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

[Israfael]

Why not progress further - since the nu-age gerbils are now habituated to a typical wargame gameplay, why not try to train them to do something more intresting and variable, with the game simulating the fight instead of heaping up a set of random rules hoping that it'd work in all situations ?

 

[Zombra]

Why do they have to keep all gamey elements of the game?

I know! I hate those gamey elements of the game!

 

[Israfael]

Not sure if you are trolling, but explanation of what constitutes a simulation and a game http://www.gamasutra.com/blogs/Eric..._Didnt_Work_For_Me_Simulation_vs_Strategy.php

 

[Jimmious]

Why not progress further - since the nu-age gerbils are now habituated to a typical wargame gameplay, why not try to train them to do something more intresting and variable, with the game simulating the fight instead of heaping up a set of random rules hoping that it'd work in all situations ?

Well what you consider progress others will consider as backtracking while progress was already made by moving to the faster and hassle-free 2-phase movement. I like both to be honest and I did enjoy EU and EW so I don't feel the need to bash the system.

 

[ArchAngel]

I also like both systems and the waypoint options they mentioned for Xcom2 are an improvement to Xcom 1.
Some other things from nuXcom is what makes it a worse game than UFO, like lack of inventory, small team, crappy geospace and air battle system and the so much "loved" aliens spawning and patrolling and getting a free go into cover move.

 

[Raghar]

No ammunition yet again? So when you are spraying you will not get too low on bullets...

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

I also like both systems and the waypoint options they mentioned for Xcom2 are an improvement to Xcom 1.
Some other things from nuXcom is what makes it a worse game than UFO, like lack of inventory, small team, crappy geospace and air battle system and the so much "loved" aliens spawning and patrolling and getting a free go into cover move.

Yeah, I found the strategy layer / geoscape of nuXCOM to be lacking.
It just lacked the charm and the depth of the orginal.
To be fair, the air battle system in the orginal wasn't great either. It did have better music, however



Since when did the aliens spawn? Do you mean on council missions?

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

No ammunition yet again? So when you are spraying you will not get too low on bullets...

There is ammo.
Even in the first game you had to reload, and really, you hardly reloaded in the orginal.
2 clips per soldier was usually enough to last a mission, especially if they have heavy plasma, and laser weapons had infinite ammo.

Apparently heavier weapons in XCOM 2, such as grenade launchers, will have an ammo count.

 

[Zombra]

No ammunition yet again? So when you are spraying you will not get too low on bullets...

Maybe you can't run out completely, but if you're constantly taking worthless shots, you have to waste a lot of turns on reloading. That's enough of a management issue to keep you thinking.

Honestly, the assumption that your guys bring enough ammo to last a firefight is a streamlining I can live with. You ever play one of these games and have a guy run out of ammo? And then spend the rest of the map having him walk around and skip his turn? It's not exactly scintillating gameplay.

 

[whatevername]

Maybe you can't run out completely, but if you're constantly taking worthless shots, you have to waste a lot of turns on reloading. That's enough of a management issue to keep you thinking.

Honestly, the assumption that your guys bring enough ammo to last a firefight is a streamlining I can live with. You ever play one of these games and have a guy run out of ammo? And then spend the rest of the map having him walk around and skip his turn? It's not exactly scintillating gameplay.

After you run out of 10mm ammo (rare ammo, you got 60 or 90 bullets) for the MP5(good gun) in JA2 1.13 that your IMP gets, you have to use garbage pistols that you've looted from the enemy. That's what great gameplay is.

 

[Average Manatee]

No ammunition yet again? So when you are spraying you will not get too low on bullets...

There is ammo.
Even in the first game you had to reload, and really, you hardly reloaded in the orginal.
2 clips per soldier was usually enough to last a mission, especially if they have heavy plasma, and laser weapons had infinite ammo.

Apparently heavier weapons in XCOM 2, such as grenade launchers, will have an ammo count.

Someone clearly never used Heavy Cannons and Rocket Launchers in the original. You had to dedicate 1 or 2 soldiers to convoying ammunition from the Skyranger to the shooters for long missions.

Another thing is that upgrading to Lasers or Plasma would clear up a lot of space in the skyranger to bring more grenades/smokes/etc for support, which is a nicer way of differentiating weapons rather than simply making the higher-tier weapons better than HCs and RLs in every way. It also even gave reason to stick with Lasers over Plasma, as 15 soldiers who don't need ammo in their gun means 15 more of something else you can take, essential if its a night time mission and you want to load up on the light-thingys.

Having intermediate weapons between infinite ammunition and 1-use (rockets) in XCOM2 will still be good through.

Honestly, the assumption that your guys bring enough ammo to last a firefight is a streamlining I can live with. You ever play one of these games and have a guy run out of ammo? And then spend the rest of the map having him walk around and skip his turn? It's not exactly scintillating gameplay.

Well if there was an inventory system you would solve this by having one soldier share his extra ammo, or giving him one of your back up weapons, or picking up the weapon of a fallen soldier.

 

[Zombra]

After you run out of 10mm ammo (rare ammo, you got 60 or 90 bullets) for the MP5(good gun) in JA2 1.13 that your IMP gets, you have to use garbage pistols that you've looted from the enemy. That's what great gameplay is.

Scarcity gameplay can be a cool thing, but XCOM isn't a scrounging/survival game. It's a game about a trillion dollar globally funded military organization. Running out of pistol bullets would be sheerest stupidity for any XCOM operative, and any soldier who forgot to bring more than a couple clips should be immediately pulled from active duty as incompetent. It would be like a paratrooper forgetting to pack his chute.

You could certainly make a case for the rag tag underground of XCOM 2 running out of bullets, but personally I'm not feeling it. These guys still have the resources to suit all their ops up in storm trooper body armor. They still have some kind of base, they still have munitions facilities. If it were a smaller scale RPG about a set party of characters trying to get from A to B to assassinate President Alien or something, that would be different and managing your bullets and gold pieces would and should matter in that case - but this isn't that case.

Well if there was an inventory system you would solve this by having one soldier share his extra ammo, or giving him one of your back up weapons, or picking up the weapon of a fallen soldier.

I guess so, but a full inventory system is not on the table for this game. I'm more than OK with that.

For me, the question "take enough ammo? Y/N" has never been an interesting gameplay decision.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Firaxis talks about the demo

http://www.twitch.tv/firaxisgames/v/6583367

Skip to around 11 minutes.

Move distances were indeed exaggerated. This pleases me.

There will be a new weapon type called "magnetic"
Cue ICP

The Viper does not instant kill dudes behind cover.

Everyone can hack, but specialists can do it competently

Extraction is not always needed, only when the mission calls for it or when you need to abort. It also takes 2 turns for the skyranger to arrive.

Squad size is still 4-6. The devs still think that its the "sweet spot"

Exalt is not around. Advent is a different organisation.

You can place extraction zones anywhere you want, as long as its on flat ground

There is still base building.

XCOM cannot perform terror missions. They are still the "good guys"

 

[Raghar]

Looks like some posters are mistaking few things about original. Do you remember XFiles? Mulder and Scully? How they had problems to find anything. You played these guys who get in, killed alliens, and removed bodies before Mulder and Scully arrived, so they wouldn't find anything.
Of course from black budgets they can afford only so much, which explains the strongly limited budget. And when people need to be whitelisted, you will not get cream of the corps.

So how aliens could win? A simply forcing governments to publicly acknowledge theirs existence and show proof of friendly aliens visiting the planet, is all they need. Which explains also how hard these troops must cover terror missions - outburst of local war, or occupied large ships - local outbreak of diarrhea.

Sometimes you feel like Baghdad bob.

When I'd make remake, I'd do it that way, and be explicit about that.

 

[Zeriel]

http://www.ign.com/videos/2015/06/25/making-of-xcom-2-see-firaxis-previsualization-footage-ign-first

Previs video, just cool eyecandy, but shows (potentially) improved overwatch cam and sectoid mind control.

 

[Average Manatee]

Squad size is still 4-6. The devs still think that its the "sweet spot"

Sounds like they are using modding capabilities as an excuse not to make the game better. Casuals get vanilla, everyone else has to wait for the long war equivalent.

It's a shame because if it wasn't obvious on day 1 that 4-man parties were not enough, it sure should be now after playing Long War.

 

[Cyberarmy]

XCOM cannot perform terror missions. They are still the "good guys"

BOOOOOOO!!!!! A wasted oppurtunity.

 

[Galdred]

At least, the clandestine organization theme makes for a better justification of squad size than not being able to design a big enough chopper.

 

[Gozma]

No ammunition yet again? So when you are spraying you will not get too low on bullets...

Maybe you can't run out completely, but if you're constantly taking worthless shots, you have to waste a lot of turns on reloading. That's enough of a management issue to keep you thinking.

Honestly, the assumption that your guys bring enough ammo to last a firefight is a streamlining I can live with. You ever play one of these games and have a guy run out of ammo? And then spend the rest of the map having him walk around and skip his turn? It's not exactly scintillating gameplay.

X-Com '94 is built on a lot more interactivity than pure gameplay, so cool things happen like a guy that runs out of ammo scavenges what he needs off an alien corpse. Or you stun a sectoid leader but the mission has gone to hell, so you end up having to carry the body back to the Skyranger to evac. You lure a damaged cyberdisc you didn't bring proper weapons to fight into a gas station so you can kill it with weak autocannon HE shots + secondary explosions from the gas pumps. It's like the Dwarf Fortress model - if you model enough realistic interactions, they will combine in interesting ways.

 

[Israfael]

Basically, what's so encaptivatiing about the old x-com is the fact that all entities are bound to the same set of rules and choices & consequences. Aliens have their own agenda, they also build bases, expand, move stuff around the world, their actions are bound to the same limitations (although they may have infinite ammo, never bothered to check), there's no situation like "your small arms can shoot through solid walls because we decided to make shooting 'gamey', but RPG projectiles and grenades trajectories are simulated because we thought it was cool (or maybe too unrealistic)".

That's what is called emergent gameplay, and somehow Gollops and a bunch of dudes did it easily while a hundred men team at Firaxis failed to capture the essence of it (even if they were dumbing it down, they failed to save the basics).

 

[Gozma]

My taste includes both snails and oysters.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

Actually, the aliens are not bound to the same rules, at least on the tactical map.
Aliens can psi attack any xcom operative on the field. XCOM cannot do that, they need vision.
Aliens are immune to fatal wounds.
Aliens can see in the dark. XCOM still haven't figured out what flash lights are.

Small arms cannot shoot through walls without destroying the intervening cover, at least not normally.
What you may be seeing is a graphical bug.
Speaking of cover, I do find the originals method of destructible terrain to be superior to the nuXCOM; it makes more sense and there's no stupid bullshit like UFO walls getting wrecked by LMGs.

The geoscape is brilliant though. I'd take the originals strategy layer over nuXCOMs anytime.

 

[Gozma]

I bet the endgame of XCOM2 is that you have to open a warp gate to the alternate reality where you won XCOM1 and a bunch of XCOM soldiers pour in. It's pretty much the ultimate clean way to end a terrorism plot, the intercession of a rival power that makes terrorism work where the rival power is also you.

 

[CthuluIsSpy]

I bet the endgame of XCOM2 is that you have to open a warp gate to the alternate reality where you won XCOM1 and a bunch of XCOM soldiers pour in. It's pretty much the ultimate clean way to end a terrorism plot.

Ugh, that's just stupid.
So that's probably what's going to happen :/

 

[Zeriel]

XCOM cannot perform terror missions. They are still the "good guys"

BOOOOOOO!!!!! A wasted oppurtunity.

Ain't it true? Imagine attacking pro-alien areas full of human-alien hybrids, colaborateurs and quislings living cushy, hi-tech lives. Then you barge in with your scruffy-looking Call-of-duty-space-marine-dudes-turned-terrorist and blast them all to pieces and bolt, all in order to make an example of what happens to those who co-operate with the aliens against humanity.

They should call them "Freedom Fighting" missions, of course

At least, the clandestine organization theme makes for a better justification of squad size than not being able to design a big enough chopper.

That's what I thought as well. Heck, that Skyranger from the remake clearly had space for at least ten guys.

I hate the "mods will fix it" crowd with a vengeance, but this is one of those things that would be very easy to mod into the base game in a matter of days.