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Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

It's fun to see the progression of "this unit is complete bullshit, it's totally unbalanced and ruins the game" to killing one on the ambush turn in the next mission once you get a handle on its tricks.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2019 07:44

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 23:05

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Mordja posted:

Like I said, I had no qualms in getting the mod that does this right off the bat. It also makes more sense to me that the aliens would only start purging their data or whatever after detecting an incursion.

TBF, it is kind of weird that you start undetected after fast-roping into the area out of a VTOL assault ship with the XCOM logo on the side.

# ¿ Feb 21, 2019 22:43

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Demolition is redundant: grenadiers already have multiple ways of stripping cover. It also does not work on non-destructible cover, which makes it even more situational. I vote Suppression: being able to throw a -50 on the aim of a flanking enemy can be the difference between life and death.

# ¿ Feb 23, 2019 08:22

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Nice thing is though, melee enemies' attack roll is calculated before they move.

If you absolutely prefer they don't move, then overwatch another soldier to hold them in place. That's a bit situational, especially since one of the benefits of suppression is using one action to lock down an alien, rather than "remove cover->kill", but it can still be useful for pulling an exposed soldier out of the fire, because suppression & overwatch are both automatic, while your shot percentage may not be that high.

# ¿ Feb 24, 2019 08:29

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Affi posted:

I love you man but this is rough to see. You don�t need to move forward at all if the enemy is frozen and standing in the open.

I�m calling it. No way he recovers unless he builds more the one mimic beacon and abuses the crap out of it. And stops bringing lovely items like mindshields over grenades on his grenadiers also I missed the setup did he forget the axe as well?

I don't have the Alien Hunters DLC, so I'm not familiar with freeze or how long it lasts, but I might have made that move too in order to boost my shotgun users' hit/crit chance. Given where Ma had already revealed, it looked pretty safe; getting pods that close together is just bad luck.

# ¿ Feb 26, 2019 18:25

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Akratic Method posted:

And regarding the Lost Tower, yeah, if your guns do 3-5 damage and you don't have both squad size upgrades, they become two-hit robots with the armor, four of them is a lot more of a problem for four troops, and the gimmick of dwindling numbers of soldiers available as you evacuate the floor gets a lot tenser. But you guys took "don't do Lost Tower immediately" to heart and here we are wrecking the "rather poo poo terminators" with mag weapons.

Yeah, Lost Tower can have some big difficulty swings depending on where you are in the game. I did it the first time with both squad size upgrades but basic weapons, (maybe just mag rifles?) and it was extremely tense keeping the two-armor suicide bombers off my last few soldiers as they made their way up.

Nordick posted:

it's really the frost bomb that's the truly overpowered thing here.

No joke. What I'm really learning from this LP is how OP the Alien Hunters weapons are. Let's put aside the pistol that gives your sharpshooter Combat Protocol and Conceal as a single action, or the axe that does more damage than a sword and gives your ranger Lightning Hands. The frost bomb is an AoE stasis, can't miss, and lets you shoot at the frozen targets. I can see needing gimmicks like that to keep from getting steamrolled by the Rulers at lower levels, but man does it break the difficulty curve against normal enemies.

# ¿ Apr 5, 2019 06:17

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Affi posted:

Gatekeepers and Sectopods sure but they have hacking and frost bombs.

I think what needs to happen is they need to underestimate a mission (like a terror mission really) and lose the frost bomb or I�ll say they�ve got this.

I can't believe the frost bomb works on Gatekeepers and Sectopods. Does it work on Avatars? because that's the other thing I can see absolutely murdering them if they don't have a fine grasp of squad action management by the time they run into it.

# ¿ Apr 5, 2019 17:08

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Dr Christmas posted:

Yes for Avatars.

But frost grenades have a reduced effect on Sectopods. I think they only remove one or two of the former's their three actions and one of the gatekeeper's. I think it might be little randomized.

Christ, that's OP. They should have just made them stasis grenades.

# ¿ Apr 5, 2019 17:53

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Nordick posted:

I mean just imagine ~~that boss battle~~ the entire LP up to this point if they ~~still only~~ had ~~ballistic weaponry and~~ no frost bomb...

# ¿ Apr 6, 2019 02:33

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

ManlyGrunting posted:

How in the hell are you suppossed to take out a sectopod as early as the game seems to want you to do this mission?

Behind the scenes, Julian has less accuracy than a normal sectopod, and only hits half as hard. A normal sectopod can one-shot dudes in predator armor. He also doesn't have access to the lighting field or wrath cannon, though the latter is a waste of the sectopod's turn anyway. He's a big ole stack of HP, but that's it.

Also, as mentioned above, you have Shen's capacitor discharge and other gimmicks, like luring him up on the generator platforms that explode for big damage + shred. IMO, the real challenge without mag weapons is keeping the flanking suicide robots out of your back row.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 05:37 on Apr 6, 2019

# ¿ Apr 6, 2019 05:17

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Yeah, I feel like Deep Cover is just there because they needed something on the tree opposite Untouchable. The latter synergyzes so much better with other Ranger abilities: it lets you be far more aggressive with Run & Gun and Slash, and can be used to bait out attacks when used correctly with Implacable. Being able to have Implacable, Bladestorm and Untouchable on the same character in WotC is incredibly broken: murder a dude, then run over to a second dude who can't do anything next turn except take a blade to the face. Deep Cover feels like it would be good on a grenadier or sharpshooter.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2019 06:04

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

anilEhilated posted:

I believe this has the potential to backfire spectacularly when they run into a real Sectopod.

I doubt it: their "frost grenade bukkake" tactic will work just as well on real Sectopods as it did on Julian, who never got a shot off. When Sectopods (and Gatekeepers) first show up, it's as packs of one with no support. By the time they start seeing them multiple times per mission, they'll probably have plasma guns and at least one Magi, which decreases a player's reliance on once-per-mission powers. Between Heavy Ordnance and the Serpent Suit, they're going to have 3x freezes per mission for the rest of the game. They've also realized that something bad happens every time you advance the plot, so I'm not counting on the Avatar catching them unaware. I think they have it in the bag.

# ¿ Apr 6, 2019 16:38

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

IMO, the EXO suit is a direct upgrade for Grenadiers, and, if you're feeling frisky, Psi Soldiers. I once stuck a Specialist in one with a maximally upgraded assault rifle because all my Grenadiers were wounded/fatigued. Yes, you lose the extra utility slot, but you gain the heavy weapon. Rocket launchers are great for removing armor and cover, which, along with proccing holo targeting, is what I bring Grenadiers for in the first place.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2019 03:25

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I actually think Vigilance is one of the worst dark events, because it increases the chances of accidentally activating a pod, and accidental pod activation is one of the leading causes of soldier death.

# ¿ Apr 9, 2019 21:10

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I think the reason Sparks seem underwhelming compared to MECs is that they come in as rookies while, depending on when you did Lost Towers, your normal troops are Captain+. They are also no longer the only melee-capable troops (and don't have the awesome cinematic melee animations), and their rookie level accuracy is hilighted by the fact that (in vanilla) they can't use weapon upgrades.

Objectively, they are good. Their weapons are a tier higher than the rest of the squad, and they have free EXO armor. Overdrive is one of the best abilities in the game bar none, and the rest of their good abilities show up in the first few ranks.

I ran a gimmick squad of three Sparks and the three faction soldiers in WoTC against endgame enemies because I didn't want to fatigue my A- or B-teams on a pop-up mission, and was surprised by how effective they were. The higher tier weapons, multiple heavy weapons, and multiple overdrives adds up to a lot of damage output.

# ¿ Apr 11, 2019 20:05

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Fwoderwick posted:

Yeah it'd be a real shame if sparks don't get a look... not wanting to raise another pokemon when Dash Rendar at Corporal is pretty much just that... The spark's main weapon does this by default and they have a heavy weapon slot so that's a lot of bonus additional shredding.

Yeah, Spark Knights make a better 6th man than rookies or Corporals, and while they aren't crucial to a deep bench in Vanilla the way they are in WotC, you guys should train up at least one to get the full experience.

# ¿ Apr 12, 2019 04:33

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

GeneX posted:

As a counterpoint, I think crippling yourself is dumb and all it takes is you screwing up once for all the items in the world to fail to help

It's not really "crippling yourself" when the difficulty of vanilla XCOM 2 was fine and Alien Hunters is the worst non-comsmetic DLC. The reason I tuned in for this was to see how they would adapt their tactics to the new and weird enemies the game throws at you, but if the single tactic is going to be "freeze everything new & threatening, kick it while it's down, repeat until completing weapon upgrades that trivialize the encounters", that isn't going to be very interesting.

# ¿ Apr 16, 2019 20:09

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Mr. Vile posted:

"For insurance" is a pretty good reason to use it, honestly. You really have to play these games in the mindset of "What's my backup plan if this doesn't work?" rather than "This is a good plan, time to go all-in", because sooner or later that 95% shot is going to miss and if you don't have a plan to fall back on then you can end up pretty screwed. It's the reason why frost grenades and mimic beacons are so broken, because they can be your fallback plan for virtually any situation. No need to worry about having a plan to get that ranger back to safety if they activate another pod or miss their 99% flank shot, mimic beacon has you covered.

I think that mimic beacons have their place, especially in an Ironman/honestman game. The vicissitudes of the RNG mean that you're maybe going to stumble into bad situations no matter carefully you tread, and the mimic beacon can save you from a squad wipe that makes a game you're 40 hours into effectively unwinnable. Especially in WotC. Using it like a frost grenade to toast a pod for free means you don't have it when you need it.

I still recall vividly a downed UFO mission in Enemy Unknown where my squad started in an entire screen of half cover, and three pods patrolled onto me in two turns: Berzerker + Mutons and two pods of four heavy floaters, one from the flank. I must have replayed that save twenty times looking for a solution, and nothing worked. Every single time I got flanked in low cover and squad wiped. If I had been playing that campaign Ironman, I would have rage quit.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 23:09 on Apr 21, 2019

# ¿ Apr 21, 2019 04:09

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Disappointed that y'all went for gear upgradeds instead of advancing the plot. :mad:

# ¿ Apr 23, 2019 05:41

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I vote research codex brain instead of sectopod breakdown.

# ¿ Apr 25, 2019 01:56

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Bruceski posted:

the endgame's just sitting there overpowered waiting for research to finish so you can end it.

And yet some of you are still voting for sectopod breakdown over codex brain. :v:

# ¿ Apr 27, 2019 02:29

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

They have powered armor and plasma weapons, they're fine. Is staying on the difficulty curve instead of coasting your idea of crippling them? They haven't even tackled Blacksite II yet, which most folks do with tier 2 weapons & armor. They're already steamrolling encounters, they're going to keep using the frost grenades, they aren't going to train up a SPARK, and running into a Gatekeeper before the Psi Gate mission really deflates what is otherwise a cool and creepy moment. Plus, actually doing the plot will relieve some of their Avatar anxiety.

Nordick posted:

Kinda out of the blue they released this DLC called Tactical Legacy Pack for WotC, which had a whole bunch of neat stuff, like a series of mini-campaigns. But the real star of that pack was yet another soundtrack, and by God is it a good loving soundtrack. Notably, it took some of the iconic tunes from the OG UFO and remade them in glorious fashion. And apart from that, the new original music in the pack is loving as well.

Sorry for going off on a bit of a tangent, but I just loving love that soundtrack.

Bruceski posted:

No need to buy the DLC to jam out either, they put the soundtrack on Bandcamp. https://2kgamesmusic.bandcamp.com/album/xcom-legacy-original-soundtrack

That is indeed a pretty good soundtrack.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 03:57 on Apr 27, 2019

# ¿ Apr 27, 2019 03:52

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Bop Gun.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2019 01:11

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

A few notes:
-The clone ability (and, IIRC, Codex teleport) do not trigger overwatch.
-The edge of the fog of war behaves in strange ways. A unit that moves exactly one square into visibility will not trigger overwatch; the shooter has to see them step from one visible tile to another. I don't know how it works if they step out of visibility, since the AI is so aggro. Also, sometimes squares on the edge of visibility can be revealed without triggering pod activation, as you've seen.
-Shanty Pete couldn't be disarmed because he procced untouchable with his overwatch kill.
-Guardian is amazing and I always choose it on specialists.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2019 02:21

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I know that, but I've never encountered a situation where I had an enemy who met those criteria, and was on the last square of visibility such that if they took a step away they would enter the fog of war, and a soldier on overwatch. So I don't know if the overwatch shooter just has to see the square the enemy is exiting, or the square that they're stepping to as well.

# ¿ Apr 30, 2019 21:57

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I wouldn't say that gunslinger sharpshooters are better than sniper sharpshooters, but they're certainly viable. Being able to shoot the same target five times in one turn can be devastating in some scenarios.

# ¿ May 1, 2019 19:55

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I preferred Reapers with expanded magazines, blood trail, needle, armor shred, banish for my one-turn high damage nuke.

# ¿ May 1, 2019 20:58

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

GeneX posted:

why the hell have you decided to cripple yourself

GeneX posted:

I think crippling yourself is dumb

GeneX posted:

voting to intentionally cripple the LPer is dumb

<LPers one-turn a Gatekeeper>

:crossarms:

# ¿ May 2, 2019 04:58

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

MonsterEnvy posted:

As far as I know the Codex data is the last Shadow Chamber thing.

Nope, still have Recovered ADVENT Stasis Suit, Psi Gate, and Avatar Autopsy to go. This is why I was suggesting they get started on the plot earlier: there's still a ton of it left.

# ¿ May 2, 2019 05:07

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

GeneX posted:

Sure? Voting on intentionally poor choices is still dumb

The optimal strategies in XCOM are frost grenade spam, overwatch creep, turtling, and delaying the plot until the last minute. They're also incredibly unfun and boring, because there's no danger, you don't have to adapt, and it knocks you off the difficulty curve to the point that missions start to feel repetitive and routine rather than challenging. Which it's clear Nat and Tea have been feeling since the Berzerker Queen. There's a reason many of the changes from Enemy Unknown, to Enemy Within, to XCOM2 were various attempts by the devs to encourage people to abandon ultra safe strats.

Frost Grenades and Reapers with Banish + Expanded Mag + Repeater are both optimal strategies, but I don't play with either, because having a "click here to win" button makes the game less enjoyable.

# ¿ May 2, 2019 19:30

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

GeneX posted:

The problem with that, and I understand it, is that difficulty seems very all-or-nothing in this game. Enemies have powers that seriously, seriously punish misplays, which is good, but they also have powers, AI, and mechanics that mean they can punish you out of nowhere; that may be fun for a lot of people, and adaptation to it is encouraged, but the game is not really great about incentivizing risk in any way, and Nat and Tea both seem to heavily dislike that bit overall.

All that said, instead of restricting armaments, maybe a more fun way of adding some more challenge is to start recruiting and using newbies again, if and when the mission isn't super, super critical.

Notty posted:

It’s interesting to see the dichotomy between where Nat and Tea’s enjoyment and the thread as a whole’s enjoyment comes.

I remember the mission where the first Codex appeared and they sounded so defeated and just done with the game, compared to now where they gleefully outmaneuver anything the game can conceive of throwing at them.

From an audience perspective. I do think they could probably stand to increase the difficulty in some fashion, but I don’t know if the game that’s most entertaining to us, the one where death lurks around every corner, is necessarily one that they’d actually enjoy playing.

I think, if you hate the idea of a tense game that can turn on a dime and meaningfully punishes your mistakes, perhaps XCOM is not for you. Everyone who played through the game worked past the early hump where Sectoids and Vipers ruin your day, thought the first Codex they encountered was complete bullshit, learned about Chryssalids the hard way, and persevered. If the normal game difficulty was unfun, it wouldn't have such high reviews. The utter brutality of the early game is supposed to encourage you to maintain a deep bench, so that when, for example, your favorite grenadier gets flanked and murdered by an Andromedon, someone can step up to take her place. The game even offers you soldiers as mission rewards to assist you in this. The lesson isn't supposed to be "train up a single squad and get super paranoid about losing a one of them." In this way the fatigue system in WoTC is an improvement, as the devs finally found a way to force players to cultivate a deep roster.

Whoever said it upthread had it right: it's not the lack of blood, it's the lack of sweat.

# ¿ May 3, 2019 08:52

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

IMO, Ever Vigilant is one of the better hidden abilities you can get on a Sniper sharpshooter. Snipers tend to either end up falling behind, or spending their turn getting into an elevated position to shoot next turn, and Ever Vigilant means that they can still contribute to the squad's firepower. It's only a pistol overwatch, FYI, so don't run Ma into a squadsight roost thinking she'll start popping off sniper shots during the enemy turn.

Your second Gatekeeper encounter was what most people see on their first. They're nasty SOBs, as you saw, but you're usually far enough into tier 3 tech when you run into them that it's completely survivable: Warden armor (and untouchable, best Ranger ability in the game) is the reason Severa lived through a gateway, stun lance and gatekeeper explosion in one turn. Your A-team often needs to go back to the Avenger for naps after getting gateway'd, which is another reason to keep up reservists.

Same with the Archon King, really: unpleasant, but doesn't full health one-shot people like you worried about. And you've figured out that free actions don't trigger reactions, and that stackable DOTs fire every move.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 00:29 on May 4, 2019

# ¿ May 4, 2019 00:26

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

I think the XCOM2 system is more realistic and better for game play. Realism wise, even if you're inside an impenetrable armored shell, taking a cannon shot to the body is going to rattle you a bit. Game play wise, it smooths out the injury curve and, again, encourages a deep bench to make losses less catastrophic.

# ¿ May 5, 2019 18:46

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

eating only apples posted:

Maybe a death when Big Dude comes back, yeah?

Only in the highly unlikely events that they activate him after their Grenadier & Ranger have used up all their actions, or when they've burnt through all their once-per-mission powers/grenades. I really hope he waits to show up on Advent Network Tower, because it would be loving hilarious. As they've discovered, barring a really unlucky devastate that KO's half the squad, he just doesn't hit hard enough with his grab attack which can be cancelled by any damage at all, including Combat Protocol and DoT effects firing to one-shot a healthy soldier in Warden armor.

And their A-Team is merely overleveled. I picked up the Alien Hunters DLC to try because I've talked so much poo poo about it, and an endgame squad in WotC with ruler armor, multiple Magi, max level soldier bonds, and extra abilities purchased with XP is insanity. At one point in the final mission, the game threw a pod of two Advanced MECs and two Sectopods at me. It was barely a speedbump.

The final encounter was still challenging, but that was because one of the Avatars teleported in with a whole bunch of Elite Spectres.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 01:59 on May 6, 2019

# ¿ May 6, 2019 01:37

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Devastate is a really random ability. The missiles can miss entirely, or they can knock your soldiers out, with several possibilities in between. The King also seems to use it less than the grab.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 06:01 on May 6, 2019

# ¿ May 6, 2019 02:04

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Most of the remaining ones aren't worth tuning in for. I mean, has anyone ITT ever actually been hit by blazing pinions, Wrath Cannon, or Gatekeeper melee? I almost hope they never figure out what Chryssalids do, so it will be a surprise if they LP Enemy Unknown, but unfortunately they're due for a terror mission.

I do want to see how they handle the endgame.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 06:14 on May 6, 2019

# ¿ May 6, 2019 06:10

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

They'll be fine, their grenadier hasn't moved yet. Or their Ranger with the mimic beacon. This is the exact situation you bring the mimic beacon for.

Enemy pods try to spread out when you activate them specifically so that you can't tag more than one alien with a grenade. They don't always succeed, mind you, depending on the cover situation and terrain. Archons and MECs ignore cover, and usually are able to spread out better as a result.

I thought for sure they were going to activate that pack when they sent Pete to the corner of the train, but nope.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 00:55 on May 7, 2019

# ¿ May 7, 2019 00:15

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Commander Keene posted:

I propose the term "Reloverwatch" for turns where Tea just has everyone reload and enter overwatch.

"Tea time."

# ¿ May 10, 2019 08:11

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

*Codicies.

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 20:32 on May 16, 2019

# ¿ May 16, 2019 18:12

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# ¿ May 15, 2024 23:05

Dead Reckoning: Sep 13, 2011

Ranking system:
Start with 5 points.
+1 point per enemy killed
+3 points per turn left on mission counter for timed missions
-3 points per civilian lost on terror missions

+5 per low level (Lieutenant or less) soldier on mission
-3 points per soldier on mission who was on previous mission

+3 points for killing an enemy with a DoT effect
+5 points for killing an enemy with a flanking shot from a non-Ranger soldier
+5 points for effective use of Fuse (destroying terrain or damaging an enemy aside from the target)
+5 points for causing fall damage to an enemy
+5 points for killing an enemy with an environmental explosive
+10 points for killing an enemy with fall damage
+10 points for wiping out a fresh pod during the "Alien Activity" phase by any means
-3 points shooting at a pod with overwatch during the "Alien Activity" phase and not wiping it out on the subsequent XCOM turn
+10 points for wiping out a fresh pod during an overwatch ambush (one soldier may act to alert the pod, but all enemies must die before the next non-overwatch XCOM action)
+10 points for fighting two pods at once, on purpose or otherwise (turrets do not count)
+15 points for causing one non-mind controlled enemy to kill another with friendly fire

+5 points per piece of accessory equipment or heavy weapon brought for the first time
-1 point per Alien Hunters DLC weapon or armor brought on mission
-3 points per appearance of the "aliens this direction" sound indicator
-5 points per turn ended with 3 or more soldiers on overwatch that does not result in enemy contact during the "Alien Activity" phase
-5 points for use of Dominate
-15 points for use of a mimic beacon
-25 points for use of a frost grenade

Dr Christmas posted:

I think it's fun how they roll their eyes at Andromedons but still hold Shieldbearers in awe and fear. Has an Andromedon ever gotten an acid grenade off?

If one hasn't someone has been looking at spoilers, because they discussed it on a previous mission. :nyd:

Dead Reckoning fucked around with this message at 22:31 on May 16, 2019

# ¿ May 16, 2019 20:32

The Something Awful Forums > Discussion > Video Games > Let's Play! > This is Fine - Let's Play XCOM 2 - Blind

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