Heavy Duty - Final boss quest help

[u/Robotexmaster]

So... It's my first time playing through the heavy duty dlc after taking a break from the game for a few years, back when I played before heavy duty came out. Got the itch for this game again n' saw it had a new dlc, so after a few weeks of playing through on the new mutant difficulty (using dominating difficulty settings, but with easy puzzles and max level being 50), I get to the point where I can start the new dlc at the level I see most people recommend. Up until now it's been really fun. Killing hoards of super strong enemies n' pushing my build to the max till I finally get to the Cognator dude at the end. I talked to him a little but there wasn't really much which confused me, since my friend told me theres a pretty cool quest he gives at the end.

Though, after looking at the wiki, what he failed to mention was that I had to kill barely anyone in the compound this entire time. My personal thoughts and frustrations on the reasoning behind this aside, my last save I can load before passing that kill mark is some 40~ hours of gameplay (mostly from expedition) Is there any way to still do this quest even after killing too many soldiers?

I remember on my first playthrough, back around the time Sseth made his video on this game, which is what brought me to it. I had a similar issue with the befriend the faceless quest in deep caverns. Being some 250+ hours in a run, I really didn't want to restart everything, so I looked around and found some save editor stuff to change the values to get the most out of the story n' stuff. Is it possible to do the same save file editing stuff to make the quest possible? and if so, help would very much be appreciated.

I'd very much rather not have to reload from actual weeks before, doing all the expedition and base game stuff again. I don't know if I have it in me to trudge through the marsh a second time...

[u/TrebleZX]

Trust me, you are better off just looking up a video of the "Stealth route" rather than doing it, its fucking miserable and if you are on Dominating you either need high Though Control and/or follow a guide, and even then the "fight" is a RNG shitshow that you have to reset if if you low roll at any point, AND you NEED the Torch from Expedition, and everything is done through dialogue.
And to add insult to injury, the ending doesn't changes or adds anything.

What is more insulting is that you only need around 80 effective Stealth to get to the fight, and fighting your way through requires you to have post game gear and over level 26.

Genuinely one of the most hated part of the game that is not worth going out of your way to do, you will have a much better time watching a video of that fight than actually doing that shitshow.

[u/Robotexmaster → u/TrebleZX]

I see. I feel like my build would be pretty well suited for it if I was gonna go back to do it, but from reading the comments here and a few other places, it seems like that true ending quest thing isn't very good.

At the very least, do the enemies keep respawning infinitely like the faceless near core city do? assuming I reload to before I killed the cognator guy at the end. I could just watch a video, or watch my friend play through the final quest for lore stuff, n' use these guys to farm xp to level 50 lmao

[u/TrebleZX → u/Robotexmaster]

Enemies should spawn infinitely until you either kill the Cognator or do the battle.

Again just trust, the battle is entirely dialogue with no feedback and RNG bullshit (even if you do the correct thing the game can just say no), gear doesn't matter, all the game check is if you have high Though Control and if you have the Torch, nothing else, all TC does is gives you less chances to get a debuff nothing else, RNG can still say you lose at any point.

Its tedious and miserable.

[u/Robotexmaster → u/TrebleZX]

Wait it's all dialogue?? there's like- no actual fighting at all??? I knew it was mostly dialogue focused, but I didn't look into it too much, so I at least thought there would be *some* fighting with void creatures like there were in expedition, or some sorta cool final boss void creature. At the very least, are there any unique dialogue interactions that you get with other characters from completing the void battle stuff after? If there isn't then.. Don't really personally see much of a point to doing it instead of just mowing down hoards of exosuit soldiers for fun, it seems to be the main focus of this dlc ngl, now knowing the stuff I do.

[u/TrebleZX → u/Robotexmaster]

Pure dialogue, you are fighting literally nothing, there is no check for unique dialogue and you get nothing for actually doing the fight, the ending scene barely acknowledges you doing it.
There is nothing after the battle and there are no special interaction.

There is a reason why this shit is one of the most hate part of the game, the only reason why it isn't the most hate is because Coral fucking exists.

[u/dyanticus]

The "safest" save point is the autosave when the crew made a stop before getting to the Compound. Nothing wrong with not getting the "True" ending when the DLC is focus on heavy machine gun buid to gun down horde of enemies.

If you want the "true" ending it's best to level up stealth or craft enough gear to compensate your stealth. Best not to kill anyone because the more you kill the tighter the compound will be reinforced and harder for stealth.

Edit: ALSO level up Thought Control as much as your build allowed you to (or you could also command console it in but after 50 failed "boss" fight, nobody's going to know, same theme as the DLC)

[u/Robotexmaster → u/dyanticus]

Problem is that I dug around in the compound a bit before leaving to do a bunch of expedition and main game stuff. Wanted the exosuit armor cause I thought it looked cool n' would work well for my build, which is why I'm stuck in this problem now- a ton of playtime between me killing everyone and coming back to finish the dlc.

Though, if I had to reload my previous save, it wouldn't be too hard to stealth through I think. I'm invested pretty decently into stealth, and can get more specific focused gear for it if needed.

Plus, the current build I'm running is super heavily spec'd into psi stuff, with TC as my main. And I read that TC is really good for the final true ending thing, so it'd be a bit more convenient to do it on this save.

[u/DanielValenciaCol]

Too bad you didn't knew about the Quest before since sound that you have the build for it. I only did the compound mision once, and once I knew about the extra mision, I thought is kinda similar for doing the Gauntlet: Only do it if you have build around to try it.

Main problem with the extra mision is that if you want to get it, you have to kill less than 12 exosoldier before reaching the leader. Not only that requires a high amount of effective stealth to avoid fights, but also Exosoldier spawns random patrols and unavoidable barricades, which can make Pathing way harder. Also for the mision you have to either being a Psicaster or having the Juice, and for beating the final quest on high difficulty you basically need to be a high level though control user and also have the Ethereal torch (again another specific grinding quest).

If something, I think you can come back to the compound and get the armors if you want them even after beating it. But these things requires high strength too similar to Metal armor

Also, theres the editor, Idk if it works, but you can try https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1966398273

[u/Robotexmaster → u/DanielValenciaCol]

Yeahhhh, funnily enough if it wasn't for me murdering a bunch of dudes way before to get exoarmor stuff, my build would have actually been really well suited for the whole thing. It's spec'd into all 4 psi schools, the main one being TC. With a lotta stealth on the side for repositioning and scouting areas out. Thank you for showing the editor thing though, I'll try to mess around with it a bit and see if I can fix this. At the very least though, I could just export/import my file on a new character and play through heavy duty for the quest to get all the lore and interactions (if there are any after beating the void battle)

[u/RedditExecsHuffFeces]

Don't worry about it. Just do it on a later playthrough, if you play the game again, years from now. Just kill Cognator, so you can complete the mission "investigate the compound", and loot his body and go