XCOM: One Does Not Simply "Shoot" a Cryssalid...

[Cespenar]

So... can one ignore a crashed UFO in this game, and not have any bad consequences?

[NEO|Phyte]

So... can one ignore a crashed UFO in this game, and not have any bad consequences?

Not looting its precious alloys/elerium/bits probably counts as a bad consequence. To my knowledge, once it's been shot down, it has ceased to be a threat to the world.

[BRC]

It would be pretty boring, though...

Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch. Turn over

Oh look, the aliens killed themselves trying to close. Hmm... fancy that.

Either that or...

Alien blows away all cover on your perimeter. Now you either have to sacrifice civilians to get behind cover or you die horribly by not being under cover.

A defensive mission would work best if you got to set up your defenses.

Like, you have a building, and some civilians to guard. Before the mission begins, you get to place defenses. Example defenses
Barricades: serve as half-cover.
Floodlights: Provides a penalty to accuracy and defense for characters in it's area of effect.
Mines: Explosions.

If you set up things right, Overwatch Spam would actually be a bad idea. If you can see the aliens already, then it's a better idea to just shoot you. Overwatch Spam is only a good idea if the aliens are going to blindly rush your defenses in order to get to the civvies.

Also, you could have unique "Sapper" type enemies that are going to try to sneak in.

What might be better would be "Evac" Missions. They function like a terror mission, except there are more aliens, and Civvies will take their actions moving towards your evac zone, rather than standing around like idiots until somebody yells at them. You need to balance between holding the Evac zone, and going out to take down aliens killing Civvies out in the field.

[Anarion]

It would be pretty boring, though...

Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch. Turn over

Oh look, the aliens killed themselves trying to close. Hmm... fancy that.

Either that or...

Alien blows away all cover on your perimeter. Now you either have to sacrifice civilians to get behind cover or you die horribly by not being under cover.

As BRC noted, something where you set up defenses could be a lot of fun. Additionally, you could have a building or base with multiple entrances. If thin men can flip out of the air, there's no reasons that aliens couldn't bust walls, sneak into ventilation ducts, and come in via the sewers. So having to clear out your building and have soldiers sweeping it while others hold the front could be an interesting setup. It might also provide a good mission type to actually split up your soldiers to efficiently clear multiple corridors of relatively weaker aliens, which is currently something the game strongly discourages.

So... can one ignore a crashed UFO in this game, and not have any bad consequences?

Neo|Phyte's answer is interesting, but raises another question for me. How long does a crashed UFO stick around on the map before you can no longer do the mission? I've never tested it.

[kkortekaas]

Anyone buy the Elite Soldiers DLC? is it worth the 5 bucks?

[Cikomyr]

It would be pretty boring, though...

Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch, Overwatch. Turn over

Oh look, the aliens killed themselves trying to close. Hmm... fancy that.

Either that or...

Alien blows away all cover on your perimeter. Now you either have to sacrifice civilians to get behind cover or you die horribly by not being under cover.

Overwatch, overwatch, overwatch..

Hey, an alien got stupid enough to close on us. They are all gonna die!!

.... hey, isn't that a Blas...?

BOOOOOOM!

Mission failed

[Cikomyr]

Neo|Phyte's answer is interesting, but raises another question for me. How long does a crashed UFO stick around on the map before you can no longer do the mission? I've never tested it.

The same as Council Missions. 1-2 days

[DaedalusMkV]

Anyone buy the Elite Soldiers DLC? is it worth the 5 bucks?

I bought it. It is not worth $5. I knew that going in. Do you want an array of simple colour options, two helmets and two minor visual modifications for Carapace armour, as well as a couple of haircut options? If so, the pack is for you. If you don't really care at all about customizing your troops' armour, you probably don't care.

[Neon Knight]

Anyone buy the Elite Soldiers DLC? is it worth the 5 bucks?

It is the armor customizations options that came with preorders. So, it depends.

___

Alright, I'm still playing through the game (don't have much time for video games these days) and I've recently started running into large UFO's. My two Interceptor standard fleet is not cutting it, so I need to look into upping my air power.

My question is, should I focus on getting Uplink power-ups, more Interceptors, or better guns for the Interceptors? And what weapons/powerups are good for Interceptors?

[Luzahn]

Hmm this is odd. For some reason the thin men on my classic playthough are three health. I hope nothing stupid has occurred.

[CreganTur]

Hmm this is odd. For some reason the thin men on my classic playthough are three health. I hope nothing stupid has occurred.

Did you start a new game on Classic, or bump up the difficulty of an existing game on classic?


I did not preorder the game, but my 360 version came with the code for the elite soldier pack in it. It claims to give you a special squad member, but I don't ever remember seeing that.

[Reynard]

Until you active the plotstuff after the alien base, 1-2 standard interceptors per continent with the basic missiles are good enough. The only upgrade you really need when you get the bigger UFOs are Plasma Cannons. The only reason you need the Firestorm at all is the goddamn purple UFO of too-fast-for-interceptors.

[Luzahn]

The game started classic, but I did install the new dlc in the middle of it. Deleted it and restarted to be sure, was only the third mission anyway.

[Anarion]

___

Alright, I'm still playing through the game (don't have much time for video games these days) and I've recently started running into large UFO's. My two Interceptor standard fleet is not cutting it, so I need to look into upping my air power.

My question is, should I focus on getting Uplink power-ups, more Interceptors, or better guns for the Interceptors? And what weapons/powerups are good for Interceptors?

A couple uplink upgrades will tide you over, but what you want is interceptors with plasma cannons, which can handle anything except battleships and the custom UFO.

Hmm this is odd. For some reason the thin men on my classic playthough are three health. I hope nothing stupid has occurred.

Was it the ones that drop out of the sky during some council missions? Some of those are default enemies (especially in the first counsel mission) and have 3 hp even though all other thin men you encounter will have 4.

Until you active the plotstuff after the alien base, 1-2 standard interceptors per continent with the basic missiles are good enough. The only upgrade you really need when you get the bigger UFOs are Plasma Cannons. The only reason you need the Firestorm at all is the goddamn purple UFO of too-fast-for-interceptors.

Firestorm taking out a battleship with an EMP cannon is pretty awesome too.

[Luzahn]

A couple uplink upgrades will tide you over, but what you want is interceptors with plasma cannons, which can handle anything except battleships and the custom UFO.



Was it the ones that drop out of the sky during some council missions? Some of those are default enemies (especially in the first counsel mission) and have 3 hp even though all other thin men you encounter will have 4.



Firestorm taking out a battleship with an EMP cannon is pretty awesome too.

Oh...the dropping from the sky would explain it, then. Whoops.

I'm sorry, squad from that parallel universe that I destroyed on a whim.

Well, at least you won't be eaten by Cryssalids now...

[CreganTur]

I've been waiting forever to shoot down a battleship. I had to let 1 go because it spawned in an area where I didn't have a Firestorm and I haven't seen 1 since... and it's been about 3 months or more!

[Luzahn]

By the way, how do I build firestorms in other continents? It doesn't seem to allow it.

[SlyGuyMcFly]

By the way, how do I build firestorms in other continents? It doesn't seem to allow it.

You don't. You build them at your main base and then transfer them to other continents.

[Luzahn]

Ahh, of course. I was thrown off by the preventing of building while the hanger was full.

[Zevox]

A little more of my classic game today. As predicted, I had my first terror mission. It went as well as it possibly could have - only three Chryssalids were even there, with the rest of the enemies being Floaters, and I managed to win without even being wounded by any of them. Mostly thanks to a Chryssalid and several zombies clustering around a car at one point, allowing me to blow them all to kingdom come with a rocket. I did end up saving only eight people though.

I've just begun month 3, and things are already looking up. With the three satellites I put up near the end of the month (US, Japan, South Africa - slightly favoring more money over the absolute worst panic ratings, but I only have two at 4 and a few at 3 now, so as long as I don't get an abduction situation where both of the 4s have a mission, I won't lose anything to a single mission for now) I got quite a bit of income, which I've already used to order three more satellites. I found I need another workshop to increase my engineer work force to get another uplink going this month, but I should still be able to do that before the end of the month, so that's good.

I've also gotten Carapace Armor, the first laser weapons, and my first squad size increase, which should substantially ease my way from here. I could pick up the second squad size increase right now too, but I want to keep enough money in reserve to make sure I can start that uplink as soon as possible, so I'm waiting on that.

Zevox

[Sean Mirrsen]

Alright, I'm still playing through the game (don't have much time for video games these days) and I've recently started running into large UFO's. My two Interceptor standard fleet is not cutting it, so I need to look into upping my air power.

My question is, should I focus on getting Uplink power-ups, more Interceptors, or better guns for the Interceptors? And what weapons/powerups are good for Interceptors?

I found the Phoenix Cannon a surprisingly good stopgap measure for increasing the Interceptors' firepower while the heavy beam weapons are being developed. I had a Supply Barge show up over a continent that was mid-transferring its Firestorm, and only had one old Interceptor with a Phoenix Cannon on standby. With a well-timed application of the Dodge boost, the interceptor survived the encounter with a sliver of health left. The Phoenix Cannon doesn't deal prodigious amounts of damage and has short range (like the EMP), but it rarely misses and fires surprisingly fast. If you have a Dodge boost to let the plane get into range unmolested, it's quite effective.

[CreganTur]

Seriously, where are the Battleships!?

I'm extending my Normal playthrough by just ignoring the Gollop room until I get the "shoot 40 down" achievement. I also really want to get the research achievement and the "shoot down 1 of every kind" achievement as well.

AFAIK all I am missing is a battleship and it has been months since I last saw one.

[Surrealistik]

Finished Ironman Impossible; playing through it again with some of the Second Wave options active.

This video immediately came to mind:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmG1Qjs7FpE

[Luzahn]

Now, those second wave options are unlocked through modding, correct? Or did I miss something awesome?

[Cikomyr]

Now, those second wave options are unlocked through modding, correct? Or did I miss something awesome?

Yup. And no.


Some of the Second Waves options I like. Some I don't. I like the fact that you can cherry-pick to your leisure.

I like more randomness in soldier stats and damages. I like longer games. I like diminishing income based on inverse panic levels. I like more abduction return randomness.

I do not like increasing sat cost (we already have increasing sat uplink costs). I do not like autocrit on flanking (we already have a bonus). I do not like randomness of income or more abduction at the same time.

But everyone got his own favorites.

[Anarion]

So, since Battleship questioning has come up a couple times, has anyone figured out how often they appear?

I blew it on my classic ironman run and lost my squad doing the battleship mission* but I have everything else done at this point and just need to train up more troops before doing the gollup chamber or waiting for another battleship.



*Zevox gets an "I told you so moment." If I had been using archangel armor I could have easily won the battleship mission. As it was, my two assaults got stuck on the wrong side of a split platform and needed 4 turns to get back around while my supports died to heavy floaters and muton elites advancing on me.

[JMobius]

I've heard that battleships only appear after a lesser ship manages to escape from you. I don't know if that's true, as that sounds rather strange.

[NEO|Phyte]

As far as I can tell, battleships only show up towards the endgame. My classic run one had shown up after I had the last plot structure built, but by that point I was beyond caring about the world, and was waiting for my psilab to turn up a gifted soldier, so I let it do its scanning thing unmolested, and it shot down my sat. I had to sit on my thumbs a while in my normal run for one to finally show up so I could shoot it down and loot its fusion cores for research purposes. Basically, they aren't at all common, but they're not tied to letting a ship get away from you, as far as I can tell.

[Impnemo]

I've heard that battleships only appear after a lesser ship manages to escape from you. I don't know if that's true, as that sounds rather strange.

I can say certainly they won't come ONLY after one escapes. I had a battleship assigned to a simple scouting mission last play through. I can say battleships may appear after a UFO is allowed to pass through coverage unmolested. It will come through with a note from your XO that it appears to be scanning for "something". Its on a kill mission for the sat. Now, what sense does it make that happens when you don't shoot down UFOs as opposed to retaliation for shooting them down, I can't say.


No wait, I take that back. It makes sense. This is XCOM. If you let one go its because you can't do anything about it, and its kicking you while you're down.

[DaedalusMkV]

Finished Ironman Impossible; playing through it again with some of the Second Wave options active.

This video immediately came to mind:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rmG1Qjs7FpE

Out of curiousity, which part? The 'you cheated' part, or the little kids playing against grown men part? For that matter, was X-com the grown men or the little kids?

It's not immediately clear, damn it!


... You know what's really cool. Walking into the control room of a Supply ship and finding 4 Mutons, 2 Berserkers and 3 Sectoid Commanders. On your first Supply ship in Classic, before the next month's funding when you've only managed to scrape together one suit of Titan Armour. I made it a fighting retreat, but still lost four squad members without being able to take the UFO. The final count for that mission was 16 dead aliens, 4 alive, and I only managed to get my Medic and one of my Squadsight Snipers out alive, both of them at 2-3 health because of lucky alien crits. I've got panic totally under control, so I'm not screwed by it, but losing three experienced troops to the game hating me still hurts.