These guys specifically addressed this recently when being interviews about Long War 2 - they are tuning this to be a shorter and tighter experience than the previous LW mod, specifically to address your very concern. Whether or not they will be successful is obviously unknown, but if it helps they are at least aware there was a problem and are attempting to course correct.
I laughed way too hard at this.
I have a long weekend so now that the DLC is all out I’m thinking of trying for my first complete play through. Given that, what are the current A-list quality of life mods (or essentially official ones like the SMG one)?
Thanks.
I would turn off the Rulers if that’s possible in the alien hunter DLC. The weapons from that DLC are great but those ruler aliens will really wreck your campaign if you’re not ready for them.
Of course if you liberally make saves it might not be that much of an issue. I would install all the long war studios mods and the main game mods.
Also, there is a mod that shows you if where you’re are going to move to will be considered a flank - that’s a really handy one. There are several quality of life mods (show HP numbers, add more cosmetics). Whatever floats your boat there. I would just stay away from any game changes. Some of them are really good but I wouldn’t do it on a first playthrough.
If you want to use swords, i would download a mod that fixes their scaling as they become useless after mid game.
Obviously get all of the long war ish mods.
ShowMeTheSkills is a great ui improvement
The mentioned Gotcha is good for showing flanking stuff.
I recommend getting a mod that fixes AWC perks. They are hugely quirky and i remember not getting them on soldiers if i got the soldier before the building, which was dumb.
Also i recommend voice mods. If you like other semi popular video games or movies, having your favorite characters voicing your soldiers can be fun.
Also recommend Height Defence Bonus. I got real tired of my sniper on a high roof and behind cover getting picked off from someone on the ground like he was standing in the open.
I wouldn’t use all the Long War mods. The newest ones change all the classes and enemies, for example. If you want the developer-intended experience, at least.
Gotcha! I think is the name of the best QOL mod out there. That’s the one that shows flanks and visibility of target objects.
edit: woops, I didn’t see that @Murbella already mentioned Gotcha. I also agree with him about cosmetic mods and the early LW mods that came out with the game.
Ah i didn’t realize that they updated the long war aliens mod to include changes to everything. I played the muton centurion one on release and remember liking it quite a bit. The enemies they added were basically commander versions of existing enemies but with new, interesting abilities. Complete bastards.
You know, it’s possible that if you download the LW Toolbox, you can switch off the new aliens and the LW class changes. They also added an extra weapon tier between mag and plasma. I would just be careful and make sure you don’t fundamentally change the game for your first run through.
New info on Long War 2’s changes to the geoscape layer of the game:
https://xcom.com/news/xcom-2-long-war-2-mod-brings-big-changes-to-the-strategy-layer-on-pc
[quote]
Players are now tasked with managing the Resistance within each region they have contacted. Each region has a certain number of rebels who may be assigned to one of three different tasks: scrounging for supplies, recruiting new rebels and soldiers, or gathering intelligence to generate new missions. You’ll also be able to deploy a single adviser – a scientist, engineer or soldier – to each region to provide bonuses to a particular task, and may improve a region’s defenses by capturing ADVENT MECs and repurposing them through the advanced Specialist perk, “Full Override.”
Rebels can die during retaliations and other missions, and even some can be Faceless in disguise. Keep this in mind when assigning tasks to your rebels, Commander.[/quote]
[quote]
ADVENT will try to move forces from adjacent regions to your location; if ADVENT feels safe in a region, it’ll try to construct research facilities to further the Avatar Project. If you’ve managed to drive ADVENT out of a region, they may return in force to try and take it back.[/quote]
And, whoa, whoa, WHOA!
[quote]
Additional changes include the ability to deploy multiple squads simultaneously to infiltrate several enemy targets at once. Each of those missions will be played individually.[/quote]
I have an extra key for the game from my monthly humble subscription. Does anyone want it?
I am SOOO excited about Long War 2. Long War 1 is my favorite game of the past few years (not including OOTP variations). X-Com 2 just keeps sending me back to Long War. I just need a bit more out of my X-Com than X2 gives me. I don’t play a crazy hardcore version of Long War, I have it modded for a less difficult version than vanilla Long War, though still more difficult and longer than vanilla Enemy Within.
Starting a new XCOM2 playthrough now so I can bone back up on the mechanics - I’ve been playing LW1. Scuttle seems to be that maybe they will release Feb 5th because that’s exactly 1 year since XCOM2 released and they happened to announce it on Jan 5th - exactly one month before. I hope that’s true. Saw this posted in the Long War Studios (whatever their new name is) forums.
Long War 2 is out!
https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=844674609
[quote]
Long War 2 is a significant overhaul of XCOM 2 aimed at giving players the feel of running a worldwide guerrilla war against ADVENT and offering them a greater variety of strategic and tactical experiences.
Many of the mod’s new mechanics are described ingame in the XCOM archives. Players are strongly encouraged to read those entries immediately after finishing Gatecrasher.
Features include:
Awesome! Looks like you have to disable all of their old mods since they’re rolled into this one. Have been wanting to get back to Xcom 2, this sounds like a great way to do it.
Perfect excuse to reinstall. I just hope my crash issues were resolved so I can finally play the damned thing.
Already!? Not that I’m complaining, but just two days ago they had a blog talking about some of the strategy layer changes, and they mentioned talking about the tactical changes in a future blog? I wasn’t expecting this so soon!
Yup. Super-pleasant surprise.
I guess I know what my weekend will be.
Welcome back Commander!
Hype music:
This is pretty cool - the XCOM devs (Jake Solomon and Garth DeAngelis) play Long War 2 for the first time.
I’ve played XCOM 2 for only 27 hours and managed to complete only one game (a loss), all of which was prior to any DLC being released. So now I’m not sure whether to start a second non-modded game with all of the DLC enabled, or just jump right to LW2. Any advice?
Also, are achievements disabled while using LW2?
From the workshop, an ongoing list of compatible mods: https://drive.google.com/file/d/0B0KYKP0J-c9vcksxLXBTUkFzdE0/view
First thing I checked, Gotcha, is compatible.