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

[JrK]

Instakilling enemies without flanking? How the hell did you make this mental leap? From my short experience with the mod so far, it was not uncommon to have a 12% chance of popping sectoids behind cover. At the very most a 55ish percent when I got a flank. Granted they were rookies but your claim is disingenuous when you haven't even tested the mod yourself.

I did 'test' the mod, newfag, and I routinely killed sectoids behind cover with one shot from a normal assault rifle.

It is also possible the mod wasn't working properly for you, steam doesn't seem to play nice with those mods. Those seem to be the percentages I got in vanilla classic.

 

[Heresiarch]

I don't understand why you guys complain that AI got bonus accuracy in higher difficulty. The original XCOM gave bonus to ALL the stats, and not just in set numbers, but in percentages.

What I think more about what the game lacks, I think it's proper alien equipment and skill scaling. Like the other guys mentioned before, Sectoids (and Thin Men, and just about any other alien except for Mutons) only use their set weapon (plasma pistol or light plasma rifle). Back in XCOM and TFTD, even sectiods/aquatoids are deadly in the late game, because they can use heavy plasma/disruptor pulse launchers. Also, like mentioned before, late game council missions got reeeaaally boring because all you fight are Thin Men.

It'll be great if they could make aliens equip different and advanced weapons over time. The heavy floaters was a pretty nice surprise tbh, but such surprises are far too few.

Last but not the least, they really should have increased the final mission difficutly by 3 to 5 folds. Currently it's big joke compared to the Alien Base mission, in which I got my whole team wiped out by 6 Chryssalids in the first try.

 

[mediocrepoet]

Slingshot DLC? Man, why are they adding more story to the game? One of the things that most gets me about the game is the story points and cutscenes. I don't want more of that shit, I usually end up tapping esc throughout the game as it is trying to skip as much of that crap as possible. I'd rather see a DLC that opened up some sort of sandbox mode that made the game feel more like the old X-Com games and less like a railroaded story campaign with relatively dull cutscenes. Even the research and building ones could be stuck into the UFOpaedia thing they have so you could see them if you wanted.

As far as the aim bonus goes. I don't know even since the original games, they've had lore about how the enemies are full of cybernetics and have vision implants and stuff. I don't think it's much of a leap to figure that they can see better and as a result fire more accurately at range than humans can. I don't see things like that as a problem.

 

[Grunker]

Yeah, the DLC thing absolutely sucks. I found myself thinking while playing the game: "Man, a game where DLC might make sense, expanding options, buildings, weapons, classes, abilities, maps, all that shit, so much room for expansion." I would pay full expansion price in the future for a heavy collection of this kind of DLC; just expanding the game that's already there.

But more cutscenes you'll skip after watching one time and three new missions? Are they fucking kidding?

 

[Gord]

Is there any info on the price yet?
Judging from the overprived "Elite Soldier Pack" Crap DLC (5 $/€ for basically some new skins, "classic X-COM hair" and helmets, yay!), it will probably cost around 15 bucks.

 

[spectre]

What is funny, they realize that the Disruptor Launcher the dlc supposedly rewards you with needs fixing (as in, it's possible to play a few games and not see it at all), yet they choose just about the stupidest way to come about.

 

[knightley]

yet they choose just about the stupidest way to come about

Got to give them some brownie points for being consistant.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Never seen Sectoids attacking me with psi, can they even do it all? Oh yeah, there's none of the Blaster Bomb horror anymore. There's a serious poverty of explosives in this game.

Regular sectoids don't, but you'll get sectoid commanders later who can mind control your guys which is bad news. There are multiple enemy plasma weapon types but they don't dramatically change how they behave, just damage. Sectoids use plasma pistols, thin men, early mutons, and I believe floaters use light plasma rifles (Same damage as a laser rifle but +10 accuracy). Later mutons will use full plasma rifles, and elite mutons will use heavy plasma rifles.
There are also muton berserkers who aren't nearly as fast as chryssalids but do crazy amounts of damage if you're unfortunate enough to have soldiers get mauled by 'em.
Explosives are lacking but sectopods can fuck your shit up. They've got a ridiculous area of effect explosive doodad which can ruin your day if it connects anywhere near your guys. In one mission I had 4 or 5 soldiers get nailed by it, damaged, and all their cover destroyed in one turn. Was spread out enough that a grenade wouldn't have done that but was lined up perfectly for that attack I guess. But yeah there's less variety.

And not having a dangerous LZ is the case most of the time but once in a blue moon you'll get a situation where your first non-dashing move away from the skyranger will spot 7 goddamn aliens or some such, which can be a massive pain in the ass if there's no/very little cover near the skyranger.

The smaller maps are kind of a bummer though. Supposedly it's to prevent situations where a single sectoid is hiding in a closet somewhere dragging the mission on but it feels less dangerous when you know the map is a rectangle and you start at one end advance toward the other.

 

[Multi-headed Cow]

Yeah, the DLC thing absolutely sucks. I found myself thinking while playing the game: "Man, a game where DLC might make sense, expanding options, buildings, weapons, classes, abilities, maps, all that shit, so much room for expansion." I would pay full expansion price in the future for a heavy collection of this kind of DLC; just expanding the game that's already there.

But more cutscenes you'll skip after watching one time and three new missions? Are they fucking kidding?

Yup. DLC just adding "New stuff" to the list would've been cool with me. A presumably scripted 3 council mission series sounds pretty bad.

 

[Jick Magger]

Pretty sure there are no triggers, you can reload a game on the last turn of a mission and do shit in a slightly different order than last time (so the RNG point changes) and the rookies turn into different classes. The only help the game gives you is to make it certain that all four rookies in the first mission turn into different classes if they live. And it sucks because if you don't have at least two heavies for April on impossible it is gonna be a shitstorm of 6 hit point thin men and floaters that can crit-kill people that are hunkered down in high cover.

It may've just been myself, but I noticed that making your rookies do certain things makes them morel likely to turn into a certain class. e.g. killing enemies at medium to close range (especially via flanking) makes them into an assault, getting them to heal people (especially stabilizing a critically injured teammate) makes them more likely to go support, killing people at long range makes them more likely to go sniper.
It may've just been myself, I admit, but following these steps seemed to work about 8 times out of 10.
Of course, I'm not willing to try it anymore seeing as I'm going up against fucking cyberdiscs and Mutons and using rookies is practically a fucking death wish. I should probably just bite the bullet and buy that Officer School upgrade.

 

[dextermorgan]

The smaller maps are kind of a bummer though. Supposedly it's to prevent situations where a single sectoid is hiding in a closet somewhere dragging the mission on

Sounds like bullshit honestly.

 

[spectre]

They already got it "fixed" by the way, whenever you spend more than two turns (give or take) with no alien in sight, the "mysterious sound wave" (dunno how else to call it) comes about and show you the general direction of the nearest active spawn point to trigger.

 

[Ulminati]

But more cutscenes you'll skip after watching one time and three new missions? Are they fucking kidding?

Don't forget you can get the blaster launcher almost at the start of the game, just like how Bioware likes selling bonus weapons for their games

 

[Jaedar]

What does the blaster launcher do in this game anywy? I finished it before I got the thing needed to research it.

 

[MadMaxHellfire]

negligible more damage, 100% accuracy without needing line of sight, same useless range.

 

[Black]

But more cutscenes you'll skip after watching one time and three new missions? Are they fucking kidding?

Don't forget you can get the blaster launcher almost at the start of the game

How?
Even then, heavies would still be shit.

 

[Gord]

I found them pretty useful so far, early game the rocket can help, later on the anti-robot perk is quite nice, too.
Might be though that their usefulness is getting smaller late-game.

 

[Bigg Boss]

Slingshot kinda sounds shitty tbh. No new aliens, weapons, or equipment, and only three fucking maps? Plus, they aren't even considering adding accents to voices instead choosing to add more stupid armor variations. I love how my African guys sounds like some white dude. How hard is it to add 10 measly voices? Disappointing shit. Now we get a VIP character I don't give a fuck about too. Yay...

 

[Gozma]

What does the blaster launcher do in this game anywy? I finished it before I got the thing needed to research it.

It equips in a heavy's rocket launcher slot, it paths to anywhere you want to shoot it in range (like it will go around a corner, that kind of thing, not UFOD-style waypoints), I think it is always accurate unlike a normal rocket, and does 50% more damage (so 6 for shredder shots and 9 for normal ones). It's pretty good and I appreciate having it when I bother to make one, but it's really expensive in several ways (takes research, two UFO navigation items, tons of weapon fragments, money), you only get it by showing you don't need it (after taking down a battleship) and it's in with so much more broken endgame shit like ghost armor it's really pointless. It does probably need to be moved around somewhere in the game power-growth curve. Or failing that it should be completely retarded like the original blaster bomb and have like 300% rocket range and cause a 15 tile radius explosion

 

[JrK]

Firaxis got butthurt and now applied some internet check on startup that prevents mods from taking effect (or they just screw up your game).

 

[Bigg Boss]

Firaxis got butthurt and now applied some internet check on startup that prevents mods from taking effect (or they just screw up your game).

Really? What the fuck?

 

[Gozma]

Probably more proof of Firaxis sloppy execution of everything, 'cause I think you can pretty easily change multiplayer-relevant shit just in the .ini files.

 

[good little toastboy]

I faced a guy with 10000 (maybe just 1000) in defense, offense and will in multiplayer yesterday. 1% to hit him, 1% to mind control him. Fun times.

 

[JrK]

That's probably a good reason for implementing that check then... :D

 

[Tel Prydain]

I kinda wish they had left the original ‘plot’ and set the game post-invasion in an alien-controlled world. Just say that the funding is coming from the resistance in that country, and that the terror level is the current risk of that country’s resistance movement being found/wiped-out.

The gameplay would be exactly the same, but being a small resistance would make the four-man parties seem slightly less ludicrous. Would also explain why every soldier in the “last, best hope of mankind” is a rookie mook who can’t hit the side of a friggen barn.

Every time my tiny crew is sent to the trashed army base, I have to shake my head at the silliness. What the frak can my rookies do that their tanks couldn’t?

Unless there are aliens I didn't bother disposing of earlier, but yeah, whatever. Shit on the other side, any AI noticable there? None. They will just sit there and wait for me to open that door and blow them all new assholes.

I'm quite sure that I've had packs come at me out of windows and doors.

hide behind crate, overwatch, overwatch, overwatch, overwatch, wait, hide behind crate, overwatch, overwatch, overwatch, wait, hide behind crate, shoot, overwatch, overwatch...
yeah, truly fun.

Yeah, that’s heaps more shallow than the original game where you walk out of cover, fire, walk back, kneel, walk out of cover, fire, walk back, kneel, walk out of cover, fire, walk back, kneel, walk out of cover, fire, walk back, kneel, walk out of cover, fire, walk back, kneel.

Good call.

If they made it too complicated the poor console gamers couldn't figure it out.

Yeah, that's why the original game was never a Playstation game. Never ever.

Also, like mentioned before, late game council missions got reeeaaally boring because all you fight are Thin Men.

Honestly, after the pain they caused me in the early game, I really enjoyed the later missions where I got to just rain hell down on them.