Yes and getting stuck upstairs/downstairs after accidentally destroying the staircase or not being able to reach an objective for the same reason.
Anyone seen this? Tempted to install the mods and give it a whirl:)
That’s a crazy mod, that Star Wars one. Pretty impressive.
I think this collection is built from that video: https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/filedetails/?id=1514945680
Is this just an aesthetic mod or is the entire campaign different?
The video indicates it’s aesthetic. Same XCom2 maps and story line.
All these Xcom 2 posts recently motivated me to continue on with my WOTC campaign that I’d stopped playing some time ago after I defeated all 3 chosen. Going to try to finish it out this time. Finished the Advent Forge campaign mission this morning.
That mod is insane! A Star Wars ToEE-alike would also be nice.
:prays:
I ended up buying the whole Xcom 2 package during the last sale, despite my previous grievances with the series.
Price was definitely a contributing factor, 20€ felt like more than a fair price for a product that is now several years old and is neatly tied together into a package that is clearly presented to the potential customer and doesn’t require cross-referencing excel tables to figure out what DLCs to buy. It’s a practice that I’m happy to support.
In any case, I started playing and the ended up enjoying the first few missions way more than I thought I would! The pace is great and I’m starting to appreciate the inclusion of timers because they set a baseline to how fast you should play - despite being a super careful player in squad level games (finished ironman JA2 1.13 on expert several times without losing anyone) I think the inclusion of timers meshes well with x-com’s board game like nature of design and level of abstraction of some systems. Would I prefer a more simulation like approach? Sure, but on the other hand that would inevitably lead to prolonged tactical battles and needless extension of the campaign. Disclaimer: I reserve the right to completely change my mind on timers once I start hitting mid and high.l tier enemy units and come back here to bitch about them :).
In any case, I’m looking for some tips for the strategy layer. With WotC I have access to factions and it seems I have so many missions available to me at any given time and I’m worried that I’ll start neglecting the ‘main’ ones and have the campaign snowball on me.
Any tips regarding research and build order are also welcome.
And if there are any must have WotC compatible mods available I’d love to know that too. Especially things like reducing visual clutter, the movement grid in tactical layer often gets in the way of seeing things.
For power coils, place a psi lab on one, and a shadow lab on the other. They use the most power and if something is built on a power coil, it power cost is free.
I would also rush psi research to get psi-operatives. They take a long time to train and are totally awesome.
My perfect squad would be 3 grenadiers (the heavy weapon soldier), 2 psi-ops, and 1 specialist.
As for your first research, I would research the thing that lets you train soldiers as a class, then do the ones that up your squad size to 6.
As for mods, because I hate the mission timers, there is one that doubles the timer times (although this might be moot since I think they added a preference to do that anyway) and one that lets you evacuate all your soldiers at once.
There is one mod called long war which does not work for WoTC. I would try that after you get bored of the base WoTC game. It has a lot of improvements in mechanics, and I certainly hope that when the make XCom 3, they will take a few pages from that mod.
I have to respectfully disagree on the perfect squad. If you have the WOTC expansion (sounds like you might), my perfect squad would be a Sharpshooter (Sniper spec), 2 Rangers, a Specialist and a Reaper.
The Reaper doesn’t break stealth when discovering enemies unless it literally gets stepped on. A perfect scout, give it lots of mobility. Run it forward to scout where the enemy pods are without revealing the squad thus giving Squadsight range to your snipers. Later on it will be able to kill from stealth without revealing itself. I had one of these on every mission.
The Sharpshooter when specced correctly with Squadview, Serial and Death from Above is the most powerful unit in the game. With wraith armor, positioned above somewhere with a reload weapon upgrade, the Sharpshooter can kill and kill and kill on a single turn until nothing is left in view. Give them the best accuracy PCS you can find. My Sharpshooter had more kills on every mission than any other unit. It wasn’t even close.
Rangers are versatile close range death dealers. Like Sharpshooters, they can deal a lot of death in a single turn with the right spec. I like to run my Rangers with Bladestorm right into the middle of an untriggered pod. When they run from cover, the Ranger cuts them all down one after another with his blade. The Ranger also stays in stealth when the rest of the squad is discovered and had a skill to drop back into stealth after discovery once per mission. Upgrade their shotgun with a laser sight to give them even more crit chance. Also give them a mobility PCS.
The Specialist can deal damage in a pinch but their role is to hack computers (required for some missions), robotic enemies and to heal the squad. Later in the game you may find yourself using other soldier types instead of the Specialist for some missions but in many missions they are required.
In the late game, once you can train Psi Ops up, you can substitute one of those for a Ranger or Specialist on missions. Psi Ops are one of the most powerful units but unfortunately, you get them so late that you will play most of the game without them even being an option.
Grenadiers are kind of an acquired taste. With armor shredding and covering fire they can be useful, but I find that with their low mobility they are often lagging behind with the specialist while the rest of my squad is doing all the scouting and killing. If you like a slower pace, they may be viable but I found myself parking them and using other units once I got past mid-game.
I like the Skirmisher and the Templar so you may choose to use one of them instead of a ranger or Specialist. The Templar in particular can be a real death dealer but requires some luck getting the right Xcom skills to reach full potential. It also helps if they are gifted or better. Both my Skirmisher and my Templar were of only average intelligence which limited the number of skills I was able to give them. The Skirmisher has exceptional mobility but I found my Templar lagging behind on most missions, which is really bad for a melee unit. The Templar needs a mobility PCS and armor with a grapple.
The only mod I use is ‘Gotcha Again’ which greatly improves the line-of-sight indicators and helps keep you from blundering into a bad, squad revealing position.
Once you kill each Chosen in WOTC you will get their weapon(s) for your squad to use. They are awesome, especially the sniper rifle/handgun. So you might prioritize taking them out ASAP.
EDIT: As far a buildings go, try to get the Covert Ops building ASAP. The missions offered there can be game changers, especially early on. It should be one of your highest priorities to build it.
I have to get ready for work like 5 minutes ago, but one comment I have is that I honestly never felt the timers were a problem - I never lost a mission due to running out of time, on Normal difficulty at any rate. And recently I used the built-in modifier to double them, and they became completely irrelevant and I kind of regret using that modifier, it drained just a little of the tension from the fights. I never would have come close to losing any this time, either, but it would have been nice to see that timer hit 2 or 3 instead of never dropping below 4 or 6 turns remaining, if that makes sense.
The fully upgraded Reaper rifle does as much damage as a sniper’s pistol. It’s a pea-shooter. A BB gun. A joke.
Reapers have a few tricks like Remote Start and their claymore. But once they’re out of tricks they’re useless. You can’t even give Reapers equipment to increase their versatility.
The Skirmisher bullpup also does too little damage, but at least the Skirmisher can fire it twice in a turn.
The Templar is OP.
Not sure how you are building your Reaper but mine has Deadeye and Talon rounds loaded, not to mention Banish and Annihilate. With the last 2 you can kill anything in the game. The first two with Soul Harvest and Needle will kill well over 50% of the in-game enemy types with 1 shot. With Silent Killer this means you can straight up kill an enemy over and over during a mission without ever breaking stealth. I admit I was lucky enough to get Tactical Rigging which allows for the Talon rounds.
Edit: And, I forgot to note that she has the Superior Laser Sight weapon upgrade for a big crit boost and also Superior Expanded Magazine (great for Banish).
Where is that located? Or does it unlock only after you beat the game?
Also, thanks for everyone for the tips, they’re really welcome. Lots of things to consider.
It’s when you create the game and it’s very easy to miss.
Yes. Once. It’s another trick in their playbook, and once it’s used, your Reaper back to being useless. Or at least, less useful than every other class.
Needle does no damage and is best used for removing overwatch or dropping something that’s almost dead.
Needle is a passive that bypasses two armor on every shot. Not sure what to say if you don’t see how useful that is on a unit that does less baseline damage. Combined with Deadeye and a high crit rate, my reapers don’t have any problems killing many things that are at full health.
On most missions you only run into one super tough unit you need to take out in one turn. The Chosen for example. My reaper killed every one of them. Gatekeepers with closed shells are another good example. Or the huge mechs that explode when they die. once a mission is generally extremely useful.
I guess we’ll have to disagree about their usefulness. I find them indispensable for their scouting skills alone. They allow me to complete missions in half the number of turns. The rest is just gravy.
Yeah, any mission I ran without a Reaper always felt like I was going in blind and being ambushed at every turn. It was actually one of the things I found a little disappointing about War of the Chosen – all three of the new classes are almost indispensable.