They changed the launcher so you have to toggle the option to play WOTC in a dropdown instead of the just clicking the button. Yeah I found them.
I only had vanilla at first, and got WOTC with some super sale bundle later, so I didn’t have the same issue, but I can definitely see how that would happen. The joys of UI.
Aaaaaand…my campaign was iron man and I haven’t played in a while so I made lots of dumb moves. Loss a good amount of top brass. MOX is dead (my only skirmisher). My top grenadier is dead. My top sniper is dead, although she focused on pistols. I still completed the mission…
I also lost the mech (spark?) in the previous mission to an insane 9 damage crit from a solo advent officer. (literally the only enemy left on the map)
Early on, losing troops is no biggie, but in the mid late game I start to become really paranoid. Not playing Ironman (the RNG in the game would drive me mad), and so I’ll go back a save or too to avoid losing a Colonel-level trooper.
The game definitely has a power curve. Early on, it’s all touch and go. Mid-game, you feel sort of on par. Later, you start to really get powerful, and outstrip the enemies somewhat, but that depends on where your research went and your cash flow I guess.
Right now, I’ve taken down one of the Chatty Cathy’s (Chosen), and have some decent armor and weapons. The choices you have to make, like protection or mobility vs. utility slots or other benefits, are pretty solid.
Until you realise the shredder gun is so ridiculously powerful it makes every other choice in this area largely irrelevant. :\
Eh, I’ve found it less than stellar, really. One shot, and the game is wonky about what actually gets affected by it. But even if it is super good, it’s one slot on a heavy armor. There are tons of other choices to make, especially if you don’t put everyone in the same armor.
Nah, man, that thing’s a beast. Make it the first action on your turn and even if you don’t kill everything it touches you’ll sweep the cover away from a good chunk of the map. Then you can reap all those juicy +hit/+crit bonuses on those dumb aliens standing around in the open wondering what the hell happened to the building that they were just cowering in.
I’m in the underwhelmed camp as well. I’d take any weapon dropped by chosen over it and I’d take any armor dropped by the kings/queen from alien hunters over it.
Consider what you get from just the hunter alone:
- [Darklance]- A Sniper Rifle with a Scope, Hair Trigger, Autoloader and Stock. Shooting the Darklance only costs a single action, allowing for shooting after moving or other single-action abilities. Deals identical damage to the Plasma Lance.
And, if that wasn’t enough, you also get:
- [Darkclaw]- A powerful pistol that will ignore up to 5 armor on targets. Deals much higher damage compared to the [Beam Pistol].
A properly spec’d out sniper with these two weapons (plus icarus armor just to make it even sillier) team’d with a reaper to spot can complete just about any mission short of the last one by themselves they’re so OP.
I’m happy it works for you, but for me, not so much. My jam is melee supported by hair-trigger and Repeater mods. But I do appreciate some boom occasionally, when I can 1) get LOS and 2) not kill my own people or civilians.
But it’s not a weapon, it’s equipment, so framing it as an either/or with the things you mention is disingenuous. Sure, it doesn’t work with all armour (though I’ll point out it does with some of the alien hunters armour), but it doesn’t need to; 2 or 3 on your team is more than enough.
Turning pods into mincemeat with maybe one or two low-health no-armour stragglers left over, for the price of a single action and guaranteed to hit regardless of cover or even walls? Sure, XCOM2 gives you many ways to skin an alien (it’s one if its strengths!) but I’ll still say it’s worth taking. :)
I must be using it wrong because I 1) never find enemies close enough to me in a clump, and 2) when I use it, it does like no damage. I’d rather equip a flamethrower.
RichVR
2962
I’ll take the shredder when there is nothing else. But later I ignore it for better weapons. For me it’s meh. Like the basic rocket.
Once you have the Chosen weapons you are set.
Well, I guess you can lead a sectopod to slaughter, but can’t make it render extinct.
(Did it get a touch of the nerf?)
I doubt it. I was able to make it work last night pretty nicely. I think you are probably right that it is a very viable approach. I just don’t know if it’s a FOTM meta-level approach!
What, kind wombat, is a FOTM?
Perchance that it is something… explicitly indiscreet that the younger people do, I will take private correspondence and illustrations (preferably graphic) on the matter.
Flavor of the month. It’s usually referring to a build or strategy that everyone is doing because it theorycrafts out the best.
I finally lost another troop (not because I’m good but because I savescum with the best of 'em). She was "Blitz, an English Colonel with 27 missions under her belt. A Ranger, she boldly charged forward to engage the Chosen and clear a way to the target, only to be mind-controlled by the bastard. Even as struggled against the mental onslaught, her teammates made the necessary decision to destroy the target, even knowing that in all probability Blitz would be killed in the ensuing blast.
So she’s listed as killed by friendly fire. So sad.
Nah, the monsters are those weird ADVENT dudes, ugh! Besides, she knew the risks. The Chosen got all gloaty and leapt up on a rock to blather some…and one of my snipers executed him with a repeater hit.
I need to get back to this and resurrect my single soldier playthroughs, still the most fun I’ve had with Xcom. Seeing how far you can get with one soldier is really pretty fun, and makes a great roguelike minigame.
