Turn-Based Tactics Phantom Doctrine - "tactical Cold War conspiracy thriller" by Hard West devs

[Zombra]

4 hours in, I like everything I see. I particularly enjoy gathering documents during tac missions so I can unlock corkboard data back at the base. Lots of guns and equipment, lots of weird different missions (tactical and otherwise) to manage and assign your team to. Flying spies all over the continent to gather info. Some of my recruits might be double agents. Changing my passport photo and growing a beard for my new identity. Solid XCOM type battles I don't really have the hang of yet. There's a lot to like here, no complaints yet. Still on sale for one more day.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Game is really good, but as you go on, the missions become tedious, and there is not enough variety.

Missions all end up the same:
1) Take anything thats not nailed down
2) Silencer nuke / karate chop enemy agent
3) proceed to complete mission objectives while karatechopping every enemy on the way
4) exfil
5) profit!

Really liked the short CYOAs although, chemical minigame was cool too, corkboard is great, altho it took me a long time to figure out i can do it alone, so DONT WASTE AGENTS in the investigation slots, its useless and its tbh much better and more immersive if you do it yourself.

All in all, game is incline, but gets tedious half way through.

 

[Nortar]

The corkboard could have been so much better if it had any substance behind it. They could have told a whole different story with it. But as it stands, it's just randomized names and places , and there's absolutely no point in tracing entries throughout different projects. Just connect the matches and you're done.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

The corkboard could have been so much better if it had any substance behind it. They could have told a whole different story with it. But as it stands, it's just randomized names and places , and there's absolutely no point in tracing entries throughout different projects. Just connect the matches and you're done.

Afaik its not randomised, the codenames do represent places and people. For example, codename Walter Poon, that appears in several corkboard projects is an undercover name of Leslie, your buddy in the CIA campaign.

But i agree, could have been done better. Could have made in game connections between projects

 

[Nutria]

I'm 8 hours in now. I like the tactical combat part of it. I find it far better than the nu X-Coms. I especially like the split between the infiltration and combat phases of it. It's way better than the X-Com bullshit where you win or lose depending on when you happen to step on a tile that activates an alien pod. It does get tedious sometimes to spend a few minutes getting your guys out after you won a mission, but no game is perfect.

The investigation part of it is a huge missed opportunity. Covert Action did this very well 29 fucking years ago on one goddamn floppy disk. You had to put the clues together to guess what the conspiracy was up to and that drove what tactical missions you went on and what you did on them. In this game, you just have pointless busywork looking through what tards imagine classified documents look like. Somehow Sid Meier making a game he didn't give a shit about back then is better than anything we can come up with today.

My biggest complaint is that the story is pants-on-head retarded. The setting is apparently something inspired by Jason Bourne novels, Vin Diesel movies, and old KGB disinformation campaigns like "Gladio". They actually mention "NSA field agents". Like Jesus Christ, the fucking post office has guys out there in the field with guns but the NSA doesn't. Every time something happens in the story I'm insulted that the developers thought I was tarded enough to be on that level.

Summary: Great execution on the tactical side, worth playing if you're into this genre, but it doesn't deliver in general. I'd say Vigilantes is a better experience overall despite having probably an order of magnitude less time and money put into it.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Wait till you do the same missions over and over, gets tedious really fast. But overall i agree with you

 

[Jinn]

Yeah, lack of mission and map variety is what ended up killing my playthrough of this at 40 hours. Biggest gripe I have with the game.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Yeah, lack of mission and map variety is what ended up killing my playthrough of this at 40 hours. Biggest gripe I have with the game.

Yeah, i also had a 50ish hour playthrough that got killed due to tedium

 

[holla_cabezas_de_mierda]

is the combat deterministic? thought I heard it was

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

There are no dice rolls in combat

 

[holla_cabezas_de_mierda]

There are no dice rolls in combat

so how are hits and damaged determined? Always hit?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

There are no dice rolls in combat

so how are hits and damaged determined? Always hit?

Awareness dictates damage dealt by firearms

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Always hit, but damage depends on awareness. Ie, if you have full awareness bar, you will get grazed for 1 dmg n such.

 

[holla_cabezas_de_mierda]

Always hit, but damage depends on awareness. Ie, if you have full awareness bar, you will get grazed for 1 dmg n such.

is it an enjoyable system?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Always hit, but damage depends on awareness. Ie, if you have full awareness bar, you will get grazed for 1 dmg n such.

is it an enjoyable system?

You're better off going full stealth.

 

[lukaszek]

deterministic system > RNG

 

[ERYFKRAD]

Always hit, but damage depends on awareness. Ie, if you have full awareness bar, you will get grazed for 1 dmg n such.

is it an enjoyable system?

You're better off going full stealth.

i thought that guns blazing is barbarian way




or drinking competition

Ambushing everyone with a single blow to the neck is as barbarian as it gets.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Yeah, karate chop all the way

 

[DalekFlay]

Is this worth $10 on GOG for someone who likes spy stories a lot and likes turn-based combat in RPGs but doesn't usually play strategy games?

 

[ERYFKRAD]

It's alright.

 

[Iluvcheezcake]

Is this worth $10 on GOG for someone who likes spy stories a lot and likes turn-based combat in RPGs but doesn't usually play strategy games?

Its worth it

 

[Nutria]

Yeah, the strategy side of it isn't that important. And for $10 it's an okay game. There's enough that's new and interesting in it that it'll probably keep you occupied for a while.

 

[Raghar]

Is this worth $10 on GOG for someone who likes spy stories a lot and likes turn-based combat in RPGs but doesn't usually play strategy games?

Story sucks. But you could LARP a secret agent.

 

[DalekFlay]

Story sucks. But you could LARP a secret agent.

Can I be a hot chick who bangs dudes for intel?

 

[Raghar]

Can I be a hot chick who bangs dudes for intel?

I think that's from era before Intel was a big company, thus they didn't have money to hire spies to kill opposition.