Saints Row 2 - Foren - Any % route improvements and discussion

I am planning to start to route this game after I am finished with one any info you have on the route of this game would be helpful.

Do you have an idea of what kind of time would be a good one for a full game run? is sub 6h 30m unreasonable or is 7h the target.

My final plan is to do a Tetralogy run of the saints row series 1,3 and 4 can be reasonable done in 13h 30m so a 6h 30m SR2 making it a round 20h run would be nice.

Hey guys, planning to do my first complete run that has a bit of routing involved, it's not fully optimised but it will probably work relatively well for now. Only the first part of my run will be routed and the rest will be based on what I remember from my first playthrough, and I'm assuming ill pick up things as more runs are done :)

The SDA post for Saints Row 2 has a few handy tips as to what the best missions are for gaining respect, It's going to be cool to see what times we can come up with in the near future :)

My splits for the first area would probably go as follows: Escape Gat [6] Septic (Suburbs) [X] Crowd Control (Suburbs) (Haven't decided if 6 needs to be done) [6] Snatch (Downtown) [6] Fraud (Factories) [6] FUZZ (Projects) [X] Fight Club (Arena) [5] Mayhem (Red Light) Sons of Samedi [6] FUZZ (Suburbs) Ronin [6] Drug Trafficking (Airport) Brotherhood Finish

Let me know what you think of this order and if you can fill in the gaps with some good ideas before tomorrow that would be awesome :) I think all the side missions I have included equal up to around 40x respect, will have to double check.

p.s will be running tomorrow night, so about 24-25 hours from now :)

Hey Red, good luck with your run if I am about I'll try to catch some of it. Could I ask that when you finish the run could you take down what the IGT is (done by saving the game) as we are in the process of deciding if we are going to use that or RTA I wouldn't want a valid record to be struck off on a technicality.

I see both of you had the full branch of each gang’s story in one go that may be the fastest way but what I found in SR1 is that contrary of what seems logical often chopping the story missions up allows you to use activities as a way to travel while adding respect needed or that when a mission finishes in a strange location it may be closer to one of the other gang missions or an activity that starts and finishes in the same local e.g. fight club. Then after you can get back to the previous mission thread using the taxis to fast travel.

Hopefully I will start routing this game in the next couple of weeks. I want to do one last run of SR1 getting that game to sub 5:30 (hopefully close to 5:20) before going to SR2.

Hey guys, Am at uni today but will be spending most of my time after it and before the run trying to implement a few more bits and pieces. I think I'm just going to stick with the early farm in order to just get a time down.

But I am thinking maybe I will add in whichever side missions I feel are appropriate for the time/space and just not have any splits for the late game for this run until we figure out the best route.

Also with my splits I definitely do not intend to just complete all of 1 gangs missions in one shot. Whatever is closest to my finishing point decides where I will go next, however finishing sons early does offer early helicopter access. Do we think helicopter access would be better overall then taxi's? Maybe for more specific missions that have awkward to drive areas?

Also I believe we should be using RTA, for the simple fact that it's going to be any% and the use of savewarping is too handy not to include. The deciding factor for RTA would primarily be whether or not in game load times vary heavily between individuals PC's, which I don't think they do seeing as it's a console port.

But I'll definitely include my IGT in my submission in the comments section :)

A few more questions, why are you trying to increase your style? What does this do in game? And also, I haven't tested but is it believed that a taxi is quicker then savewarp? because savewarp was my plans for exiting crowd control early on and also relocating to mayhem and finishing that at 5 (in the suburbs) to lead into the first mission.

I'm just going to keep posting questions as they pop into my head, glad to see there are at least a few people willing to give this a shot.

Don't worry about the question about increasing the style, I see now in your last post that increasing it to level 7 will yield 35x extra respect for each activity, significantly lowering the activities needed to complete.

Any suggestions for the quickest way to earn money without completing activities? Do the pimps in snatch drop significant amounts of cash? This could be easiest and most consistent way to get enough money by the end of snatch 6. Let me know what you think :)

Alright guys so my game crashed at 4 hours and 30 minutes in, which kinda sucks lol the game started to lag really hard just before it happened.

So after 4 hours and 30 minutes I believe I only had a couple of ronin missions left, the brotherhood, and ultor.

Even with the major amount of mistakes I made in a, missions, b, no taxi's and c, driving, I think we can beat this game relatively quicker then we thought we could.

Also, I forgot to buy clothes and tattoos, and I did a second septic activity before I bought the car, so more time could be saved there in the form of respect.

The helicopter is definitely going to be an advantage, especially when there is little need to farm any more experience from activities and we want to keep the story missions going sequentially.

In terms of your splits Martin I got really confused when I went to do some of the sons strongholds, I think that will need to be routed a bit differently as I found myself deciding it was simply too far away at each point to consider going to it. Also the Stronghold 4 to FUZZ Projects 6 is perfect but that activity didn't show up for me at that point in the run? Not sure if it was just a glitch though

I also found myself savewarping constantly as a lot of the ronin and sons missions start point were at our base. It actually makes it really convenient lol

Let me know what you guys think :)

Got the first part of my route it takes me 1:08:xx and I end with 16 levels of respect just shy of 17:

Jailbreak:

Appointed: Defender on the way to the court house go close to the clothes shop in Harrowgate for the taxi ride latter

Do the race close by twice the end of the previous mission to get 1 level of respect.

Take taxi to the clothes shop in Harrowgate then drive to the police station. Listen to the 3 wiretaps then get the folder. Call dex then go to the ultor mission.

Revelation: after mission you will have about 32k take the tag near you then get a taxi to foreign power buy the magma.

Do Septic Avenger Suburbs Expansion District: at the end of this activity you will be downtown.

Do the Snatch Downtown District: after mission take taxi to foreign power by vortex we are now 1k style point to the next level multiplier.

Down Payment: do it in the vortex. Durring the mission when you are underground take the tag.

The way I see it is doing an activity to completion gets you 52,500 respect with no multiplier so with 30% you get an extra 15,750 which is basically like getting a 2x level 6 reward plus 1,750. SO every 4 full activities you do you get the equivalent of a 5th in bonus respect.

Going to be doing another run in the next 24 hours with some of sellz new tips but also a few other bits and pieces. Still hoping to just finish the run and get an average time to see what we will be able to achieve.. Hopefully my PC doesn't crash again lol.

Martinz I forgot about taxi rides thats why I felt that it was too far away, I'm assuming now that you can get a taxi that leads relatively close to the trailer park :)

Did some routing last night and at about 4hs IGT in (Not optimized playing) I have the full sons of samedi arc done and over half of the Ronin and Brotherhood arcs with maybe another 5-8 respect levels needed to be gained at a 40% multiplier. I honestly think with a bit of work this will properly end up being as short as 1 which is a 5:30.

I should get a couple of hours tonight to finish off the route and I’ll post it then before going over it again to optimize it and mission strats to get it down to a good run overall.

Finished my route did my first SS run and got 5:50 IGT(not sure real time) http://s1261.photobucket.com/user/sellz4/media/100_4838.jpg.html?sort=3&o=1

After you get level 9 style there is a need for you to keep on getting respect with gang kill streaks and the like. If a tag is nearby and convenient you should get it I have 9 at the end of my run and it is worth 4.5k respect. Dual Gals are OP use throughout as soon as you get them only other weapon used are rockets to blow up cars and planes in a couple of mission. You will often pick up food from dead gang members which can be used in a tight situation where health is needed.

Jailbreak:

Appointed: Defender on the way to the court house go close to the clothes shop in Harrowgate for the taxi ride latter

Do the race close by twice the end of the previous mission to get 1 level of respect.

Take taxi to the clothes shop in Harrowgate then drive to the police station. Listen to the 3 wiretaps then get the folder. Call dex then go to the ultor mission.

Revelation: after mission you will have about 32k take the tag near you then get a taxi to foreign power buy the magma.

Do Septic Avenger Suburbs Expansion District: at the end of this activity you will be downtown.

Do the Snatch Downtown District: after mission take taxi to foreign power by vortex we are now 1k style point to the next level multiplier.

Down Payment: do it in the vortex. Durring the mission when you are underground take the tag.

Samedi 1 SW

Ronin 1

Ronin 2

Samedi 2 TT

Samedi 3

Trailer park stronghold

Suburbs stronghold TT

Ronin 3

Ronin 4 TT

Humbolt PARK SW

Samedi 4 IH

Ronin 5 IH

Harrowgate foreign power buy 20k car

Rebadeaux stronghold

Septic Avenger down the road

University stronghold

Samedi 5 TT

Samedi 6

Samedi 7 TT

Ronin 6

Projects stronghold TT SW

Saints stronghold HT land in front

Brotherhood 1 road route use heli after

Samedi 8 IH

Samedi 9 IH

Samedi 10 IH

Samedi 11 IH

Museum stronghold TT

Ronin 7 TT

Ronin 8 IH

Suburbs stronghold TT

Ronin 9 TT SW

Ronin 10

Ronin 11 TT SW

Ultor Dome Foreign power spend 180k until level 9 Style rank TT

Fight club

Brotherhood 2 TT

Apartment stronghold

Brotherhood 3

China town Strongholds TT

Brotherhood 4

Docks Strong hold SW

Brotherhood 5 IH

Brotherhood 6

Brotherhood 7

Brotherhood 8

Airport stronghold SW

Brotherhood 9 IH get full rockets when you can

Brotherhood 10 IH

Brotherhood 11 TT use rockets for faster completion

Ultor Cut scene

Ultor 1 IH

Crowd control, near Shopping Centre do until you have 4 respect (normally 3 levels)

Shopping Centre Stronghold TT

Ultor 2 IH

Ultor 3 IH

Ultor 4 TT

IH = in heli get before mission trigger otherwise marker is gone TT = take taxi there SW = save load warp after

The Rusty's Needle strat is a nice find the style boost of clothes and tats aren't the greatest and when compared with what is gotten from buying car but it is definitely quicker. The prison warp is nice it combats Carlos’ poor path finding through the prison and will keep early resets low, no one like to loses any time that quickly into the run, and the fact it is 10secs quicker is better still.

The next thing we need to sort is which Activities need to be done in a way that balances reward against time taken. The ones I picked in my route were the ones that flow the best in order to get around the map but with taxi and an easy save warp they may be able to be improved. In the placement of when to them I think it has a pretty good balance between having the respect in hand to string missions together and the boost you get from style rank but I had to sacrifice infinite sprint to get it so.

I have found a way to get the Factories Insurance Fraud in, in place of Suburbs Expansion District Septic Avenger, the only issue is that the insurance fraud takes longer but has a far better reward. I need to work out whether the time save with infinite sprint is greater than the time lost in doing the longer activity or if there is a way to get the insurance fraud more consistent in terms of time taken as the main plus of Septic Avenger is that it is easy to consistent times.

The route would be after Revelation take a taxi to Harrowgate foreign power, buy the magma then drive over to Factories Insurance Fraud after the activity is complete take a taxi to the shop closest to Snatch Downtown District and contiue from there.

@SOB I have watch the part of your stream where you did Insurance Fraud and used your method for it, as it is far quicker than doing it normally, but even with this it is quite a bit slower than septic avenger I run on console so the timing is obviously different but for me it is 8mins slower so if infinite sprint save more than 8mins over the run, which on instinct I would say it will, the switch up is worth it.

@martin to me tyhe only reward that are worth it are unlimited ammo in any weapon and infinite sprint I personally wouldn’t go out of the way to pick up anything other than these 2.

Also about my route: I do Revelation solely as a way to get quick cash in order it get style bonus as early as possible it is 30k for 7ish min mission and it allows you to get to style level 6 with a 30% boost on respect earn. Doing an activity to completion gets you 52,500 respect with no multiplier so with 30% you get an extra 15,750 which is basically like getting a 2x level 6 reward plus 1,750. SO every 4 full activities you do you get the equivalent of a 5th in bonus respect so that is a 20min save.

If we could find a way of getting big money fast we could cut out this mission all together saving both the time doing it and the level use to do the mission. I have an idea to abuse the chops shop by calling in taxis to deliver but I have yet to test that speed wise.

Also had the idea to take the heli (horizon as it has 4 seats) after Insurance fraud and do snatch in the heli I know it is possible to pick them up what I need to find out is if it I viable to do all 6 level without destroying the heli letting you fly to saints 3 and doing saints 3 in the heli after which you can save it and use it for saints 4.

Hey guys

I've run SR2 about a week about but don't have a capture cam so I couldn't record it. I got 5:53:20 RTA and that could TOTALLY be optimized. I'm thinking sub 5 for sure.

One thing I definitely want to note is that I only completed 5 activities (with 1 extra level of a mission later). I started out and as soon as you do Appointed Defender, head over to the crowd control right off of the suburbs. I haven't actually timed Septic Avenger but it seems like it'd take so much more time.

In Crowd Control, don't play the rooftop one but do the others. BUT make sure you do level 6 at the ultor dome. This way, you end up right next to Fight Club and can immediately do that. I finished up to here with a time of 33:31. At this point, though, you're right next to the car shop but have 19,700, just 300 shy of buying a car for mucho style points. I've been trying to think of ways to quickly get an extra 300 for that.

Anyway, After Fight Club, I took a taxi to the Insurance Fraud. My strategy was to quickly get up to the highway in the factories district. That made it super easy to finish all 6 rounds. And after that, take a taxi over to the foreign power in the dt (or close to) district. Hit up Snatch after that.

After doing these 4, I have splits that head off with the samedi but then go between the ronin and brotherhood for the most part. At a certain point, I get low on respect and head over to the university where I do that stronghold for the samedi and do the demo derby. Demo derby is SUPER quick, compared to everything else.

At this point, depending on how you've been racking up respect on the side and if you could buy a car after fight club, you should have enough. But if you don't, you can kill yourself somewhere on the southern island, maybe by the hideout, and you'll respawn at the hospital which has a heli assault. The first level there goes by real quick but the others take so much longer.

TL;DR: I've found the the best activities in these orders are

Crowd Control (Suburbs) (14:26)
Fight Club (Ultor Dome) (9:39)
Insurance Fraud (Factories) (13:45)
Snatch (Downtown) (25:36 - 2 major hiccups)
Demo Derby (University) (6:21)

Anything else seemed to take much longer and the only reason CC is really in this list is it's close to the end of Appointed Defender and lets off at FC.

That's what I'm thinking. They seemed to just take so much time, comparatively. I think it'd be more useful to try to get to the prison and do that Fight Club there since that'd only be about 10 mins as well.

The only real useful awards are Snatch and IF so those are top priority, regardless of time, IMO.

Oh, and Chop Shop and Hitman would be good if we can reliably find a route where we'd definitely see targets but...they don't seem to offer enough to make them worth it either.

On another note, do you think getting a chopper is actually often a good thing to do early? You get a fast one as part of the Samedi (assuming it doesn't glitch out) and besides that, save warping and taxis will probably be faster regardless.

How do you get the chopper with the Factories Insurance Fraud? I thought I saw you mention it but I can't find it now...

My strategy with IF is to keep restarting until in the Factories district. This has 2 advantages. The first is that you're right there. The other is that you can do this:

Basically, you get to the highway super quick and beat everything right there. If going to the airport to get a chopper is going to be quicker overall, even if it makes IF a little longer, I'll totally change my strategy to do that.

Also, thanks for the money hint. That should make respect even a little easier to get. The only drawback is with how many activities I do, I'll have to constantly get near misses and drive in the wrong lane.

EDIT: duh, you explained how right above. I had an issue where the airport didn't always have a heli. I'll have to look a bit closer and start comparing times.

I way I see it the first obstacles to be solved are the following:

1.The first level(s) of respect to be gained after S2

2.Whether Revelation is locked in as the way we make quick cash

3.Whether we go S2 - S3 - Revelation then activities or S2 - Revelation - activities then S3 possibly in a heli

4.When, which and where activities are done in the route with the idea of time to reward value, style boost and travel to the activity

Insurence fraud until level 6 airport strats are a must but to level 3 reseting for close by/ good area is properly the way to go but them you don’t get a heli at the end.

For 1 up to now I have been using the nearby race to get to level 1 respect. Doing it twice gets you there comfortably. No doubt there may be better options but that is the first way I came up with to do it quickly

For 2 I was the one who came up with the Revelation strat 30k allows you level 6 style and I reasoned that the time invested to get the money to do that was offset by the time saved no having to complete extra activities.

For 3 I personally go the second way but I see the benefits of the first I did some test and found that snatch in a heli is possible, as your vehicle is fixed at the end of each level, But the risk is very much there if you get caught on any sort of ledge it is very likely the heli is done and you with it.

For 4 like I have said before the only upgrades that are remotely worth a detour for are unlimited ammo for any gun and increased/ infinite sprint the rest are just getting them done quickly. The dream scenario for me would be both fight clubs level 6 demo derby level 6 snatch level 6 or fuzz level 6 for unlimited ammo and insurance fraud level 3/6 and if needed crowd control level 3.

For 5 it hinges on snatch if that gets locked in for twin Gal unlimited ammo then a heli is desirable so level 6 with airport may be the way to go even if technically level 3 rewards will suffice along with the fact the main bulk of respect come for level 5 and 6 but that is more time consuming than 3 levels.

@Sellz, One thing I am confused on, though, is why the revelation mission is important to do. I know that getting that extra respect is important but with the activities I had done, I found no need for the bonus respect that early on and the activities I'd done were pretty fast, to boot. I feel that the extra time spent going to the police station, doing the mission, and heading to the activity afterwards would be much more than simply doing a small set of activities to make up the respect you would have gotten at that time. The way I have it planned, you only have to do 2 sets of activities with lower respect and then everything else with level 5. You end up with enough respect to take you to the final mission as well, assuming you do what you can to get respect as you kill gang members and drive "poorly."

Also, I do see the importance of getting SR3 done before, at least the IF activity, if we're going for airport strats so that race would probably be beneficial. Otherwise, we can't store the heli.

Do you know how long Fuzz takes? I did it once and it didn't seem like it took terribly long but it seemed like there were better options out there. Particularly going to do both fight clubs because they're each less than 10 mins.

I'd ultimately say that Snatch and IF are must have's. But having a heli for snatch, to make it consistent, would probably be for the best. Right now, so many things can go wrong that can put you so far behind.

@SOB, I'll take a look at that tonight. Seems like it could be a solid plan and it might make it so I don't have to do CC and will get a heli which will be even better. But afterwards, would you continue with IF till 6 or just go for the sprint boost but not unlimited?

I still have to try out those airport strats too cause I have a hard time understanding how it'd be faster than the highway but for now, I'll accept it :P

I think what I'll do is set a timer and try to see my best times out of "x" runs.

As a last note, the one thing that I know would make everything more awesome is if we could get a tornado or the other attack chopper. Fuzz would be over so fast, as well as mayhem. But without DLC, we don't have one by default, and in over 10 attempts, couldn't find one at the police station. Stupid RNG!