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

[Grey_Wolf_c]

I'm starting to wonder if I'm doing something wrong. I started in Europe, have had no cash problems and have a lab, and yet I seem to be lagging horribly behind in science. I have started my second month (lost Mexico - should've kept a satellite for such an occasion), and have barely completed a half dozen of projects, even when keeping to the faster ones. I just developed laser weapons, but otherwise still have the original techs. Haven't lost a single man, though, and even with my starting weapons I still can keep up - but apart from Chrysalids, I have yet to face anything with more than 4 HP. I worry what will happen when that changes.

GW

[Evrine]

I don't think you're doing anything wrong Grey Wolf, you're just really early in the game. I struggled right through month 3 to get everything done and to tech up as fast as possible. I lost France and Germany, but it doesn't seem to have made a big difference. About halfway through month four I lost Egypt and Nigeria, and that didn't make a difference either, but month 4 is really where I took off in terms of stability and growth. I'm at the beginning of month 5 and I have plasma weapons, titan/archangel armor, and I'm facing down packs of mutons with relative ease.

Part of it is due to a large number of ufo raids/crashes in month 4, as there tends to be a high amount of salvage that I have no use for and can sell, and they tend to have large amounts of alien alloys, which is usually what I run out of faster than money these days.

[shadow_archmagi]

Originally Posted by Ishikar

To address the cover question, if the shields on your cover are red then it's no good or you'll be flanked, I haven't seen much beyond that yet to indicate flanking/LoS.

Cover seems to be really generous- I think it's a full 180 degrees, so you have to be completely past their cover to shoot them

IE: if X is a guy, and _ is his cover, the periods represent the area the cover covers.
X
_.........................
...........................
...........................
...........................

Originally Posted by Ishikar

I've found that run and gun is most useful as a means to get that last burst of speed to reach distant cover and still be able to overwatch/rapid fire if need be.

Run and gun is amazing. I had an assault climbing ranks very quickly before the Muton Incident.

Originally Posted by Ishikar

Cryssalids are really not as scary as they used to be. I had one mission where one of my assaults opened a door and activated 3 of them who cornered him. Killed one with rapid fire and hurt the other two with other shooting but didn't kill them, I was afraid that I was going to be down two guys with zombies in my face to make everything worse but found that two guys just took 9 damage hits and breathed a HUGE sigh of relief.

Are you playing on Classic? Because I've never seen a chrysalid or a zombie *not* one hit kill someone.

Originally Posted by Ishikar

Overwatch is AWESOME for escort missions, by using it effectively and keeping my squad spread out I've been able to keep the enemy infiltrators from being able to attack/move at all on my returns. Nothing is quite as ridiculous as watching 4 people all overwatch the same thin man as soon as it jumps onto the overpass.

Overwatch is what I live by. 90% of my first encounters with aliens leave at least one of them dead as my entire squad blazes away at the bastard.

Originally Posted by Ishikar

ARMOR IS KING!! Learn it, live it, love it. The casualties I've had were from when I ran soldiers without it and they ate rather unfortunate plasma rifle fire. Carapace is a good baseline but certain classes benefit from the abilities in variant armors. I really like the skull/spider suit (can't remember exact name right now) for my sniper for the extra mobility/grapple option and a friend of mine uses it with his supports for the extra movement to get to wounded soldiers more quickly. I've just finished research on the Titan and Ghost suits and plan to upgrade my heavy support soldier to the former.

Someday I'll have a game last long enough to research Titan. Someday. I'm just glad that we somehow got all our Carapace Armor back after the people wearing it turned into chrssalidses.

Originally Posted by Ishikar

Overall I've been taking a more leisurely pace in the game

Are the mutant appearances slowed way down in normal? Because in Classic, I've got Mutons threatening to rip me limb from limb long before I start getting extra satelites up. Should I be getting satelites earlier?

EDIT: They really, really need a way to pick up a medkit off a dead man.

[KillianHawkeye]

Well, month 2 is kicking my butt. I just faced my first terror mission and lost all my operatives to the damn cryssalids. It took my whole squad to kill one, then two more popped up.

Anyway, I managed to get 5 engineers by selling a couple S.C.O.P.E.s to South Africa, so I should be able to build the facilities and tech I need as soon as I get some more credits.

[CreganTur]

Originally Posted by KillianHawkeye

Anyway, I managed to get 5 engineers by selling a couple S.C.O.P.E.s to South Africa, so I should be able to build the facilities and tech I need as soon as I get some more credits.

I would kill for that deal. I need engineers very, very badly.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Originally Posted by CreganTur

I would kill for that deal. I need engineers very, very badly.

I got a lucky break there, I got the same deal, closely followed with two carbon-fiber vest for 5 scientists that allowed me to build a bunch of rooms I could not before. I'm waiting on them to finish so I can start my next 3 satellites.

Grey Wolf

[Archonic Energy]

7.5 Hrs till european unlock...

*stares at clock*
...
move faster danm it!

[nooblade]

De-rail: I'm playing the original XCOM while waiting for a new computer to arrive (hopefully this weekend).

XCOM: UFO Defense (to distinguish it) is a funny game. I'm trying not to spoil it (either game really) too much with wiki stuff but I don't see why it's so difficult for recruits to use heavy weapons and things like that. Time unit used by weapons scale up as character TUs go up, so the only advantage to having more TUs is moving faster? Maybe? And moving and shooting in the same turns is a problem. But then there are some strategies just to take advantage of game quirks, like this: Rear Commander. The way that recruits can use heavy weapons is by having a commander throw the weapons down. I would've never thought of that.

I'm playing on beginner and still have at least one death every mission at the start. I've accidentally killed one of my own soldiers too. Reapers at night were terrifying! This game may have given me bearfear. Then everything got a little easier when I figured out how to get the tanks; they're great for scouting. Also laser rifles. Everyone has a laser rifle now and suddenly they're not so inaccurate as stormtroopers.

Somehow XCOM: UFO Defense is better than UFO: Alien Invasion. I can't quite put my finger on it. I look forward to playing the new game.

[Ishikar]

Originally Posted by shadow_archmagi

Are you playing on Classic? Because I've never seen a chrysalid or a zombie *not* one hit kill someone.

Are the mutant appearances slowed way down in normal? Because in Classic, I've got Mutons threatening to rip me limb from limb long before I start getting extra satelites up. Should I be getting satelites earlier?

EDIT: They really, really need a way to pick up a medkit off a dead man.

I'm playing on Normal difficulty in what is thus far an ironman game (I'm not truly on ironman but I have yet to reload to prevent disaster, almost did when my sniper ran out like an idiot due to an ability mis-click.

I've had Mutons for a while now and I was a little slow about satellites too, I'm in like month 5 or 6 I think. Also the Cryssalid thing was straight luck since I had 10 HP on those guys and they were gravely wounded when the mission finished.

[Grif]

Originally Posted by nooblade

De-rail: I'm playing the original XCOM while waiting for a new computer to arrive (hopefully this weekend).

XCOM: UFO Defense (to distinguish it) is a funny game. I'm trying not to spoil it (either game really) too much with wiki stuff but I don't see why it's so difficult for recruits to use heavy weapons and things like that. Time unit used by weapons scale up as character TUs go up, so the only advantage to having more TUs is moving faster? Maybe? And moving and shooting in the same turns is a problem. But then there are some strategies just to take advantage of game quirks, like this: Rear Commander. The way that recruits can use heavy weapons is by having a commander throw the weapons down. I would've never thought of that.

I'm playing on beginner and still have at least one death every mission at the start. I've accidentally killed one of my own soldiers too. Reapers at night were terrifying! This game may have given me bearfear. Then everything got a little easier when I figured out how to get the tanks; they're great for scouting. Also laser rifles. Everyone has a laser rifle now and suddenly they're not so inaccurate as stormtroopers.

Somehow XCOM: UFO Defense is better than UFO: Alien Invasion. I can't quite put my finger on it. I look forward to playing the new game.

More TUs are good in the sense that certain actions like walking, reloading/dropping ammo, and throwing grenades relies on fixed TUs to accomplish, so you get more leeway to do these sort of things. In a way, your more experienced soldiers become more mobile.

I see you also found laser rifles. They're great precisely because they're more accurate than the rifle and they require less TU to shoot to boot.

[Tengu_temp]

Originally Posted by shadow_archmagi

Are you playing on Classic? Because I've never seen a chrysalid or a zombie *not* one hit kill someone.

Chrysalids seem to deal around 7-8 damage with their melee attack on Classic. Survivable with better armor.

[KillianHawkeye]

Well I lost the council at the end of month 3.

Not too surprising for my first try. The second one is starting out a bit better now that I have a clue what I'm doing. I started out digging straight for the nearest steam vents and went for engineers before scientists, gave my first satellite to a country that actually needed it, got 200 credits from another mission and started constructing my thermal power station, and now I'm approaching the end of month 1 in good shape to build whatever I want (as soon as I get more money).

[shadow_archmagi]

Originally Posted by Tengu_temp

Chrysalids seem to deal around 7-8 damage with their melee attack on Classic. Survivable with better armor.

Odd, because, again, I have yet to see a 10hp soldier survive a hit from one.

[Impnemo]

I should have started on a higher difficulty, normal is just too much a push over. I'd like to say live and learn, but thats sorta the problem.

Spoiler

So I'm on the temple ship, finally lose a solider, another critical but stable, rest of my team half dead. Bust through to the last room. Sniper almost kills the preacher man on round one. My two assaults up front get mind controlled. My VIP is just off to the side, good thing too because the bad guys drop a psi rift on the two folks they just mind controlled. Crash. WUT? NOAH! Thank goodness for autosave and all, but good grief what a way to kill the suspense.

[Codemus]

Remember that they can crit just the same as anybody else.

On other news, my sniper the other night was pulling shots sporting a crit chance higher than his to-hit chance. How do those percentiles work anyway? Does it first roll to see if it hit, then if it was a crit? Or does it roll two different attacks, with the crit superceding the normal one?

Though I guess that is getting into the guts of the game, and probably isn't really known.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Originally Posted by Codemus

Remember that they can crit just the same as anybody else.

On other news, my sniper the other night was pulling shots sporting a crit chance higher than his to-hit chance. How do those percentiles work anyway? Does it first roll to see if it hit, then if it was a crit? Or does it roll two different attacks, with the crit superceding the normal one?

Though I guess that is getting into the guts of the game, and probably isn't really known.

First is to hit. Second is separate roll, to see if the hit is a crit. To see the same effect, target a distant enemy with the shotgun. I've seen that chance to hit as low as 2%, while the crit chance is stable at 70%.

I am fairly certain it was mentioned in passing in one of the videos.

Which reminds me: has anyone specialised their assaults towards crit-happy? I understand they are meant to eschew the shotgun and use rifle primarily (so it would be a long distance attacker) with a likely ridiculously high crit chance with enough enemies present. I'd like to know if it is worth attempting.

Grey Wolf

[BRC]

I only have on assault using a Shotgun, but that's because a judicious use of Arc Throwers gained me enough plasmas, and I don't want to spend the alloys needed to build scatterlasers

[Impnemo]

Is base layout random/semi-random/unknown? Are steam pockets predetermined by difficulty and or continent? Just made 3 new games and all had one pocket in the corner of the lowest level.

edit: newp, totally random. Next base spawned with 3, 2 connected.

[Anarion]

Finally got some time to get the game going. I noticed so far that base sequencing seems to be a huge deal. I'm not sure I spent my money right either, as I bought some of the officer training upgrades and now I'm really short on engineers to the point that it's stalling pretty much everything else I want to do and I have no way to get more until the end of the month or if a lucky choice mission pops up.

I also quite nearly lost all of Africa, and it struck me as amusing that I was incredibly thankful when the aliens launched a terror attack on Nigeria, allowing me to drop the panic rating on the entire continent. There might be something a little off when you're going "yay, aliens are killing civilians, I'm saved!"

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c

First is to hit. Second is separate roll, to see if the hit is a crit. To see the same effect, target a distant enemy with the shotgun. I've seen that chance to hit as low as 2%, while the crit chance is stable at 70%.

I am fairly certain it was mentioned in passing in one of the videos.

Which reminds me: has anyone specialised their assaults towards crit-happy? I understand they are meant to eschew the shotgun and use rifle primarily (so it would be a long distance attacker) with a likely ridiculously high crit chance with enough enemies present. I'd like to know if it is worth attempting.

Grey Wolf

I've done all my assaults as defense, though I also use shotguns exclusively (and imo the scatter laser is well worth the alloys as an upgrade over plasma rifles). Having them be able to run and gun in, take out enemies consistently, and then have the heavies and snipers pick off the rest has been pretty successful for me. And the increased defense means that they are very likely to survive the counterattacks from a couple enemies left over if the dice roll badly. So, I have difficulty seeing why the crit build is worth it.

Also, the scatter laser usually leaves mutons on exactly one health bar (on normal, which I'm doing for my first run). If there's a muton alone, an assault trooper with an arc thrower can usually take a turn of fire and do the capture by himself. If you have two guys, you can easily get a 90% capture chance in one turn on what was a full hp muton.

[Codemus]

Thanks Grey Wolf.

In other news I have lost nearly all of Asia. Base wise, I've spent too much energy focusing on research, and not nearly enough time building up satelites. As in I only have five (2 in N.America, 2 in S.America, and one in Germany).

Also, paying absolutely zero attention to my aircraft has (shocker) come back to bite me, as now my current air force is only barely strong enough to take down a scout. Thank goodness damage tracks over if you abort the intercept and imediately send a second one in.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Originally Posted by Codemus

2 in S.America

Is the S. America bonus worth it? I am one satellite away from it, and have a bunch of autopsies and even a couple of interrogations waiting on the wings, but they also happen to be all my "fast" research projects, so I'm feeling the pressure to get them over with.

Originally Posted by Codemus

Thank goodness damage tracks over if you abort the intercept and imediately send a second one in.

Great tip. I was so disappointed when I couldn't scramble both my jets to take down the "larger than scout" UFO. Will keep this in mind.

Grey Wolf

[Codemus]

Well think of it this way. One the one hand, you can do all of your autopsies AND interogations instantly (time does not pass at all for this!), OR you can spend two days each on autopsies and then again however long it takes for interogations on top of that.

[Impnemo]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Finally got some time to get the game going. I noticed so far that base sequencing seems to be a huge deal.

It is. Also note that the adjacency bonus goes vertical.

Is the S. America bonus worth it? I am one satellite away from it, and have a bunch of autopsies and even a couple of interrogations waiting on the wings, but they also happen to be all my "fast" research projects, so I'm feeling the rpeassure to get them over with.

Lets assume they all take 1 day a piece. How many do you have? Thats X number of days applied to other research projects and some yield research credits which can reduce the time of subsequent research by 25% or more. If research speed is at all a concern, its worth it.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Originally Posted by Impnemo

Lets assume they all take 1 day a piece.

Good grief. All my interrogations and autopsies take 5 days, not 1 (as I said above, I am really worried about how slow my research is going for someone based in Europe). I know I will save time in the long run by waiting for the bonus. The thing is, maybe the time I wait (say, 10 days until I have the nexus, plus however long it takes to build a satellite - 5 for this example) I am researching other things. But I know that the autopsies and interrogations give speed bonuses to the other research, so if in the end I would save those same 15 days by getting on it without the satellites over S. America, then it was not worth it.

Grey Wolf

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Grey_Wolf_c

Is the S. America bonus worth it? I am one satellite away from it, and have a bunch of autopsies and even a couple of interrogations waiting on the wings, but they also happen to be all my "fast" research projects, so I'm feeling the pressure to get them over with.



Great tip. I was so disappointed when I couldn't scramble both my jets to take down the "larger than scout" UFO. Will keep this in mind.

Grey Wolf

Have you done any interrogations? Most of them give you a research credit that reduces research time on some type of technology by 50%. For example, mutons drop all plasma research by 50%, and thin men make armor research faster. If your science seems slow, it might be because you skipped on these.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Have you done any interrogations? Most of them give you a research credit that reduces research time on some type of technology by 50%. For example, mutons drop all plasma research by 50%, and thin men make armor research faster. If your science seems slow, it might be because you skipped on these.

I have done thin man and greys (sectoids?) autopsy, and grey interrogation*. I have floater and chrysalid waiting for autopsy. Plus thin man and UFO driver waiting for interrogation. 5 days each. I have not encountered mutons yet.

Oh, that reminds me - someone said a page or so back that they couldn't sleep the chrysalid. Yes, they are immune - their facebook page says as much.

Grey Wolf

*I am worried of rushing ahead with the plot and find myself facing too hard challenges, so even if I wait for S. America, I may wait to interrogate the UFO driver.

[Anarion]

Only the UFO driver advances the plot. And only interrogations speed up research, the autopsies just give you new stuff. I definitely suggest doing all your non-plot interrogations right away unless you're super close to the South America bonus, since that will speed up everything else you're doing.

[Codemus]

I don't think you would get much info out of them anyway, what with being bugs and all.

Another thing that is Pro satelite? You will get the extra cash for covering it, the other bonus for having 2 satelites there (I think it is +3 Engineers a month?) and it makes detecting UFOs more common which means more salvage and bodies for the gray market. You wind up gaining a lot the more than just the S.American bonus.

[Grey_Wolf_c]

Originally Posted by Codemus

Another thing that is Pro satelite? You will get the extra cash for covering it, the other bonus for having 2 satelites there (I think it is +3 Engineers a month?) and it makes detecting UFOs more common which means more salvage and bodies for the gray market. You wind up gaining a lot the more than just the S.American bonus.

All those bonuses are received regardless of where I place the satellites. Which I am going to place. I'll get 3 - I can either cover the whole world, or I can send a second one to S. America and leave a continent without. And there are countries that are bound to pay far better for a satellite than Argentina, and with better bonuses.

Edit: how long does it take to make a satellite, anyway?

GW

[Codemus]

For me it was something like 20 days to make, and 5 to set up.

EDIT: I should note, I think that dosen't count multiple satelites. I've only ever build them one at a time, so I think if you sit down and build five at once, they all progress at the same time. So it may actually be beneficial to build up a store of satelites early and dole them out as you upgrade your maximum active capacity.