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[mbpm1]

Lost shitty incoming vids don't even have all the lost in there, it's usually just a single zombie, which is not threatening in the least

I hate the constant Lost interupts

In fact I was neutral before but now I'm starting to veer towards "no" on the Lost.

They're either boringly easy or boringly annoying.

 

[PhantomThief]

Yeah so far the lost arent interesting at all. Just annoying.

 

[PhantomThief]

Like any delay like that (a few weeks) it's probably for the best. My guess is they weren't quite happy with the level of polish.

Probably smart too because iirc, that was a little bit of backlash when vanilla launched on PC with performance issues.

It is a Firaxis game after all =)

I remember you saying this..

But no, the game runs terrible on ps4. Damn you firaxis!

 

[platypotamus]

Their ability to be effective while maintaining stealth is very powerful. It allows useful tactical benefits in scouting and positioning, which are always helpful.

None of my Reapers ever seem to have the ability to both be effective and maintain stealth though. Sometimes they can manage one of them, but never both.

Meanwhile, my Skirmisher does like 5 things on his turn while moving all over the place, and my Templar turns on that one skill that gives him an extra action for every kill and kills like 6 guys.

And the orders in the resistance ring for Skirmishers/Templars are way better too!

 

[Basileus777]

None of my Reapers ever seem to have the ability to both be effective and maintain stealth though. Sometimes they can manage one of them, but never both.

Meanwhile, my Skirmisher does like 5 things on his turn while moving all over the place, and my Templar turns on that one skill that gives him an extra action for every kill and kills like 6 guys.

And the orders in the resistance ring for Skirmishers/Templars are way better too!

I'm with you. Reapers are neat early game, but later on you're sacrificing a party slot for a class that is pretty useless when it comes to attacking enemies.

 

[Poodlestrike]

I'm with you. Reapers are neat early game, but later on you're sacrificing a party slot for a class that is pretty useless when it comes to attacking enemies.

They hugely increase the effectiveness of the whole REST of the party by letting you know in advance what's going to come your way, though. Massive advantage.

They also completely break stuff like the Blacksite mission where combat isn't strictly speaking necessary.

And, again, once you get into late game and the Chosen start racking up strengths, being able to delete one unit per mission with Banish gets awfully attractive.

 

[Incendiary]

Man I have a difficult decision to make. Advent supply raid in a Lost zone, can't use explosives for fear of activating swarms. Chosen Assassin shows up. Shit goes down.

Mox is down to one HP. All that's left is a full HP Assassin who just cloaked and a Trooper she just summoned. Incoming Lost swarm next turn. Only got one supply box so far. Do I evacuate my team and take the loss? Stay and fight off a Lost swarm AND Assassin with Mox at one HP who will likely die to a stiff breeze?

Luckily the game crashed mid-mission so I have plenty of time to think about my decision.

 

[Deleted member 47027]

Man I have a difficult decision to make. Advent supply raid in a Lost zone, can't use explosives for fear of activating swarms. Chosen Assassin shows up. Shit goes down.

Mox is down to one HP. All that's left is a full HP Assassin who just cloaked and a Trooper she just summoned. Incoming Lost swarm next turn. Only got one supply box so far. Do I evacuate my team and take the loss? Stay and fight off a Lost swarm AND Assassin with Mox at one HP who will likely die to a stiff breeze?

Luckily the game crashed mid-mission so I have plenty of time to think about my decision.

Keep Mox. Get outta there!

 

[Crazymoogle]

In my experience the Chosen will fight the Lost if (1) they are close enough to each other and (2) the chosen is not cloaked. This is exactly what happened to me on that mission once.

But honestly unless both of the enemy units draw Lost fire you're better off evac'ing, the penalty isn't nearly as bad as having that hero unit die.

 

[Incendiary]

Keep Mox. Get outta there!

I ended up evacuating Mox and trying to stay and fight the Chosen with my remaining 4. One died and two others got blinded so I just evaced the survivors and took the L for the mission.

I'll get you next time, Assassin!

 

[ISee]

The resistance super soldier obsession to fire on mind controlled soldiers is ridiculous. Sectoids and Co. are now a high priority kill target during retaliation missions for me. Those resistance soldiers killed my Sarah, my main specialist. I made them pay for it...

 

[bobnowhere]

The resistance really level up later in the game. They took out two pods of Muton/berserker before I even made it to the area and then helped me take out the codices.

 

[Skade]

Well, they tend to focus on the Codices for me. That's very nice of them. It's too easy to one-shot a codex, better have it multiply 6 times so i have more targets to shot at will being pestered by the Hunter.

Idiots...

 

[Jangowuzhere]

Well, I fought my first chosen at a stronghold. That shit was not fun :/

I expected the fight to be difficult, but I wasn't expecting it to be total bullshit. The constant spawning waves of enemies with the chosen respawning in a couple turns was way too much. Ontop of that, the chosen I fought had an ability to summon more enemies at will. It was just a frustrating slog from start to finish.

I save scummed during the fight. I was playing on Ironman and backed up my save a couple times. I just couldn't deal with losing all my high level soldiers to such a cheap battle. I managed to get out with only one dead and half of them bleeding out on the floor :/

 

[ISee]

Well, I fought my first chosen at a stronghold. That shit was not fun :/

I expected the fight to be difficult, but I wasn't expecting it to be total bullshit. The constant spawning waves of enemies ontop with the chosen respawning in a couple turns was way too much. Ontop of that, the chosen I fought had an ability to summon more enemies at will. It was just a frustrating slog from start to finish.

I save scummed during the fight. I was playing on Ironman and backed up my save a couple times. I just couldn't deal with losing all my high level soldiers to such a cheap battle. I managed to get out with only one dead and half of them bleeding out on the floor :/

Bluescreen rounds are a must have to kill the sarcophagus asap. That's at least the lesson I learned from this mission.

 

[Diancecht]

Oh boy. I have a gun modification for my Reaper that can one shot an enemy and it has 10% chance to proc.

One shotted a Chosen with it. Feels good...

 

[Naar]

I have a story to share but before I share it I don't think they balanced the expansion with the main game that well. What I mean is that instead of having a few days to rest, the game is constantly shifting between missions of the main game and expansion missions and I never have any time to rest my soldiers more than 2-4 days.

I just feel that missions pop up more often after the expansion.

Anyways my story!

So I had this mission from the resistance about rescuing a scientist from a lost infested zone. The mission didn't sound too hard but I knew it couldn't be THAT easy and I was right.

My team lands and there is a timer that after 6 turns the turret that is protecting the scientist will run out and he will die from the lost. I manage to reach him around turn 3 and then one of the chosen show up next to him and summons advent soldiers and one of the soldiers spawns next to the turret. I decided to shoot the soldier but missed and hit the turret instead and destroyed it and a large lost swarm converged on us.

To make matters worse the scientist had an unconscious escort that was a bonus if I could extract him as well.

I manage to get to the scientist, pull him out, pick up his unconscious escort, drag both of them BACK to the starting point, all while managing to kill the chosen and holding off against the lost and having my sniper pretty much in the same place he started the mission and picking off the lost while my team pulls back.

It was an epic moment when I pulled it off and didn't get any of my guys killed. Was something out of a zombie movie lol. Wished I had recorded it

 

[Crazymoogle]

Apparently on easy the Sarcophagus only has 40HP? Anyway yeah, I also had the slog. Found out a few things:

1. Enemy spawn when the Chosen is in regen is random, I kept getting some high level enemies but on save reload it would get a bit varied

2. The mission ends the moment you kill the chosen after the sarcophagus. So even if the room is filled with adds you don't need to fight them on your last turn.

3. Psionic hero unit was incredible here, Rend, parry, and then use the upgrade for a free melee once they try to leave melee range.

4. If you think the fight is bullshit, just wait til you see the weapon specs after LOL. The perks sheet is pretty incredible

 

[Crazymoogle]

I have a story to share but before I share it I don't think they balanced the expansion with the main game that well. What I mean is that instead of having a few days to rest, the game is constantly shifting between missions of the main game and expansion missions and I never have any time to rest my soldiers more than 2-4 days.

I just feel that missions pop up more often after the expansion.

That's kind of the point though, you start with 12+ grunts because they expect you to have to swap out all the time. Once you start doing resistance missions + have people in for bond or psi development, there's this constant in/out across your entire roster, which is a great change from XCOM1/2 where it wasn't that hard to just have a core team of 6-8 and then ignore the rest.

Great story though - similarly my first chosen random encounter had a lot of Lost adds, I think it spent the first 6 turns just fighting them hand to hand. The triangular us vs. them vs. them makes some maps, particularly city ones, quite interesting, especially because anyone is liable to toss a grenade and (1) spawn even more adds and (2) mess up the geometry. lol

 

[Naar]

That's kind of the point though, you start with 12+ grunts because they expect you to have to swap out all the time. Once you start doing resistance missions + have people in for bond or psi development, there's this constant in/out across your entire roster, which is a great change from XCOM1/2 where it wasn't that hard to just have a core team of 6-8 and then ignore the rest.

Great story though - similarly my first chosen random encounter had a lot of Lost adds, I think it spent the first 6 turns just fighting them hand to hand. The triangular us vs. them vs. them makes some maps, particularly city ones, quite interesting, especially because anyone is liable to toss a grenade and (1) spawn even more adds and (2) mess up the geometry. lol

My issue with the constant mission pop up is that I don't have time to rest my team after they are injured. And I don't mean the same 6-8 people, but I rotate about 12 different soldiers because everyone is almost always injured after a mission

 

[Jangowuzhere]

Bluescreen rounds are a must have to kill the sarcophagus asap. That's at least the lesson I learned from this mission.

I'll keep that in mind next time. I don't want to go through the same experience again.

 

[Crazymoogle]

My issue with the constant mission pop up is that I don't have time to rest my team after they are injured. And I don't mean the same 6-8 people, but I rotate about 12 different soldiers because everyone is almost always injured after a mission

I hear you, I just think the intention is to rotate a bigger roster. I'm at 16 including hero units, and that's been good up until the first chosen fortress. Now I will probably add a few more to cover psi-ops and robots, or at least invest in an infirmary. If I was playing ironman I would need even more due just to rotate in for stupid-death characters. (The game even has the SITREP restricting you to lower rank soldiers for some missions, no doubt as encouragement to keep up the grinder mill)

 

[Naar]

I hear you, I just think the intention is to rotate a bigger roster. I'm at 16 including hero units, and that's been good up until the first chosen fortress. Now I will probably add a few more to cover psi-ops and robots, or at least invest in an infirmary. If I was playing ironman I would need even more due just to rotate in for stupid-death characters. (The game even has the SITREP restricting you to lower rank soldiers for some missions, no doubt as encouragement to keep up the grinder mill)

At least you have more options to level up your soldiers now via resistance missions. I'm still on my first expansion play through and unlocking new things

 

[Crazymoogle]

At least you have more options to level up your soldiers now via resistance missions. I'm still on my first expansion play through and unlocking new things

Yep! There's also a resistance card to start all rooks at sergeant, and you can also feed in xcom points.

 

[Sentenza]

Yep! There's also a resistance card to start all rooks at sergeant.

I always wondered if that thing fucks you up when you are trying to turn rookies into psionics.

 

[Poodlestrike]

I always wondered if that thing fucks you up when you are trying to turn rookies into psionics.

You still have to put them through the GTS, so no.

 

[LurkerPrime]

I kinda don't like the card... I want nicknames earned, not given.

It is an amazingly powerful card, though.

 

[bobnowhere]

I hear you, I just think the intention is to rotate a bigger roster. I'm at 16 including hero units, and that's been good up until the first chosen fortress. Now I will probably add a few more to cover psi-ops and robots, or at least invest in an infirmary. If I was playing ironman I would need even more due just to rotate in for stupid-death characters. (The game even has the SITREP restricting you to lower rank soldiers for some missions, no doubt as encouragement to keep up the grinder mill)

Yeah, I probably have 3x the amount of soldiers than vanilla xcom2. Though now that I'm over that mid game bump where XCOM have become the dominant force on earth, not the aliens, and I have tier 3 armor and weapons and fully stocked infirmary I'm using less and less soldiers.

I also find I'm playing the game a little differently than vanilla. In that game I usually took 2 rangers, 1 specialist, 1 heavy and 2 snipers while now I barely take snipers at all. It's now at least 2 specialists including Russian Tennis Ace and world class hacker Sventlana Kuznetsova, 2 melee and heavies/skirmishers/reapers. With all the range tricks I find Snipers a little redundant.

 

[Incendiary]

Warlock is a chump compared to the Assassin. The first battle with him was so much easier than either time I faced the Assassin. I don't think he hurt any of my troops the whole mission.

Yeah, I probably have 3x the amount of soldiers than vanilla xcom2. Though now that I'm over that mid game bump where XCOM have become the dominant force on earth, not the aliens, and I have tier 3 armor and weapons and fully stocked infirmary I'm using less and less soldiers.

I also find I'm playing the game a little differently than vanilla. In that game I usually took 2 rangers, 1 specialist, 1 heavy and 2 snipers while now I barely take snipers at all. It's now at least 2 specialists including Russian Tennis Ace and world class hacker Sventlana Kuznetsova, 2 melee and heavies/skirmishers/reapers. With all the range tricks I find Snipers a little redundant.

I pretty much only use Snipers on Lost missions now as their Pistol is invaluable. Otherwise yeah I don't really use them now.

I do like that between the new units, the Covert Ops, being wounded, and being tired, there's a lot less of "okay take 1 of each guy + 2 of whoever seems useful on this mission" and more "okay, are you at full health and will? Then go on this mission and we'll make it work." It makes for some interesting tactics.

 

[Poodlestrike]

I had a roster of about 23 on my first run, but honestly, only around 10 or so saw significant service time. The rest were fill ins when literally all of my officers were out for some reason, or used mostly for covert ops.

Infirmary is a gamechanger in terms of soldier downtime. Especially for guys like the Skirmisher who don't get tired very easily.

 

[Naar]

I do like that between the new units, the Covert Ops, being wounded, and being tired, there's a lot less of "okay take 1 of each guy + 2 of whoever seems useful on this mission" and more "okay, are you at full health and will? Then go on this mission and we'll make it work." It makes for some interesting tactics.

This to me is probably the biggest and best change

 

[Baron_Calamity]

Had a single mission take over 3 hours. My team was hidden and didn't engage for the first two hours. It was the lost, advent, chosen Assassin, and alien ruler cobra fighting each other. Turns took forever. Advent kept missing the lost even when right next to them. There were so many corpse that the game started glitching and the lost remained in their standing pose after killed. There were times when I thought the game locked up but it was just the cpu figuring out turn actions.

 

[Kaffeemann]

The game starts to crash more and more often for no apparent reason :/

 

[Crazymoogle]

Had a single mission take over 3 hours. My team was hidden and didn't engage for the first two hours. It was the lost, advent, chosen Assassin, and alien ruler cobra fighting each other. Turns took forever. Advent kept missing the lost even when right next to them. There were so many corpse that the game started glitching and the lost remained in their standing pose after killed. There were times when I thought the game locked up but it was just the cpu figuring out turn actions.

This is what needs video. :lol. Amazing

 

[BlackJace]

The game starts to crash more and more often for no apparent reason :/

I've noticed that too (PC). I wonder if it's mods, but I only have one active.

 

[Nete]

I got my ass served on the Assassin fortress, holy cow with that last part. I will savescum for another try, but I'm really not sure how to approach it.

Spoiler

Especially when my Assassin has the "teleport after being hitted", which is quite a fuckery with the spawning mobs all around the room.

I'm tempted to just put the misison on hold and wait until I have a full Colonel squad. Already on Plasmas and third armour tier.

 

[Grimsen]

The only thing the Warlock does that is remotely dangerous is the spectral army. When I faced him, he would summon 4 rangers with lots of life, and he's invulnerable as long as they're alive. It can be tricky if he also teleports in reinforcements.

 

[LurkerPrime]

The only thing the Warlock does that is remotely dangerous is the spectral army. When I faced him, he would summon 4 rangers with lots of life, and he's invulnerable as long as they're alive. It can be tricky if he also teleports in reinforcements.

He can mind control multiple soldiers at once. If you're in a bad position due to the existing pods, this can snowball terribly.

Don't underestimate him.

 

[BrassDragon]

Heh, did a random blacksite mission and ran into the Archon King early on. The ruler grabbed my Ranger (codename Vaquero) and lifted him into the air for a slam down attack. Apparently being this high up gave the Ranger line of sight to the target site so Central proceeded to calmly explain where we need to put the explosives.

Bradford is just that unflappable. Meanwhile, Vaquero was like 'I CAN SEE MY HOUSE FROM HEEEEEEERRRRREE!'

We had to carry him off the battlefield unconscious. He'll be wearing Archon Icarus armor in a few weeks.

 

[Grimsen]

He can mind control multiple soldiers at once. If you're in a bad position due to the existing pods, this can snowball terribly.

Don't underestimate him.

I don't think he ever got the chance to MC more than one dude at a time before I beat him.

It might not be his abilites that are weaker, but his AI. In my game he would summon zombies way too much, which is very easy to handle.

 

[Randomizer123454444]

I finally completed my (save-scummy) commander campaign for this expansion. My comments:

- Starts of the campaign was extremely rough for me. I think it was just me being inexperienced and not knowing things like "explosions attract lost" or how to deal with each individual chosen
- New mission types are awesome
- It was highly interesting fighting chosen + a pod of enemies + 2nd pod just wandering into combat zone during engagement + chosen summoning new enemies (+ add lost to mix in some maps). This happened more than once and I attribute to fact that chosen like to flee + run around a lot this time and my troops having heavy melee / close range focus
- I encountered a bug which almost ruined my campaign, where "Lost World" dark event never expired. I regret ever allowing this event to happen. Was fixed eventually by visiting a mission with "Lost" StiRep. Thx for GAF use who gave me the tip!
- Chosen weapons are OP and I love it
- First chosen stronghold, "Warlock" was very rough for me because I forgot he had a "melee immunity" strength and I brought.. templar + 2 sword rangers with me. Woop woop! Other two were cake walks because I had max weapons and armor by that point + full squad of colonels
- With amount of stuff that runs around on screen, pistol snipers are the best thing ever. Never leave Avenger without it! Also with some extra accuracy stacked on, one fan fire could hit for 30+ damage.
- New hero classes are nice during first 2/3rds of campaign but they run out of steam towards the end. Towards the end I just benched all the hero classes and brought my vanilla guys instead

 

[Dick Justice]

High-level psionic enemy should've been an upgraded sectoid (like in LW2), rather than yet another Advent reskin. Game needs less of those generic fuckers.

 

[RedlineRonin]

I remember you saying this..

But no, the game runs terrible on ps4. Damn you firaxis!

=/

Sorry to hear that!

Are the load times even any better? I figured those would have to be better, at a minimum.

 

[LurkerPrime]

You know, I really like the way they implemented quirks in XCOM 2. When a soldier gets a fear of something--they have, in my experience, really earned it. Like narrowly surviving an attack from a Sectoid or Chosen and then getting a fear of them, for instance. It feels really appropriate and not random.

In general I love how they've turned soldiers into "more than just numbers." It must've been a focus of the xpac, because most new mechanics tie into this feeling.

High-level psionic enemy should've been an upgraded sectoid (like in LW2), rather than yet another Advent reskin. Game needs less of those generic fuckers.

The two new ADVENT enemies tie into some of the SITREPs and dark events pretty well.

I don't think he ever got the chance to MC more than one dude at a time before I beat him.

It might not be his abilites that are weaker, but his AI. In my game he would summon zombies way too much, which is very easy to handle.

Yeah, that might be it. Purifiers kinda suffer from this too--they cause a lot of destruction, but not much actual damage.

And I guess Spectres too. Their threat is huge, but what they do most of the time is ineffectual.

 

[Poodlestrike]

You know, I really like the way they implemented quirks in XCOM 2. When a soldier gets a fear of something--they have, in my experience, really earned it. Like narrowly surviving an attack from a Sectoid or Chosen and then getting a fear of them, for instance. It feels really appropriate and not random.

In general I love how they've turned soldiers into "more than just numbers." It must've been a focus of the xpac, because most new mechanics tie into this feeling.


The two new ADVENT enemies tie into some of the SITREPs and dark events pretty well.

I think it's actually random, unfortunately. I've had people pick up Fear of Mutons on missions the bastards weren't even in.

 

[drhankmccoyphd]

I just bought Xcom 2 and WotC. At the start screen should I select Xcom or Wotc when creating a new game?

 

[LurkerPrime]

WotC, if you want all of the expansion content in your campaign.

I think it's actually random, unfortunately. I've had people pick up Fear of Mutons on missions the bastards weren't even in.

...Boo!

The RNG strikes again.

 

[bobnowhere]

WotC, if you want all of the expansion content in your campaign.


...Boo!

The RNG strikes again.

I accidently took my healer with 'Fear of the Chosen' on a chosen stronghold mission. She passed the first check but on the 2nd she became obsessed and charged the Assassin delivering 2 massive shots at point blank.

 

[Incendiary]

=/

Sorry to hear that!

Are the load times even any better? I figured those would have to be better, at a minimum.

Load times on PS4 aren't really better. The load time in the Skyranger is shorter but it's replaced with a waiting on a black screen with the XCOM loading symbol instead.

Also had a mission where the ground textures glitches out so it looked like my troops and all the buildings were floating the whole time.

Heh, did a random blacksite mission and ran into the Archon King early on. The ruler grabbed my Ranger (codename Vaquero) and lifted him into the air for a slam down attack. Apparently being this high up gave the Ranger line of sight to the target site so Central proceeded to calmly explain where we need to put the explosives.

Bradford is just that unflappable. Meanwhile, Vaquero was like 'I CAN SEE MY HOUSE FROM HEEEEEEERRRRREE!'

We had to carry him off the battlefield unconscious. He'll be wearing Archon Icarus armor in a few weeks.

I love that Bradford gives zero shits unless a timer is about to expire or half your squad is already dead.

You know, I really like the way they implemented quirks in XCOM 2. When a soldier gets a fear of something--they have, in my experience, really earned it. Like narrowly surviving an attack from a Sectoid or Chosen and then getting a fear of them, for instance. It feels really appropriate and not random.

In general I love how they've turned soldiers into "more than just numbers." It must've been a focus of the xpac, because most new mechanics tie into this feeling.

I enjoy that a lot too. Mox has a fear of fire because a Purifier walked right up to him and unloaded a flamethrower in his face. And the character I made for my gf got shot by a MEC and now is afraid of them. I texted her this morning saying. "I'm sorry, but you're afraid of robots now. "

 

[Fantastapotamus]

How exactly do Rescue Missions work?
A, rather valuable, soldier of mine was captured and I have no idea how to get her back. It's been like an in-game month and I still see no option to rescue her. Is there anything I need to do first?