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Oh cool, I didn't know Otto Zander was an LP reference. In fairness I haven't read the LP, I got this game completely blind. Re-asking a question I asked right before this thread went online: I finished this game on Normal, what should be my next step? Turning on Ironman, Classic, or some Second Wave options?
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Jan 19, 2013 09:02
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Oh man, I was doing so well in my new game, kicking rear end and taking names, gotten all the way past the alien base without even losing a single nation. That jump to Classic isn't as hard as I thought it would be, I guess a bit of experience goes a long way! ...Then when turning the game off, on a hunch I checked the difficulty. Sure enough, I hadn't turned it up from Normal.  Eagerly anticipating my entire squad dying in the next mission to punish me for my hubris and arrogance.EDIT: To make me look like less of an idiot, what does the 'Marathon' Second Wave option do exactly? I like the idea of the game taking a lot longer, my biggest complaint about the first playthrough is that it went way too quickly.
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Jan 20, 2013 13:26
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How do people suggest I handle my game where I accidentally started on Normal instead of Classic and didn't notice until after the alien base? The obvious solution is to turn it up to Classic now and keep playing, and maybe make my next run Classic and Ironman, but I feel like that's a bit dishonest since the bulk of the game's real difficulty is already done with. The other ideas I have are: 1. SHIV overload squad on Classic. Just to see how it goes. 2. Go 'gently caress it', turn the game up to Impossible as penance for the previous mistake, and try to even slightly survive the massacre. So basicaly: Should I pretend I didn't make the mistake, turn it into a gimmick run, or burn it to the ground?
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Jan 21, 2013 08:04
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SynthOrange posted:AHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAAAAAAH, no. Not by a long shot. Turn it up. I just didn't remember having a whole lot of trouble after this. I mean there were some rear end-kickers like my first encounters with Sectopods and Muton Berserkers (oddly enough not Cyberdiscs or Ethereals, they tended to go down pretty easy), but I sort of breezed past the rest.
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Jan 21, 2013 08:21
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Propaganda Panda posted:Please do this and report back with your findings. Doing this. I'm starting with 22 soldiers and almost every country in the blue on panic. I will post again when I've reached critical Oh gently caress levels. I'm even going against myself and not going to reload until I've either won (no chance) or died horribly. EDIT: Well, this is gonna suck. This was against a small scout ship. Two Sectoid Commanders and two Mutons did this. Vandal survived with a single hit point. Cleretic fucked around with this message at 12:21 on Jan 21, 2013 |
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Jan 21, 2013 12:02
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Cleretic posted:Doing this. I'm starting with 22 soldiers and almost every country in the blue on panic. I will post again when I've reached critical Oh gently caress levels. I'm even going against myself and not going to reload until I've either won (no chance) or died horribly. I failed literally every mission. This picture was the only time anyone survived. The second mission was a terror mission in Japan. It failed so badly Japan immediately dropped out. Every single failure led to Asia gradually getting worse. There as an abduction mission that gave me a choice to go to Australia, but it decided to send me to the UK instead. Not that it helped anyway because I still failed. I decided to call it when Asia was all at max panic. The council report only had China drop out, not sure why.
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Jan 21, 2013 13:21
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I'm not really enjoying the fact my soldiers in Classic seem to be categorically unable to shoot the broad side of a barn, much less an alien. The aliens meanwhile seem to be sharpshooter extraordinaires capable of one-shotting pretty much everyone, wich understandably causes my troops to panic quite a lot. Does anyone have any advice for moving into Classic? I think I'm gonna need it.
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Jan 22, 2013 12:15
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I'd be enjoying classic difficulty if I felt like any of my failures were my fault. At no point here have I lost a soldier and gone 'okay yeah, I kind of deserved that one'. I'm now understanding the hatred of Thin Men, because those guys can apparently shoot a fly's wings off at a hundred yards while my soldiers apparently have the marksmanship of a blind toddler drafted into the Galactic Empire. Sectoids and Floaters are annoyingly proficient too, but nowhere near to that level. And the game seems to like giving me missions 90% full of Thin Men, so invariably I see then snipe someone hiding behind full cover every turn. None of this feels like my fault. It feels like the game rolls a d20, hides the result behind the DM screen, and then tells me I've failed miserably.
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Jan 24, 2013 13:21
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I just picked up Enemy Within today, and started with a Normal Ironman run. Because hey, why not? And certainly, it wasn't the Ironman part that screwed me over. ...It was that the game just kept giving me snipers. I had one heavy, one assault, one support, but like five snipers. And I mean I like snipers, getting one with Squadsight a good spot early in the map means I'll basically win the entire first half of the mission (and probably the second half too), but I need other things to maximise snipers. Do you guys have a pre-designed, spoiler-light 'How Not To Suck At Enemy Within' guide? Just some things I should be taking into account? I was bad enough at Enemy Unknown, I don't need new poo poo I don't understand making me screw up even more. EDIT: Or do you guys just advise 'jump right in, make mechs and genetically-modified soldiers and just try not to suck too badly until you learn'? Cleretic fucked around with this message at 14:12 on Feb 28, 2014 |
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Feb 28, 2014 14:00
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Apparently playing Enemy Within 'well' leads to me running low on money constantly. I should probably start selling corpses more often. You only ever really need one, don't you? Also,I need to learn not to freak out. A run that was actually going fairly well went to poo poo in literally one turn, when my squad's assault died while my support got choked by a Seeker. Then I moved my sniper into a horrible position to try saving the support, and, well... Although I have noticed: Was the first terror mission pushed back in Within? I didn't run into it. WHich is honeslty just as well, that mission is hell, and requires you to basically rush laser weapons from the get-go just to stay on top of things.
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Mar 1, 2014 14:11
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Internet Kraken posted:I think its buggy. It gets rid of some lines, notably Vahlen's bitching about blowing up aliens, but it leaves other ones in. She'll still chew you out for blowing up a meld canister. However it also inexplicably gets rid of some of the flavor dialogue that play during missions, such as when you encounter a new enemy or come across a set piece. I don't see any reason for it to do that, especially since it only affects like half of them, so I'm guessing its glitched. I think it's actually done with people making the jump form EU to EW in mind. I'm running with it right now, and they talk about the Seekers, but not the rest of the aliens so far.
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Mar 3, 2014 02:48
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Okay, after like, four proper tries I have to throw in the towel, I am just not metal enough for Ironman. I don't really consider myself tremendously reliant on the ability to reload, but I get really stressed out when a mission goes colossally bad and I can't reload for a do-over. I'm okay with my star fighting force slowly bleeding out by losing one or two in missions here and there, but losing like four of them when things go really south is just too much pressure for me. I had to call it when, after a shaky espionage mission and EXALT base assault killed off a few of my best soldiers, I lost Durand, both of my star assaults, and my best Sniper in the one UFO assault. Still, some thoughts for it being my first proper EW game: -The gene mods are pretty awesome, although I probably should've paced them better. Less 'sticking one of the A-Team in for the full package when it seems safe to', more of a slow trickle thing when there's someone to cover for them in case something happens in the 3-6 days they're in. -I'm pretty sure the secondary heart mod is cursed, though. I gave it to two soldiers, a support and an assault, that were both really reliable members. But after they got that heart, they would go down in the first three turns, without fail. Usually without even firing off a shot. -MECs are rad too. I hd both a fist and a flamethrower body, and while I feel like the first was probably more useful (and more fun), that's not to take anything away from the flamethrower. Enemies don't seem to panic as badly as my soldiers do, though, but that might just be me not really getting what they were doing. -For the first time I tried some of the upgrades I wouldn't usually - namely a more mobile sniper and a more offensive, shotgun-based assault. I'll probably do the second one a lot more often, but as for the sniper... Well, I'll be sticking with the Squadsight side of the upgrades for the first one. Second can be more mobile. -The EXALT missions were a real treat, I really enjoyed both the more tricky objectives and actually fighting EXALT. The last espionage mission hosed me over hard, because I had to defend a decoder that was in the middle of a pit where they could easily pick me off, but overall they were great fun. Only complaint I'd make is that it's a bit hard to tell them apart; I can identify problem aliens and pick them off first because they all look distinct, but I couldn't really tell EXALT apart until they whip out a medkit or something. -Just as an aside, are EXALT meant to be the same as/related to the group from XCOM Declassified? I didn't play it, but I really couldn't help but notice they dressed the same and seem to use similar equipment. Cleretic fucked around with this message at 13:38 on Mar 4, 2014 |
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Mar 4, 2014 13:34
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Hieronymous Alloy posted:If ironman is just busting your balls ridiculously hard and you want "ironman lite," alt-f4 will close you out of the game instantly, usually meaning that you restart at the beginning of the turn. It's useful for misclicks and line of sight bullshit and so forth, or for when you realize "gently caress, I meant to move the other guy first," so forth. Yeah, I was typically spreading it out, I think at my peak I had somewhere around a dozen 'usable' soldiers - not always top-class, but solid enough substitutes. But then in my last game session a combination of complacency, bad luck and being taken by surprise meant I just kept losing soldiers. And while I'm aware of that shutdown trick I don't really want to use it. On top of being just a cheap cheat, it doesn't often save me from my real problems. I wanted a step up from just a Normal difficulty game since I know I'm at least better than that, but I misjudged my game sense in relation to the demands of Ironman. I'm thinking I should instead go for a non-Ironman Classic run, since that's an environment that still punishes mistakes and poor play, but gives you room to go back and adapt to it. Being forced to live with your mistakes is a great take on a challenge run, but it's really not a good idea to go for it before you know what you're doing.
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Mar 5, 2014 16:05
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Internet Kraken posted:The EXALT maps are usually fun but they feel too easy. EXALT just charges in with little regard for safety and you can mow them down easily. The only guys you need to really worry about are the Heavies because they have explosives. It really depends on what map you draw. I'm not sure how it usually goes, but I had four EXALT missions in my run. The first one was sort of a stealth mission, with the saboteur starting on the opposite side of the map and having to tag two beacons on the way back to the rest of the squad's starting point. That was really cool, and I was disappointed that the rest weren't like that. Stealth works surprisingly well in XCOM. The other three were a control point sort of thing that you're talking about, and those varied depending on the map. The first one had the control point in a separate room, and the second one on a balcony, and both of those were really easy to defend once I got there. The third one had the control point in the middle of a construction site, though, and that one was... hard. Anyone blocking the capture was a sitting duck for the EXALT on the outside, so I lost a fair amount of people on that one. Cleretic fucked around with this message at 09:41 on Mar 6, 2014 |
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Mar 6, 2014 09:39
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Is there by chance an option somewhere to forceme to pick a research subject, like with Civ? I'm pretty sure I hosed up this Classic run massively, largely because I forgot to tell my researchers to actually research something at some point. So for god knows how long they'vejsut been sitting idle, and now I'm way behind on research and having to fight the base invasion with bullets.
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Mar 7, 2014 13:50
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Alright, beat the game on Classic difficulty. No Second Wave stuff. Six soldiers dying overall, one of them my support in the Temple Ship so it couldn't really be avoided. Apparently slightly better than the world average overall, but I fall behind in some stuff (apparently my game was a lot less bloodthirsty than the average). I lost three countries from the project by the end, but everyone else was pretty chill. This was the first time I opted for Africa as a starting continent, and that seemed to work really well; I used to go Europe because the continent bonus seemed pretty decent and the HQ felt like it was in a really convenient position for getting to most countries, but then I realized I don't really use Workshops and Laboratories often, I instead prefer to get my scientists and engineers from abduction missions. All-In really felt a ton more useful to me. Ashamed to admit I did a little bit of savescumming. It was almost entirely due to Chryssalids in around the second quarter of the game; if you get more than two at once, and you don't deal with them in very short order, your squad's basically hosed. They're bearable in terror missions because they spend most of their time going after civilians, but they're easily the most terrifying part of the alien base assault. I'm thinking next game I go for a bit of a 'fun run', and just turn on all the random-based Second Wave options. Possibly with Marathon, too.
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Mar 10, 2014 14:13
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dogstile posted:Oh I wasn't aiming that at you, that was more of a "that's actually really fun to do on occasion so go for it". I've done that, i've also rolled with the punches. Either is awesome. Yeah, there is something appealing about constantly replaying a specific, pivotal turn trying to get it to work out. I had that in the base defense mission, when circumstnces led me to handle a Mechtoid, Muton, Chryssalid and Sectoid Commander in one turn, with a Cyberdisc waiting in the wings somewhere. Managing that without losing people really felt like an accomplishment. Coincidentally, that was also the turn I learned that Disarming Shot is loving amazing.
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Mar 11, 2014 01:06
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Internet Kraken posted:Wow. Bomb disposal missions on impossible are loving brutal. Its only month two and I have to do one and its full of thin men. I barely made it to the bomb in time, but at least I didn't lose anyone. Yeah, this is sort of my problem with almost any council mission. They're so heavily loaded with Thin Men that they're hell, but because it's so homogenous it's not even an interesting hell. The best council mission is the Newfoundland one, which is also completely homogenous, but it's salvged by actually planning around its one enemy instead of just filling a generic map full of Thin Men.
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Mar 19, 2014 04:40
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Sot his came up while narrowing down EXALT's base location in my current game (It's taking a while, because almost every time I get intel on its location it rules out a single country). While it's quite a useful way of narrowing it down, knocking out like half the potential countries in one sweep (or it would have, if I hadn't ruled out most of them anyway), I can't help but wonder what information my covert operative got to determine this.
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Mar 23, 2014 01:31
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E-Tank posted:ARGH. How the gently caress can you do Portent? I swear to christ that the computer loving *cheats*! It's early Thin Men, so it is a huge bitch, but in replays it's not too bad because all the spawns are at the same locations. You can pre-empt the ambushes if you're clever. The Newfoundland mission is similar, if you destroy the fish the Chryssalids break out of then they don't spawn.
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Mar 23, 2014 10:28
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, that's not fair. I'm all for a difficult game, but not one where the computer is so obviously loving cheating. 
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I think the XCOM Chryssalids look way better than the X-Com ones, but they do look a bit doofy. Their concept art is a lot sleeker and more streamlined, probably because of their posture and a more flattering than usual view of the head. I think if they were able to translate the movement in that concept a little better, Chryssalids would look absolutely amazing. As it is, while they're still pretty decent, they fail to make a strong impression until they straight-up murder you. I always thought the most striking initial appearance in the game was the Cyberdisc, though. First time it turns up for you it's kind of peculiar, but not outwardly dangerous... then it moves to attack and HOLY gently caress.
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Mar 24, 2014 15:53
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RBA Starblade posted:I like how you could quietly infiltrate through the skylights and around the sides, but since EXALT is such a non-threat there's no reason not to just knock down the door. And the wall. And all the other walls. My usual game plan is to have my sniper jump onto the roof and blast down into the main room, while the rest of my squad murders their way into it.
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Mar 26, 2014 05:08
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I can't help but feel a little weird about the "We Have Ways" continent bonus, because it's the only one that seems really shady, while every other continent has something relatively positive. North America gives discounts to interceptors, and that makes sense because that's probably where XCOM is hiring the jets from. It's only natural Asia gets Future Combat; they've got the most technologically innovative countries, after all. Europe gets Expert Knowledge, since that's where a lot of the big academic institutions are. Africa's a bit weird, but I can still understand it. They're willing to put everything on the line for all this, while every other continent's being relatively reserved Africa's just doing everything it can. But South America... I dunno. We Have Ways definitely has the creepiest and most potentially offensive implications. The best South America can bring to the table is being really good at dissecting dead bodies and extracting information, and while I appreciate their expertise in that while I'm saving the world from alien invaders, I can't help but feel like that doesn't reflect super well on them as a people.
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Mar 26, 2014 16:02
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I don't think I've ever been as excited about a new game as I am about this one. EU was just so good, it's one of my favorite games of the last few years, and this only looks better. Looking forward to November, when I can play as the racist supremacist group fighting against the peaceful assimilating immigrants.
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Jun 2, 2015 07:01
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It'd never happen, but I'd be on board with an XCOM game about fighting terrestrial supernatural creatures. Not even terror from the Deep; tap into the other urban legends of the era aliens got big in. XCOM versus Bigfoot and ghosts.
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Jun 4, 2015 16:36
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RickDaedalus posted:So besides Beagle, are there any other good XCOM playthroughs? Jade Star just wrapped up his Commander's Guide over in the LP subforum, a Classic/faux-Ironman (his computer troubles are legendary enough that Ironman is a bad idea, but he's not save scumming), which is a pretty decent 'how to XCOM' tutorial. He spends a lot of the early-game going over how to play safely and smartly, not falling into traps, the pros and cons of the various skill choices. The idea was more doing it as a Classic difficulty tutorial, making it not seem so intimidating, and he does pretty well at that.
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Jun 7, 2015 04:46
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Ravenfood posted:I mean, I think its honestly kind of cool to get a sequel to all of my failures. Every other game ever has given me a sequel to my successful runs, or let me pick my most successful, but a game that goes from all of my fuckups? That's cool. I think it's especially fitting for XCOM to be doing this, because a massive part of XCOM, as a game, is dealing with failure. The whole game is really about either minimizing failure, mitigating it, suffering it, and recovering from it (or not), more than any other game I've ever played or seen. Your failures in XCOM are as much a part of your experience as your successes, if not moreso. Why shouldn't XCOM 2 be a sequel to a failed run? Failed runs are a huge part of XCOM, as is clawing back from the brink.
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Jun 10, 2015 12:29
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Strobe posted:Ocarina of Time postdates Link to the Past, so I'm not sure it quite qualifies. I know this is an irrelevant, pointless derail, but I want to drop the knowledge I do know about the Zelda timeline. What people are talking about is the 'Decline Timeline', which is when Link from Ocarina of Time dies while fighting Ganon. The Decline Timeline consists of most of the overhead games; all the ones before OoT, as well as the Oracle games, and the recent Link Between Worlds. I think it exists as an explanation for why all the overhead game settings are so sparse with very little civilization; they're basically set in a high-fantasy post-apocalypse. Still, presuming the timeline nonsense was thought up during/after OoT, that does still mean there were games in the timeline made after it. Personally, I always felt like the Decline Timeline was a bit of a cop-out, because it's not really built into the game in which it supposedly happens. You can argue all you want which Dark Souls 1 ending is canon, but you could fulfill both of them. Similarly, building XCOM 2 off of EU's failure state works not just because failure is a big part of XCOM, but also because there is a specific failure state described when you do lose. Dying to Ganon in OoT isn't really 'intended' or 'designed', since he's no more impossible than any other bosses and losing to him plays out exactly the same as losing at any other point in the game: you keel over and have to start again.
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Jun 12, 2015 18:12
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ChickenHeart posted:So, with XCOM 2 being an exploration of "what happens if you lose XCOM:EU," would it be safe to assume that XCOM 3 will be based on the premise of "what happens if you lose XCOM 2?" You joke, but I could actually see this as being a really fun no-combat strategy game. Part XCOM, part Uplink in gameplay, trying to wrangle out an online resistance against a totalitarian government. Your members start off as conspiracy theorists and stupid nerds angry about extremely minor details of the greater picture, then slowly grows to include people with both actual grievances and power.
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Jun 14, 2015 06:26
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The XCOM Twitter account just tweeted an exclusive screenshot. The last one wasjust a shot of the Viper enemy ensnaring a soldier, so I didn't expect much, but... ADVENT HAS MECS, GUYS, WE'RE hosed
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Jun 17, 2015 17:10
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MrBims posted:You should see the E3 video, unless you're just not remembering that part. I did not see the E3 video. Tracked it down now.
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Jun 17, 2015 17:15
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DrManiac posted:How much did Beyond Earth's expansion improve the base game? I want to take advantage of the firaxis bundle but I already have all the heavy hitters besides beyond earth which was pretty mediore. Everything it does is good, and it has some nice ideas, but it's just not well-balanced and doesn't do enough to elevate the game. You're okay to skip it.
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Jan 21, 2016 15:50
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