Surgical sitrep is absolute bullshit. My Templar gets Shadowbound, my Specialist gets mind controlled, can my sniper hit the sectoid? No, lol goodbye to all three of them. I guess it's also my own fault for not just bringing three grenadiers to blow everything up but still
+1
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DuriniaEvolved from Space PotatoesRegistered Userregular
With those rewards I'd try to solo it if they asked.
I just did that mission.
You know that feeling when you're trying to be all sneaky and things get a little hairy and you wonder if maybe you should have just shot things and then suddenly you're up to your ears in active pods?
Oh, and sectopods.
Took me almost 2 hours and I ended up evaccing down a ranger and my best sniper, but picking up two high-ranking grenadiers and the engineer.
I was like "oh hey this one is a countdown what happens if people are a step away from evac again... aw, I have time to clear up the last pod."
I did not! I did not have time. If they don't make it to the evac they get captured, you genius! Haha argh, it's just been so long since I was under the gun for evac, instead of like "aw you borked the objective, just call the skyranger".
Lost 3 people! Now to wait for rescue missions. I wish they were automatic in Covert Ops, but it looks like it's just random.
Then I had a mission where I accidentally activated 2 pods three times, lost one of my only Specialists, and left with 4/5 of the remaining folks gravely injured. If Faceoff hadn't hit every single person when I used it I would have been completely doomed.
Also Reaper + Templar is amazing. The only issue I have with it is that it seems to not allow for a Parry afterward, but that's kind of an alright tradeoff for generally killing literally everyone in sight.
Surgical sitrep is absolute bullshit. My Templar gets Shadowbound, my Specialist gets mind controlled, can my sniper hit the sectoid? No, lol goodbye to all three of them. I guess it's also my own fault for not just bringing three grenadiers to blow everything up but still
I would MAYBE do Surgical with a Colonel Reaper and two Magi in WAR suits IFF there was no timer.
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Gennenalyse RuebenThe Prettiest Boy is Ridiculously PrettyRegistered Userregular
Surgical is some right bullshit. I barely scraped by a surgical supply raid with a Skirmisher, Specialist, and Templar. Everyone else worth using was either a Squaddie/Corporal, Tired, or Wounded. Even my SPARKs were on their last legs, HP-wise.
The Specialist was a badass who got smacked in the face by an Archon, sliced in the face by my mind-controlled Templar, got shot in the face by a turret, and finally died to a Muton saying "FUCK THIS GUY IN PARTICULAR" and shooting then meleeing him. Rest in peace, Overdrive.
Oh yeah, did I mention a Priest mind-controlled my Templar early on? That was fun! Also there was a pod with a freaking Gatekeeper and two Mutons on the mission! I beat it by sheer luck when the Gatekeeper decided to fly right up to my Skirmisher and got not-Bladestorm'd and stunned. I forget the name, it's the Skirmisher version of the ability. Then I grappled up to a tower and unleashed everything at the Gatekeeper until it exploded.
One death, a Skirmisher with two HP left, and a Templar with one HP left. Fuck Surgical.
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DragkoniasThat Guy Who Does StuffYou Know, There. Registered Userregular
Had a mission with the Lost, supply run. There were so many explosions(both purposefully and accidental) that I had to wade through like 50 of them. Then the Assassin showed up.
Luckily for me see ran through the sea of the Lost and ended up revealing herself so I took her down with no injuries.
But between her and the Lost I only got like 4 of the 15 crates.
@pickles you and i got into some heavy shit on a covert mission that went sideways.
Advent, Lost, Mutons, those nano snipers. I couldnt believe how much shit advent threw at us trying to kill/capture us. In the last 2 turns, we took a muton grenade and you were bleeding out and i was fucked up. Managed to pick you up and get you to Firebrand after so many Lost missed attacks on me or decided mutons had more meat on them.
I like to think this is how it went down, but without you getting chewed on by zed.
Crap. I'm not sure what to do here. I had some issues with some mods I had installed, so I started a new game with none.
And now the chosen assassin has Brutal right on the first mission I encounter her. I don't really want to use any mods but the bug with Brutal is basically game ending. So...I guess it's mod, restart, or wait for patch.
Ugh this is really frustrating...
Steam Profile | My Art | NID: DarkMecha (SW-4787-9571-8977) | PSN: DarkMecha
I genuinely wonder if sitreps are actually working properly. Surgical, for instance, is supposed to seriously reduce the mission difficulty. In the files, it says "reduce pod size by two", which might mean something else but at its face implies that all pods should either be 1 or, rarely, 2 enemies. You can even click the little ? on the sitrep and see the "bonuses" intended to counteract the penalty in these cases. But... they just don't seem to be happening?
I'm concerned about after they actually do patch it that then the mod is broken and I have to remove it. The game seems to not like that very much, and either has issues or atleast just complains every time I load a save.
Also the mod breaks Sparks in that they can take Will damage but can't ever recover it. Since I really want to use Sparks I'm kind of stuck. Sigh.
Steam Profile | My Art | NID: DarkMecha (SW-4787-9571-8977) | PSN: DarkMecha
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SnicketysnickThe Greatest Hype Man inWesterosRegistered Userregular
I'm concerned about after they actually do patch it that then the mod is broken and I have to remove it. The game seems to not like that very much, and either has issues or atleast just complains every time I load a save.
Also the mod breaks Sparks in that they can take Will damage but can't ever recover it. Since I really want to use Sparks I'm kind of stuck. Sigh.
Is Sparks taking Will damage even a problem, given that they are immune to all effects tied to the Will stat?
I'm concerned about after they actually do patch it that then the mod is broken and I have to remove it. The game seems to not like that very much, and either has issues or atleast just complains every time I load a save.
Also the mod breaks Sparks in that they can take Will damage but can't ever recover it. Since I really want to use Sparks I'm kind of stuck. Sigh.
Is Sparks taking Will damage even a problem, given that they are immune to all effects tied to the Will stat?
I was wondering that too. Do Sparks even use that stat for anything?
Steam Profile | My Art | NID: DarkMecha (SW-4787-9571-8977) | PSN: DarkMecha
I genuinely wonder if sitreps are actually working properly. Surgical, for instance, is supposed to seriously reduce the mission difficulty. In the files, it says "reduce pod size by two", which might mean something else but at its face implies that all pods should either be 1 or, rarely, 2 enemies. You can even click the little ? on the sitrep and see the "bonuses" intended to counteract the penalty in these cases. But... they just don't seem to be happening?
I had five or six full-size pods in my previous game's Surgical mission. Plus reinforcements.
It is definitely not working as intended.
+2
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SnicketysnickThe Greatest Hype Man inWesterosRegistered Userregular
I'm concerned about after they actually do patch it that then the mod is broken and I have to remove it. The game seems to not like that very much, and either has issues or atleast just complains every time I load a save.
Also the mod breaks Sparks in that they can take Will damage but can't ever recover it. Since I really want to use Sparks I'm kind of stuck. Sigh.
Is Sparks taking Will damage even a problem, given that they are immune to all effects tied to the Will stat?
I was wondering that too. Do Sparks even use that stat for anything?
I'll be honest, I hadn't even noticed that they had a Will stat at all.
I genuinely wonder if sitreps are actually working properly. Surgical, for instance, is supposed to seriously reduce the mission difficulty. In the files, it says "reduce pod size by two", which might mean something else but at its face implies that all pods should either be 1 or, rarely, 2 enemies. You can even click the little ? on the sitrep and see the "bonuses" intended to counteract the penalty in these cases. But... they just don't seem to be happening?
I'd interpret that as reducing the total amount of pods in the mission by two.
Oh sorry, I misremembered. It's actually "PodSizeDecreaseToTwoEffect" for Surgical. TO two, not BY two. Also should reduce alert level by 1, add 2 turns to the timer, and block any Chosen or Alien Rulers from spawning.
You know I wonder, IS Brutal bugged? Maybe that's it's intended function. Part of the expansion is to get us to stop having this unstoppable A-Team thing going on, maybe that's really meant to be permanent...
Steam Profile | My Art | NID: DarkMecha (SW-4787-9571-8977) | PSN: DarkMecha
Oh sorry, I misremembered. It's actually "PodSizeDecreaseToTwoEffect" for Surgical. TO two, not BY two. Also should reduce alert level by 1, add 2 turns to the timer, and block any Chosen or Alien Rulers from spawning.
Awesome. My team would have carved the hell out of two pods.
If it's intended then it's stupid. No other Chosen bonus renders your soldiers useless merely by the Chosen being present, nor is the default UI designed in such a way as to make it clear "hey these veterans are useless and I need to fire them now".
If it's intended then it's stupid. No other Chosen bonus renders your soldiers useless merely by the Chosen being present, nor is the default UI designed in such a way as to make it clear "hey these veterans are useless and I need to fire them now".
Yeah I'm inclined to agree. Just gonna install the mod to fix it.
Steam Profile | My Art | NID: DarkMecha (SW-4787-9571-8977) | PSN: DarkMecha
You know I wonder, IS Brutal bugged? Maybe that's it's intended function. Part of the expansion is to get us to stop having this unstoppable A-Team thing going on, maybe that's really meant to be permanent...
It's too much, then.
Like it is all soldiers in LoS of the attack. The Assassin is all but guaranteed to get at least 1 attack in per appearance, and on the stronghold assault they're going to get in a lot more. If someone starts with 40 will, they're down to completely useless pretty quick.
Like "don't just use 6 soldiers" has more than been taken care of by the rest of the game, "hey everyone you sent on the Stronghold Assault is useless and can contribute nothing whatsoever to your cause" is a pretty fucking awful random roll. Hell, I'd be okay with it if they had "stay in the infirmary to recover Will to 50" or some fucking thing, but it's too harsh as it is.
Edit: and I mean I'm into the idea of like the soldiers of the first third not making it to the last third because of war weariness, but there needs to be some danged thing to address it beyond "Hey these folks, remember to never take them on missions even though they're high level because this little stat means they're going to be horrible".
I'd kind of love it if you could retire people to train other soldiers. Maybe allow them get people to like 1 below their promotion level with a small bonus like +1 health or mobility.
What class do you think is best and worst to be smart? I think it's sharpshooter, specialist, ranger, grenadier but I'm curious if anyone feels differently.
Someone posted the exact code for Brutal on reddit. It's pretty unambiguously just a super strong, probably overturned, but intentionally programmed permanent debuff.
What class do you think is best and worst to be smart? I think it's sharpshooter, specialist, ranger, grenadier but I'm curious if anyone feels differently.
You mean their combat intelligence? I think its most important for specialists, then rangers/grenadiers, and lastly sharpshooters. I don't really use snipers though and gunslingers don't really need anything from the sniper side of the tree.
It's the "every soldier in LoS" that makes Brutal, uh, brutal. Like you'll maybe have your Reaper miles ahead and out of sight, but splitting up is generally death, so practically speaking it's just "every soldier." Permanent Will loss on the person they actually hit and temp on everyone else would be much better. The guy actually hit gets lasting scars, everyone else just gets a temporary shock.
Yeah, the Hunter can be a real motherfucker, and you got the most useless weakness in the game. Best advice is to try to take cover such that any high ground can't get flanking shots on you. If he gets up on a building, grenade him to get him out of cover and also cause some falling damage. Failing that, just take the knowledge extraction. Once you get a few more ranks under your belt it's much easier to kill him. Cooldowns and consumables are key, generally.
This is basically what I did. I used a grenade launcher to break the house he was on and drop him down then shot him down to 4 hp. Then he grapples away to the edge of the map, on a 3rd floor roof behind heavy cover, kills one of my guys and heals back to 7hp.
And that's it. Because he's so far away I can't get more than a 20% shot in a single move, can't get in range to use the grenade launcher again in a single move, and he will bleed out another soldier next turn.
In all the times I replayed this mission, he never missed a shot. And I kept my guys in heavy cover, so as far as I know his hunter rifle always hit and always puts them in bleed out. Letting him extract seems realistically to be the only viable option for the first retaliation mission.
His tracking shot always hits. His Hunting Rifle has between 75(?) to 95 aim (+20 elevation). So you're pretty likely to be hit in low cover. You're about 50% to be hit in low cover hunkered and unlikely to be hit in high cover hunker.
Yeah, those tunnel VIP extractions need some tuning, they're waaaay out of whack with the other mission types. I was getting two Andromedons and two Codexes per turn as reinforcements, and this was before beam weapons.
Andromedons are the worst. At least with Codexes (Codices?) you can use a flashbang or just try to use a high damage initial attack given their low health. Andromedons though, in a game where I have an obsession with clearing all the red icons in a devastating alpha strike, annoy me to no end.
What class do you think is best and worst to be smart? I think it's sharpshooter, specialist, ranger, grenadier but I'm curious if anyone feels differently.
Lets see. Ranger wants, at the very least...
Conceal + R&G
Implacable + Bladestorm
Rapid Fire + Reaper
Shadowstrike and Phantom are nice bonuses with little downside
Being able to pick up every other skill is nice but unnecessary. Blast+Shredder is almost a necessity. As an aside, because of Blast Padding. Grenadiers make some of the best Covert Ops soldiers when there are +dodge bonuses on the table. Because Dodge Tanking gets a lot stronger with armor.
Sharpshooter wants
EITHER
Kill Zone + Faceoff
OR
Steady Hands + Hunker Down
Other skill additions are nice but are unnecessary. You would have to pick up every skill to make it worth while to have one sharpshooter for any mission rather than one for closer in engagements and one for longer range engagements. (The exception is that every Sharpshooter wants Kill Zone)
The reason for this of course is that Death From Above + Steady Hands + Hunker Down means that you're shooting at +30 aim if you get a kill. This entirely engates basically any long range penalty
So i would say that
Edit: Formatting
-Rangers is the most important to have high CI on. They gain the a lot from higher levels and also need a lot in order to get everything they really want/need.
-Grenadiers are the second most important but there is a cap. They don't gain as much as CI increases past gifted but can still use every point.
- Specialists are third. However they have unique uses for CI at Genius or Savant because not only do they scale hard they gain unique effects that cannot be achieved elsewhere.
-Sharpshooters are last. They get very little from CI unless the CI is Genius or Savant. This is because their skills are so wildly divergent in style that if you're only able to dip rather than grab everything you've not added anything. But if you're able to grab everything then you're a go on any mission in any situation.
What class do you think is best and worst to be smart? I think it's sharpshooter, specialist, ranger, grenadier but I'm curious if anyone feels differently.
Definitely specialist is best at genius or savant. All of the abilities are top notch, which is why we always ran two specs for medic and a combat hacker. and make sure they get a superior extended mag and superior aim pcs for ever vigilant guardian overwatches.
Im trying to make a grenadier work, but all the bullet wizard stuff just consumes so much ammo, you really need both extended and quick load mags, which you cant.
Are there breakthroughs in giving ammo capacity the same as damage boosts?
so any news on the technical quality of the console version? Its early so im guessing not, but I remember xcom 2 got so bad in terms of load times the longer you played it.
So close to a flawless mission, but the Assassin got a cheap shot off before I could finish her.
I still don't get how her stealth thing works. I knew where she ran to, I did a Scanning Protocol to make sure, and I lobbed a Frost Bomb over the wall to get her.
But when I moved three people over to blast her, they couldn't see her. Was that a bug, or is there just no way to reveal them to target them?
She then revealed, stunned my sniper, and ran off to make things difficult.
Not difficult enough I admit, but I'm a little salty about the injury she really shouldn't have lived long enough to inflict.
I discovered today how well the Hunter's rifle meshes with Death from Above. My sniper was able to kill four things in one turn without using any abilities.
I discovered today how well the Hunter's rifle meshes with Death from Above. My sniper was able to kill four things in one turn without using any abilities.
Yeah, turns out Death from above + Hunter's Rifle means you've basically got Serial for free.
Posts
I just did that mission.
You know that feeling when you're trying to be all sneaky and things get a little hairy and you wonder if maybe you should have just shot things and then suddenly you're up to your ears in active pods?
Oh, and sectopods.
Took me almost 2 hours and I ended up evaccing down a ranger and my best sniper, but picking up two high-ranking grenadiers and the engineer.
Yeah, pretty much this.
--Mark Twain
I was like "oh hey this one is a countdown what happens if people are a step away from evac again... aw, I have time to clear up the last pod."
I did not! I did not have time. If they don't make it to the evac they get captured, you genius! Haha argh, it's just been so long since I was under the gun for evac, instead of like "aw you borked the objective, just call the skyranger".
Lost 3 people! Now to wait for rescue missions. I wish they were automatic in Covert Ops, but it looks like it's just random.
Then I had a mission where I accidentally activated 2 pods three times, lost one of my only Specialists, and left with 4/5 of the remaining folks gravely injured. If Faceoff hadn't hit every single person when I used it I would have been completely doomed.
Also Reaper + Templar is amazing. The only issue I have with it is that it seems to not allow for a Parry afterward, but that's kind of an alright tradeoff for generally killing literally everyone in sight.
I would MAYBE do Surgical with a Colonel Reaper and two Magi in WAR suits IFF there was no timer.
The Specialist was a badass who got smacked in the face by an Archon, sliced in the face by my mind-controlled Templar, got shot in the face by a turret, and finally died to a Muton saying "FUCK THIS GUY IN PARTICULAR" and shooting then meleeing him. Rest in peace, Overdrive.
Oh yeah, did I mention a Priest mind-controlled my Templar early on? That was fun! Also there was a pod with a freaking Gatekeeper and two Mutons on the mission! I beat it by sheer luck when the Gatekeeper decided to fly right up to my Skirmisher and got not-Bladestorm'd and stunned. I forget the name, it's the Skirmisher version of the ability. Then I grappled up to a tower and unleashed everything at the Gatekeeper until it exploded.
One death, a Skirmisher with two HP left, and a Templar with one HP left. Fuck Surgical.
Luckily for me see ran through the sea of the Lost and ended up revealing herself so I took her down with no injuries.
But between her and the Lost I only got like 4 of the 15 crates.
Advent, Lost, Mutons, those nano snipers. I couldnt believe how much shit advent threw at us trying to kill/capture us. In the last 2 turns, we took a muton grenade and you were bleeding out and i was fucked up. Managed to pick you up and get you to Firebrand after so many Lost missed attacks on me or decided mutons had more meat on them.
I like to think this is how it went down, but without you getting chewed on by zed.
Steam - NotoriusBEN | Uplay - notoriusben | Xbox,Windows Live - ThatBEN
And now the chosen assassin has Brutal right on the first mission I encounter her. I don't really want to use any mods but the bug with Brutal is basically game ending. So...I guess it's mod, restart, or wait for patch.
Ugh this is really frustrating...
No way I'm dealing with that
I'm concerned about after they actually do patch it that then the mod is broken and I have to remove it. The game seems to not like that very much, and either has issues or atleast just complains every time I load a save.
Also the mod breaks Sparks in that they can take Will damage but can't ever recover it. Since I really want to use Sparks I'm kind of stuck. Sigh.
Is Sparks taking Will damage even a problem, given that they are immune to all effects tied to the Will stat?
D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
I was wondering that too. Do Sparks even use that stat for anything?
I had five or six full-size pods in my previous game's Surgical mission. Plus reinforcements.
It is definitely not working as intended.
I'll be honest, I hadn't even noticed that they had a Will stat at all.
D3 Steam #TeamTangent STO
So I just make sure to bring the battle scanner with me whenever I'm in her region and sniff her out before she attacks.
Not going to enjoy killing the Assassin.
Awesome. My team would have carved the hell out of two pods.
You can recruit another with a covert op after a little while.
Literally a walking gun emplacement. Also may be overkill that she's a Savant with Killzone/Serial as extra skills.
Madness I tell you.
Yeah I'm inclined to agree. Just gonna install the mod to fix it.
It's too much, then.
Like it is all soldiers in LoS of the attack. The Assassin is all but guaranteed to get at least 1 attack in per appearance, and on the stronghold assault they're going to get in a lot more. If someone starts with 40 will, they're down to completely useless pretty quick.
Like "don't just use 6 soldiers" has more than been taken care of by the rest of the game, "hey everyone you sent on the Stronghold Assault is useless and can contribute nothing whatsoever to your cause" is a pretty fucking awful random roll. Hell, I'd be okay with it if they had "stay in the infirmary to recover Will to 50" or some fucking thing, but it's too harsh as it is.
Edit: and I mean I'm into the idea of like the soldiers of the first third not making it to the last third because of war weariness, but there needs to be some danged thing to address it beyond "Hey these folks, remember to never take them on missions even though they're high level because this little stat means they're going to be horrible".
I'd kind of love it if you could retire people to train other soldiers. Maybe allow them get people to like 1 below their promotion level with a small bonus like +1 health or mobility.
You mean their combat intelligence? I think its most important for specialists, then rangers/grenadiers, and lastly sharpshooters. I don't really use snipers though and gunslingers don't really need anything from the sniper side of the tree.
His tracking shot always hits. His Hunting Rifle has between 75(?) to 95 aim (+20 elevation). So you're pretty likely to be hit in low cover. You're about 50% to be hit in low cover hunkered and unlikely to be hit in high cover hunker.
Andromedon corpses are slow so eh.
Lets see. Ranger wants, at the very least...
Conceal + R&G
Implacable + Bladestorm
Rapid Fire + Reaper
Shadowstrike and Phantom are nice bonuses with little downside
Specialist wants
Field Medic + Scanning Protocol
Nice bonuses for lategame include
Covering Fire + Threat Assessment
Ever Vigilant + Guardian
Restoration + Capacitator Discharge
But these are not particularly necessary
Grenadier wants
Blast Padding + Shredder
Salvo + Hail of Bullets
Being able to pick up every other skill is nice but unnecessary. Blast+Shredder is almost a necessity. As an aside, because of Blast Padding. Grenadiers make some of the best Covert Ops soldiers when there are +dodge bonuses on the table. Because Dodge Tanking gets a lot stronger with armor.
Sharpshooter wants
EITHER
Kill Zone + Faceoff
OR
Steady Hands + Hunker Down
Other skill additions are nice but are unnecessary. You would have to pick up every skill to make it worth while to have one sharpshooter for any mission rather than one for closer in engagements and one for longer range engagements. (The exception is that every Sharpshooter wants Kill Zone)
The reason for this of course is that Death From Above + Steady Hands + Hunker Down means that you're shooting at +30 aim if you get a kill. This entirely engates basically any long range penalty
So i would say that
Edit: Formatting
-Rangers is the most important to have high CI on. They gain the a lot from higher levels and also need a lot in order to get everything they really want/need.
-Grenadiers are the second most important but there is a cap. They don't gain as much as CI increases past gifted but can still use every point.
- Specialists are third. However they have unique uses for CI at Genius or Savant because not only do they scale hard they gain unique effects that cannot be achieved elsewhere.
-Sharpshooters are last. They get very little from CI unless the CI is Genius or Savant. This is because their skills are so wildly divergent in style that if you're only able to dip rather than grab everything you've not added anything. But if you're able to grab everything then you're a go on any mission in any situation.
Definitely specialist is best at genius or savant. All of the abilities are top notch, which is why we always ran two specs for medic and a combat hacker. and make sure they get a superior extended mag and superior aim pcs for ever vigilant guardian overwatches.
Im trying to make a grenadier work, but all the bullet wizard stuff just consumes so much ammo, you really need both extended and quick load mags, which you cant.
Are there breakthroughs in giving ammo capacity the same as damage boosts?
Steam - NotoriusBEN | Uplay - notoriusben | Xbox,Windows Live - ThatBEN
So close to a flawless mission, but the Assassin got a cheap shot off before I could finish her.
I still don't get how her stealth thing works. I knew where she ran to, I did a Scanning Protocol to make sure, and I lobbed a Frost Bomb over the wall to get her.
But when I moved three people over to blast her, they couldn't see her. Was that a bug, or is there just no way to reveal them to target them?
She then revealed, stunned my sniper, and ran off to make things difficult.
Not difficult enough I admit, but I'm a little salty about the injury she really shouldn't have lived long enough to inflict.
Steam: MightyPotatoKing
For regular troops since they automatically get a new ability at rank up any soldier ap they have is just bonus right?
Yes. They can use AP towards getting their second ability on any standard rank, or the bonus abilities that are randomly rolled.
Yeah, turns out Death from above + Hunter's Rifle means you've basically got Serial for free.