TLE being a scrubcorp in the grand scheme of things doesn't help the fact that their ideas of what is and isn't good aren't up to par with the rest of the world. In general, (as someone said before) support builds use whips. These builds require more than just moving around and killing anything that moves; finding parts, grinding some silly or harder to use skills, and being able to do more than just poke/stab/bash/fist/shoot things to death. Not all players are able to keep to the general build (hell, I have 1 raw in some random things, everything from Focus to Hack to Lockpick, around 5 in medic and whips, and 1 in various other skills) so if they have to focus on just combat, its a much easier thing to do. My first characters were combat oriented and to be honest, I'm doing better overall in combat with my support-esque character, despite the loss of heavy armor or multiple layers. It did make dodge (and getting as much in Reflex as possible) a higher priority that I have to pit against other support mutations, because I wear extremely light armor.
I've had no problems using whips so far. While slightly weaker, they're faster and more accurate than most other weapons (venomous lash excluded). Just powerattack everything at every opportunity, and fight in aggressive (or cautious, if you're having a hard time hitting things). Despite the 'help powerattack' page, I think it actually increases accuracy, rather than decreases it, but at any rate, it also helps prevent the 'bounces off enemies skin' message and gives an opportunity to stun. Go from an antenna whip (easy to buy) to a leather whip (10 skins and 'improv whip with skin') and later a venomous lash (if you're really lucky, a flame chain is awesome) then skip a blacklash for a flash whip. Balanced grip is the only way to go, and shock mods on the flash whip/blacklash; for anything below that, it's preferential as far as butane or shock, because they both do an extra 1-3 damage and have the possibility of setting the target on fire.
As far as the planting thing goes: I don't think you can grow your own things, no.