X-COM Firaxis - XCOM: Enemy Unknown + Enemy Within Expansion

[ArchAngel]

Yes but there ARE mods, and very good ones at this point.

Skeptics could give the setup Xcom + EW + Long War + Long War Rebalanced a try. They might even be pleasantly surprised.
If you end up doing it, pay attention to the new/changed mechanics and don't underestimate the strategic level of the game, or you'll have your ass handed to you on an alien plate soon enough.

I would say this Rebalanced Long War is probably best version of new Xcom, at least until LW2 for WotC is finished and polished.

But they are both still worse than Phoenix Point. Once you play a modern Xcom without pods and limited equipment and bullshit % chance to hit, you cannot go back.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

Yes but there ARE mods, and very good ones at this point.

Skeptics could give the setup Xcom + EW + Long War + Long War Rebalanced a try.

that's what i said, long wars do a hell of a job, mainly by removing all the "fun new mechanics", working around them or diluting them in numbers. but then some shits devourer comes and shrieks both nuxcomxs are perfect as they are reeeeee. i hope you'll forgive me if, more than stupidity, i get angry at lies.

 

[Tuco Benedicto Pacifico]

You should get angrier about your Aspenger instead of calling people "liars" because of your struggle to keep up with what's being said.

Now now ladies, there's enough nu-xcom to go around!

It's fine, we've known each other for years and through several forums.
Even if usually he kept on the passive-aggressive side of things, instead of acting as the internet tough guy.

 

[Mazisky]

WOTC + MODS is the best (modern) game of its genre avaiable at the moment on PC, both gameplay and graphics.

There is always a group of detractors, expecially in edgy gaming forums, but that doesn't change the fact.

 

[mastroego]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

 

[Mazisky]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

Still is not the horrible game some people try to describe to fuel their typical internet edginess.

 

[ArchAngel]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

Still is not the horrible game some people try to describe to fuel their typical internet edginess.

Unless those MODs completely change how WotC plays it is horrible. Vanilla Xcom 2 gameplay wise is better than WotC. Only good thing about WotC are engine/UI improvements and sending guys to special missions thing.

Xcom 1 with Long War Rebalanced was kind of fun in comparison even if it being made by an autist.

 

[Mazisky]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

Still is not the horrible game some people try to describe to fuel their typical internet edginess.

Unless those MODs completely change how WotC plays it is horrible. Vanilla Xcom 2 gameplay wise is better than WotC. Only good thing about WotC are engine/UI improvements and sending guys to special missions thing.

Xcom 1 with Long War Rebalanced was kind of fun in comparison even if it being made by an autist.

Dude, I don't want to be disrespectful, but when you praise Phoenix Point which is clear to everyone it was a 2 years paid beta test scam, and not even a good game, i have difficulties in taking your opinions on this genre seriously.

I have the feeling that if Firaxis made Phoenix Point and Gollop made Wotc, suddenly Wotc became a masterpiece and PP a bad game. But that's only my feeling, i can be wrong.

 

[ArchAngel]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

Still is not the horrible game some people try to describe to fuel their typical internet edginess.

Unless those MODs completely change how WotC plays it is horrible. Vanilla Xcom 2 gameplay wise is better than WotC. Only good thing about WotC are engine/UI improvements and sending guys to special missions thing.

Xcom 1 with Long War Rebalanced was kind of fun in comparison even if it being made by an autist.

Dude, I don't want to be disrespectful, but when you praise Phoenix Point which is clear to everyone it was a 2 years paid beta test scam, and not even a good game, i have difficulties in taking your opinions on this genre seriously.

I have the feeling that if Firaxis made Phoenix Point and Gollop made Wotc, suddenly Wotc became a masterpiece and PP a bad game. But that's only my feeling, i can be wrong.

What can I say, I cannot stand pods, lack of inventory and everything based on % hit chances. Not to mention timed missions and terrible geoscape. PP has its own problems but none of this bullshit.

And if you didn't try Long War Rebalanced you got no clue how better it is than Xcom 2 vanilla or WotC.

One example of comparison PP vs new Xcom. In Xcom you got a line to shoot you check % and press shoot if you think you got a fair chance to hit. Yesterday my sniper had line to enemy and if I just pressed shoot I would have shot my ally in the back instead. Real ballistics beats whatever shit new Xcom has.

 

[Suicidal]

I agree that some of the things in PP are better than in new XCOMs but the whole game has this "walmart bargain bin" feel to it. I'm sure if you would combine XCOM with PP only taking the best out of both games you'd have a 10/10 tactics game.

 

[Mazisky]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

Still is not the horrible game some people try to describe to fuel their typical internet edginess.

Unless those MODs completely change how WotC plays it is horrible. Vanilla Xcom 2 gameplay wise is better than WotC. Only good thing about WotC are engine/UI improvements and sending guys to special missions thing.

Xcom 1 with Long War Rebalanced was kind of fun in comparison even if it being made by an autist.

Dude, I don't want to be disrespectful, but when you praise Phoenix Point which is clear to everyone it was a 2 years paid beta test scam, and not even a good game, i have difficulties in taking your opinions on this genre seriously.

I have the feeling that if Firaxis made Phoenix Point and Gollop made Wotc, suddenly Wotc became a masterpiece and PP a bad game. But that's only my feeling, i can be wrong.

What can I say, I cannot stand pods, lack of inventory and everything based on % hit chances. Not to mention timed missions and terrible geoscape. PP has its own problems but none of this bullshit.

And if you didn't try Long War Rebalanced you got no clue how better it is than Xcom 2 vanilla or WotC.

One example of comparison PP vs new Xcom. In Xcom you got a line to shoot you check % and press shoot if you think you got a fair chance to hit. Yesterday my sniper had line to enemy and if I just pressed shoot I would have shot my ally in the back instead. Real ballistics beats whatever shit new Xcom has.

Do real balistic, no pods and inventory make PP a better game when everything else is worse? UI, Maps, Artstyle, Graphics, Features, HQ, Classes, Enemies, Customization, Variety, Missions and the list goes on.

Single features do not make a game better on a whole level.

Simcity 2013 had a modular system and real agents, which are 2 very cool features missing from Simcity 4. It doesn't make it a better game tho, it's still worse by a huge margin.

 

[ArchAngel]

I agree that some of the things in PP are better than in new XCOMs but the whole game has this "walmart bargain bin" feel to it. I'm sure if you would combine XCOM with PP only taking the best out of both games you'd have a 10/10 tactics game.

So you admit you like popamole games that look nice.

 

[ArchAngel]

I have 200 hrs with WOTC + Mods, had great fun indeed with, but I have exactly 1000 hrs with XCom + Long War, most of them played before the Long War Rebalance modmod was even a thing, and now the game is even better, and with a good margin.
So I suppose I disagree.

Still is not the horrible game some people try to describe to fuel their typical internet edginess.

Unless those MODs completely change how WotC plays it is horrible. Vanilla Xcom 2 gameplay wise is better than WotC. Only good thing about WotC are engine/UI improvements and sending guys to special missions thing.

Xcom 1 with Long War Rebalanced was kind of fun in comparison even if it being made by an autist.

Dude, I don't want to be disrespectful, but when you praise Phoenix Point which is clear to everyone it was a 2 years paid beta test scam, and not even a good game, i have difficulties in taking your opinions on this genre seriously.

I have the feeling that if Firaxis made Phoenix Point and Gollop made Wotc, suddenly Wotc became a masterpiece and PP a bad game. But that's only my feeling, i can be wrong.

What can I say, I cannot stand pods, lack of inventory and everything based on % hit chances. Not to mention timed missions and terrible geoscape. PP has its own problems but none of this bullshit.

And if you didn't try Long War Rebalanced you got no clue how better it is than Xcom 2 vanilla or WotC.

One example of comparison PP vs new Xcom. In Xcom you got a line to shoot you check % and press shoot if you think you got a fair chance to hit. Yesterday my sniper had line to enemy and if I just pressed shoot I would have shot my ally in the back instead. Real ballistics beats whatever shit new Xcom has.

Do real balistic, no pods and inventory make PP a better game when everything else is worse? UI, Maps, Artstyle, Graphics, Features, HQ, Classes, Enemies, Customization, Variety, Missions and the list goes on.

Single features do not make a game better on a whole level.

Simcity 2013 had a modular system and real agents, which are 2 very cool features missing from Simcity 4. It doesn't make it a better game tho, it's still worse by a huge margin.

I will agree that UI and graphics are worse but that is expected when one game is AAA and another is AA. The rest is not better in Xcom 2, at least not compared to version of PP I am currently playing.

 

[Suicidal]

I agree that some of the things in PP are better than in new XCOMs but the whole game has this "walmart bargain bin" feel to it. I'm sure if you would combine XCOM with PP only taking the best out of both games you'd have a 10/10 tactics game.

So you admit you like popamole games that look nice.

I can't speak for unmodded XCOMs but XCOM 1 Long War and XCOM 2 WOTC with a shit ton of mods are quite fun, there's a lot to do in terms of customization, both tactical and strategic decision making and they are quite challenging. As I mentioned, I'm playing through modded WOTC right now and it feels like the hardest western-made game I've played in the last 10 years.

How is that popamole?

 

[Darth Canoli]

I'm playing through modded WOTC right now and it feels like the hardest western-made game I've played in the last 10 years.

Time to play Knights of the Chalice 2...

 

[SerratedBiz]

So can people recommend some good WOTC mods to play with? LW2 seems like a clusterfuck, is there anything else out there that's good other than mods to make my bitches look hot?

 

[Suicidal]

So can people recommend some good WOTC mods to play with? LW2 seems like a clusterfuck, is there anything else out there that's good other than mods to make my bitches look hot?

I just threw a bunch of shit at random, but here are some that really stand out:

Musashi's RPG Overhaul - removes classes and allows you to learn any ability on any soldier, upgrade their stats using stat points you get on promotion and equip any weapon you want. When your soldiers get their first promotion from rookie they get 2 random traits that are very powerful and after that it's your choice whether or not you want to build around those traits or do something else entirely. There are limitations: abilities are separated into different categories and some require previous abilities in the category to be unlocked also you cannot have abilities from more than a certain number of categories on one soldier (that number is configurable in the options).

Not Created Equal - Randomizes stats of recruits, which makes training them more interesting. For example you can get a recruit with like 80 aim straight away, but only 3 hp and shit movespeed, so you can try to make him into a sniper or a long range gunner. Works very well with the RPG Overhaul mod. Degree of randomization is configurable.

Grimy's Loot Mod - Makes enemies drop items that you can then use to craft special gear with random modifiers, some of which can be really strong. For example early in the game I crafted a shotgun that cannot crit but instead has a 30% damage increase at all times and improved accuracy as well as some random attachements. I've been using it on one of my soldiers ever since. Again, goes very well with RPG overhaul mod cause it gives you the ability to build your soldiers around using those special crafted items. Also makes going for loot dropped by enemies very lucrative.

There are also some mods that look promising, like Augmentations and Gene Mods that I cannot comment on yet cause I haven't reached the stage in the game where they become available.

Because all of this shit makes your soldiers much stronger, I recommend a bunch of enemy mods to go with them. I just installed several 5-star rated ones at random. Keep in mind the enemy mods are kinda unbalanced and you can run into situations when some 20 hp 2 armor 10 damage fatass shows up in a relatively early mission. For example, I encountered a modded muton super sniper that almost caused me a squad wipe several missions before encountering a regular muton that was much weaker.

 

[cvv]

Anyone successfully finished Impossible Ironman?

I did push through Legend/Ironman in XCOM 2. I aced Classic/Ironman in the OG. But jesus jumping christ, I can't into I/I to save my life. Across yesterday and today I had 8 restarts, with never getting through the first month. Furthest I got was the second abduction mission.

Is it normal to restart and restart and restart until the insane RNGesus doesn't take a dump on you? Or am I just doing something horribly wrong? I really don't know. I just feel there is about 30% chance in the first mission that you WILL get one-shot in full cover and your squaddies will panic and sometimes even injure or kill each other. And the next turn it's all over. 4HP Sectoids and 6HP Thin Men who don't give a shit if you're behind full cover in smoke is a recipe to an utter RNG fest with limited options to mitigate the risk.

 

[Zeriel]

I did it years ago. There's no real special sauce except retrying again and again. Don't get me wrong there are build orders you kind of have to follow if you make it through the first few months, but the hardest part is the beginning, it's a lot of playing perfectly and also getting some luck in there. You'll restart the most in the beginning. Once you get higher tech the difficulty falls off pretty hard.

I guess a reminder that you really have to jew the systems in XCOM 1 they removed in 2 (i.e overwatch and activations). Always having favorable activations and limiting the number of times where the enemy ever gets to act is your standard operating procedure. It's pretty common to spam grenades to avoid any chance of the enemy attacking early on, unless you're specifically trying to do a capture, etc.

 

[ArchAngel]

Anyone successfully finished Impossible Ironman?

I did push through Legend/Ironman in XCOM 2. I aced Classic/Ironman in the OG. But jesus jumping christ, I can't into I/I to save my life. Across yesterday and today I had 8 restarts, with never getting through the first month. Furthest I got was the second abduction mission.

Is it normal to restart and restart and restart until the insane RNGesus doesn't take a dump on you? Or am I just doing something horribly wrong? I really don't know. I just feel there is about 30% chance in the first mission that you WILL get one-shot in full cover and your squaddies will panic and sometimes even injure or kill each other. And the next turn it's all over. 4HP Sectoids and 6HP Thin Men who don't give a shit if you're behind full cover in smoke is a recipe to an utter RNG fest with limited options to mitigate the risk.

You just need to survive month 1 with least possible number of casualties and rest is easy. You need to rush one Sgt and get 5th party member, that is key to survive month 2.

 

[cvv]

You just need to survive month 1 with least possible number of casualties and rest is easy. You need to rush one Sgt and get 5th party member, that is key to survive month 2.

I know that. I'm only wondering how many restarts people need to get through the first two months. When you're watching LPs on Youtube there is never any restart, be it Beaglerush, Chris Odd, Marbozir or Zemalf. They always start a series and breeze through the initial stage with very few casualties or none at all. So are they just super good or super lucky?

 

[IDtenT]

Or they preplay the first bit multiple times?

 

[ArchAngel]

You just need to survive month 1 with least possible number of casualties and rest is easy. You need to rush one Sgt and get 5th party member, that is key to survive month 2.

I know that. I'm only wondering how many restarts people need to get through the first two months. When you're watching LPs on Youtube there is never any restart, be it Beaglerush, Chris Odd, Marbozir or Zemalf. They always start a series and breeze through the initial stage with very few casualties or none at all. So are they just super good or super lucky?

I mostly restart if I lose any soldiers in first 2 missions. Then I only restart if I don't manage to get 5th soldier before first Terror mission (well you can try it with 4 but it is very hard to do that with no loses). After that restarting in months 2 only happens if you manage to lose more than 2 higher level soldiers. Also weapons are more important than armor. I had my characters one shot even with armor so I would rather kill enemies and not have them shoot at all. Also you never let enemy shoot at your characters if they are not flashbanged, your team is not under smoke, you are not covering or you are not out of sight. Even full cover without one of these will not really help you.

 

[gurugeorge]

You just need to survive month 1 with least possible number of casualties and rest is easy. You need to rush one Sgt and get 5th party member, that is key to survive month 2.

I know that. I'm only wondering how many restarts people need to get through the first two months. When you're watching LPs on Youtube there is never any restart, be it Beaglerush, Chris Odd, Marbozir or Zemalf. They always start a series and breeze through the initial stage with very few casualties or none at all. So are they just super good or super lucky?

1) NEVER reveal fog of war with any move after the first in your turn - maybe the second if you're really experienced, know the map, and know what you're doing. This is the absolute number one golden rule of XCOM. The game is tuned so that your team will usually be able to handle one group of aliens. If you reveal more aliens while you're fighting, your chances of winning reduce drastically. Another way of looking at it is that you want to maximize your number of moves on an alien reveal. If you reveal aliens on the second, third or fourth move, you've run out of options and then you have both the new group of aliens with a full set of moves (while you have none), plus the aliens you're already trying to cope with. Very, very bad news.

2) Positioning is everything: always go for as much full cover as possible. Generally, it's good to find a positioning setup that gives most of your team full cover, and "pull" to that position (with overwatches).

3) If you're stacking up the side of a building, the leader (first mover to that spot) should be one tile back from the tile on the edge, then reveal the fog of war around the corner with the first move on the next turn.

4) So long as you follow rule 1, you can scoot your team around the map pretty fast by stacking them behind the leader.

 

[cvv]

Yeah I know these rules and try to follow them. But after a few more restarts I've decided I just don't enjoy Impossible. It's just way too obnoxious and RNG dependent. You can't alpha-strike pods reliably, you can't prevent covers being destroyed and getting your soldiers exposed and critted and the rest of the squad panicking, running out of cover and shooting each other. Very often you don't have a choice but to trade shots at mid-range with aliens which is always a recipe for disaster in XCOM, especially whenever Thin Men are involved. You HAVE to alpha strike Thin Men or you just straight up lose. And often you just can't prevent a squad wipe no matter what you do.

I've just had an crashed UFO mission where the approach was through a dash-worth of exposed terrain with barely any cover. So I progress carefully and hunkering down. I trigger a pod and the Outsider through a hole in the wall. They all retreat further into the ship. I advance and hunker down behind half-cover (no other is available). On the AI turn one of my hunkered-down soldiers gets one-shotted by the Outsider. Another one panics, runs out of cover a gets critted and one-shotted by a mind-merged Sectoid. And another one gets hit for 3 damage, despite being hunkered down. And then another Sectoid pod wanders in.

How I could've prevented it? I don't see how, even if I was a tactical genius. Do I just camp near the starting point, keep clicking End Turn and wait for the aliens to find me or what? It's just sheer insanity. Restarting runs on Impossible over and over and over because you can get wiped for a tiny mistake - or even if you don't make any mistakes at all - is just obnoxious.

I go back to C/I or maybe another Long War run (although those can be obnoxious too, given the insane amount of missions in a campaign). I mean you get punished hard on Classic too but at least you can reliably alpha-strike pods, which removes a huge amount of risk and RNG from the game.