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

[Zeriel]

Most people (who bother to do it at all) just do I+I once for the achievement. It's definitely not for everyone. I can't say I enjoyed it in a "I'd want to do that every time" way, but it was fun for what it was once.

XCOM 2 was so easy that Impossible there felt like Classic on X1 though.

 

[gurugeorge]

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.

It is ridiculously RNG-dependent at the beginning on Impossible, that's true, especially on the Strategic side. There's no shame in trying a few starts to get something that doesn't just fail stupidly early on. Once you're "in the saddle" it's tough but doable thereafter.

 

[Average Manatee]

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.

Yes.

If you don't speed hack the game to let you overwatch everyone in place for 10 straight turns in 20s, and then do that in between every single squad move, you aren't actually playing XCom Ironman Impossible correctly.

 

[Galdred]

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?

It took me an embarassingly high number of restarts to get there, which led me to knowing all ins and outs of the worst maps (construction yard, cemetery, road bridge, ...), which helped tremendously. If you don't satellite rush, it also makes it easier to not need a perfect start.

 

[ArchAngel]

Tactics for I/I are retarded but that is how you need to play.

The worst maps are usually council missions.

 

[cvv]

Tactics for I/I are retarded but that is how you need to play.

The worst maps are usually council missions.

Nah, in council missions the spawns are fixed plus most maps are alpha-strike friendly.

But if you get the road bridge or the street in an abduction mission and you're forced to trade shots with Thin Men at mid-range you WILL wipe in two or three turns unless you're insanely lucky. In Long War the snakes are mostly rendered harmless by free flashgangs and medkits but in vanilla they are straight up retarded.

 

[Jaedar]

When you're watching LPs on Youtube there is never any restart, be it Beaglerush

If you've ever watched him "live" you'd know he frequently spends like 10-15 minutes per turn, sometimes playing the same mission for 4+ hours if it's a long/hard one (especially in long war).

 

[ArchAngel]

Tactics for I/I are retarded but that is how you need to play.

The worst maps are usually council missions.

Nah, in council missions the spawns are fixed plus most maps are alpha-strike friendly.

But if you get the road bridge or the street in an abduction mission and you're forced to trade shots with Thin Men at mid-range you WILL wipe in two or three turns unless you're insanely lucky. In Long War the snakes are mostly rendered harmless by free flashgangs and medkits but in vanilla they are straight up retarded.

Yes but in first 2 months they throw more enemies at you than normal missions.

 

[cretin]

Kind of want to give nucom another crack, where should I start? Long war? LWR? Skip to Xcom 2? LW2?

I played through nucom back when it first released havent really touched it since.

 

[gurugeorge]

Kind of want to give nucom another crack, where should I start? Long war? LWR? Skip to Xcom 2? LW2?

I played through nucom back when it first released havent really touched it since.

I'd say the original XCOM (the second updated version, whatever it's called, with Meld) + Long War. That's really the best the nu franchise has to offer in terms of the classic scary alien invasion scenario, and the LW mod really shines.

XCOM2 is a very different scenario. It has some cool things about it but it's basically a story about resistance once the aliens have won, so it has a very different feel to it. Plus there are a lot of timed missions which is a bit annoying really. Also the maps are modular, and while they did it quite well, it loses some of the meticulously handcrafted feel of the XCOM maps. I don't know, while XCOM2 has got good aspects to it and is worth playing at some point, it just feels more messy to me than the first game, and I'd recommend as above first if you're reconnecting with the nu franchise. LW2 never seemed to get as much kudos as LW either.

 

[Mazisky]

Kind of want to give nucom another crack, where should I start? Long war? LWR? Skip to Xcom 2? LW2?

I played through nucom back when it first released havent really touched it since.

I'd say the original XCOM (the second updated version, whatever it's called, with Meld) + Long War. That's really the best the nu franchise has to offer in terms of the classic scary alien invasion scenario, and the LW mod really shines.

XCOM2 is a very different scenario. It has some cool things about it but it's basically a story about resistance once the aliens have won, so it has a very different feel to it. Plus there are a lot of timed missions which is a bit annoying really. Also the maps are modular, and while they did it quite well, it loses some of the meticulously handcrafted feel of the XCOM maps. I don't know, while XCOM2 has got good aspects to it and is worth playing at some point, it just feels more messy to me than the first game, and I'd recommend as above first if you're reconnecting with the nu franchise. LW2 never seemed to get as much kudos as LW either.

The problem with Xcom 1 are the maps tbh, handcrafted and limited does not go well with this kind of games.

Xcom 2 is superior in every aspect but the atmosphere, which is crap compared to original or EU\EW 90's horror

Enemy within with procedural maps and long war would be the best modern turn based

 

[geno]

Kind of want to give nucom another crack, where should I start? Long war? LWR? Skip to Xcom 2? LW2?

I played through nucom back when it first released havent really touched it since.

I find Long War Rebalance more enjoyable than the original mod. It tries to address the problems with the pod system, overwatch spam or enemies having a free moving turn.

 

[mastroego]

I find Long War Rebalance more enjoyable than the original mod. It tries to address the problems with the pod system, overwatch spam or enemies having a free moving turn.

I've played a lot with that, and it does fix almost everything in a way that makes inconceivable to go back the "original" Long War.
But, at least with the last version I played (and those change A LOT), it always comes to a point where it's flatly impossible to go on, the enemies becomes HORDES of enemies massively armored and so on.
Regardless of starting difficulty.

Which basically brought to me to a deadlock with a game that I loved.
I can't go back, and I can't go forward.

 

[mastroego]

Shit.
This guy just pumps out update after update so the only way to play a campaign is to start at some point and keep your config that way while he keeps doing his thing.

Now, I invested who knows how many hours in my last campaign which was supposed to be the "perfect" (and probably final) one, getting my team exactly where I wanted it in terms of compositions and abilities and so on. Eventually I had to rage-quit because of the issue I wrote about earlier.

I was on version 1.27.10.
This I just noticed in the changelog of 1.27.11 (!!!!!!!):
Strategic:
- Alien level is now reduced by difficulty. Specifically, New Alien level = Old Alien Level * Difficulty[0.625/0.75/0.875/1.0] - This makes it so that later game, on the easier difficulties, the aliens are at a significantly lower level. Makes easier difficulties much easier into the later game. Note this change will work immediately on any ongoing campaign.

SHIT.
I might have been able to salvage that campaign, if I didn't rage-quit and uninstall.
SHIT.
And we're now at version 1.35.04.......

 

[mastroego]

...and this was added in version 1.28.06

- Alien pods that are revealed on the 1st/2nd/3rd turn will now have a 100%/66%/33% chance to be taken "Off Guard" which means they will receive no scamper movement - Helps make those missions where you activate the entire map on the first turn a lot easier

Oh Lord.
By the time I've read them all through version 1.35 I will want to start a new campaign again, I know that already....

 

[mastroego]

...and these from version 1.32.00

- Peter Van Doorn, Annette Durand, Shaojie Zhang, Hank Miller, Hans Graft, and Stanislav Orlov have unique perks - Makes them feel more special without interfering with their class perks
- Annette and the Furies all arrive with 3 extra levels than previously - Makes them easier to use as you get them rather late

 

[mastroego]

Fuck it.
Reinstalling XCOM, Long War and LW Rebalance

 

[ArchAngel]

I find Long War Rebalance more enjoyable than the original mod. It tries to address the problems with the pod system, overwatch spam or enemies having a free moving turn.

I've played a lot with that, and it does fix almost everything in a way that makes inconceivable to go back the "original" Long War.
But, at least with the last version I played (and those change A LOT), it always comes to a point where it's flatly impossible to go on, the enemies becomes HORDES of enemies massively armored and so on.
Regardless of starting difficulty.

Which basically brought to me to a deadlock with a game that I loved.
I can't go back, and I can't go forward.

From what I know his idea behind the mod is that if you take too long to finish the game enemies will get progressively stronger until you can no longer fight them without losing soldiers all the time which will cost you the game. Basically you are on a hidden timer. Not the most fun design philosophy.

 

[mastroego]

From what I know his idea behind the mod is that if you take too long to finish the game enemies will get progressively stronger until you can no longer fight them without losing soldiers all the time which will cost you the game. Basically you are on a hidden timer. Not the most fun design philosophy.

Yeah, I kinda agree, but it was more than that, there was a specific issue with lower difficulties not being lowered in that regard, which probably the author overlooked because he only plays on Impossible, and the player base isn't that large.

 

[ArchAngel]

From what I know his idea behind the mod is that if you take too long to finish the game enemies will get progressively stronger until you can no longer fight them without losing soldiers all the time which will cost you the game. Basically you are on a hidden timer. Not the most fun design philosophy.

Yeah, I kinda agree, but it was more than that, there was a specific issue with lower difficulties not being lowered in that regard, which probably the author overlooked because he only plays on Impossible, and the player base isn't that large.

Well only difference now is that on lower difficulty you will have a bit more time until game becomes impossible to finish.

I have also been thinking about going back to LWR but after playing PP it is hard to go back to a game that does not have inventory, rigid two action system and other limitations of Xcom1 engine.

 

[mastroego]

Possibly.
But it might be that XCOM's own progress will be enough to win this time (ok, I know!)

I will try for once the halved-time campaign and see how it goes.
I will state again, this mod adds too many good things to go back.
If ONLY I could identify a combination of Difficulty + Settings that'll make it winnable....

 

[Darth Canoli]

From what I know his idea behind the mod is that if you take too long to finish the game enemies will get progressively stronger until you can no longer fight them without losing soldiers all the time which will cost you the game. Basically you are on a hidden timer. Not the most fun design philosophy.

Yeah, I kinda agree, but it was more than that, there was a specific issue with lower difficulties not being lowered in that regard, which probably the author overlooked because he only plays on Impossible, and the player base isn't that large.

As a general rule, you're right but as far as the X-COM franchise go, the end-game is always a cakewalk so increasing the difficulty further over time might not be such a terrible idea...

 

[Serus]

Darth, do you even know about what mod they are speaking? Seriously, WTF!? Long War Rebalance ! One of the main selling point of that (sub)mod is that difficulty curve is reversed, start being easier, end harder.

 

[Darth Canoli]

I admit i have no idea, ideally, the difficulty early on should be the same as in the original UFO and from mid-game, you start to increase the difficulty exponentially but it has to be done in a way a fast run would be impacted, a run with average speed becoming way harder late game and a slow paced run nearly impossible.

 

[mastroego]

A brief (?) report on my new run with Rebalance.

Well a LOT of things changed since version 1.27.
Now I'm playing 1.35..... and I'm already behind since 1.36 requires a new campaign.
Facepalm.

Anyway.
It's impossible to enumerate all the improvements.
The (additional) work they did on the UI is fantastic.
There are also tons of little refinements like the new mechanics for In The Zone. It was this mod, I believe, that introduced the requirement for a steadied weapon to activate In The Zone, which made it more realistic but way less powerful.
Now, if you fire with a NON steadied weapon, you get at least an automatic reload, which, in the economy of the turns, is not insignificant by any means.

There are really tons of little adjustments like this one.
Of course I don't agree with every single change: he keeps moving abilities around in the tree and some choices do appear suboptimal. But overall it's still incline and many abilities will be shuffled around some more anyway, that's for sure.

FINALLY I decided to play the shorter campaign (there's even a super-short version now), and boy, I wish I tried it sooner.
This is a far better pace, even if it does feel a bit fast at times.
But again, overall, it's a game changer.
I'm playing on Classic, the second difficulty level (which led me to rage-quit the last time, even if it took lots of missions) and so far, I seem to be holding. I think the fix with the Alien Progress really is working.
I made it a little easier with some of the Second Wave choices, but I did not activate ALL (nor just) the ones which reduce the difficulty. It's more about preferences, really, but you ARE able to further fine-tune the level of the challenge.

Also, I'm not downplaying the strategy game any more. I take it seriously now.
I've found myself rushing critical projects or productions by selling meld and lots of things I used to simply hoard (even if it means not being sure I'll have them for future projects), trying to fulfill every reasonable request, especially the ones that contribute to the more pressing matters, and so on.

I've rushed a conquest of the first alien base by the end of Month #5.
It was hard, kinda epic, but doable.
I don't believe I've ever even contemplated doing it so fast. But this means I've removed a source of resources for the Aliens... two more bases remain, and I think I'll attempt at least another one as soon as possible.

I'm more or less swimming in Meld BUT after the base conquest mission I spent like 250 or so of it to fast-heal most of my A-Team (did I mention that with this mod you can spend 50 Meld to greatly reduce the healing and fatigue time?)

The real cold shower arrived with the dreaded Deluge Mission.
I think the mod author even commented specifically on this one. The fact is that the types of enemies in this (and possibly other) mission are hardcoded. So to tune them down he'd have to tune them down everywhere.
During the campaign run I hadn't yet faced a single enemy Mech, because they're very, VERY tough now and I suppose they'll start coming only later.
But if you get Deluge, you'll have to face them, together with a lot of Boss-level grunts, and that's the way it is.
I'm afraid I had to cheat (save-scum) to beat this one.
PERHAPS it is possible to beat it even by simply having a runner sneak past the enemy horde and reach the marker at the end of the map. Placing juicy, sacrificial targets to draw the enemy fire away from him and so on. But it'd still feel like cheesing it.

Anyway, we'll see if it was just something limited to this singular case, or if the difficulty will start spiking like crazy again.
Well the Fishing Village mission also comes to mind, I believe the issue is similar in fact, but I was still able to do it "cleanly" even though it was the hardest one up until that point.
Anyway, I can't deny that I'm having FUN.