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[XCOM] XCOM 2: War of the Chosen Announced - The Real War begins in August

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    Who-PsydWho-Psyd Registered User regular
    I've had that bug myself! It's really really annoying and the trigger seems to be unreliable enough that you can't avoid it by changing play.

    I can trigger it pretty much every time, Plasma Sword/Axe Bladestorm Ranger will set the Stun Lancer on Fire, melee is disabled while Burning so somehow the Stun Lancer gets its actions back because it just used an action that is no longer possible for it to have done.

    As long as you never set a Stun lancer on Fire on their Turn the bug will never occur, obviously this can still happen if they run through Fire from Environmental.

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    PhonehandPhonehand Registered User regular
    Man, just ran through the endgame. The last fight is hilarious with two fully trained Psi Ops. All that automatic damage just slices through the Avatars like butter.
    Why anyone would play this on Ironman is beyond me. I experience a mission ruining bug once every five or six missions, which may not seem that high, but when it alters a campaign there's no way I'm risking it.

    I find that playing on Ironman makes me a better player. Knowing that I could lose the entire run to one bad move makes me play smarter... and while bugs do happen on occasion, if you're playing smart you can minimize the damage they do.

    I lost 39 troops my last successful game. It was a bloodbath early on, to be sure, but even when the shit was hitting the fan, I had my eye on the ball; a lot of the game was spent managing failures without losing significant progress.... for example, I always made sure to evac my highest ranking soldier in what was otherwise quad wipes, because my highest soldier determines how soon I can get squad size upgrades. As I lost troops, I made sure to stick rookies in the GTS right away to train in the classes that I was losing. And, gradually, my research came through with enough gear upgrades that I stopped dying so much.

    It's all fun and games until a sectoid tries to zombie an enemy that bugged through the ground, freezing your game forever.

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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    edited July 2016
    Phonehand wrote: »
    Man, just ran through the endgame. The last fight is hilarious with two fully trained Psi Ops. All that automatic damage just slices through the Avatars like butter.
    Why anyone would play this on Ironman is beyond me. I experience a mission ruining bug once every five or six missions, which may not seem that high, but when it alters a campaign there's no way I'm risking it.

    I find that playing on Ironman makes me a better player. Knowing that I could lose the entire run to one bad move makes me play smarter... and while bugs do happen on occasion, if you're playing smart you can minimize the damage they do.

    I lost 39 troops my last successful game. It was a bloodbath early on, to be sure, but even when the shit was hitting the fan, I had my eye on the ball; a lot of the game was spent managing failures without losing significant progress.... for example, I always made sure to evac my highest ranking soldier in what was otherwise quad wipes, because my highest soldier determines how soon I can get squad size upgrades. As I lost troops, I made sure to stick rookies in the GTS right away to train in the classes that I was losing. And, gradually, my research came through with enough gear upgrades that I stopped dying so much.

    It's all fun and games until a sectoid tries to zombie an enemy that bugged through the ground, freezing your game forever.

    Haven't had that problem, because I suffer not the Sectoid to live.

    Dracomicron on
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    BethrynBethryn Unhappiness is Mandatory Registered User regular
    If you haven't tried it already, use Julian's voice on a SPARK.

    I knew you could, I just didn't know what happens when you do.

    ...and of course, as always, Kill Hitler.
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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    Bethryn wrote: »
    If you haven't tried it already, use Julian's voice on a SPARK.

    I knew you could, I just didn't know what happens when you do.

    I was grinnin' the whole time. His in-mission chatter is pretty good, too.

    That said, I was let down that SPARKs didn't have much in the way of a Research/Proving Ground upgrade set. I figured I'd need to put a few days of work into doing what Lily suggested with Julian, and it would result in an upgrade of some sort, like how you could autopsy/Foundry a ton of bonuses for SHIVs in the last game.

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    Mr RayMr Ray Sarcasm sphereRegistered User regular
    Bethryn wrote: »
    If you haven't tried it already, use Julian's voice on a SPARK.

    I knew you could, I just didn't know what happens when you do.

    I was grinnin' the whole time. His in-mission chatter is pretty good, too.

    Putting him on overwatch:

    "So... I can shoot anything that walks past?"

    Squad member breaks concealment:

    "I'm a giant robot. What's your excuse?"

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    AegeriAegeri Tiny wee bacteriums Plateau of LengRegistered User regular
    Lying%20Down%20on%20the%20Job%20WTF_zpskbm7uvh5.png

    Hmmmm. There is a reason you guys are losing...

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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    Is that guy... flying like Superman?

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    AegeriAegeri Tiny wee bacteriums Plateau of LengRegistered User regular
    He's having a nap on the job! How is that acceptable?!

    The Roleplayer's Guild: My blog for roleplaying games, advice and adventuring.
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    TerrendosTerrendos Decorative Monocle Registered User regular
    The Skulljack is supposed to kill if it hits, right? I've only used it a couple times on Commander difficulty, and it seemed to work that way on Veteran. Last night it glitched out an enemy instead of killing him, and as a result one of my team died.

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    RainfallRainfall Registered User regular
    Terrendos wrote: »
    The Skulljack is supposed to kill if it hits, right? I've only used it a couple times on Commander difficulty, and it seemed to work that way on Veteran. Last night it glitched out an enemy instead of killing him, and as a result one of my team died.

    Skulljack is super glitchy, but it should be an instant kill.

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    honoverehonovere Registered User regular
    Isn't the Skulljack at like 70% for actually hitting though?

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    EvmaAlsarEvmaAlsar Birmingham, EnglandRegistered User regular
    Yeah it is possible to miss with the skulljack. I've only had it happen the once, though.

    However, I very rarely if ever bother with skullmining an advent trooper because of how janky things become.

    I had a specialise skulljack an advent stun lancer when his hack strength wasn't great, and as a result he failed the hack and suffered the 'feedback' penalty despite killing the stun lancer. It just hurt him for 2HP. HOWEVER, every subsequent hack / haywire protocol in that mission, whether performed by him or the other specialist I had on the field, did a further 2HP damage to the same specialist whether it was successful or not. Dunno if anyone else has had this happen to them but it's made skullmining totally not worth the effort for me.

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    LeumasWhiteLeumasWhite New ZealandRegistered User regular
    It's good for quick intel grabs, and the occasional insta-kill on a shieldbearer, but it has the usual melee drawbacks of probably revealing new territory/units and setting you up to get killed if you miss.

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    FoefallerFoefaller Registered User regular
    It's good for quick intel grabs, and the occasional insta-kill on a shieldbearer, but it has the usual melee drawbacks of probably revealing new territory/units and setting you up to get killed if you miss.

    I dunno if it's a bug or changed, but most times when I've had it miss I get a free half turn I can use to attack or run for cover.

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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    Foefaller wrote: »
    It's good for quick intel grabs, and the occasional insta-kill on a shieldbearer, but it has the usual melee drawbacks of probably revealing new territory/units and setting you up to get killed if you miss.

    I dunno if it's a bug or changed, but most times when I've had it miss I get a free half turn I can use to attack or run for cover.

    Depends on how close to him you are, I think.

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    mastertheheromasterthehero Professional Video Editor & Book Author Registered User regular
    Speaking of bugs.

    I had one retaliation mission that as soon as it started, it was completely insane.

    A MEC spawned in mid air, at ARCHON levels of height and was shooting at my troops from above. We managed to kill it and it teleported down to the ground then floated up in the air again.
    Okay, weird but not out of control weird.

    Then we activate a spawn with an andromedon and a gate keeper. My Psi trooper gets put in a bleeding out state and instead of doing the stabilize>revive combo, it went straight to revive. So naturally I revived him.

    My Psy op woke up, but not really. He stated in the unconscious state, but I could move him and use his psychic abilities. So whenever I would click to move him, he would get up and ragdoll across the floor then fall unconscious at the moved spot. He'd cast his psychic spell without any animation except for him looking like a dead, ragdolled corpse.

    Then when we killed the entire pod with void rift and other nonsense, but the Andromedon never "actually" died. He died but didn't go into his 2nd phase where he's under robot control. The andromedon would be stuck in place but play various animations as if it had detected the group. I couldn't shoot him with any weapons because he wouldn't register as an enemy. According to the game he WAS dead and if I used psi lance, the damn thing would take damage!

    Eventually I discovered that the reason the mission wasn't completing was because there was another group of lancers and a MEC to the north which had been stuck in place, not moving. I killed those guys and suddenly my mission was completed even though it said I hadn't killed one enemy.

    It was the weirdest, glitchiest X-com mission I had ever played. Because I didn't want the bug to affect my game, I didn't save it, so all I got are memories.

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    CorsiniCorsini Registered User regular
    That said, I was let down that SPARKs didn't have much in the way of a Research/Proving Ground upgrade set. I figured I'd need to put a few days of work into doing what Lily suggested with Julian, and it would result in an upgrade of some sort, like how you could autopsy/Foundry a ton of bonuses for SHIVs in the last game.
    Other people agree: http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=720053228
    I can't say how good it is because I only had one game where I got Shen's Last Gift and then things went poorly, but it does add a few upgrades from autopsies.

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    Mr RayMr Ray Sarcasm sphereRegistered User regular
    Oh man, I've finally found a combination of mods that I'm happy with, and they basically turn XCOM 2 into a whole different game ala Long War:
    • A Better Advent
    • A Better Advent - Better Pods Plus
    • Additional Mission Types
    • Long War Perk Pack
    • More Squad Size Upgrades
    • Bleedout mod

    "A Better Advent" (ABA) adds new Advent/Alien unit types and smarter AI for them. "Better Pods Plus" makes enemy pod sizes scale with force level and replaces "fixed" spawns on the story missions with the new ABA units. The "plus" version of Better Pods also increases pod sizes across the board, but there's a vanilla version if you don't want that. "Additional Mission Types" adds new mission types, mostly of the "hold the line until evac while infinite reinforcements drop on your head" variety, often with resistance backup which you get to keep if they survive the mission like the blueshirts in Long War. The Long War Perk Pack splits the vanilla classes into 7 new ones with new perks which are mostly balanced, but probably a bit stronger than their vanilla versions. More Squad Size Upgrades does exactly what it says; you can upgrade your squad size all the way to 8, and bleedout mod makes it so that low-ranked soldiers will actually bleed out sometimes instead of just dying (IIRC in vanilla they have no chance at all until Corporal).

    The end result is that Advent has more dudes, they're better, smarter and have more variety to them, and there are missions where they'll come at you in infinite waves if you don't finish the objective and GTFO. At the same time the additional missions throw free rookies at you, everyone is a bit more likely to survive hitting 0hp, and you can potentially have a much larger squad by end-game. I'll have to play a bit more to figure out if this is remotely balanced, but I'm having a blast with it so far.

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    AegeriAegeri Tiny wee bacteriums Plateau of LengRegistered User regular
    That's similar to what Chris Odd uses, but one thing I've noticed is that it really fucked with enemies using grenades. He once had 4 dudes behind a car and 2 mutons with their turn. Guess who didn't get grenaded into oblivion? Naturally, I had been watching him play for so long I forgot that aliens had grenades.

    Sure was a mistake :P

    The Roleplayer's Guild: My blog for roleplaying games, advice and adventuring.
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    TerrendosTerrendos Decorative Monocle Registered User regular
    I do think that, if I were to play through this game again with the Long War Perk Pack, I would also add the higher squad size mod. When you have 4 classes (plus Psi Op, maybe plus Spark) you can have one of everything and have an extra slot for a second of whatever class you expect to be most helpful. My Veteran run, I had a solid "A" squad, a "B" squad of backups in case someone got injured, and a few extras with unusual builds (Combat Specialist, Gunslinger Sharpshooter, etc.) that I could bring along if needed.

    This time, with 6 slots and 7 classes (again, not counting Psi Op) I don't have nearly the flexibility. I gotta have a Gunner because shredding is just so important in the endgame, Grenadiers are too useful for opening fights to leave behind, Sniper Sharpshooter is a must for one-shotting Codexes and massive damage to other mechs with Blue Screen rounds, Medic Specialist is a necessity because I'm not very good. That leaves 4 classes vying for 2 spots on any given mission, and basically no variation between "A" and "B" teams because those must-have abilities are so important.

    I like the Long War Perk Pack (LWPP), but I don't think I'll be using it again. I don't especially like the idea of bloating both my team and ADVENT with more and more units to try and get balanced teams with more classes in them. I'll stick with the 4+1 in the base game.

    PS Turns out LWPP's Gunner does get way better in the later ranks. I didn't realize it at first, but they actually get really good Aim, second maybe only to Sharpshooters, so they hit a lot more often than OG Grenadiers. That, combined with a few of the later abilities, means you can really count on them for tearing down tough foes. I do wish that Shredder were the default ability instead of Area Suppression, because it's so important late-game that no other perk on that tier is worth consideration.

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    The Zombie PenguinThe Zombie Penguin Eternal Hungry Corpse Registered User regular
    I think i'd be more enamoured with the LWPP if it

    a: Didn't screw over multiple other mods (Like Chooseable AWC perks),
    b: Wasn't buggy when it comes to assigning AWC perks (because what my Shinboi needed to learn was Phantom from the awc. Which she starts with.)
    c: Didn't have so much cruft in the trees. There's a lot of repeated perks across the trees, and a bunch of them are just bad - 1 less damage when shot through cover, etcera. Why would i ever take this in a game which is weighted so heavily towards the offensive end?

    Which is a shame, because there's a ton of great stuff in there - the changes to Slash and the addition of Fleche are inspired. Assaults are really fun (Although probably hideously broken) - like you mention, the GUnner changes are interesting too. I like the shinboi's setup - having Death from Above in there is really damn cool.

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    Mr RayMr Ray Sarcasm sphereRegistered User regular
    I think i'd be more enamoured with the LWPP if it

    a: Didn't screw over multiple other mods (Like Chooseable AWC perks),
    b: Wasn't buggy when it comes to assigning AWC perks (because what my Shinboi needed to learn was Phantom from the awc. Which she starts with.)
    c: Didn't have so much cruft in the trees. There's a lot of repeated perks across the trees, and a bunch of them are just bad - 1 less damage when shot through cover, etcera. Why would i ever take this in a game which is weighted so heavily towards the offensive end?

    Which is a shame, because there's a ton of great stuff in there - the changes to Slash and the addition of Fleche are inspired. Assaults are really fun (Although probably hideously broken) - like you mention, the GUnner changes are interesting too. I like the shinboi's setup - having Death from Above in there is really damn cool.

    Which is why I'm finding Additional Missions gels so well with LWPP; the extra mission types are defensive ones where being able to actually tank a bit is incredibly helpful, since you're not going to be able to kill every enemy pod in one go. Hell, I'm actually considering building vests!

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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    Interesting: if you turn off the Shen's Last Gift mission, as soon as you get the Proving Ground you can start the Mechanized Warfare project at no cost. At the end you get a SPARK. Further robots cost normal.

    Just had a run with real SPARK potential. My starting continent had the Spare Parts bonus, so the mechs would only cost 50 supplies (plus cores etc). Sadly the run failed before I could build a robut army.

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    NotoriusBENNotoriusBEN Registered User regular
    @No Great Name
    You turned into a ranger at the start of my campaign. We got the hunter weapons early and I have fusion swords now, but you still kept the axes.
    You are now some cross variant of the Blue Beetle, painted red, and a Native American Warrior.
    An Ottowan Warrior would be close, but tribals around the world always got crazy with their face paint to strike fear in their enemies.

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    NotoriusBENNotoriusBEN Registered User regular
    update. in true native american fasion, @No Great Name has never killed without using every part of the beast.
    he's wearing berserker skins as his own now...

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    Mr RayMr Ray Sarcasm sphereRegistered User regular
    I might be a bit screwed on my current play-through when the alien rulers show up... I had to evac without one of my soldiers who had both the hunter's axe and frost grenades on him at the time. I've beaten the rulers before, but I've always relied heavily on freezing them in place to counter those bullshit extra moves they get. I'm not sure how I'm going to beat them this time... halp?

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    Who-PsydWho-Psyd Registered User regular
    Mr Ray wrote: »
    I might be a bit screwed on my current play-through when the alien rulers show up... I had to evac without one of my soldiers who had both the hunter's axe and frost grenades on him at the time. I've beaten the rulers before, but I've always relied heavily on freezing them in place to counter those bullshit extra moves they get. I'm not sure how I'm going to beat them this time... halp?

    Stack as many kinds of DoT's as you can. Fire, Poison, Acid. Hits them for every bonus move and also has some debuff effects that makes them a bit less scary. Poison does not work on Snake even though it only shoots Ice

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    No Great NameNo Great Name FRAUD DETECTED Registered User regular
    update. in true native american fasion, @No Great Name has never killed without using every part of the beast.
    he's wearing berserker skins as his own now...

    Checks out

    PSN: NoGreatName Steam:SirToons Twitch: SirToons
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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    I beat the Berserker Queen once by standing on a building and dropping a grenade on her every time she climbed up to the roof, dropping her back down again. It was like Whack-A-Mole with explosives.

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    cB557cB557 voOOP Registered User regular
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    MuddBuddMuddBudd Registered User regular
    Finished the game this weekend.

    My big annoyance toward the end was all the random missions from the resistance that you lose a contact if you ignore. Like, I don't need that Advent supply convoy. I got Elerium out the wazoo here and I'm like, a few days from taking them down entirely. I don't need your supplies.

    There's no plan, there's no race to be run
    The harder the rain, honey, the sweeter the sun.
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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    MuddBudd wrote: »
    Finished the game this weekend.

    My big annoyance toward the end was all the random missions from the resistance that you lose a contact if you ignore. Like, I don't need that Advent supply convoy. I got Elerium out the wazoo here and I'm like, a few days from taking them down entirely. I don't need your supplies.

    Then make that choice. Is avoiding the risk and time spent on the mission worth sacrificing the region? If you're really about to topple ADVENT, it shouldn't matter.

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    LeumasWhiteLeumasWhite New ZealandRegistered User regular
    It's still dumb. Taking your soldiers on a mission is risk enough; no need to hit you with penalties too. "The game's about over so I don't care" is weak.

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    DracomicronDracomicron Registered User regular
    It's still dumb. Taking your soldiers on a mission is risk enough; no need to hit you with penalties too. "The game's about over so I don't care" is weak.

    The first game punished you way more for not being careful with what missions you skip. At least you don't lose the game from countries leaving you, and they're fairly easy to get back.

    Honestly the strategic penalties are so fucking mild compared to the potential tactical disasters that I can't get worked up over them. I just lost a C/I run because a Council Mission I should have ignored (6 days left on the Avatar countdown, just managed to get my team healthy) went sideways, leaving me with mostly Squaddies to hit the Blacksite.

    Didn't go well...

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    LeumasWhiteLeumasWhite New ZealandRegistered User regular
    It's just another one of those things that cuts down on meaningful tactical/strategic decisions. You take every mission you're offered, or you lose something; no choice required. And resources are tight enough that you can't really afford to, until you get to the end of the game and no longer care.

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    Mr RayMr Ray Sarcasm sphereRegistered User regular
    It's still dumb. Taking your soldiers on a mission is risk enough; no need to hit you with penalties too. "The game's about over so I don't care" is weak.

    I used this to my advantage when I was working my way towards an Avatar facility I couldn't quite reach; mission came up in a region in the opposite direction so I deliberately ignored it. Oh look, now I have the comm capacity to reach the site! It should really only be a thing that happens if you ignore terror missions though; if you lose a region for a frigging supply raid how is it actually any different functionally from a terror mission?

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    OpposingFarceOpposingFarce Registered User regular
    Idk. I both love and hate how hyper aggressive alpha strike-y the tac layer is, but I do prefer the strategic layer a great deal. I like that the repercussions for not taking missions can be undone, but that there are repercussions. It forces that decision of whether to risk having to use bench warmers for the next mission.

    It's not perfect but better than before.

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    GashikGashik Office Communist Registered User regular
    So I picked up XCOM 2 on the Steam sale, and just booted it up last night. Couldn't resist the call of the character creator, so I spent my first night filling out a roster. Decided to go with some Overwatch characters to start with, since I've been playing that a bunch lately. How'd I do?

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    honoverehonovere Registered User regular
    Gashik wrote: »
    So I picked up XCOM 2 on the Steam sale, and just booted it up last night. Couldn't resist the call of the character creator, so I spent my first night filling out a roster. Decided to go with some Overwatch characters to start with, since I've been playing that a bunch lately. How'd I do?

    Now get all the Overwatch voicepacks

    Or not because that way is the mod rabbit hole.

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