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

[Jade Dragon]

Originally Posted by Impnemo

Wait, what? Madness! This is XCOM, rookies are chryssalid bait, nothing more, as god intended.

That was the original X-COM, where you could send out much larger squads and could afford to scout with rookies equipped with grenades.

In XCOM, you have much smaller squads, and are the world's last line of defense. In practice, Rookies are fresh troops that have yet to earn respect, but in theory, these guys are Navy SEALs, Army Rangers, and their foreign equivalents.

[GloatingSwine]

Originally Posted by Jade Dragon

That was the original X-COM, where you could send out much larger squads and could afford to scout with rookies equipped with grenades.

In XCOM, you have much smaller squads, and are the world's last line of defense. In practice, Rookies are fresh troops that have yet to earn respect, but in theory, these guys are Navy SEALs, Army Rangers, and their foreign equivalents.

And they still can't hit a barn at ten paces. From the inside.

[Jade Dragon]

Originally Posted by GloatingSwine

And they still can't hit a barn at ten paces. From the inside.

Your Colonel-rank Sniper sometimes has the "miss" animation showing the shot going a meter wide.

Do keep in mind, though, that you can't shoot straight through a giant stack of barrels and one-shot the guy hiding behind it in real life. The hit and miss animations can get real bad sometimes. Presumably, this is all happening in real-time, and you actually shot the alien when he poked his head out to see where you were.

[YakYak]

My thoughts exactly. Same for when you shoot through the cover you're hiding behind, instead of leaning out of it.

[Krade]

I had a Heavy Floater miss one of my guys at point-blank and the shots fired backwards from the gun. That was... interesting.

[Luzahn]

Yeah, I've gotten a similar bug where my guy refuses to turn properly while firing, and suddenly gains some sort of pistol-elbow.

[DaedalusMkV]

Heh. Sometimes my Snipers forget that they're supposed to be using pistols, and just start firing their sniper rifles from the pistol stance (IE graphical glitch, using the sniper model instead of the pistol). Have you ever seen a sniper holding his laser rifle at arms length, aiming halfheartedly, then fire a bunch of plasma bolts out of it from somewhere inside the gun, clipping through the sides of the barrel? It looks profoundly silly.

[Zevox]

You know, someone should compile a list of all the bugs this game has. I half wonder whether it'd set some kind of record.

Zevox

[mistformsquirrl]

I've seen far, far buggier games heh <X_X>

[Anarion]

Originally Posted by Zevox

You know, someone should compile a list of all the bugs this game has. I half wonder whether it'd set some kind of record.

Zevox

Ocarina of Time involved a speed run that skipped almost all the temples by glitching through walls and the fastest way to move was by running backwards in focused targeting mode, plus you could make yourself hover with bomb explosions.

Except for the mind control near fog of war freezing the game thing, all these graphical glitches are really minor and X-com is very tame.

Besides, if walls actually worked in X-com, half the difficulty would be gone. I think it takes two playthroughs just to be confident about what positions are actually safe from being shot at.

[Zevox]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Ocarina of Time involved a speed run that skipped almost all the temples by glitching through walls and the fastest way to move was by running backwards in focused targeting mode, plus you could make yourself hover with bomb explosions.

Except for the mind control near fog of war freezing the game thing, all these graphical glitches are really minor and X-com is very tame.

Besides, if walls actually worked in X-com, half the difficulty would be gone. I think it takes two playthroughs just to be confident about what positions are actually safe from being shot at.

I wasn't referring to setting any records for severity, but rather quantity.

Zevox

[Noldo]

Originally Posted by Anarion

Both. You should have one or two soldiers that you take on every single mission, at least until they get up to captain because getting up to six squad members is incredibly important. (Iirc captain is when you get squad size II, someone will correct me if I messed that up.) However, if you only take the same squad on every mission, a death or serious wound can really mess you up. It's generally good to take 1-2 rookies or lower-ranking squaddies on each mission so that you build up a team of soldiers that can cycle in and out as injuries happen.

Has anybody tried using a Heavy with Holo-Targeting as trainer, with intention that he/she takes rookies/squaddies to (hopefully) easier missions and tries to give the kills to them? Add Shredder Rocket at Sergeant level for further assistance...

[Opperhapsen]

Originally Posted by Zevox

I wasn't referring to setting any records for severity, but rather quantity.

Zevox

It's nowhere close, truly.
But I'll concede that it needs some QA works.

Originally Posted by Krade

I had a Heavy Floater miss one of my guys at point-blank and the shots fired backwards from the gun. That was... interesting.

180 degrees?
Nice!
I've only managed 90 degree angles when I missed a 100% shot point blank. (DAMN YOU ROUNDING UP)


ANYWAY
Completed Classic Ironman, thin men can suck an egg.
Heard something about DLC, what do we know so far?

[Gamerlord]

Ran into two more bugs on my Ironman playthrough: Was hitting the Alien Base, one of my guys got critically wounded by a Chryssalid....and then he somehow fell though the map into that bottomless pit. The weird thing is, his character model was still where he was attacked, but it said if I wanted to stabilize him I had to get down there somehow. Also, one of my soldiers refused to take cover, whenever I placed him near any sort of cover he would just do the normal standing animation and receive no bonuses (Cost me the mission.)

Originally Posted by Zevox

You know, someone should compile a list of all the bugs this game has. I half wonder whether it'd set some kind of record.

Zevox

Have you ever played a game made by Obsidian Entertainment?

[Cikomyr]

Oh man, Mind Control is such a useful and broken power.

Final mission. I Mind Storm two mutons on the right, MC another on the left so he distracts the 4th one. My other teammates take care of the Berserker.

After trading fire, my Muton survives and is at the forefront of my exploration... He is left in the open in the face of...

... two Sectopods...

Oh damn. I deploy my men with cover, and I get a few shots that barely dent the megathings...

All right. First ennemy turn:

Sectopod 1 prepares missile strike
Sectopod 1 fires at Muton. Misses!
Sectopod 2 fires at Muton. Kills him.
Sectopod 2 fires at Sniper. Misses!



Thank you brave Muton, you just saved my butt.

Stupid pathfindind gave cover to the sectopods against a shredded rocket (THEY WERE NEXT TO EACH OTHER!! HOW CAN A PROXIMITY ROCKET HIT ONE BUT NOT THE OTHER?!?!) and 2 turns later, both mechadroids blow up.

That's when the Muton Elite appeared...

By the way. Is it me, or the Etherals are stupid to have Muton Elites right next to them in the final chamber?!

[Avilan the Grey]

Got my first Swedish character this morning. With a pure Danish name. So I had to rename him pronto!
Oh well I guess they can't think of everything...

[CreganTur]

I hired some new recruits recently and the game's random name generator decided to play a trick on me by giving me a female American rookie who has the same name as a friend's wife.

[Avilan the Grey]

I realized after reading online that I should start over now when the tutorial is done so I can do things my way (like actually focusing on satellites and starting in Africa).
Also apparently you can ignore the plot points for a very long time so you are more than ready to take on what's coming.

[Eurus]

Originally Posted by Avilan the Grey

I realized after reading online that I should start over now when the tutorial is done so I can do things my way (like actually focusing on satellites and starting in Africa).
Also apparently you can ignore the plot points for a very long time so you are more than ready to take on what's coming.

From what I've seen, the enemies scale up over time regardless of how fast you're doing the plot... my first run through, I didn't see Mutons until the alien base assault. My second, I took my time and saw them long before.

[BRC]

Originally Posted by CreganTur

I hired some new recruits recently and the game's random name generator decided to play a trick on me by giving me a female American rookie who has the same name as a friend's wife.

Were the game really cruel, it would check to see if you had linked your steam account to your facebook, and if so, start naming people after your facebook friends.

[Cheesegear]

Originally Posted by Avilan the Grey

Also apparently you can ignore the plot points for a very long time so you are more than ready to take on what's coming.

I ignored the Alien Base Assault for a very long time. I thought I would be amazing and fight the mission with full Plasma gear, and half my team wearing Titan Armour.

I ended up fighting Muton Elites, Heavy Floaters and Cyberdiscs. 3 of my squad died. The only survivors were the Sniper who never even got wounded, and my two Assaults in the aforementioned Titan Armour.

Next playthrough I'll be doing things as quick as I can.

[Reynard]

The biggest trouble I've had with the Base is the time an errant bolt from alight plasma rifle took out a wall and activated the Sectoid Commander from halfway across the map, mid fight with 5 Cryssalids and some Thin Men.

[Cikomyr]

Man, ghost armors are by far the coolest and best of the lot, except psi armors, which sole purpose is to further break psionics.

The best military form is the one that doesn't have one, said Sun Tzu. The man was right, nothing beats stealth exploration, unlimited grappling hooks, free movements, movement bonus, cover bonus.

I can move around with the supreme mobility of a truly perfect military force. Defeat anything save a Sectopod without a scratch, and that's before I get psionics!

[Opperhapsen]

Originally Posted by Avilan the Grey

Got my first Swedish character this morning. With a pure Danish name.

What instead of Borkson he was named Børksen?

I think it's to compensate for no Danes, give Swedes a random chance to have a Norwegian or Danish name. (Are there Norwegians in the game?)

Speaking of missing countries. Has anyone had a dude from the United Arab Emirates? Or a Saudi? Israeli?
Pretty sure I've had a Jamaican and it seems odd to include them but barely anyone from the Middle East.

[Zevox]

Originally Posted by Gamerlord

Have you ever played a game made by Obsidian Entertainment?

KotOR2 and NWN2. Neither of which were as buggy as this in my experience. The former was incomplete, but even so I didn't stumble over bugs practically every time I played it.

Zevox

[Luzahn]

I find it odd that we have soldiers from Scotland. Did they declare independence while I wasn't looking?

[Opperhapsen]

Originally Posted by Zevox

KotOR2 and NWN2. Neither of which were as buggy as this in my experience. The former was incomplete, but even so I didn't stumble over bugs practically every time I played it.

Zevox

New Vegas had a bug where looking at people's faces made the game not work.

[Reynard]

Originally Posted by Luzahn

I find it odd that we have soldiers from Scotland. Did they declare independence while I wasn't looking?

Scottish (also N.Irish, Welsh, Guernsey-Born and Jersey-Born) soldiers wear their own flags on their uniforms.

[Luzahn]

Originally Posted by Reynard

Scottish (also N.Irish, Welsh, Guernsey-Born and Jersey-Born) soldiers wear their own flags on their uniforms.

Ah, that's interesting. Thought maybe that could be it.

On that line of thought, though, does anyone else notice odd patterns in soldier nationality? I often get clumps of soldiers of the same country.

[Opperhapsen]

Originally Posted by Reynard

Scottish (also N.Irish, Welsh, Guernsey-Born and Jersey-Born) soldiers wear their own flags on their uniforms.

Welsh, N. Irish and Jerseys don't get their own flag though.