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That Italian Guy posted:I, on the other hand, am happy that this run is without WotC. I feel that, while the expansion adds a lot of content, not everything is tone/gameplay consistent with the base game. WotC feels similar to the "Crimson Court" expansion to Darkest Dungeon: I like both games more without it, even if I like some elements of the expansion pack. I can see arguments for both directions. I think the especially the strategy layer of the game is better with WotC, and the tactical additions at least provide variety. On the other hand, there's enough of stuff in the base game, and the game already doesn't explain all the rules and systems in place very well. Having all the DLC features on could really bog down a blind LP. Also the Chosen absolutely, categorically, refuse to shut up, ever. XCOM LPs already tend to be shouting matches with Bradford & co., having the Chosen join in with their 20 second newsflashes isn't exactly ideal. The Crimson Court comparison rings a bell, though. I disliked the Darkest Dungeons expansions, since while that game could use more variety to support its interminable length, it definitely didn't need yet another dungeon you have to run a million times. XCOM 2 didn't need to have longer campaigns either, although I think WotC integrates way better than Crimson Court does. In other news, original self-insert character sent, do not steal!
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Jan 4, 2019 15:46
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TheGreatEvilKing posted:I don't have PMs, but I do have a file for Samuel L Jackson, who helped me save Earth. Post the download link, I'll PM it to put it in the same queue with the others.
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Jan 6, 2019 07:28
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I run my campaigns off the goonpool from the games thread. It has XCOM soldier versions of all kinds of posters, for example Richard "Lowtax" Kyanka is in there. It's mondo cool.
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Jan 6, 2019 16:16
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IcePhoenix posted:Does lowtax spawn with an exo suit? He spawns with a cuban in his mouth.
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Jan 6, 2019 18:41
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Natural 20 posted:I think our pool is currently 25-30 soldiers deep You're good.
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Jan 6, 2019 19:50
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That Italian Guy posted:I was wondering how the hell I was still alive after I think that's reverse  !This opening mission is brutal on any difficulty setting. If you hadn't figured out how good grenades are, or how flanking shots work, your campaign would have ended here. Concrats commanders, you guys made the cut!
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Jan 12, 2019 00:53
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I also have a Blood Bowl background, here's some thoughts on the similarities between that game and XCOM: Both games are about risk management and squad cohesion. Some risks just aren't worth taking, and sometimes holding back and not taking a risk means ADVENT will take a risk. The enemy AI is not very risk averse. You also have to be able to concentrate the power of your team to a point. In Blood Bowl, this means having teammates next to each other for assists. In XCOM, it means all of your squad needs to have vision of the area where poo poo is going down. In Blood Bowl, a lone piece will get marked and blocked down. In XCOM, if a unit can't get line of sight to the enemy units, they are pretty much worthless. In both games you absolutely want to figure out what you want to achieve during your turn, before moving any pieces. Moving pieces one by one and reacting to what happens is a very bad plan. Figure out a plan, decide on the moves to make, then execute in the order of least risk involved. There's no Turnover rule in XCOM, but there's all kinds of variations of 'Now my soldier is flanked by an army of aliens and there won't even be a corpse left'. "What is the worst thing that could happen to me in this position?" is a good thought to keep in mind. Blood Bowl has the strategic concept of the 2-1 grind. For those who don't know Blood Bowl, the idea is that it's fine to let the opposing team score once, if it makes it easier for your side to score two times. The strategy part of XCOM kinda works the same way. Fighting tooth and nail in a mission with a faint hope of winning just isn't a good idea. It's a waste of time and resources. Let ADVENT take that one, and you'll be in a much better state to crush the next mission. Losing a mission isn't that big of a deal, losing a mission with a squad wipe is.
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Jan 12, 2019 12:53
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I've built a mindshield a couple of times. It's not a great item, but my first ever experience with Sectoids, was a Ranger getting MC'd in the second mission, and turning into goddamn Jason Voorhees. The ability to dash behind your cover and attack is messed up when the aliens get to use it. Considering the end of the latest video, our pals might find out exactly how badly it can go with these sword wielding types on the field. So anyway, for a while I had a habit of having mindshields on Rangers. Standard grenades are unimpressive when you have a Grenadier on a mission, and there's often better options available than running forward close enough for a hand lobbed bomb. Experimenting with the other items is a good idea in general.
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Jan 29, 2019 17:01
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That sniper position was really good, it just wasn't tenable with the hp your soldiers have right now.
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Feb 2, 2019 21:55
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The game does advertise the GTS on the squad selection screen with the cryptic message 'Increase Squad Size through the G.T.S. facility'. Build that thing! Having one more soldier on the field isn't just a flat increase in firepower. The tactical game is all about using various powers in concert, and having more tricks to pull on your turn multiplies your options immensely.
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Feb 14, 2019 21:29
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Yeah, I think pontificating on what has happened should be okay, it's half the fun!
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Feb 15, 2019 20:02
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Yeah, turns out Codexes loving kill people. You still got a win here, and that means you don't need to do that skulljack move again!
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Feb 16, 2019 05:44
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XCOM 2 is a game that absolutely delights in pulling the rug from under you. It doesn't want you to win, and it has a formidable array of cheap shots and bullshit moves, that it can and will pull on you. That's what makes it the emotional roller coaster ride that it is, and you know, you can take it or leave it. I love the game for how intense it is, but I have also hit alt-f4 on it several times just for being such an rear end.
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Feb 16, 2019 11:40
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Commander Keene posted:I feel like giving exp bonuses or something for speed and efficiency would have been a better way to encourage players to keep moving. Enemy Within (the expansion for XCOM 1) tried this. It had the timed Meld canisters scattered around missions, which literally locked away all the new fun toys of the expansion. You had to get to those in time to have access to the cool robot soldiers and mutant gene mans. It didn't really work. The risk of losing experienced soldiers is just too high to warrant taking risks for bonuses, even really shiny ones. Losing a lot of good soldiers is the primary way of losing the game. Unless you make the bonuses pivotal to winning the campaign, I don't think it's going to be enough. Now I'm not going to tell anyone they're wrong for disliking the timers. They're a very heavy handed solution, they're explained poorly, and just feel bad. Losing missions to the timer usually has a very negligible effect, though. Getting a squad killed running after them is the real threat. That leads me to the main complaint I have about the tactical missions: the missions where you don't have the ability to create an evac zone and retreat. These types of missions are a massive death trap that the game doesn't signal nearly strongly enough. When the evac ability is there, it's possible to take calculated risks and cut your losses if it all goes pear shaped. It's a good test of skill and tactical foresight, to have to recognize a losing situation early enough to be able to pull out. Taking away the evac means that you just have to eat whatever hilarious cascade failure the game has in store for you this time. That is something I'd say is just unfair. The Avatar Project timer discussion also made an interesting thought occur. All the games in the series, including the classic ones, really want to sell you this idea of fighting a losing battle against an almost insurmountable alien force. They tell you that the enemy is gearing up to something, and time is short. In all of the games, however, the exact opposite is true. The strategy layer of every XCOM game is geared in the player's favor, and as long as the player doesn't implode in the tactical fights, the games will almost inevitably hand them a space marine murder squad that the aliens cannot challenge. It's the aliens that will lose in the long run, and have to resort to silly tricks to win, like an early base assault in the classic game, or convincing you that attempting to defend snakeman terror missions is a sound idea.
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Feb 21, 2019 08:36
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I cannot abide this rampant violence against turret-chan. 
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Feb 23, 2019 07:18
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This is one of those non-choices. Like people said, grenades are what you use to remove cover. Suppression is always useful if there's a live alien in sight after everyone else had a go. It's an excellent fallback plan if you can't get everything in sight killed outright. Suppression is also one of the few abilities that work really well against enemies in indestructible hard cover. Also I believe suppression somehow counts as a hit, so it will break overwatch and a bunch of other alien abilities, like mind control. It can't miss either, so that's double good.
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Feb 23, 2019 10:39
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The scouting power is good and free if there's no enemies in sight.
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Mar 2, 2019 23:07
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You're definitely pulling yourself out of the hole that the early game left you in! The upcoming alien facility mission is going to be pivotal, I don't think you can afford to lose that one. I'm worried about mutons and heavy stun lancers. They haven't yet seen the muton counter-punch, and that's an easy way to lose a ranger. Mutons also carry grenades and the big boy guns, they can one shot some of the team since they won't have plated armor for the mission. Heavy stun lancers are also horrifying and they might face the double stun lancer + priest pack, which can take out a squad by itself.
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Mar 5, 2019 07:27
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Bremen posted:Aren't Priests from the expansion? Isn't that a Priest that they zoom in on and try to figure out in the latest video? It dies to overwatch shots before it can do anything, but it seems to have the white armor of a Priest.
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Mar 5, 2019 10:41
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That Italian Guy posted:I think it's a Shield bearer - which is also bad news when acting as an unknown factor. Priest are from the expansion afaik. Yeah, you guys are right. The Priest has a very distinct helmet, and that's not it. The Shieldbearer, while not really an enemy you want to see on the field, is at least more straightforward to fight against.
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Mar 5, 2019 11:15
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Bladestorm is also good at countering Advent reinforcements. Since the reinforcing units are forced to do a cover seeking move as their first action, a Bladestorm ranger sitting on the red flare gets a free hit on them. It's a powerful but very aggressive ability, since it usually requires the ranger to stand right next to the heat. Implacable is very good as well, and allows for more conservative play. Like Bremen said, Implacable might be better for less experienced players.
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Mar 14, 2019 14:29
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Visiting the Black Market every now and then is a good idea. There's such a plethora of bad choices for you to make, commanders.
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Mar 14, 2019 21:00
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Pete has transcended into an anime form, and I think we all should just accept it.
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Mar 19, 2019 19:09
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anilEhilated posted:Research the plot. It's kinda silly if you run into Gatekeepers before the actual - wonderfully creepy - Gate mission; this has happened in my last WotC playthrough and it really ruins the effect. This is a good point and idea. Research plot.
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Mar 30, 2019 10:15
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This was posted in the other XCOM thread, and I think it's appropriate here as well:
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Apr 5, 2019 11:30
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A sectopod actually got a turn off. It made the fatal mistake of choosing to wind up instead of firing, but we're getting there!
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Apr 20, 2019 05:51
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The thing that made chrysalid terror missions dangerous was the fact that they had about five million action points, so they could run around and turn every civilian on the map into more chrysalids in like two turns. Even Power Armor did nothing against them since once one was next to an X-Com soldier they would spend all them action points on infinite attacks. When one of the fuckers got next to the team, they'd easily turn like four soldiers into more of themselves, every turn they got. It was not a good time. There he is, the smirking fucker!  StoryTime fucked around with this message at 19:10 on Apr 22, 2019 |
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Apr 22, 2019 19:01
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jng2058 posted:Hey man, you might wanna spoiler that. They don't know that Chrysalids can infect people yet! They shouldn't know that until it comes up in play! Oops, sorry, I didn't remember they hadn't seen that yet. There's three XCOM LP's going on at the moment, it's a bit hard to keep track of all of this!
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Apr 22, 2019 19:13
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