So I figured it out. It’s a teeny little icon next to the ‘Launch archaeology probe’ one at the bottom of the screen on the geoscape that only appears when you select that particular aircraft (presumably only when it’s within range).
Wheeee (can we keep 'em? can we?)
It was a rough mission, comprising classic military blunders such as ‘lets split our forces and put all our support troops on one side of the map and our fighting force on the other’ and ‘did anyone bring a gun for the new girl?’ (nope). And in the end it was pointless - it was literally the last mission I did before heading off for the finale.
But I smooshed 'em good, which is all I was really playing for anyway.
Although I’ve played with all the DLC I’ve missed a lot, including all the Ancients DLC and not defeating the Behemoth. The last mission and the mission to defeat the Behemoth were activated practically simultaneously, and the game was dragging a lot (Haven Defenses and Infested Havens non-stop).
A very enjoyable experience that will hurt XCOM 3 if some mechanics are not implemented, such as the manual aim, localized damage and the more alive and less boardgamey strategic map.
From XCOM I’ve missed the soldier customization and the variety of maps and missions, but I don’t think I can play XCOM again after Phoenix Point.
Agree that the map feels way more alive (and dangerous) than XCOM2. Love the game, my only gripe is a lot of things are more obtuse than they should be. And needs loads more tool tips.
Yeah and I’ve got a feeling that when the mod doors open they’ll be among the first things to get expanded upon. I think that’s when I’ll look at playing it again, and hopefully finishing it too. That’s if I can’t stop myself before!
I’ve been thinking of firing up the game again but got really turned off by the idea of super broken skill combos. Is it still possible for 1 soldier to clear out a nest of baddies in a single endless turn?
Much better than me, I’m sure, but more than just skill it was done by abusing really broken skill synergies like having 2 soldiers with the Rally skill to endlessly give each other endless actions. I may have the wrong skill names, and or they at least plugged that, but I assume the game still allows endless overwatch responses (well until the character runs out of ammo)!
Melee build is still very broken, and has been since the previous time I played (though a lot of the other broken bits were indeed fixed) and you can finish most missions in your first turn. At the same time, you don’t have to use it… but I think Phoenix Point kinda overstays its welcome in some ways (especially with the DLC! blimey there’s too much) so it’s nice not to have trivial missions drag on forever.
I feel like most tactical games with swords and guns hit this trap with melee builds. X-Com 2, Phoenix Point, WH40K Mechanicus, WH40K Chaos Gate – it’s like, “Hmm, we’ve built a class that always runs out of action points while standing in the open… I got it, give them an extra action when they stab a guy”
I think partly it’s down to the IGOUGO nature of these games. You rush a melee guy in without killing his target and it’s pretty much guaranteed that target relocates and then murders the melee guy next turn. So you have to do something to make the melee risk worth it.
Maybe it would be more interesting if they did what pre-gunpowder tactical games do and have units in melee range be “engaged” in melee combat and unable to break out. Add in the risk of friendly fire for anyone shooting at either engaged character and now you have a very different tactical environment around melee vs ranged.
Actually I think melee combat in games with guns is just dumb. If aliens were to invade us today, we wouldn’t be putting troops in the field armed with swords and battle axes.
Gears of War Tactics has probably the best ‘knives in a turn based gunfight’ I’ve played with the bayonet charge - it didn’t feel thematically out of place and was useful without feeling too powerful. I really liked how it worked, mechanically - you needed a direct route to run at your target or you couldn’t use it (was there a minimum range for it too? can’t remember). Less sure about the lancer - I remember that being an overpowered AP generator - but again it’s a sorta bayonet PLUS it’s a chainsaw which makes it automatically amazing.
Phoenix Point could probably fix the worst of the melee stuff just by putting a cap on the amount of times that ‘get 2 AP per kill’ skill can trigger in a single turn. Feels weird that they’ve left that as is. Plus all the melee weapons are just too powerful generally - the Scyther is like 600 dmg for 1 AP. Nothing else comes remotely close (snipers are like 3AP for 350 even with the infiltrator perk).
It does seem like melee builds in Phoenix Point don’t have a huge variety of build options though. The cybernetic enhancement that makes melee attacks 1ap seems to be a requirement.
I feel like melee classes often reduce the variety of non-melee builds, too.
Like in the back half of many of these games, ranged combat becomes less valuable for removing threats, and much more valuable for repositioning/weakening enemies to set up combos for the melee guys. The melee guys are like kings in a game of checkers that can remove all the opponent’s pieces in a single turn.
Oh, without a doubt. Melee is pretty poor for most of the game but then you suddenly have access to a bunch of highly synergistic abilities/equipment that turn it round completely. Though there isn’t really much depth to it - any assault+heavy soldier will one shot most enemies even with the basic/mid-tier melee weapons and the bleeds and other effects some of the weapons have end up not mattering at all.
Then again, a lot of it is DLC related stuff so I wonder if any of it is even that viable at all in a vanilla game without it.
