Cyberpunk 2077 - Face Melter Build Guide
When I started playing Cyberpunk 2077 I wasn’t sure how I was going to play it and how to spec it out. But very quickly I decided that playing a Netrunner or hacker was the most appropriate. That’s when I discovered the Overheat quickhack and it was all I needed to get hooked.
I’m going to call this the “Face Melter” build cause, why not? The whole point is to set people on fire so it kind of fits. The main goals of the build are to be able to ‘one shot’ most enemies with a single quickhack of Overheat (or Short Circuit for robots). In the higher levels you can move up to Contagion for taking out groups of enemies. That is more in the Intelligence level 16-20 and probably in the mid to late 20s for character level.
As you start off, I would probably put 6 points into Intelligence to get you going, then balance everything else out. As you level, putting points and perks into Technical Abilities, namely Crafting, will be helpful. Any perks to decrease crafting cost and increase components from Deconstructing are helpful. Once you get to Intelligence level 12, then you can start crafting the Rare versions of the quickhacks. This is an important milestone and I will get into that more later.
There are a few goals beyond perks and attribute points. You will need to progress the story up until you meet Vik, your ripperdoc. This is really quick, so no worries there. Also, you will get a gig for a free ‘Ping’ quickhack that will also have the benefit of directing you to the first Netrunner that you can buy quickhacks from. It also introduces you to hacking Access Points. This is a fundamental part of the build experience as you can get so many eudodollars and components from Access Points.
Beyond these goals, you will need to get up to Street Cred level 10 (or 11) and collect 46000 eurodollars in order to pay off Vik and to purchase your cyberware OS upgrade. It is 21k to pay him off and then 25k for the Epic OS upgrade. This is a game changer as it allows for more RAM and more quickhacks to be slotted.
This build has what I will call 3 phases in which you will likely progress. This is based on the availability of attribute points and then the perks unlocked. I have tested this build, in the higher levels up to Very Hard difficulty with Moderate threat. In the lower levels, this will also work with Normal difficulty up to High threat. I wouldn’t really push it past that until you get used to the playstyle and how much damage you can do.
Phase 1 - This is the beginning phase (duh) and you will be building up your Breach Protocol and Quickhacking skills. We will be focused on Overheat, your single target Damage Over Time (DoT) quickhack and then Short Circuit for robots. The main accomplishments here are to buy and / or craft these quickhacks and you will also begin dumping a lot of perk points into Breach Protocol and a few into Quickhacking perks. For the most part, just take them as you can in order of level in which they unlock.
Breach Protocol
Level 3 Intelligence - Mass Vulnerability - This will decrease the physical resistance of all the enemies in network. This will be important early on as most encounters will turn into gun fights since your quickhacks will not be strong enough to kill at this point.
Level 5 Intelligence - Advanced Datamine - This will increase the amount of eurodollars acquired from Access Points. This is helpful because you will need around 50000 eurodollars to really get going in this build. That sounds like a lot, but focus on side missions and encounters marked on your map. Save up the reward money there and before you know it you will have the 50k.
Level 7 Intelligence - Mass Vulnerability: Resistances - This will be your first real damage boost to quickhacks. Decreased resistances to all elements will increase the damage of your Overheat quickhack.
Level 7 Intelligence - Extended Network Interface - Highlights Access Points so you can jack in and get more money and components.
Level 9 Intelligence - Datamine Mastermind - Increase the Components received from Access Points. This is important, as this is the best source of the components and early on you can start obtaining Epic and Legendary components.
Level 11 Intelligence - Total Recall - ICEpick daemon reduces quickhack costs by 1 RAM. As you are getting started, RAM availability and RAM management is a challenge. Every little bit of savings helps.
Level 12 Intelligence - Datamine Virtuoso - This is probably optional, but I took it in order to potentially obtain a quickhack from an Access Point. This is not game changing, but if you have the points, go ahead and put them in here.
Quickhacking
Level 3 Intelligence - Biosynergy - One of the first and best RAM recovery perks. Put points in here as soon as you can.
Level 3 Intelligence - Bloodware - 10% more damage from your quickhacks. I would probably alternate between this and Biosynergy until both are capped at 3/3.
Level 5 Intelligence - Hacker’s Manual - Unlocks Uncommon quickhack crafting. Will save you a bit of money early on and also save you from having to find them at Netrunners around town.
Level 5 Intelligence - Forget-Me-Not - Recover 1 RAM unit when killing a target affected by a quickhack. This is probably optional, at least early on, as you will most likely not manage to kill an enemy with a quickhack just yet. If you have extra points, then go for it. If not, wait for later.
Level 7 Intelligence - Weak Link - Reduce the required RAM for quickhacks on a device. I would not rush to 3/3 this, but 1 at the start is helpful. Devices do not usually have huge requirements anyway, but this does help.
Level 9 Intelligence - Signal Support - Increase quickhack duration by 50% (when 2/2). This is a huge damage increase. Having Overheat run for 50% longer can make the difference in a one shot or not.
Level 11 Intelligence - Subliminal Messaging - Quickhacks deal 100% more damage (when 2/2) to unaware targets. When sneaking around, why not get a free damage increase? Wont help once you get into combat, but take it while in stealth.
Level 12 Intelligence - School of Hard Hacks - This is the big one. Unlocks Rare quickhack crafting. As far as perks go, this is the main goals of phase 1.
Phase 2 - This is where things get interesting. If phase 1 is the foundation of this build and the damage potential, this is an evolution into Area of Effect (AoE). By now you should have your OS upgrade, quite a few perks, and Rare quickhacks. Now we will introduce Contagion. This is a DoT attack that can spread to other enemies. So the phase 2 perk focus will be on speading the quickhack to not only more enemies but further away as well.
Breach Protocol
Level 14 Intelligence - Cloud Cache - Breach Protocol reduces the number of RAM used for your next quickhack. I would probably call this optional as I did not actually take this till I was well into my 30s for level. If you have points, take it, but might be worth saving a few points for level 16 since there are quite a few perks to get then.
Level 16 Intelligence - Mass Vulnerabilities: Quickhacks - This is a big one. 30% more damage from quickhacks. Get this right away.
Level 16 Intelligence - Totaler Recall - The next level to Total Recal, ICEpick reduces RAM costs by another unit. This pairs really well with Head Start at level 18.
Quickhacking
Level 12 Intelligence - Diffusion - Increase the spread distance of quickhacks, namely Contagion, but also others.
Level 14 Intelligence - Plague - Quickhacks jump to more targets, take this to 3/3 asap for 3 additional targets.
Level 16 Intelligence - Critical Error - Another big boost in damage. Allows your quickhacks to crit hit and do extra damage.
Level 16 Intelligence - Hacker Overlord - Epic level quickhack crafting. Get this right away and get crafting! Welcome to the big leagues.
Phase 3 - For lack of a better way to say it, god mode. Taking Intelligence to level 20 and unlocking Legendary quickhacks and getting a legendary OS upgrade, you will be unstoppable. Feel free to crank up the difficulty here.
Breach Protocol
Level 18 Intelligence - Head Start - Automatically uploads your ICEpick during Breach Protocol. This goes really well with Compression at 20.
Level 20 Intelligence - Compression - Reduces the length of sequences for Breach Protocol. Since you get the ICEpick for free with Head Start, this makes Breaching pretty easy.
Quickhacking
Level 18 Intelligence - Anamnesis - RAM cannot drop below 4 units. Take your time, but get this to 3/3 so you can always have RAM available.
Level 20 Intelligence - Optimization - Another RAM cost reduction, grab this.
Level 20 Intelligence - Bartmoss’ Legacy - The real game changer, Legendary quickhack crafting. As an upgrade to Epic quickhacks, Legendary will give you some passive bonuses just for having them slotted in your OS.
Ok, so what else?
Depending on how you like to play, single target or AoE, then pick a Legendary OS upgrade to fit your playstyle. I went with a single target focus but there are others out there.
Also, make sure to get some more points into places like Technical Abilities to make crafting easier. There is also a perk to make Tech weapons ignore armor. That makes a nice back up when combat goes to guns. I’m currently using a Tech Pistol and it destroys things that I don’t actually melt.
At some point it’s nice, maybe early on to grab some extra carrying capacity. Can start with the perk but later you can find some cyberware to help you out.