50/50 but started to go for salvage because I started to build up a small reserve finally (2 million. My maintenance is ~580k month).
I just did a 3.5-4.5 scary mission. My normal is around 2-3 skulls I think. I read the missions scale up for each story mission you do, as well as have a difficulty that depends on which region you are.
I have not seen any assaults, I saw my first Grasshopper today. I have 4-5 heavies.
Thrag
1846
At the start when doing half star missions I was going all cash, or 75% cash. Once I felt I had a few months expenses saved up I started going for 75% salvage.
I had one mission where the text said something about the enemy bringing their mech techs so the salvage should be good. So I went all salvage for that one. I ended up facing a swarm of light mechs none of which I had any use for so the salvage ended up being crap. So on the next mission to make up for the lost revenue I took an easier mission next where I didn’t expect good salvage and took all cash. So of course in that one I’m faced with mechs I’d really like to add to my collection, and I even managed to get my only headshot kill on one of them. Needless to say my 0/2 salvage did not include any of those salvaged mechs.
RichVR
1847
I finally went from cash poor to a month ahead of bankruptcy plus some cash by doing every mission at Detroit. I still have the Argo mission waiting. But I need a cushion. I also got a Locust from parts that has only a LRM 10 and Dekker can sensor lock. I love this fucking game.
AStott
1848
I haven’t gotten that far myself yet, so maybe I’m not understanding things. Doesn’t the second statement explain the first? Maybe they didn’t intend for you to grind?
I’ve done 75% cash, but have migrated towards salvage for missions where I expect new mechs
I typically complain too when you’re limited in a game to four units. Five or six are optimal, IMO. Wasteland 2 gave you seven, though I can’t say it made combat any better. (It did allow you to distribute more skills among your squad, which is probably the reason.)
Dunno, 4-5 seems like a good number for party members. Once you get to 6 you honestly don’t care about them, they are disposable xcom squaddies.
What about negotiating Rep? A few times I’ve wondered if it’s worth it, because I tend not to buy stuff from the store except in dire emergencies. Of course, in case of dire emergencies I usually wish it was cheaper. :) But generally so far I’ve avoided sacrificing cash/scrap rewards for Rep.
Never negotiated for rep, would max scrap if I knew I was facing heavies/assaults, otherwise leaned into cash.
vyshka
1854
I just now realized that they sometimes post missions in pairs covering the same action from opposing sides. Just now had one mission to defend a base for the local government, and another from the capellans to destroy the base.
I wish the mission rep penalties and rewards were a bit more dynamic, or context sensitive. I haven’t found that there’s any negative impact to your rep with a government for taking a mission against them. For instance I found on Detroit I could take missions for and vs the Capellans one right after the other - and it didn’t seem to hurt my rep with them at all.
Does that change later on? (Still in the 2 skull max phase…)
Thrag
1856
From one of the missions I described, here’s a Centurion disappearing under a torrent of flame. Note that the heat meter shown has yet to have the effect of my flamers added. This resulted in an instant shutdown. One of my most satisfying moments.
vyshka
1857
My sad Trebuchet hiding in the corner after an assassination mission gets off to a rough start. Lost both LRM15s (1 was ++). Luckily I’d dropped him down to 1 medium laser instead of 3, so he had enough armor to survive.
Mark_L
1858
Actual footage of my Kintaro, the “Haters Gonna Hate”
Found scrap from a Zeus available in a store. I’m lusting after it with my lance of medium mechs, despite the cost of that 1/3 of a mech being about 2/3 of my total savings.
So which skill trees do people focus on?
I had a defend facility mission a couple missions back that was a no win in my view. I got whatever it is where they say nice try and pay you like 100k for going to the trouble.
The reason I call it a no win is because it was a two front battle to defend a facility. So 3 mechs and like 3 vehicles came from one direction. And then from the hills in the exact opposite direction came 4 mechs plus 2 at a slight side vector.
The fact that all of these were light mechs and vehicles was irrelevant. I couldn’t kill them all fast enough because they all just made a bee line to LOS on the buildings and proceeded to bring them all down before I could kill them all.
I can’t think of any lance build out that would of made any difference because they all showed up w/in 2 turns of each other on opposite sides of the facility I was supposed to defend.
Making a mental note to avoid defend facility missions, lol
Yeah, you could have an assault mech lance and you just won’t be able to kill them quick enough unless you get ridiculously lucky with some headshots.
I did a total of perhaps 2 non story missions while I had a story mission active except for, I think, the second one where the skull rating of the story mission was too high for my lance. The grinding is forced, since you need to do generic missions before the next story mission opens up and you can’t just wait since you run out of cash (and I think the clock story missions unlock is completed regular missions, not time).
Late game you get a headshot every 3 tries with the correct mech/pilot build!
Against mediums, lights and vehicles I think I average 2 down a turn late game, if I have my 4 mechs in LOS (not that they show up other than story missions anymore).
I have not been able to get any base defense mission with no broken buildings. That I think is close to impossible.
I did one defend facility mission to date, it was early on and only a 1/2 skull difficulty. I spread out and tried to make sure nothing could get within range of the buildings. This seemed to mostly work, except for a sneaky commando and spider that tried to slip in the back. I took the spider out with an alpha strike, and the commando decided instead to ignore the buildings and go for one of my mechs that was facing away. That was its last mistake.
