X-COM XCOM 2 + War of the Chosen Expansion Thread

[mastroego]

So, since some of you guys suggested I wasn't too far from the end, I finished LW 1.
Took me a month or so (of very intermittent play, admittedly) but I got there and finished it. I was playing with an ini-enabled easier setting... initially it was for learning but I grew too fond of my soldiers!
180 missions, 6 lost soldiers, about 300 hours of play (with more than a little savescumming, ok).

Now the mid-late missions were a drag, too much repetition really, but the building of my enlarged team, all in all, has been a fantastic gaming experience and the bizarre thing is that now I'm ALMOST TEMPTED too start it all again, with a harder setting and less savescumming...
I bought X-Com 2 to play that but if I do I'll "waste" what I learned about LW1 and I'll need to learn everything from scratch.
And if I do start X-Com 2 I'm unsure again whether to go vanilla or LW2... either option will mean not playing the other version (or even LW1 for that matter) for who knows how many months - if ever
Can't decide what to do

 

[ArchAngel]

Do what you think you will enjoy the most. Unless you plan to die in next few months you can always play the other things you didn't now.

 

[Jimmious]

Well...when someone says that he doesn't know what to do, suggesting that he should do whatever he thinks is best is not the best advice ever
Tell him if he should go for LW2 since you're the biggest LW2 fan here, or if he should stick with LW1

 

[Jaedar]

Can't decide what to do

I found LW2 pretty bad, so either replay LW1 or wait for xcom2 vanilla expansion and play that.

 

[Zombra]

Can't decide what to do

In my experience, the immediate 2nd playthrough always dies off quickly. Wait 6 months and see if you're still itching to relive it. Meantime, try something new, maybe XCOM 2 vanilla. If it doesn't ring your bell, maybe try LW2.

 

[mastroego]

Yeah, you're right, that tends to happen with other games too.
It's just that LWx imply/require a long commitment so I try to avoid wasting time.

I looked for info about LW2 and it seems indeed that it's very different from LW1. Might not be my cup of tea.
Some suggest vanilla + simpler mods, like additional classes.
Vanilla does indeed seem lacking in that department, I'd miss the LW1 soldiers going plain vanilla.

 

[Zombra]

Yeah, LW2 seems like way too much of a fuck to use the whole giant package. The "new classes only" mod is here. Beware, they aren't bothering to support it any more, so probably won't work with the expansion.

 

[mastroego]

So, perhaps against my better judgment, I've started again LW1. I like the class system in LW1 too much.
It was a drag indeed by the end, but a lot of that was my own fault: playing at a very easy setting and with save-scumming, I got too powerful too early.

I've increased the difficulty by two notches and I plan not to abuse the save system (barring truly exceptional cases perhaps), in order to play it more closely to how it's intended.
We'll see how far I'll go this time and if the interest remains.
I was surprised to meet drones in the very first mission, and I actually had to start twice since the first time my team was almost wiped out immediately. I am now proceeding with more caution.

Thanks for the comments and I'll keep monitoring the thread to see how things proceed on the XCom 2 front.

 

[mastroego]

Sorry, last question promise :D

Has anyone tried/managed to create a local copy of the ufopaedia?
I'd use it regularly but the site has often problems.
It'd be a shame if it got lost eventually.
I've tried making a copy with HTTrack but it doesn't grab anything (yeah I've also adjusted the parameters to follow external links and whatnot).

 

[LESS T_T]

CREATE YOUR OWN XCOM PROPAGANDA NOW

While XCOM 2: War of The Chosen launches on August 29th, start recruiting efforts today! You can create some war-and-meme-worthy posters right now, through a free download on Steam. Welcome to the XCOM 2: War of the Chosen Propaganda Center.

Now available for free on Steam, the XCOM 2: War of the Chosen Propaganda Center contains the Photobooth application included in XCOM 2: War of the Chosen. With it, create your own propaganda posters using a variety of backgrounds, filters and soldier poses of your favorite XCOM troops.

Even if you haven’t signed up for duty yet, you can get a jump by creating your new troopers in the Propaganda Center. Then designate them as soldiers or VIPs that you might find in your XCOM 2: War of The Chosen campaign. Let’s walk you through this…

DOWNLOAD PROPAGANDA CENTER
The first, most obvious, step is to download the Propaganda Center. It’s available on Windows PC – and you’ll find it on the Steam store here. The app itself is a 3GB download and has the same system requirements for the XCOM 2 base game.

HOW PROPAGANDA CENTER WORKS
From the main menu, you can see who is currently available in your Character Pool or create your own, new soldiers. For the sake of this walkthrough, let’s focus on the Photobooth option.

1. Starting from the top, you can select the formation. Get your squad lined up, in a wedge formation, as a small mob, posing with a pal or going solo.
2. From there, select up to six soldiers to set up their position and pose (there are loads of different poses for all the soldiers and number of class-specific ones as well.) From there, tweak with your mouse to zoom in and around what you’ve put together. Not sure how you want to compose the shots? There are six pre-sets to get you going.
3. Next up, select from 23 different background images. Want to make yours stand out more? Go ahead and tint it with two color variants.
4. From the 16 different layouts you can choose how – and if – you want to stylize your propaganda art. Do you want to make it look like you’re taking a snapshot or drafting a recruitment poster? It’s up to you.
5. Select from a few different fonts, filters and effects to complete the look of your images.
6. When you’re ready, tap the “Take Photo” button. By default, it saves a poster-sized image (720 by 1080 pixels) to the following directory:
   1. Documents / XCOM2 Propaganda Center /XComGame/Photobooth

Be sure to follow XCOM on Twitter and Like XCOM on Facebook to keep up to date with the latest information on XCOM 2: War of the Chosen. If you’re looking to enlist with the Resistance, join the 2K Forums!

 

[Jaedar]

Features like that really make me wonder if this game is even for me.

I could not care less about all these purely visual customizations.

Also I realized they are asking for 40 Ebro, and that isn't even the full experience, because the dlc (which has been rebalanced to fit) is sold separately.

 

[Grunker]

I have an embarrasingly huge roster of custom modded friends, characters and whatever in my character pool. Makes it easy to recognize my guys and makes me appreciate the dynamic stories rising from the gameplay more (I skip the stock story bits). Feels like video game version of painting miniatures.

 

[ArchAngel]

Only soldier customization I did was in Xcom 1 where I would give different color helmets depending on soldier class. It was an easy way for me to know what to do with each soldier while switching between them with Tab so I could give them fast orders. I didn't need to look down to their icons or weapon loadout.

This same system is pointless in Xcom 2 as their made animations happen one after another instead of at the same time like in Xcom 1 so you got all the time in the world to look down and see who you switched to.

 

[Jaedar]

I have an embarrasingly huge roster of custom modded friends, characters and whatever in my character pool. Makes it easy to recognize my guys and makes me appreciate the dynamic stories rising from the gameplay more (I skip the stock story bits). Feels like video game version of painting miniatures.

It very well might be, but painting minis is another thing I never got

Only soldier customization I did was in Xcom 1 where I would give different color helmets depending on soldier class.

One of the nicest QoL features in LW is that it did this automatically.

 

[Grunker]

I didn't paint minis either but only because I'm handicapped at working details

 

[Fedora Master]

As with most features, Firaxis saw the "Your Dudes" stories from UFO and completely missed the point.

 

[bonescraper]

Plenty of info, for example, they added fatigue.

 

[Morgoth]

CREATE YOUR OWN XCOM PROPAGANDA NOW

I was reading "Create your own XCOM popamole now."

 

[Vibalist]

So I'm watching this dude do a playthrough of WotC on Legendary Ironman (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtMfblSJRcI&t=8s), and at first I'm really, really impressed with all the new stuff that has been added. New classes, new enemy types, new ways to build your soldiers (bonds and extra skills), new buildings, new tech. New mission types, revamps of old mission types, new maps, subterranian missions. Assassins hunting you, factions you can gain influence with. And then there's The Lost, a zombie horde that will attack both aliens and your own men depending on who's closest, meaning there's a new dynamic to fighting.

And yet I get bored after 5 or 6 videos (not in a row, just in total). Maybe it's because this guy is really good at the game and makes it seem too easy, but there's no tension. The Lost especially are a wasted opportunity. They haven't been a threat in any of the instances where they showed up, partly because you can chain kill them, but also because their movement range is so ridiculously short they won't even hit you the same round they reach you. They are the very essence of trash mob. Just there, getting mowed down, without ever presenting the slightest threat. As a matter of fact, they make missions easier because they also attack the Aliens, who aren't anywhere near as astute as a halfway decent player, meaning they get damaged by The Lost quite frequently. They're like an ally, essentially.
Don't get me started on the missions that feature only The Lost and no Aliens. The game might as well just hand you the victory and save you the tedium on those.

Then there's the fact your guys seem even more overpowered now than before. You're granted tons of new abilities and advantages compared to vanilla (one Reaper ability, which blows up cars and other flammable objects for 10-12 damage to everyone within a rather large radius without breaking concealment is especially overpowered), but the enemies aren't. Not really. There are new enemy types, but they're not stronger than the old ones, just different. Therefore you barely get to see them do anything, because you now have such a wide array of techniques you can kill them with they're lucky to ever get a turn. The only challenge so far are the assassins, who admittedly are pretty threatening (at least initially), because they have tons of HP and can conceal themselves. But even they don't manage to kill a single soldier in the above video series (he's lost one so far, to a sectoid who did the unexpected and went for a shot), partly because they have a tendency to just knock your guys out and then leave the map (there's an in game explanation for why they behave that way, but it still makes them less of a threat than they could be).

Maybe I need to play this to assess it. Many LP videos with pro gamers certainly make things look way easier than they are, and I'm definitely not the best at XCOM. It's just that, from watching the videos, it seems the problem that plagued XCOM 1 and 2 (the game gets piss easy once you figure out how to wipe out pods in one turn, assuring no retaliation fire) is magnified because you have even more OP skills now, and your enemies don't.

 

[Mazisky]

So I'm watching this dude do a playthrough of WotC on Legendary Ironman (https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OtMfblSJRcI&t=8s), and at first I'm really, really impressed with all the new stuff that has been added. New classes, new enemy types, new ways to build your soldiers (bonds and extra skills), new buildings, new tech. New mission types, revamps of old mission types, new maps, subterranian missions. Assassins hunting you, factions you can gain influence with. And then there's The Lost, a zombie horde that will attack both aliens and your own men depending on who's closest, meaning there's a new dynamic to fighting.

And yet I get bored after 5 or 6 videos (not in a row, just in total). Maybe it's because this guy is really good at the game and makes it seem too easy, but there's no tension. The Lost especially are a wasted opportunity. They haven't been a threat in any of the instances where they showed up, partly because you can chain kill them, but also because their movement range is so ridiculously short they won't even hit you the same round they reach you. They are the very essence of trash mob. Just there, getting mowed down, without ever presenting the slightest threat. As a matter of fact, they make missions easier because they also attack the Aliens, who aren't anywhere near as astute as a halfway decent player, meaning they get damaged by The Lost quite frequently. They're like an ally, essentially.
Don't get me started on the missions that feature only The Lost and no Aliens. The game might as well just hand you the victory and save you the tedium on those.

Then there's the fact your guys seem even more overpowered now than before. You're granted tons of new abilities and advantages compared to vanilla (one Reaper ability, which blows up cars and other flammable objects for 10-12 damage to everyone within a rather large radius without breaking concealment is especially overpowered), but the enemies aren't. Not really. There are new enemy types, but they're not stronger than the old ones, just different. Therefore you barely get to see them do anything, because you now have such a wide array of techniques you can kill them with they're lucky to ever get a turn. The only challenge so far are the assassins, who admittedly are pretty threatening (at least initially), because they have tons of HP and can conceal themselves. But even they don't manage to kill a single soldier in the above video series (he's lost one so far, to a sectoid who did the unexpected and went for a shot), partly because they have a tendency to just knock your guys out and then leave the map (there's an in game explanation for why they behave that way, but it still makes them less of a threat than they could be).

Maybe I need to play this to assess it. Many LP videos with pro gamers certainly make things look way easier than they are, and I'm definitely not the best at XCOM. It's just that, from watching the videos, it seems the problem that plagued XCOM 1 and 2 (the game gets piss easy once you figure out how to wipe out pods in one turn, assuring no retaliation fire) is magnified because you have even more OP skills now, and because The Lost are so shit.

There is the new beta strike option, so you can't wipe out anyone instantly. it may be interesting
(it double the hp of everyone and increase the timers for balance)

 

[Vibalist]

Ah, that's cool. However, I don't know of any game that was ever made better by HP bloat.

 

[Mazisky]

Ah, that's cool. However, I don't know of any game that was ever made better by HP bloat.

Well, the hp increase is to constrast the most common complain, pods wipeout.

Don't think other games had this issue to begin with.

 

[Zombra]

The announcement of the expansion has inspired me to return to XCOM 2 and try to play through it again. No plans to actually get the expansion as I'm sure it will break all my favorite mods.

 

[Raghar]

The announcement of the expansion has inspired me to return to XCOM 2 and try to play through it again. No plans to actually get the expansion as I'm sure it will break all my favorite mods.

Don't do that. When they would release expansion you'd play the same story, and similar game.

 

[Vibalist]

Huh, looks like I was a bit quick on the draw re the videos I linked to, as the guy actually just lost a mission (retaliation mission, too many civs died). Up to that point, however, everything had been going flawlessly.

In addition, I noticed that despite losing the retaliation mission, he didn't even lose contact with the area. WTF. Didn't that used to be a consequence?

Also, one of the soldiers you can get (Dragunova, a Reaper, which is a new class) is easily the most OP I've seen in the entire game. She has a chance to stay revealed after each shot (with diminishing returns, to be fair), has a ton of high damage explosives, great aim (even at close range, despite only carrying a sniper rifle) and as long as she's in concealment, enemies will only spot her when she's within one tile of them. There's no reason not to bring her on every mission she's available.

This is somewhat remedied by the new fatigue system, where soldiers gradually lose will if you use them too much, meaning you have to leave them out on occasion, but she's still way too good in my estimation.