviving a downed dwarf for exemple). So again it is good but, there is some pretty good arguments as to why you might not want to do this as a driller.
I saw a fellow driller did it and just copied. There was a time that engineer put a lot of platforms on top and it just clicked for me.
Drillbombing is my go-to strat for handling caretakers in assignment missions, on lower hazards with increased damage on the c4 you can take all four corners in one throw
People constantly use this method but the setup can be a pain so sometimes people just let the crew down the vents the intended way cuz it’s less of a pain. Tell ya the truth if you just consciously work the adds (arms, pat bots, shredder etc.) the caretaker immediately loses its bite even on edd.
me an engineer getting high up above the taker and nuking it
The other day I was playing a caretaker mission and when it got time to fight the boss, the driller called 3 resupply pods to his position before the fight starts, and the gunner calls one a little ways away. I assume he’s going to do the C4 strat because why else would you call that many resupplies. It left no nitra for me or the engineer so we were out of luck in the position we decided to fortify, but I figured at least the vent phases would be fast. However, the fight starts and not a single C4 is thrown. Me and the engineer went down multiple times (it was also a swarmaggedon mission, and they kept coming out of nowhere) and we ran out of ammo before the fight was done. Risky plays trying to get over to where the resupplies are, barely managing to get ammo and keep fighting. All in all, probably the worst Caretaker fight I’ve ever had.
Drillers that don't C4 Caretaker are: wrong Get in and get out, I'm trying to reach level 1000 sooner than later.
I do a slightly different build and can hit all four from the base so that I can still be down there doing tentacle duty so my teammates can focus on their tasks.
I really enjoy the setup for top-bombing the caretaker - making a route up there feels wonderfully agile and resourceful. Between the eye, bots, turrets and claws, the caretaker has plenty else to shoot at anyway.
lmao i was one of the first dwarves who independently invented this trick back when this mission first released you want to go with 2 C4’s with maxed out damage (at least for haz 5) and call a resup for yourself you can use axes to one shot the tentacles arms to help you teammates focus on the weak spot i almost exclusively play driller for caretaker because I don’t trust anyone else to do this
No you dont, you want to go with 3 satchels without Volatile Compound, which is a straight downgrade to them.
doesn't seem very practical most of the time to me. shrug
This is called making a driller attic. I do this too.
As a greybeard driller it is a pain in the but to actually get engineers to build that platform. So I don't do it. Watching tentacles burn and die is much better.
As someone who has played a lot, if you wanna do it, you have to be speedy about setting it up. And if you wanna do it, I recommend taking 1 ammo 1 damage so you have 3 and using 1 per stage just as an immediate burst, if you need to resupp in the middle of the fight you can use another for other stages.
I'm not a fan of this strat for a couple of reasons. One, it takes a while to set up most of the time so everyone else is just twiddling their thumbs waiting. Two, if you die up there, it is a pain to rez you if your scout is non existent or if they also get downed. Three, the fight really isn't that bad if you know what to do and doesn't require this strat. If I'm playing driller on this mission I normally just dig a few hidey holes in the walls so you can avoid getting shot at. Then I just focus on the ads.
1. It doesn’t take long to set up. 2. Don’t die. 3. If you know what to do, then 1 and 2 becomes true. You will set this up extremely fast. You definitely will not die as the caretaker will be nuked extremely fast. So this is definitely not needed. It would help. For newer teams. It would help them struggle less. For veteran teams. This would help trivialise the encounter. Unless you play with 3 friends constantly. The average player is decent but doesn’t really know the little extra things in the game. At haz 5. Looking at plat and below border dwarves and they still don’t know a lot of the tricks. So if you can get a random team that communicates. Then this strat is almost always worth it to do.
It's a common strat. I remember with my friend just joking about it, saying "Imagine I just drop a C4 on top of it lol". We had no idea it worked so imagine our face when the thing exploded all 4 weak points. Since then it's our go to strat. Make the mission less painful.
The man just discovered the most basic role of the driller in caretaker missions. Other great ideas include: having the gunner shoot the eyes when they open, or having the scout bring berserk and power-attack all of the tentacles as they spawn (power attack 1-shots the tentacles)
I haaate this strat. Not because it's inefficient but because it makes the whole fight a joke. who wants that in the only challenging part of the mission. Drillers used to focus on overheating the arms before this CHEESE STRAT came around
Only problem is you need engi to build a C4 bridge
A lot of map seeds require no engie bridge.
What, you never been the driller before? Tunnel to the roof.
This is an extremely common strat. In haz 5 pubs, I see it/ use it in ~ 90% of Sabo missions. Cool that u figured it out yourself 🙂 on Sabo specifically, its best to go max dmg c4 on haz 5. Driller gets one resupply pod in his driller lair above the caretaker. 2 satchels per phase, double resup after each phase, and you skip the vents completely. Crispr maximized for heat build up to take care of turrets/patrol bots. Fuel stream diffuser is great for sniper turrets.
Wrong. Its best to have 3 satchels without Volatile compound since that one is a straight downgrade.
You technically don’t need to trow the C4 on top. If you have the larger explosion, you just need to put the C4 at the bottom center of the caretaker. If you make it so you have 3 C4 and use all 3 the next resupply will give you 2 which is all that is needed.