I’ve only played horde a few times in Gears 5 and I don’t really understand how the power taps work, or why I need to take such risks to do anything with them. I know that you have to stand next to it for like 20-25 seconds to cap it so unless i’m doing that between rounds I don’t see how or why I would ever do that. And when I do have it up and running and I can actually extract power from it, I get like 100 power. I’ve noticed that if I can extract multiple times I get more power but only in increments of maybe 100? Just doesn’t seem worth it. And sometimes my character just yells "power tap upgraded!’ but what’s the upgrade?
I figure I have to be using it incorrectly but can’t just futz around with it while preparing for a wave or killing things. Can someone enlighten me on what I’m supposed to do?
When you collect everyone on the team gets power and it goes up the more you use it. I don’t know the max but if you have 2 taps you could be getting maybe 400 power each per round (2000 power) in total.
I think the max is actually even higher than that. I think I’ve seen around 800 or so per person for a maxed tap. Definitely helps. I always try to relocate the fabricator to to the first tap that appears most of the time.
Oh EVERYONE gets it? That actually makes a big difference then, if you’re able to do it multiple times in multiple taps.
Follow up question then…wtf do you even spend it on? I’ve been playing Marcus and JD so I’m getting my perks and that’s nice, but no engineer I’ve played with is actually building or upgrading anything. Am I just playing with terrible engineers or do you really just spend power on yourself now? If the engineer is building, how does he advance his own perks, seems like he’s at a disadvantage? Or is this why you donate power to the fab, so the engineer can build stuff? Does anybody actually donate to the fab?
Engineers don’t get individual perks aside from cards.
How money is spent just depends on the team strategy. Public horde is mostly a free for all. Private games generally build a base first with a forge. Leveling of personal skills would be last.
If no one “donates” to the fabricator then the engineer can hardly do anything. Like others have said, public is free for all and chances of finishing an Elite or above on public are zero.
Play custom games, there is usually an engineer and the average player will contribute power on a regular basis.
But if you want a stupid amount of power, find a Jack with a max smelt card and a compulsive collecting (weapons) disorder and give him a lv4 forge. In my last game everyone was getting 3k by wave 15. By wave 40+ everyone was fooling around with 15k and hardly anything to spend it on.
Other than perks, you can also use power to buy a specific set of weapons. Marcus for example, can buy a retro lancer I believe so you could buy one to use as your second weapon so you have two weapons that take advantage of his assault rifle damage perk. Every character also has a certain type of grenade that they can buy.
Characters can also buy a couple different specific fortifications. I wouldn’t build too much if you have an engineer, but on games without one a few level barricades or weapon lockers from non engineers still helps.
The power taps are worth it if you don’t have a good Jack with a forge. Every time you harvest power it upgrades itself to like lvl 4. Whatever amount it says you get, the entire team is getting that same amount. So if you get 800 and there’s 5 people on your team your actually getting 4000.
Some taps are just bad spots to defend and not worth keeping. As an engineer main I prefer to wait until wave 11 before I build a base. If we have a Jack i’ll build a forge for him to smelt. Maybe 1 weapons locker for heavy weapons or JDs farming lancer GLs. After the first boss wave the first tap shows up. Ill move the fabricator over to it and then setup Fort Knox, Helms Deep, Castle Black, whatever you want to name the fortress
Jack is pretty much the new scout. He is the power generator and he can revive people from a distance. I just got explosive hijack and I love him even more now. Jack and engineer are must picks for waves 1-50 after beginner.
No need to get money from taps if you have decent del and Jack with smelting card levelled up you can get tons of money more. Tap is not really required, not even on master
no jack, make sure to have 2 taps going. if you have a jack, get a forge maxed quickly and keep base around one power tap.
generally strategy we do is setup in base until the first 10 rounds are complete. just building weapon locker and forge. then move once the tap is up, which is random. sometimes its right in base sometimes it the opposite side of the map. also, youll notice public horde is a cluster, so it doesnt surprise me you are unaware of the importance of them when doing a higher level run.
I was asking myself the same thing the other day. Have no idea how the power tap works or see anyone hardly use it ever. I’m currently boosting Jack’s assists medal while going for the power collect medal at the same time on beginner horde with no bots. About halfway on both medals. If I pick up dropped weapons, could I smelt them for extra power using the taps or something like that? Anything to make the tedious process go faster!
This is correct. Goes from 200, 400, 600, 800 if you keep the tap alive and keep drawing from it each round. It then stays at 800 per round. Values are per human player in the game, that are currently alive.
Lot of good tips in here… As an engineer myself I build stuff only if players donate, if not then I do whatever I can to get good weapons and just shoot things out to lv up my engineer class the best I can. I spent my own energy on sentries and if players come looking for a base to take cover, well there won’t be any base since you haven’t done much to contribute to a base. If I am playing another class like JD and donating most of my power since the only perk I ever buy is the GL damage for 1000 energy the whole rest goes to the fabricator and by wave 20 I still do not have a weapons locker of my own to replenish my GL ammo and swap between, then I will quit the game.
I end up playing engineer half the time because whenever I leave the job to someone else they screw it up. Too many times I see these mistakes
They moved the fabricator to a bad spot. “I put it where it was for a reason. It forces the enemy to spawn on that side of the map and instead of around us”
We don’t even have a forge yet and they spend money on sentry turrets. The sooner you build the forge the better especially if Jack is on the team. We don’t have the upkeep to keep those things reloaded all the time. Also that early in the game you don’t need them.
They build a lot of stuff before the first power tap appears. Except for the forge and a locker I don’t build until the tap appears. I treat our starting position as a temporary base. The more you build the more you have to move.
They don’t build a locker. If they do they put the wrong guns on them.
They put stuff way in the back where there is no cover. If we have to run 50 yards to get to the weapons locker it’s in a bad spot. We won’t make it there when were getting shot.
They put turrets in front of the fences…why?
They put fences along side cover the enemy can vault. They wonder how the enemy is getting in -.-
They upgrade the wrong things first. If were sitting on several heavy weapons id rather upgrade the locker instead of the turrets. If our base is being overrun every wave id like the fences to be upgraded to lasers instead of building a shock turret.
When I offer constructive advice or politely ask for a specific thing to be built(forge) they feel I threatened their manhood and rage quit.
Maybe i’m right to be picky or maybe i’m just spoiled… Whenever I try to lvl up my JD or Kait I get paired with an inexperienced engineer. When your at a certain lvl and play on a higher difficulty is it too much to ask for you to know what your doing?
Custom Lobbies is the way the go Public is useless like most said Jack and Del are essential to have a smooth ride to 50 I disagree you do need a Kait if she has high level she can kill most bosses with a couple of Overkill shots
but playing Customs yesterday we reached wave 43 with 30 k in fabricator and everyone with maxed perks
cutting though everything on insane until the good ol’ servers decided F U guys we kicking you out here
Honestly I tried some yesterday just to see and without fail I have a mic and said me and the eng are together I was Jack and said we will be building a forge to maximize base and perks just deposit Wave 2 comes and we see someone build barriers in wave 2
I did a match on elite. We were saving up to upgrade the forge and an Emile spends money from the fabricator, not his own money cause he went bankrupt buying perks, to build a lvl 1 sentry. I know people don’t like the fact not everyone can build everything but sometimes I want the engineer to be the only one who can build stuff. I would also like a requirement to play on certain difficulties. Not like a “you must be lvl 15+ to play above advanced” I would like a “X amount of playtime into horde before playing this difficulty”
