Yah. I agree. I linked his playlist above. The other tester who is broadcasting is joINrbs. His twitch feed is more informative than his youtube. All his LW2 vids are still up on twitch. Just puts highlights on youtube.
That was for the first Long War. I don’t think LW2 has that option.
I saw the HQ attack video and it was pretty brutal. There’s one of those in each region?
I’ve been playing on commander and am not that far in. So far it is very hard.
The infiltration mechanic is interesting and leads to large differences in my strategy from mission to mission. Some missions require fast, stealthy squads of a few strong soldiers. Some allow me to send a small army of rookies and Grenadiers/Cannoneers. It also leads to not being able to do a lot of missions because they disappear before i can infiltrate them at all.
I must admit to not really getting the whole squad thing. I guess they want you have to regular squads and have members move between active/inactive in that squad. However i don’t have enough people that i can do something like that. I need to use whomever is healthy when i need them and unless there is a huge bonus for using the same squad, i just can’t do it.
Even with Very light enemy activity, the missions are difficult and still require fighting retreats. In my last mission i snuck to an item retrieval and then had to fight off enemies while waiting for four turns for the transport. By the end of the mission i had killed 14 enemies with 4 more remaining. This is on a very light mission.
Also i don’t think vanilla did this, but when you trigger an objective that triggers an alarm, it makes EVERY enemy on the map run right at you. I think they also react to loud actions. It certainly leads to some VERY hectic moments.
The haven management mechanic is very cool.
So far my favorite class has been the one with the sawed off shotgun as a secondary weapon. This basically allows them to run up to 1-2 enemies per battle and make them disappear.
Take all what I say with a grain of salt. I’ve heard these things and I’m by no means very good at LW2 yet.
The infiltration mechanic is very important. You want to get to 100% and over if possible which will mean less pods and more time on maps (and quicker time to call the chopper). When you are in the squad select screen, you gain more infiltration time by your equipment and apparently some of your abilities. Ideally your infiltration time is shorter than the time until the mission expires so you can try to get 100%.
Squad cohesion is important. The longer a squad stays together the more bonuses you get to your will stats. You’re apparently not supposed to just throw people around willy nilly. I’m not sure if any of the bonuses take effect though until you’ve promoted someone to a leader through the AWC.
Apparently the alarm level is not just binary also - you can for example move near a civilian who runs away and “yells” which will bring over a nearby pod to investigate (not the whole map). If you go loud and shoot off a grenade, that will probably be loud enough where all enemies on the map will start to make it towards you.
The game is a LOT of fun. No more am I just looking for the best setups to clear the map - that’s often times not possible. I’m scoping out where the goods are and where my EVAC is and trying to minimize my engagement time.
A nice “infiltration calculator” is floating around bitspace. If you don’t want to know the numbers behind the mechanic, and thus spoil some of the magic, don’t click.
Cool stuff. I feel like the game does not give you enough info on this in game and the UI is not good enough.
It doesn’t seem to tell you what the end result is if you keep infiltrating to the final moment, which seems like basic info. I could have swore that one of the official videos showed some colored bar that was updated in real time when the player changed their squad. Maybe it was added in and not part of the game though.
I would probably either need twice the soldiers or to just to do half the missions in order to pull this off. I suppose i could just not take damage too…
Still if i could get enough soldiers, it would be an interesting mechanic.
Agreed. This is especially true in the Haven management screen. The game gives me no indication of the relative effectiveness of having rebels on Intel, Supply, or Recruit. It’s all trial and error; so, right off the bat, I’m making blind strategic decisions.
Did you read the Xcom archives? It’s not that well explained but all the stuff is there.
Yes. I read the archives. That gave me an understanding of the functions, but no hint on effectiveness. To take a small example, around how more likely is it for me to spot a spy if I have a LCPL Haven advisor vs. a Master Sergeant? If I put 2 people on intel, how much more effective is my mission generation, approximately vs. 3 or 4?
I thought soldiers advisors only helped detected infiltrators not gather intel, i would have to check on that.
Yeah, I think you’re right. But higher ranked soldiers are “more effective”. My question is, around how much more effective? With this last question, I don’t think there’s any way to figure it out, even by playing a lot.
Edti: Oh, woops, I see the disconnect. My previous post had 2 separate questions in it. The second is about rebels rather than Haven Advisors. Sorry that wasn’t clear.
Just picked this up on Humble Monthly.
Can anyone recommend some quality of life mods for someone who loves these games, but tends to get frustrated with the lack in information sometimes in the Xcom series?
My LW2 compatible mod list for anyone else looking for a quickstart. All quality-of-life or fun additions, no gameplay or mechanic changes.
Thanks sir,
I had not made it far enough back in the thread to see this was already covered. I appreciate the repaste!
And i am already tired of height cover being useless. Time to find a mod that works with long war to fix that.
Mission Award Variety is a hoot, thanks for tipping off to it.
Let us know what you find for this.
The sniper has a skill that gives a defense and aim bonus from height.
I believe I read somewhere that officers are better at finding infiltrators than enlisted personnel. I see people in let’s plays putting 1st and 2nd lieutenants as haven advisors. Bear in mind that if a Haven has two infiltrators you will fight both at the same time in the mission. I’ve been trying to figure out the best class to have as an advisor since I want someone that can deal with alot of enemies quickly but I get to keep the corpses so a Grenadier is not a good choice. Those enemy rendezvous missions have been the only way I’ve gotten my hands on faceless corpses and I don’t know how many I need for a mimic beacon. Best I can come up with is Assault with Trench Gun skill.
Soldier advisors also help with the recruitment job adding a multiplier to every personnel in the region doing recruitment.
I believe Scientists do the same for Intel and Engineers for supplies. I also think that recruitment and supply jobs will increase advent strength in the region over time so it’s best to do Intel until you liberate a region.
I would do Ranger, he has the ability to fire twice per turn so its helpful.