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Half cover is 25 Defence, and full is 50.. I think. Not sure about distance
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Nov 20, 2013 06:19
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Cover increases your defense, distance will penalize/benefit the shooter in some way. Think like how quick the shotgun accuracy drops off from being up close to moving further away, or how the sniper rifle's range penalty is inverted and decreases your chance to hit when you're too close to whatever alien you want to shoot.
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Nov 20, 2013 06:19
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Right, so my point was it's not quite as simple as aim-defence.
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Nov 20, 2013 06:28
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dud root posted:Half cover is 25 Defence, and full is 50.. I think. Not sure about distance
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Nov 20, 2013 06:37
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Those On My Left posted:How does cover and distance factor into this? There's a breakdown on the wiki, but the short version is: Cover is +20, full cover is +40, and the range on most weapons is +42 and then -(4.5*distance).
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Nov 20, 2013 06:41
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 "Man, I was sure I heard a Sectopod around here somewhere. Oh well, everyone back to the Skyranger I guess."
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Nov 20, 2013 07:03
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Mr. Vile posted:
Sectopods only occupy one square and don't have a step-out. If it's behind a full cover rock, odds are good that you can't draw LOS to the square it occupies.
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Nov 20, 2013 07:17
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So, I've spotted what I'm almost positive is a bug. I've been playing this EW campaign for five ingame months and have not had one single loving Assault. I've deliberately sent out as many rookies as possible to try and train them up, I've got 20 soldiers at Squaddie or above, and not a single one of them has ever promoted to Assault. I mean, I understand the RNG dicks you over with promotion assignments sometimes, but that much?
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Nov 20, 2013 07:26
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Mister Bates posted:So, I've spotted what I'm almost positive is a bug. I've been playing this EW campaign for five ingame months and have not had one single loving Assault. I've deliberately sent out as many rookies as possible to try and train them up, I've got 20 soldiers at Squaddie or above, and not a single one of them has ever promoted to Assault. I mean, I understand the RNG dicks you over with promotion assignments sometimes, but that much? I saw nothing but snipers in 3 months. It happens.
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Nov 20, 2013 07:56
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poo poo I want: Elite chrysalids and seekers. Seekers were played up as hot poo poo when really they suck. Like maybe I'm doing this wrong but every time I've found seekers they've gone directly for my close quarters assaults and gotten their poo pushed in, they need an AI overhaul as well as an elite seeker with decent health and a grenade that can move after shooting / nading would be a great. I was honestly expecting tentaculats when they first came up with the idea. As for chrysalids, I'm thinking elite chrysalids with wings, twice the health and thin man spit. Something to make you go 'WHAT THE gently caress' even on late game terror missions. Basically I want the late game to, while still allowing me to show those loving thin men who's boss, also throw out those xcom quality pissed pants moments.
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Nov 20, 2013 07:59
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More enemies that turn invisible might be nice. Are you prepared for the upgraded infiltration abilities of the Invisible Thin Man?
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Nov 20, 2013 08:04
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VisAbsoluta posted:Damage Control or Vital-Point Targeting? For flamethrower MECs I think the benefit of higher damage is necessary to its weapon, but what about punchy ones? Damage Control since it will be more exposed when hitting aliens? It's a tough choice but I regularly one-shot mutons with railguns and Vital-Point Targeting. It may only be awesome at my current point in the game, but it certainly trivializes the current difficulty jump. That said skill roulette really hurts when it comes to getting reliable healing :/.
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Nov 20, 2013 08:09
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Speedball posted:More enemies that turn invisible might be nice. Are you prepared for the upgraded infiltration abilities of the Invisible Thin Man? Just go the whole hog and just make them able to fire at you without breaking stealth. In that similar vein might as well have a giant middle finger come on the screen when they double (!) crit your soldiers.
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Nov 20, 2013 08:15
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Motherfucker posted:Seekers were played up as hot poo poo when really they suck. Like maybe I'm doing this wrong but every time I've found seekers they've gone directly for my close quarters assaults
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Nov 20, 2013 08:29
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Well EXALT turned out to be pretty easy to deal with. After their initial sabotage I launched a few covert missions and then had enough intel to attack their base with laser, carapace, and a corporal MEC. The mission was filled with heroics like my two assaults rushing into a room with six enemies and slaughtering all of them in two turns. I only had one casualty, my lone support, Lt. Thabo 'Big Bo' Sesay. I gotta say too, the whole op was loving cold. Just roll in, murder everybody, loot anything not nailed down and roll out.
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Nov 20, 2013 08:39
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Edit: ^^^^^ Oh gently caress, not Big Bo! Am I crazy, or do crysalids seem more mobile in EW? They were always fast, but I swear their movement has increased by at least a couple squares per move. Also the new sectopods are terrifying and I love/hate them.
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Nov 20, 2013 08:40
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Fledgling Gulps posted:Well EXALT turned out to be pretty easy to deal with. After their initial sabotage I launched a few covert missions and then had enough intel to attack their base with laser, carapace, and a corporal MEC. The mission was filled with heroics like my two assaults rushing into a room with six enemies and slaughtering all of them in two turns. I only had one casualty, my lone support, Lt. Thabo 'Big Bo' Sesay. The crazy disparity between where EXALT is technology and skill-wise, and where my troops are just makes every mission against them feel unfair. On my last one, I had half my squad stand out of cover in the middle of the map the majority of the mission, because not a single EXALT trooper was going to live long enough to fire a shot anyway. Maybe if they auto-overwatched on arrival like Council Mission Thin Men they'd be a bit more of a threat, but as it is I can play incredibly fast and lose and just mow them down by the dozen every mission without even a scratch to my troops. It's kinda sad to see one of their troops just get hammered by a triple tap from my Assault Covert Op's laser pistol and go down the same turn he shows up. But it sure does make for good XP. 
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Nov 20, 2013 08:48
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RandallODim posted:The crazy disparity between where EXALT is technology and skill-wise, and where my troops are just makes every mission against them feel unfair. On my last one, I had half my squad stand out of cover in the middle of the map the majority of the mission, because not a single EXALT trooper was going to live long enough to fire a shot anyway. Maybe if they auto-overwatched on arrival like Council Mission Thin Men they'd be a bit more of a threat, but as it is I can play incredibly fast and lose and just mow them down by the dozen every mission without even a scratch to my troops. It's kinda sad to see one of their troops just get hammered by a triple tap from my Assault Covert Op's laser pistol and go down the same turn he shows up. But it sure does make for good XP. That mission was the only time I ever had trouble with EXALT, because one of their heavies finally decided to shoot a rocket and it took out all my cover.
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Nov 20, 2013 08:54
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I had huge trouble with Exalt on the burning military base map when it was my first Exalt mission. I breached the central building with my rescue crew to get to my operative faster and ran into two medics and a heavy. The Heavy ends up killing two of my guys with a rocket (Not created equal and Hidden potential really HP screwed me) making one of my other guys panic and the medics ripped off half my MEC's health. Meanwhile, my operative gets locked down by another Exalt group who he has a semi-standoff with until they all decide to stop loving around and grenade him to death. They were a total joke in the missions where they ran to hack you, but they've definitely messed me up when they worked like regular pod activations.
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Nov 20, 2013 09:00
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Boy, that Newfoundland mission loses pretty much all of its tension when you get it later in the game. It does become rather cathartic though, to wander through that sad little village, feeling like the space Orkin Men.
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Nov 20, 2013 09:21
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I just had the best final fight. Between the OTS upgrade, council medals, Psi armor and the mind shield, my Volunteer had over 180 will. Dashed in with Mimetic Skin, killed both Muton Elites with Rift, then dashed up with Mimetic Skin again. The main Ethereal floated down into range of Close Combat Specialist, so my Volunteer attacked (Alloy Cannon) and broke camouflage. The Ethereal tried to mind control (might've been a different Psi attack), but it failed, and then Neural Feedback hit them for 13 damage. My first Ironman finish!
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Nov 20, 2013 09:27
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I think if someone messed around with EXALT's AI to make them less bone-headed and more aggressive towards your troops instead of rushing the encoder, they could be a lot more fun and a lot more threatening. I really hope someone's able to mod that final EXALT mission too, maybe make the map bigger with more enemies and some elite-elite troops? At the very least, there's gotta be a way to give them plasma.
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Nov 20, 2013 09:28
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Happy Noodle Boy posted:I'm aiming for the army of four achievement so I'll be gunning for SHIVs so I can have something expendable while I build up 1-2 good soldiers. Gonna save you some heartache and inform you that Army of Four only works on Classic or Impossible.
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Nov 20, 2013 09:37
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Phew, finished my first ever Normal Iron Man campaign, but just barely. The new enemies in EW made the start of the game pretty hard at times. I lost my best sniper before the Alien Base Assault when I got sloppy and figured there'd only be one or two weak enemies left. Suddenly, two Mutons walk out of a building and murder her in two seconds flat. I think I actually cussed them out. Lost two other really good troopers over the course of the game (one of them another sniper), but this was because I thought I was moving them into high cover, while they were actually jumping down a level into a big pack of aliens. One of these was during the Base Defence mission, which was loving intense. Might be the coolest addition in EW. After that, once I got some plasma weapons going, I got complacent. Especially once I had my two snipers fully equipped, and my MEC fully upgraded, nothing seemed to be able to hurt me anymore. I only ever rolled out with 2 assaults, a support, a MEC and two snipers. They were all colonels, and my snipers Deadshot and Bullseye (not terribly original, I know) could do 10+ dmg twice per turn if they got their Double Tap. What's the worst that could happen?  Enter, the very last mission last night. First thing I noticed is that I took one of my colonels who'd been in gene therapy for a while, and she's only got normal armor, an assault rifle and a pistol with her. I apparently swapped out her proper gear to her replacement while the doctor was fiddling with her genetic makeup...  First room of the mothership, no problem. Second, third and fourth, ditto. Then comes the fifth room. I send one guy up to check what's out there, without moving my other guys up a bit and properly positioning them. Oh boy...two sectopods. So i pull back, and I thought I had my guys spaced out enough so their artillery bombardment couldn't hurt me. I was very wrong. Assault class trooper Rhino and my medic die instantly. My psi trooper, the French chick who's name escapes me, just barely escaped the blast.  Now I'm down to four, and I haven't even hit the sectopods yet. I still have my lady snipers though, and they are not to be messed with. Through a combination of headshots, double taps, a psi rift and MEC Zao's giant fuckoff Particle Cannon, I manage to take out the metal behemoths with only Zao taking one hit. It didn't hurt that the sectopods missed like four shots in a row. But now, the final room. I know what's coming, and I sure wish I had some more backup with me. Sadly, their bodies are slowly decaying in the room with the sectopods. Luckily, my snipers have had the gene therapy that makes them immune to mind control. I take it maybe four or five steps at a time on the left balcony, putting everybody on Overwatch the whole way through. Finally, I make it to the uber ethereal...who proceeds to take control of my MEC. This is a properly lovely start. Deadshot and Frenchie manage to get some good shots in on her, but it´s not enough. Zao unloads his particle Cannon into Bullseye and she loses half her life. The other ethereal proceeds to mind control Frenchie. The uber ethereal has at this point retreated around a corner, out of sight of my snipers. I can´t walk out there, that´d be suicide, with the Muton Elites still in play  I knew I saved my grenades for a reason! Deadshot and Bullseye can just barely reach the uber ethereal, and kill the bitch. Frenchie mind blasts the rest of the survivors into the hall way, takes the ship away from earth, the end... Man, that last mission was equal parts awesome and terrifying. I was so afraid of losing it at the end. If my whole team had perished, there's no way the rest of my roster would've been able to do what they failed to do. I do now see that Iron Man is the only way to go though.
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Nov 20, 2013 09:43
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Fantastic. I need to hurry up and finish my current run so I can start ironman, it sounds like a lot of fun. Is it possible with the new expansion to do a mech only run past a certain point? Or all mechs and one volunteer? I've put 2 in my team and between them theyve probably got half of my total kills since I researched railguns. Also I get the feeling that the punching mechs might be slightly more useful than the flamethrower ones? The flamethrower is an awesome weapon but extra movement range every turn surely has to be better in most situations.
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Nov 20, 2013 09:55
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Brasseye posted:Fantastic. I need to hurry up and finish my current run so I can start ironman, it sounds like a lot of fun. Running MECs gets to be ridiculously expensive Meld-wise. A fully upgraded Paladin suit is 200 Meld, which is ten perfect Meld gathering missions, when most games only last 30 or so missions. And Terror/Council/Exalt missions don't get you Meld at all. The initial 40 Meld you get for researching Meld, and the 5 per Mechtoid, help but its going to be almost impossible to get more than 3 MECs for a long time. And you're probably never going to get their third tier abilities. And MEC weapons require stupid amounts of resources to make compared to the other weapons on their tier. You're going to have a really rough time keeping everyone up. Zore fucked around with this message at 10:08 on Nov 20, 2013 |
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Nov 20, 2013 10:04
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nnnotime posted:Starting with 4 troops in the Skyranger is default for all un-modded difficulties. For Normal and Easy you start with the OTS so you are ready to upgrade once you have a Sargent and the required bitcoin amounts. Does this mean I botched my install of Implassic then, or am I completely misunderstanding what you're saying? RBA Starblade posted:Oh ok, I thought it was going to do something like "the attack happened while your A-team went out on the field to go ruin some sectoid's day, good luck everybody else". I kept sending Rookies on post-alien base missions for this reason.
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Nov 20, 2013 10:45
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So what Second Wave options do people like to run with? Hidden Potential, Not Created Equally, and Training Roulette are obviously very popular (and they're a fixture of my last few games), but I've also been messing around with Results Driven and High Stakes, both of which complicate cash/reward flows a bit and can make the game pretty tense as countries lose faith in the XCOM project. I had to stop using Red Fog, though, because it seems to render soldiers completely useless for the duration of a mission if a Sectoid so much as farts in their general direction. Maybe it wouldn't be such a big deal if I had larger squads, but it really hurts things when one or two of your 4 or 5 soldiers takes a hit for 2 HP and suddenly can't move or hit worth crap. Also, I liked the concept of New Economy, but it seems to cause a lot of issues when your home country is only providing like $68/month and you can't even get enough momentum to bankroll new satellites and equipment. I really like the idea behind Second Wave options, though, since they can breathe a lot of new life into a game without needing to fall back on editing files or using mods. Cream-of-Plenty fucked around with this message at 11:12 on Nov 20, 2013 |
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Nov 20, 2013 11:10
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poptart_fairy posted:Does this mean I botched my install of Implassic then, or am I completely misunderstanding what you're saying? We're just really confused about what you're saying! Because, I mean, you were saying fielding four men rather than six is a big change, right? A big change from what? Implassic shouldn't be reducing the number of soldiers you can field, but more than that it sounds like you're talking about it reducing the number of soldiers you can field from six to four, and we're really confused by that because you always start out only being able to field four soldiers regardless of difficulty, that's just how XCOM: Enemy Unknown works??
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Nov 20, 2013 11:31
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Just started another game because my first classic EW game ran into some problems. Those problems being, e.g.: - a large scout landed in mid-April. When approaching it (Carapace + lasers, I know ok?!?), I simultaneously activated 3 Thin Men, 1 Mechtoid + 2 Sectoids, 1 Cyberdisk + 2 Drones. They promptly wiped out my entire squad in two turns. It was one of those forest maps with less than stellar cover, combined with bad tactical decisions. - Some technical difficulties, such as my Site Recon going tits-up because the command to activate the beacon led to my sole trooper running outside, dropping down in front of 3 Lids and getting zombiefied. Had to reload the save, but faced the same difficulty (the level selection is a bit wonky). Anyways! Those seem less of a bad game and more of my previous EU experience being a real disadvantage in here. - I had practically no gene mods nor no MECs. Apparently selling alien bodies is no longer great business idea? This puts me somewhat behind the aliens, since I really, really need heavy ordinance to deal with mechtoids. - Beelining laser -> meld -> carapace only works if you actually USE your meld, otherwise you are simply handicapping yourself Other things I have noticed: - more multipack activations, especially near meld points - I once activated 1 pack of mutons and 2 packs of floaters simulatenously. Managed to fight my way out of that with only 2 losses. Is this something other people have noticed or just a fluke? - attrition rates are much higher, since you are under time stress to get meld - much more variability in number of aliens per mission - the multipack activations sometimes lead you to fight every single alien on the map in one long battle and the numbers seem to be something else than in vanilla - improved sectoid combat AI, but sometimes they ignore a flanked trooper (flanked, but in full cover) to shoot another trooper (not flanked, but in half-cover) I pretty soon realized that my previous EU playstyle + EU tech tree were actively hampering me. Started another campaign, promptly got a squadwipe in first council mission  So how the hell should I approach meld, genemods and MECs? They seem pretty vital.
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Nov 20, 2013 11:47
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I don't know why but my EXALT missions are much more unsuccessful than my alien ones. I'm playing on Classic with Training Roulette, Not Created Equal and Hidden Potential and for some reason I can never get out of an EXALT mission without casualties and a shitload of wounded. I still always win though. The last mission they had ballistics, I had a MEC and lasers. The map was that autoshop one. My soldiers are very good at isolating and destroying aliens but I get loving murdered when I get zerg-rushed by EXALT operatives. I run out of ammo, I run out of cover and very quickly, I run out of health. Maybe I just lack crowd-control abilities on my troops, the MEC's flamethrower is the only thing that saved me from losing that mission. I'm probably the only one in the thread but I actually find the EXALT to be a challenge. I think the tables will turn once I get carapace armour though. Do they also get upgraded armour?
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Nov 20, 2013 11:54
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Today I learned: Seekers are pathetically easy. They do squat all and die from a slight breeze. On Classic. Seekers on impossible, on the other hand, will destroy everything you love and hold dear, because they can kill your guys very very easily. One of your guys has only 2hp? Dead. Have a rookie without a breathing apparatus? Dead. Miss too many times because you're playing on Impossible and they have 6hp? Dead. Ambushed while fighting against someone else? Dead. Two Seekers attack at once? Oh, you better believe they can do that! Outfit all your guys with anti-strangulation gear? Now don't you just feel SILLY, because these guys have guns! They've got guns with all the accuracy of a Thin Mint and they will use them if you ever try to out-cheese them - and sometimes just randomly, too! They will decloak and they will shoot you and it will always hit and very usually crit because it's always flanking! Let me tell you: there is nothing fun about 6hp unblockable damage! BONUS POINTS: do what I did and turn on Absolutely Critical because you're playing a SHIV game. It worked so well in EU... Also, super cheap guide to Newfoundland: -Find $15 in spare change from under the sofa. -Get a Rookie. -Sacrifice him to appease the whale god. -Biscuits and tea for the ranked guys. MechPlasma fucked around with this message at 12:02 on Nov 20, 2013 |
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Nov 20, 2013 11:55
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MechPlasma posted:Today I learned: Seekers are pathetically easy. They do squat all and die from a slight breeze. I don't know about impossible mode but I specifically always leave 2 of my troops without the respirators on purpose. I think their AI prefers strangulation over shooting. I certainly prefer 2HP loss rather than a LPR flank shot.
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Nov 20, 2013 11:58
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This has probably been asked before, but this thread moves too fast to keep up with. Do you get offered the third Slingshot mission again if you ignore it the first time around in EW? I know it worked like that in EU. So far, I've been too busy trying to get my sat coverage up without countries bursting into panic to even build either of the Meld facilities. Just one more month...
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Nov 20, 2013 12:13
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Jolan posted:This has probably been asked before, but this thread moves too fast to keep up with. Do you get offered the third Slingshot mission again if you ignore it the first time around in EW? I know it worked like that in EU. No, you turn down Newfoundland, Progeny or Slingshot missions and you never get offered them again.
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Nov 20, 2013 12:21
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Iny posted:We're just really confused about what you're saying! Because, I mean, you were saying fielding four men rather than six is a big change, right? A big change from what? Implassic shouldn't be reducing the number of soldiers you can field, but more than that it sounds like you're talking about it reducing the number of soldiers you can field from six to four, and we're really confused by that because you always start out only being able to field four soldiers regardless of difficulty, that's just how XCOM: Enemy Unknown works?? I think my initial install of Implassic, pre-EW, might have been borked then because when I installed it the game would start me off with six lady dudes.
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Nov 20, 2013 12:25
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That French convoy mission is the bane of my ironman attemts. 
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Nov 20, 2013 12:27
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Mister Bates posted:So, I've spotted what I'm almost positive is a bug. I've been playing this EW campaign for five ingame months and have not had one single loving Assault. I've deliberately sent out as many rookies as possible to try and train them up, I've got 20 soldiers at Squaddie or above, and not a single one of them has ever promoted to Assault. I mean, I understand the RNG dicks you over with promotion assignments sometimes, but that much? Use the OTS upgrade that makes soldiers start at squaddie.
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Nov 20, 2013 12:30
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El Perkele posted:Just started another game because my first classic EW game ran into some problems. The South America bonus is more powerful with increased research times and the additional benefits from autopsies, like more genemod-options. Everything is easier, especially getting more Meld, once you get the genemod "mimetic skin" (requires Seeker autopsi).
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Nov 20, 2013 12:41
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| # ? Jun 7, 2024 18:43 |
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hhhmmm posted:Use the OTS upgrade that makes soldiers start at squaddie. I have wholeheartedly emphasized the Beagle approach of "Asia gently caress yeah". I previously used Africa. Future combat is invaluable in the first months when you're often money-limited. Few months later money is no longer that big of a question. If you start in Asia, you save 187 bucks if you pick Squad Sizes 1+2 and New Guy. I have found that early-game power multiplier crucial, because ability of ranking up your squaddies (which can be problematic if you have only 4-person squads) pays back quite soon in reduced casualties and diminished loss ratio. edit: South America! Haven't even tried that yet, thanks.
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Nov 20, 2013 12:47
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