XCOM 2 is on sale 60% off...

[huttj509]

That assumes you get them - the resistance orders are random, and it took me several games before I got the one that gave me the concealment bonus. If timers are seriously irritating you, I can definitely see modding them as a better choice.

I got an RO early on that's been simply gold.

Enemy units are disoriented their first turn if revealed on your first turn.

So I find a pod on my turn, they run to cover, then on Advent turn they each only get 1 action.

[boomwolf]

Personally I found that the double-turn-limit and double-avatar-length are "easy mode" when used alone.
But when used with others they can be really good.

Double turns works well with beta strike to make the longer firefights not screw you over in the mission timers and return the game to be balanced around slower gameplay.

Double avatar is practically taking the avatar timer off the game, so you need to add a new strategic timer to replace it. enter grim horizon, where dark events pile up and become extremely nasty. good luck taking your sweet time now.

[Avilan the Grey]

Personally I found that the double-turn-limit and double-avatar-length are "easy mode" when used alone.
But when used with others they can be really good.

Double turns works well with beta strike to make the longer firefights not screw you over in the mission timers and return the game to be balanced around slower gameplay.

Double avatar is practically taking the avatar timer off the game, so you need to add a new strategic timer to replace it. enter grim horizon, where dark events pile up and become extremely nasty. good luck taking your sweet time now.

Good points. Seems reasonable.
I will try everything "Vanilla" for now.

[Avilan the Grey]

Okay, I just spent the night restarting the game 22 times (yes I am that pathetic) until the following conditions were met:

1. At least 2 of 4 starters were female.
2. At least 2 of 4 starters were some of my favorite custom characters.

I also noticed another thing: As I saved just before promoting them when I finally got what I wanted, my favorite character became a Ranger (which I wanted her to be) every time (4 out of 4). The others were random. It might be RNG, but it's a bit weird.

[Avilan the Grey]

Well i might have to change the difficulty.
I now have had to restart the second mission three (3!) times because I just can't make it to disarm the bomb within the 7 turns I have. The first two times I didn't even get within reach of the bomb before turn 7. The third time I had two soldiers that could in theory reach it only to discover there was a third pod of enemies behind it, so in order to disarm it I had to sacrifice all but that one soldier (so total party wipe since she was alone against three enemies on her turn after that).

I am trying a forth time, but it is annoying that in order to reach the bomb I have to blindly run every single turn; I cannot stop to go into overwatch at any turn or I won't make it in time.

Edit: Make that 4 times. This map is basically generated in such a way that it is impossible to not take at least 50% losses.
I have had to resort to save scum to make sure my 15-24% hit chances hit, because if a single soldier fail an OW or a low chance hit, at least 2 soldiers will die.

[Avilan the Grey]

...OKay, I solved it.
I needed a specialist to hack it from a distance (my only specialist was wounded). So I had to reload the FIRST mission so I could make sure the guy promoted to specialist wasn't wounded.
THEN I could finish the second mission with a whole turn to spare.

[Chen]

Okay, I just spent the night restarting the game 22 times (yes I am that pathetic) until the following conditions were met:

1. At least 2 of 4 starters were female.
2. At least 2 of 4 starters were some of my favorite custom characters.

I also noticed another thing: As I saved just before promoting them when I finally got what I wanted, my favorite character became a Ranger (which I wanted her to be) every time (4 out of 4). The others were random. It might be RNG, but it's a bit weird.

Cant you just recustomize then after the fact? You can certainly can do it manually. Figured you could do the same with the char pool.

[Avilan the Grey]

Cant you just recustomize then after the fact? You can certainly can do it manually. Figured you could do the same with the char pool.

The first four are always random (either random picks from your Character pool, or random from well the wast sea of randomness).
Come to think of it is there a mod that allows you to pick your soldiers for mission 1?

[Rodin]

The first four are always random (either random picks from your Character pool, or random from well the wast sea of randomness).
Come to think of it is there a mod that allows you to pick your soldiers for mission 1?

I've never used custom characters so I'm not sure, but a quick Googling shows something that may help:

How to use custom and imported characters in XCOM 2
By default, the game will give you both random characters and the ones you’ve made. If you want to exclude either, this is what you should do :
Go to C:\Users\your-username\Documents\My Games\XCOM2\XComGame\Config
Use Notepad to open XComGameData.ini (make a backup copy first!)
Find the lines with InitialSoldiersCharacterPoolSelectionMode and RewardUnitCharacterPoolSelectionMode
You can now change their values to one of three options:
eCPSM_Mixed is the default, which uses both random chars and your pools
eCPSM_RandomOnly will force it to ignore your pools and use only random characters
eCPSM_PoolOnly will make the game give you only soldiers and VIPs from your pools
Save the changes made to the file


Edit:

Looking at that, that's still only random picks from the Pool. Not sure how to actually pick out 4 specific guys.

[Leon]

I prefer to not have some of my favs in the starting four since its a fairly good bet that someone is going to get badly hurt or worse, i do need to go back and change some settings tho as several of my favs are now scientists/engineers since they are from the generation where i ticked that box but they never actually ever turned up as the VIP till WotC.

I have a pool of 50 or so soldiers now and have only specifically made three of them, the rest have been promoted to the pool for heroic actions in games or looking really good by chance.

[Eldan]

I never bothered with the custom characters much. Occasionally, I give someone an additional accessoire or two, or remove a hairstyle that looks particularly stupid. That's it.

[Avilan the Grey]

You actually have dropdown menu in the Character Pool list where you can set those options.

Anyway, I have played for most of last night and most of today and:

1. Anyone but me that finds the graphics, even when effects (light, shadows etc) are up to High or (whatever it's called at maximum) are very flat the few time you are in full clear daylight? I did a mission that was during the day in 100% visibility, and there was zero dept in anything. At first I thought my settings were off but in the Skyranger, with dark shadows and small spotlights, everything looked as usual.

2. Isn't it "fun" when you confront a Chosen who's only real weakness is explosives, and she insists on bringing Zombies into every battle (almost)?

3. The "Difficulty" calculation (as in what the game thinks a mission is) seems awfully off. Worse than in the first game: The mission I had such trouble with above? "Easy". Two missions today that were cakewalks? "Hard" and "Medium" respectively.

4. The resistance fighters in the last mission tonight were amazing. I DID take out the Viper as soon as I got there, and handled one of the mechs by myself (and the Chosen Assassin never attacked anyone but my guys). However that small group of resistance fighters drow off, or killed 2 stun guys, one officer, one Mech and one regular troop. They also ate down the Faceless down to only 2 HP before I could reach it. Color me impressed!

5. Same mission: My first Muton. He never got close. An Overwatch shot with a minigun and one with a shrapnel shotgun and he died as soon as he entered the map. I'm not getting cocky though; I know they're going to be a pain.

Edit: I have... 60 or so ppl. 20 of them I carefully "built" myself. The rest are cherry picks (and then redesigned) from a "Lore Friendly Character Pool" I downloaded. I will promote ppl to the list if that happens and also I will edit the ones I have (for example I had a ranger that almost bled out from being shot by a plasma gun today. I added a huge scar on her and I will export her back with that.

[Eldan]

So, apparently, Steam doesn't like my credit card anymore? Wanted to buy the expansion, since reviews are good, and steam won't sell to me. Bugger. I'll have to call my credit card company.

So instead, I decided to install Long War and start a campaign in that. I just discovered a few voices I hadn't seen before, like Trigger-happy Guy in German. He communicates entirely in angry mumbling growls and delighted shrieking and it's hilarious. He just so happened to be my Technical guy, too, so he comes with a flamethrower and rocket launcher. For additional fun, he's a balding, shifty-looking middle-aged guy with a "recruited from prison, unspecified crimes" background.

So, sometimes, random just works.

[Sian]

I never bothered with the custom characters much. Occasionally, I give someone an additional accessoire or two, or remove a hairstyle that looks particularly stupid. That's it.

This so very much ... I've never really given a rats arse (or understood why people sometimes appear to get such a hard-on from it) about painstakingly creating custom characters. Sure, an edit here and there to easily differentiate at a glance, changing stuff that looks/sounds stupid or jarring as hell, but no further than that ... I'm playing a strategy game, not Doll Dress Up Simulator

[Eldan]

I have begun using bright primary colours as class uniforms, though.

[SlyGuyMcFly]

This so very much ... I've never really given a rats arse (or understood why people sometimes appear to get such a hard-on from it) about painstakingly creating custom characters. Sure, an edit here and there to easily differentiate at a glance, changing stuff that looks/sounds stupid or jarring as hell, but no further than that ... I'm playing a strategy game, not Doll Dress Up Simulator

Different strokes and all that. Personally, I find my XCOM experience is greatly enhanced by replacing the largely anonymous and interchangeable randos with, say, the cast of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Quite aside from the inherent hilarity of the tonal dissonance, it's way more dramatic and exciting when That's Xcom, Baby inevitably happens. Wrestlers, Power Rangers and World Leaders are runs I've done, and enjoyed tremendously.

It comes down to much you care for the story telling and emergent narratives, I think. Some people play XCOM like it's Advance Wars or Starcraft where units are totally interchangable and losing one is nothing more than a loss of invested resources. Others play it like it's a Fire Emblem or Shining Force game, where each unit is distinct from the others and losing one means losing a character from the story, permanently. It's not surprising to me that those more invested in the units as characters would spend more time making said units more characterful.

[Eldan]

I absolutely come to love my squaddies. But for that, I don't want them to be characters I know from elsewhere. I want them to be recruits from the XCOM universe. They start out random to me, but over the missions, I get to know them. Once I have my core of six or seven high level guys, I know their nicknames and have stories and personalities for them in my head. But that's developed over the game, nothing they start out with. And having them characters I know from elsewhere would only hinder that.

[warty goblin]

I absolutely come to love my squaddies. But for that, I don't want them to be characters I know from elsewhere. I want them to be recruits from the XCOM universe. They start out random to me, but over the missions, I get to know them. Once I have my core of six or seven high level guys, I know their nicknames and have stories and personalities for them in my head. But that's developed over the game, nothing they start out with. And having them characters I know from elsewhere would only hinder that.

Yeah, I'm pretty much in that boat as well. So I only futz with the customization every now and again when some newb has truly intolerable hair. This is a war damnit, and we aren't hauling around that much mousse. Oh, and in Enemy Within, I always made sure to give the MEK troopers full face helmets, because otherwise they looked silly.

Had a weird thing happen this weekend. In the middle of a retaliation attack on a camp, the game glitched in a new and exciting way. The aliens' turn took a long time to process and they didn't act for two rounds, which sure made it a lot easier to kill the four berserkers running around. But the next tactical battle was simply unplayable, couldn't get through a turn without the game crashing - something it seems to do occasionally anyway - to the point where I gave up and replayed the retaliation attack. Ran fine after that.

The Chosen don't really seem to matter that much in my current game. The Assassin was annoying to be sure, because it was pretty much impossible to stop her from putting at least one soldier in the hospital whenever she showed up, and she was immune to Overwatch. But my Hunter is vulnerable to explosions, and I like to run dual grenadiers, and the Warlock is vulnerable to melee attacks and so is a perfect candidate for getting shanked by his sister's sword.

Gatekeepers on the other hand can go to hell.

[Rodin]

I absolutely come to love my squaddies. But for that, I don't want them to be characters I know from elsewhere. I want them to be recruits from the XCOM universe. They start out random to me, but over the missions, I get to know them. Once I have my core of six or seven high level guys, I know their nicknames and have stories and personalities for them in my head. But that's developed over the game, nothing they start out with. And having them characters I know from elsewhere would only hinder that.

This is how I roll too. My favorite ever was actually from one of my earliest games - I randomly got a Sharpshooter lady with the knitting needle hairbun and big thick glasses. I called her my killer librarian, changed her hair color to "old lady blue" and sent her out to go badass granny the aliens to death.

Gatekeepers on the other hand can go to hell.

Gatekeepers in my game have gone next level in strategy. They seem to know that I have Psionic Feedback, so they charge into my guys and Gateway. This kills the Gatekeeper, which in turn causes them to explode, which makes them deal MORE damage...

[Avilan the Grey]

Different strokes and all that. Personally, I find my XCOM experience is greatly enhanced by replacing the largely anonymous and interchangeable randos with, say, the cast of My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic. Quite aside from the inherent hilarity of the tonal dissonance, it's way more dramatic and exciting when That's Xcom, Baby inevitably happens. Wrestlers, Power Rangers and World Leaders are runs I've done, and enjoyed tremendously.

It comes down to much you care for the story telling and emergent narratives, I think. Some people play XCOM like it's Advance Wars or Starcraft where units are totally interchangable and losing one is nothing more than a loss of invested resources. Others play it like it's a Fire Emblem or Shining Force game, where each unit is distinct from the others and losing one means losing a character from the story, permanently. It's not surprising to me that those more invested in the units as characters would spend more time making said units more characterful.

Indeed.
I am finding that unlike my first instinct, almost exclusively use members of my team that has the Children of Anarchy options enabled. As a tangent, I have shortened my Pool to only ppl I really enjoy, and told the game to use a setting when randomizing squaddies with a 90% chance of using some kind of CoA gear. Besides it feels rather lore friendly; these people are NOT a trained military force, like in the first game. These are a rag tag bunch of people from all over the globe.

Spoiler: Here's a shot from my Skyranger after operation Gatecrasher:

Show

...That's not a cigar. It's a lip ring.

Edit: I am running "Tinman". My own definition: Turning autosave off, only allowed to save between missions or if I need to turn off the game. If I forget... well. This means that I can reload, but has to redo the whole mission every time. No save scumming after being really lucky.

[Eldan]

Yeah, see, I wouldn't go for that. I want them to look at least halfway practical, no half-naked and no laces-and-leather pants. (Doesn't help that all my games seem to start in the arctic). I mean, they can have coloured hair, piercings, unusual T-shirts, all that. It's not a military. But they shouldn't look like a music festival, either.

[warty goblin]

This is how I roll too. My favorite ever was actually from one of my earliest games - I randomly got a Sharpshooter lady with the knitting needle hairbun and big thick glasses. I called her my killer librarian, changed her hair color to "old lady blue" and sent her out to go badass granny the aliens to death.

One of my best grenadiers smokes. Seems risky, given the amount of freaky alien ordnance he runs around with. I had a sniper with an eyepatch at one point as well.

Gatekeepers in my game have gone next level in strategy. They seem to know that I have Psionic Feedback, so they charge into my guys and Gateway. This kills the Gatekeeper, which in turn causes them to explode, which makes them deal MORE damage...

I had a gatekeeper show up on a mission where I could only bring 3 soldiers, the same turn that my medic had a mental breakdown about a squadmate being wounded. The only way I could figure out to kill it before six Lost it had resurrected overwhelmed me was to charge it with my maxed out sword Ranger using the assassin's katana. That about half killed it, then Mox gave her a second action to finish it off.

Course she got slightly blown up, but everybody survived.

[Eldan]

My current heavy spawned as an eighties caricature. Big burly black man with a beard,big hair, big gold earrings, cigar, aviator shades.

[Avilan the Grey]

Yeah, see, I wouldn't go for that. I want them to look at least halfway practical, no half-naked and no laces-and-leather pants. (Doesn't help that all my games seem to start in the arctic). I mean, they can have coloured hair, piercings, unusual T-shirts, all that. It's not a military. But they shouldn't look like a music festival, either.

This is what I felt before actually buying the game. Now I'm going for "distinctive".
Anyway, it's really not dumber than the opposite, like storm troopers or Advent soldiers who are less protected than fully naked aliens.

[warty goblin]

This is what I felt before actually buying the game. Now I'm going for "distinctive".
Anyway, it's really not dumber than the opposite, like storm troopers or Advent soldiers who are less protected than fully naked aliens.

The only fully naked alien I can think of is the sectoid, which, although more durable than the early game Advent troopers is still hideously vulnerable to even slightly decent weapons. Plasma rifles cut them up like nobody's business, and even magnetic guns massacre them left right and center. It's also been genetically modified like crazy, so quite likely would be more weapons resistant than a bog standard human. After that most of the seriously durable enemy units are either fully mechanized or have very heavy armor.

I guess some of the Lost are fairly tough, but they're still hilariously easy to kill by the bucket. I seem to constantly have the Dark Event where Lost hordes can show up everywhere, and I'm beginning to think they're an asset. They activate right after the aliens, so break alien overwatch, having them around keeps aliens busy, and in particular can basically shut down melee aliens since melee attacks don't give Headshot bonuses. I have happy memories of a horde boxing in an Andromedon and beating it half to death for me before I could be bothered to kill off the whole lot. Bonus points for grenading an enemy position and having it inundated in the living dead.

[Vitruviansquid]

Some characters I made in the pool:

Wulfrik "WorldWalker" The Wanderer
Gotrek "Slayer" Gurnisson
Nazeebo "Nephalem" Witchdoctor
Li "Wizard" Ming
Elizabeth "Lamb" DeWitt
Daenerys "Khaleesi" Targaryen
Gabriel "Bloodraven" Angelos
Danny "Iron Fist" Rand
Apollyon "Wolves" Blackstone
Sarah "Ghost" Kerrigan
Geralt "Witcher" Of Rivia

I'm definitely finding it more interesting with character pool creations, even though I didn't touch the character pool at all until until WOTC, with multiple campaigns of Xcom 2 under my belt.

You never thought you needed Wulfrik the Wanderer being best pals with the Wizard from Diablo 3, then it happens and realize you do.

[Avilan the Grey]

Some characters I made in the pool:

Wulfrik "WorldWalker" The Wanderer
Gotrek "Slayer" Gurnisson
Nazeebo "Nephalem" Witchdoctor
Li "Wizard" Ming
Elizabeth "Lamb" DeWitt
Daenerys "Khaleesi" Targaryen
Gabriel "Bloodraven" Angelos
Danny "Iron Fist" Rand
Apollyon "Wolves" Blackstone
Sarah "Ghost" Kerrigan
Geralt "Witcher" Of Rivia

I'm definitely finding it more interesting with character pool creations, even though I didn't touch the character pool at all until until WOTC, with multiple campaigns of Xcom 2 under my belt.

You never thought you needed Wulfrik the Wanderer being best pals with the Wizard from Diablo 3, then it happens and realize you do.

All mine are "original" characters, except one woman who's based on Siouxie Sioux. Just because. Nickname "Banshee" btw.

...Isn't it fun when you blow up all cover to get a flanking shot only to realize later that because there's no cover you have to rush 4 troops across a field with no chance to shoot or overwatch... Because you blew up all the cover earlier?

[Vitruviansquid]

I don't think I've ever had to blow up that much stuff in one turn, and I'm a big advocate for blowing up all of your problems.

[Avilan the Grey]

They wounded my Ranger so I wanted to avoid getting flanked. That's when I took out the first row of cover. Then in the same turn I woke up a pod by mistake which were in a perfect flanking position. So there went the second row of cover...

[GungHo]

My current heavy spawned as an eighties caricature. Big burly black man with a beard,big hair, big gold earrings, cigar, aviator shades.

I usually go with G.I. Joe meets Jagged Alliance