• Hey, guest user. Hope you're enjoying NeoGAF! Have you considered registering for an account? Come join us and add your take to the daily discourse.

XCOM 2 |OT| Be Aggressive! Be Be Aggressive!

Proc

Member
Pretty new to the series here and I'm liking it a lot.

Question, is it typical to lose 1-2 recruits on the battlefield when you're first starting out? It hurt me deep when I lost this dude who looked like guile.
 
Is there an overall strategy for how to play this game? Like, not the nuts and bolts of moving your soldiers in the missions, but the actual choices of which missions to take, which areas to contact, which things to scan, which stuff to build and research?

I mean, I know the overall objective is to get to the Blacksite missions so you can move the Avatar Project meter down a notch, but those missions are really hard, even on the easiest difficulty.

Found this on reddit, wished I saw this before I started playing.

https://www.reddit.com/r/Xcom/comments/44job9/tips_for_surviving_the_early_game_and_building_to/

I just did the blacksite and a UFO attack and now all my guys are wounded with 5+ days to heal and I have 1 healthy squaddie left, had to purchase 3 recruits to even staff for a guerrilla mission where I got stomped lol.


Quest regarding the timer, do I have to do blacksite missions right away? I did the first one while the bar was at 6 and it was a grueling fight. Does anyone know how many bars it reduces? Also what is this 20 days limit after the avatar project is completed?
 

Jisgsaw

Member
I've taken to spamming right click. It appears to skip anything that doesn't seem to be a disguise for loading times.

Much to my chagrin I found it auto-cancels the "Begin Mission/Return" dialogue. Oops.

OMG, thanks for that.
Those screen before/after missions always last like 2 min. for me, I assume it was loading during it, but apparently not. Why the hell are they so long then?
 

Sciz

Member
Feel like such a scrub on this, made it onto my first actual mission and I'm just getting my ass handed to me every time. Mission requires me to extract all operatives and complete the objective, but it's fucking impossible to keep anyone alive when they go down in one shot. Also it takes half the turn counter to make it near the objective which causes me to get my operatives in poor positions.

What am I doing wrong?!

There are two general principles that give you a huge edge:

1. Having a height advantage gives you a significant aim bonus.

2. Explosives blow up most cover.


Learn to exploit both to their fullest and you'll start cruising through the aliens.
 
So if you finish a blacksite mission when the avatar project timer is counting down, will that completely reset their progress to 0 out of 12 bars?
 

Flare

Member
Endish game spoilers:

So I was happily doing a retrieve VIP mission, and an
Avatar teleports
in.
First off, god damn this was a cool enemy. This thing moves around after every shot lands and recovers 5 HP... is there a way to hold it in place because it was just wrecking my squad with hit-and-run tactics.
 
Hah, only now do I notice that the advanced warfare center can be built, gives bonuses to soldiers as they level, AND reduces recovery time. First playthroughs in these games are such a mess. :)

And HOLY BALLS, I thought fire effects tank the performance, but I had my first mission in the rain. Then a building caught on fire.

wqsPcnE.gif
 

peakish

Member
Grenadiers with explosive talents are so good it's a little crazy. They are the one class I can't imagine doing without.
Yeah, it's crazy. I just got an upgraded launcher for extra radius and damage, and there's skills that give you more grenades and I believe can increase the damage even further. My current best soldier, appropriately named 'Tank', is the VIP of my team with how much cover and armour he shreds. And that's when he isn't throwing the flashbangs for disorientation.

Btw, the UFO mission was pretty damn sick.
Easy enough to cheese though, I got one soldier in eye range of the disruptor and then blew it apart with my snipers from the ramp.

I'm loving the game, but it's disheartening to see how so many are unlucky with bugs to the point where the game breaks. I've encountered quite a few personally, but I've been lucky to not hit any game ruining ones. I really hope Firaxis gets patches out ASAP.
 

Morzak

Member
I just tried to start a game, and as soon as i try to start a new campaign the game crashes 1-3 seconds into the campaign intro video. Dis anyone have the same issue and knows how to fix it GPU drivers are up to date and all other drivers are too.
I didn't find any solution for this online :(
 

Steel

Banned
I feel like the longer I play this, the more busted my saves get or something. Glass windows and doors just straight up don't animate anymore.

Yeah, the animations for destruction are definitely getting more and more whacky for me. Pieces of buildings defying the laws of physics, enemies falling through roofs before the roof explodes, guns being shot point blank through windows without the window ever getting destroyed....

Patch needed.
 

Tacitus_

Member
Endish game spoilers:

So I was happily doing a retrieve VIP mission, and an
Avatar teleports
in.
First off, god damn this was a cool enemy. This thing moves around after every shot lands and recovers 5 HP... is there a way to hold it in place because it was just wrecking my squad with hit-and-run tactics.

Shove a shotgun up its arse and hope it doesn't dodge seemed to work for me.
 
So if you finish a blacksite mission when the avatar project timer is counting down, will that completely reset their progress to 0 out of 12 bars?
No. A Site may have dots beneath it on the map. I did one with 3 dots and the bar went down by 3 dots. I assume the level of the site affects how advanced the Avatar bar is.
Word of advice; Black Sites with 3 dots (lvl 3) are Very Difficult!

I am now at August and I regularly fight against Gatekeepers, Amdromodons and Sectopods usually at the same time. And I slaughter them (usually). Got my first Psi Soldier and got Null Lance straight away. Fucking lethal.
 

peakish

Member
Pretty new to the series here and I'm liking it a lot.

Question, is it typical to lose 1-2 recruits on the battlefield when you're first starting out? It hurt me deep when I lost this dude who looked like guile.
When starting out, absolutely. I was losing rookies left and right a couple of days ago. Now prepare yourself for losing the veteran soldier you've gotten attached to over 10 missions.
 

twobear

sputum-flecked apoplexy
i 'm thinking of restarting my game for a second time. playing on veteran difficulty, after the first month the game just seems to become basically impossible--is there like ONE starting build that you should go for that will get you through the first month without starting to lose absolutely everyone when mutons and mechs turn up or am i just playing insanely badly?
 
The joy of discovering that the grenade you threw at a mech, caused the roof it was standing on to collapse, with it failling to it's death. :)

The sadness of watching more of the roof collapse the next turn, with the VIP falling to her death, :(
 
The strategic layer is super interesting, so I've got two Guerilla ops options and their corresponding dark cards are not super debilitating, one will double the cost of recruits for a month, the other doubles the cost of black market items for a month. Rewards are 162 supplies or 1 scientist (I've got two).

I've got a retaliation coming in about 4 days, and if I take these ops, my squad won't be in good shape for the retaliation, PLUS, I'm trying to gear up for the black site.

Loving the decisions to make in this game.
 

Proc

Member
When starting out, absolutely. I was losing rookies left and right a couple of days ago. Now prepare yourself for losing the veteran soldier you've gotten attached to over 10 missions.

Thank you, you've given me the courage not to drop the difficulty to easy.
 
I got a transmission from the bald guy saying "commander, we've got a new scientist and a veteran soldier for you back at HQ" but when I went back to HQ I didn't see any new people. Is there something I gotta do? Do I need to look in like a personnel storage compartment or something
 

Panda Rin

Member
I got a transmission from the bald guy saying "commander, we've got a new scientist and a veteran soldier for you back at HQ" but when I went back to HQ I didn't see any new people. Is there something I gotta do? Do I need to look in like a personnel storage compartment or something

You have to purchase them from HQ. It's the raised fist icon next to your HQ on the strategic map.
 
Upgrading the Power rooms at the base is essential. If you want all the options plus an extra Workshop and/or Lab you need space. I'm wondering if there's any other building I have to build as I have only one room left to excavate.
 

Archaix

Drunky McMurder
Pretty new to the series here and I'm liking it a lot.

Question, is it typical to lose 1-2 recruits on the battlefield when you're first starting out? It hurt me deep when I lost this dude who looked like guile.


Certainly normal when starting out. Your soldiers getting better equipment will help a bit but ideally you should be trying to put yourself into situations where you aren't being shot at, because those are situations where you can die. Obviously you need to balance that with actually killing enemies, but as a rule if your soldier isn't in high cover then you should have a good reason for it and if they aren't in any cover at all your reason should be "That guy pissed me off back at the bar and I want him more dead." The tutorial mission gets everybody killed to show you some common errors and to show you that soldiers will die and that's part of the game.

With time you'll learn what the enemies can do (Which helps in keeping your soldiers safe) and start to get a feel for the tactical combat. For example, if you have a soldier in a good position but with terrible odds at hitting you can use overwatch on an enemy. Your chance to hit will be even lower but the threat of an active overwatch will force the enemy to make different choices like running away or shooting from where they are instead of moving to flank you.
 

FunnyJay

Neo Member
In the missions that have a fixed evac point, has anyone tried putting in another evac point after finishing the objective? Like on a VIP mission? Does that result in a mission fail if you don't use the "real" evac?
 

Zeliard

Member
I started over yesterday after having screwed up on the strategy layer in my first attempt and making things too overwhelming on the ground. I'm having considerably more success now, with almost every mission getting a Flawless grade.

I got global weapon upgrades and Predator armor up fairly early, as well as Squad size to 6 because I have a Ranger who is just a beast and kills everything with his sword, so he got up to Captain quickly. He has like 20 more kills than anyone else. This run is going so well I regret not turning Ironman on. :(

In the missions that have a fixed evac point, has anyone tried putting in another evac point after finishing the objective? Like on a VIP mission? Does that result in a mission fail if you don't use the "real" evac?

Skyranger summoning is completely disabled on those missions, I think.
 

polychron

Member
I've just beaten my first playthrough on commander, and let me say
that last mission can actually go fuck itself. It was just a relentless onslaught on enemies, and I didn't have nearly enough AOE to deal with them. I only beat it because I got lucky and got executions on the first two avatars.
That said, I really like the game, and I'm psyched for my next playthrough. Not sure I'm mentally ready for ironman though...
 
Why wouldn't they have the LOS indicator right on the bottom bar where it shows your targets? Seems silly that you have to zoom way out, rotate, and hope you can see what's in your LOS.

Archon tip.

Even if you kill the fucker before he can get off his Blazing Pinions attack, they will still drill you the next turn if you don't move.
 
Is Cone of Fire broken or am I just completely misunderstanding the skill? I just set it on a group of three enemies who I ambushed and my sniper only fired at one of them. I was under the impression he'd fire at everyone who moved in the cone's area.
 
N

Noray

Unconfirmed Member
Is Cone of Fire broken or am I just completely misunderstanding the skill? I just set it on a group of three enemies who I ambushed and my sniper only fired at one of them. I was under the impression he'd fire at everyone who moved in the cone's area.

Check your ammo. Your sniper will only keep firing as long as there is ammo in the chamber, which makes the ammo upgrades on his weapon very attractive.

Also I just completely steamrolled an Escort VIP mission by taking control of a Sectopod. I set it in raised stance and just had it plow through the building where the enemies were, and they were so caught off-guard they all just shot at it and missed and couldn't do anything as I basically just used it as a distraction. I tried attacking with it but it didn't do any damage for some reason, but it's fine, it was an excellent distraction/cover destroyer. Feels so good to use their own overpowered units against them and decimate them.
 

Falk

that puzzling face
Why wouldn't they have the LOS indicator right on the bottom bar where it shows your targets? Seems silly that you have to zoom way out, rotate, and hope you can see what's in your LOS.

This would be silly if there's like 5 of the same type of unit and you can't tell which is which. But yeah, some UI elements really could use a little iteration. Choosing which direction to melee from is another one.
 

Sober

Member
Is there a reason that GAF handle is last name and not nickname?
Because for GAF-COM, your GAF handles are the real people!

You can always give yourself a quirky nickname and we won't stop you if you want but 1) the randomly generated ones due to your class, etc. are always more interesting IMO and 2) you can edit the randomly generated nickname list for added procedural hilarity.

This is what the roster would look like when you have GAF handles:

 

Sullichin

Member
I'm never going to beat this game. First mission with a turn limit and there's just no way I can get to the evac in time even if I bolted directly toward it.

Is the turn limit more lax on easy?
 
This would be silly if there's like 5 of the same type of unit and you can't tell which is which. But yeah, some UI elements really could use a little iteration. Choosing which direction to melee from is another one.

Have both display then for all those times you have 5 of the same types at once. Icon on the bottom to tell you yes, you are in LOS here, and the little icon overhead.
 

Mr Swine

Banned
so whatever happened to those awesome Mech's you had in EW? Isn't the expansion cannon? Would be cool to have them in XCom 2 :/
 

Sarek

Member
Ugh... black site mission was a complete disaster. Managed to skip by the first enemy group without seeing them, and when I ambushed the first one I actually saw, it activated 2 other groups + a turret. End result 2 KIA 3 captured... Now I got only 8 soldiers left, of which 5 are squaddies, and two are already injured for 4 more days. Was pretty awesome fight though, almost pulled it off!
 

Lanrutcon

Member
Blaster Bombs are NUTS.

Demolished half a hospital from a city block away. The patrols on the roof and top floor got exploded, then fell a story or two.
 

BigTnaples

Todd Howard's Secret GAF Account
so whatever happened to those awesome Mech's you had in EW? Isn't the expansion cannon? Would be cool to have them in XCom 2 :/


Didn't play the expansion but no it is not canon.


Canon is you lose EU very early on in the campaign.
 

patapuf

Member
I am sad so many of my grenadiers and specialists died, their abilities are awesome. I only have one decent of each.

They just keep dying :(

Starting to get some lategame toys. That's some good stuff.
 

Sober

Member
Something doesn't seem right...


I saved and tried the hack, went through without a hitch.
The bar fills left to right on the hack so I assume the mark for the hack attempt just is the inverse, telling you how far the bar needs to go to succeed. Which is why like a 2% success is all the way at the end and 100% is right at the left.

Or am I missing something else?
 
Something doesn't seem right...


I saved and tried the hack, went through without a hitch.

I don't understand? Is that "unlock change 0%"? I think it's 0% chance to "unlock" (read: trigger) feedback which would lead to reinforcements being called? So in other words you have 0% chance for reinforcements?
 
Top Bottom