XCOM: Enemy Unknown, It's up for prepurchase on Steam. Options

[_Pax._]

"Unit Analysis View." What is this?

Line up a shot. Don't confirm it ... hit the "more information" button instead. (Note, you can then confirm the shot after seeing this screen.)

Yep, that's Unit Analysis View.

[LurkerOutThere]

Get south America covered with sats it only takes 2 and autopsies and interrogations become instant.

[X-Kalibur]

I've got a colonel of each class and have tried out most of the ability splits. I'll even put in some tips on armor usage based on skill setups as well. (I love that damn skeleton suit, even though it's not as protective as my angel, titan, and ghost armor).

<edit> Found this. Funny.

[X-Kalibur]

We'll start with the Assault class. Their two trees are based around defense (left) and offense (right)

Tactical Sense provides a +5 defense per enemy in sight (max 20%) while aggression gives +10% crit chance per enemy in sigh (cap 30%). Both of these can be really useful and it depends on how you play your assault troopers. I tend to prefer Tactical Sense but giving a shotgunner aggression makes them quite deadly.

Lightning Reflexes vs Close and Personal - LR makes the first reaction shot against you in a turn miss, guaranteed. Close and personal gives you a diminishing 30% crit chance based on range. I honestly can't bring myself to pass up LR. It lets you blow an enemy's overwatch shot while you move in, possibly for a run and gun.

Flush Vs Rapid Fire - Flush gives you decreased damage, increased hit chance and forces them to change cover while rapid fire allows two shots at a 15% penalty. Flush is sometimes useful on a rifle wielding assault but generally I find Rapid Fire to be more useful; it can also be used after run and gun, making it useful on either style of assault.

Close Combat Specialist vs Bring 'Em On - CCS gives you a free (no overwatch required) reaction shot against any enemy who moves within 4 squares of you (this appears to be limit 1 per enemy, maybe 1 per round). While Bring 'Em On gives a +1 crit damage bonus for every alien your team can see (cap +5). While I can see it, going the crit route with a shotgun and rapid fire, I just have a hard time not taking CCS which helps greatly against Chrysalids and Muton Berserkers (and panicked aliens from psionics).

Finally, we have resilience or Killer Instinct - resilience makes you immune to critical hits while killer instinct gives you a +50% crit damage bonus when you run and gun. This one is actually really tricky, if you're up close and personal, you already have a high crit chance and the extra damage is, well, killer. But being immune to crits is a godsend. I'll compile this with overall feeling on the class.

At Major you get an ability that gives a health bonus based on the armor you wear. Heavier armor = more bonus. This is a bit of a conundrum. If you've got a shotgunning assault trooper, you want them probably in skeleton armor for the movement boost to get close but if they are close and in lighter armor, crit immunity can be more useful than extra crit damage. While a rifle using assault trooper can easily use heavier armor and eat up overwatch shots for other team members. Honestly I keep both of my assaults in skeleton armor and they both have LR to avoid reaction shots while maneuvering for kills or stuns. I've not yet had an assault die on me but you need to make sure they always have cover. The skeleton suit already provides a defense boost which if coupled with tactical sense makes your trooper really hard to hit.

[X-Kalibur]

Now for the heavy. They are sort of a mixed bag bringing both large firepower and decent support to the field, depending on the tree. That said... they have some traps.

Bullet Swarm vs Holotargeting - Bullet swarm is so superior pretend the other one doesn't exist. Holotargeting provides a measly +10% hit chance against targets that have been fired at by the heavy, including suppression. Bullet Swarm lets you, essentially - fire twice, fire and suppress, fire and then move, fire and reload, fire and overwatch. For me, no contest. And extra 10 percent chance against a creature in cover that you have a 35% chance to hit only makes it 45%. I'd rather fire once and maybe break their cover and then either suppress or fire again.

Shredder Rocket vs Suppression - lets be honest, you need at least one person with suppression on your team. Shredder rockets have their uses and if you field two heavies, totally take it. But I don't like blowing stuff up unless I have to. Suppression gives you a reaction shot if they move (like overwatch but single target) and forces a -30 aim penalty on them. Shredder rocket gives you a second rocket to be fired that does less damage than a normal rocket but anything hit takes 33% more damage for 4 turns.

HEAT ammo vs Rapid Reaction - 100% more damage against mechanical enemies (drones, cyberdiscs, SECTOPODS!) or a 2nd overwatch shot but only if the first one hits... HEAT Ammo, thanks. Makes a joke of cyberdiscs and makes Sectopods more manageable. Also note - HEAT ammo applies to every weapon on the heavy, even rockets.

Grenadier vs Danger Zone (done in Archer voice) - Grenadier gives you two grenades instead of 1 if you use them. Danger zone adds an additional 2 tiles to your rocket and suppression effects. I'll give you a better idea of why I like Danger zone when we hit the final ranks.

Rocketeer vs Mayhem - Rocketeer gives you one additional standard rocket. Mayhem gives your suppression fire damage equal to the tech level of the gun. So LMG = 1, Laser =2, Plamsa = 3. This is guaranteed damage and is even affected by HEAT Ammo. See that cyberdisc with two drones behind it? I suppress it, hit both drones as well, and all 3 of them take 6 damage. Score. Also helps for stunning bigger aliens, because hey, 3 damage is nothing when they start quickly going past 10. Also works great with the first ability because you can take a normal shot and THEN suppress them.

Major ability - take two less damage if in cover and not flanked.

I love a mobile squad and heavies are already limited in their movement. I prefer to keep them up front with my squad by using the skeleton armor again. The damage reduction from Major rank helps protect against the failings of the lighter armor and if needed, you can give them some extra health through their accessory slot instead of a grenade or scope. Their guns often blow away cover on misses leaving enemies more vulnerable and even suppression can blow out cover.

[X-Kalibur]

Now for support class. You have two VERY different play styles with the support and along with assaults these make up the backbone of your teams.

Sprinter vs covering fire - sprinter gives 3 extra tiles of movement, aka, amazing. While covering fire allows you to react with overwatch on a firing alien. If you're going a fire team support route go with covering fire while a medic will want sprinter. Alternately, sprinter on the fire support just because extra movement is great and you can stick them in heavier armor.

Field Medic vs Smoke and Mirrors - really easy choice. If you're running a support medic - Field medic gives medkits 3 uses per battle while a fire support can get a 2nd smoke grenade per battle. All in how you're using them.

Revive vs Fire suppression - I'm a little torn on this one. Revive is useful... if your unit actually goes critical rather than dying, and sometimes I'd rather just have them stabilized than back in the fight. Rifle suppression otherwise works just like the heavy's suppression ability. Useful.

Dense Smoke vs Combat drugs - early on dense smoke is the super obvious choice, you get +20 more defense in the smoke (total of +40 defense!). Combat drugs gives you +20 will and +10 crit chance in the smoke, really useful when you fight psionic enemies later (and have your own psionics) as will affects your ability and resistance to psi. I find combat drugs more useful late game but dense smoke is a life saver earlier.

Savior vs Sentinel - Savior allows medkits to heal 4 more damage each use. This means 10 HPs if you have improved medkits. Sentinel allows 2 reaction shots while on overwatch (no first hit required like the heavy). Easy choice based on the type of supporter you're running.

Thoughts: Supports make either great scouts and fire support (sprinter + sentinel + rifle suppression) or are the team medic. But don't overlook that scouting and fire support. Later ships have something like 27 aliens in them and you have 6 soldiers. Their 2nd item slot also allows for a great variety, allowing a scout oriented support to carry grenades and a scope to break cover and improve accuracy. With a light plasma (having an innate +10 aim bonus) you get a really accurate, if less damaging, shot that adds up in a hurry. They can either soften up a unit or bring down a wounded one more easily.

[X-Kalibur]

Finally - Snipers.

While they mostly excel at open maps like UFO exteriors, don't count them out in closer quarters either.

Snap shot vs squad sight - I would say this boils down to how mobile your sniper is. Snap shot allows you to fire or overwatch with your rifle after moving, but with a -20 penalty. Squad sight allows you to fire on aliens your teammates can see, provided you have a shot to it. Once you have better pistols and the pistol upgrades I don't find snap shot to be all that useful, it's also not as useful until higher ranks when you aim is better as well. I'd leave the snap shot at home.

Gunslinger vs Damn Good Ground - Gunslinger gives pistols +2 damage. Damn good ground gives an additional +10 aim and defense against targets on lower level than you. (does not count if you are flying in armor! warning!) While with the skeleton suit you get a grappling hook that helps getting to higher ground, most of your shots are going to be taken from the same level because the higher ground will screw your LOF. This is from having used DGG and being unimpressed.

Disabling Shot vs Battle Scanner - both amazing abilities. Disabling shot causes 2 damage at most (great for subduing) and causes their gun to require reloading. Battle scanner gives you two throwable scanners that provide sight. Use your judgement here, both are super useful. The scanner is amazing for throwing into a building or UFO to avoid someone else getting shot at for visual contact though.

Executioner vs Opportunist - I wouldn't bother with executioner. You get +10 aim against targets with less than 50% health. Meanwhile, Opportunist removes the aim penalty from overwatch and allows reaction shots to crit. This one should be a no brainer unless you're running around with that snap shot sniper and you need that +10 to offset your -20 (don't forget, sniper rifles are less accurate at closer ranges as well).

Major gives you low profile - makes half cover count as full cover. You can now position yourself anywhere you want that has cover and be fairly safe. Enjoy.

In the Zone vs double tap - In the zone: "Killing a flanked or uncovered enemy with your sniper rifle does not cost an action". Double Tap - you can fire twice if you don't move. 1 turn cooldown. Again, unless you're playing that weird snapshotting sniper, in the zone isn't likely. Meanwhile, I'm double tapping muton elites and berserkers to make sure they stay down.

I'd keep your sniper in either skeleton armor (mobility and defense bonus + grappling hook ftw!) or angel armor (heavy + flight). The defense bonus granted by the skeleton armor along with half cover counting as full makes your sniper REALLY hard to hit, however. Mine is now in Psi-armor, however, since he's my only psionic. I'd love to have a support that was psionic, sigh.

[X-Kalibur]

Again, my team is 1 sniper, 2 assault (1 shotgun 1 rifle), 1 heavy (support oriented), and 2 support (1 medic, 1 scout/fire support). I tend to emphasize defense over offense because I like all my troopers making it back.

<edit> thoughts on psionics!

There are only two choices to be made as you go down the tree. You "rank up" just by using them, doesn't even have to be successful.

You start with mind fray - and it's awesome. 5 damage and gives penalties to aim, will, and mobility for 2 turns and has a 1 turn cooldown.

Choice 1: Psi inspiration or Psi Panic - inspiration provides you and allies within 3 squares +30 will for 2 turns and removes the effects of mind fray or panic. 4 turn CD. Panic makes an enemy unit panic if they fail the will check. 2 turn CD. I like both of them a lot but inspiration probably has more use as you get further. Standing in combat drugs with an inspiration buff just upped your Will by 50 - now you just have to mind fray an ethereal successfully and another unit with the same bonuses might be able to mind control him for the achievement!

Choice 2: Telekinetic field or mind control. Mind control is obvious, you mind control them for 3 rounds if you succeed, it has a 5 round CD. Telekinetic field gives you +40 defense to anyone in the field of effect and only last through the enemy turn, 4 turn CD. Control is great for making aliens kill each other, telekinetic field could be awesome on a support or heavy who is compromised.

<edit edit>

I apologize for the post spam. It was just easier to break up my thoughts that way.

Also, while I shy away from explosives early one (no weapon fragments, no making or researching weapons!) grenades are great later on when one won't kill an enemy but will break his cover. Look at it like this - enemy is in cover, team has 35% chance to hit. Give them scopes they now have 45% chance, give someone a grenade and blow his cover? he just took 3 (or 5, alien nades) damage and lost cover and the team now has a 75% chance to hit him... or 85% for the scoped folk.

[Tanegar]

Also, while I shy away from explosives early one (no weapon fragments, no making or researching weapons!) grenades are great later on when one won't kill an enemy but will break his cover. Look at it like this - enemy is in cover, team has 35% chance to hit. Give them scopes they now have 45% chance, give someone a grenade and blow his cover? he just took 3 (or 5, alien nades) damage and lost cover and the team now has a 75% chance to hit him... or 85% for the scoped folk.

Heavy with Rocketeer versus Mutons in cover. Wait, did I say in cover? I mean standing around with their dicks in their hands. >:D Even better if all three of them cluster up.

Am I the only one who color-codes troopers? Rookies get white armor, Assaults are green, Heavies are red, Supports are yellow, and Snipers are black.

[LurkerOutThere]

X's guide bears out a number of things I've found. I've got Arcangel research but havn't built/deployed it as i'm a bit concerned about my resource count, but personally i prefer titan armor to skeleton, even for my assaults. Plus Titan armors poison immunity is a godsend. I've had two muton berserkers and a crysalid come up to wail on my chitin and titan equiped assault and i still had more then half health, I don't think there was any other way they would have survived that.

Speaking of which, dont's sell crysalid corpses, they are suprisingly rare in the late game and are needed to produce the afformentioned chitin armor. I made this mistake and now only have two chitin to go around, which is enough to meet my needs but I still wouldn't mind having one more.

[CanRay]

No, strangely, Precision gives you the laser Sniper and the laser .... Shotgun. *shrug*

Precision ground lenses, allows for really accurate lasers, and mulch-faceted prisms to make rainbow "shotgun" laser blasts. Also, they had to figure out a reason to pump the Shotgun Laser when you fired every shot. The soldiers insisted upon this for some reason.

[Tanegar]

Well, I've had my first TPK. During an alien abduction mission in Sapporo, Japan, I ran afoul of an army of Mutons and a Cyberdisc. I think my big mistake was taking a team that was half Rookies. The first group consisted of two regular Mutons and a Berserker, and they managed to kill one Rookie before being wiped out. Then the Cyberdisc and a Drone spawned right on top of my team and killed two more, including my one remaining Colonel-level Support trooper, which is a major loss. I did manage to down the Cyberdisc, but then three more triads of Mutons arrived. If I had run at that point, I might have been able to salvage something, but I foolishly attempted to stand my ground, and the three remaining troopers were quickly butchered.

I really need to spread some promotions around, and buy that OTS upgrade that makes new soldiers come in at Squaddie level instead of Rookie.

[_Pax._]

Disabling Shot vs Battle Scanner - both amazing abilities. Disabling shot causes 2 damage at most (great for subduing) and causes their gun to require reloading. Battle scanner gives you two throwable scanners that provide sight. Use your judgement here, both are super useful. The scanner is amazing for throwing into a building or UFO to avoid someone else getting shot at for visual contact though.

Battle Scanner + Squad Sight, strikes me as a damned fine combination. Throw the scanner as far forward as you can, then snipe the ever-loving crap out of any aliens the scanner can see.

I haven't used the tw together yet, mind you. But the synergy seems pretty blindingly-obvious to me.

[LurkerOutThere]

I do not believe battle scanner qualifies for spotting BUT battle scanner is amazing because it will detect guys wtihout "triggering" them or notifying them of your presence. And ocne their detected they stay highlighted. Makes a great way to set up ambushes for patrolling enemies or encircle a coven.

[LurkerOutThere]

On the last level now......will let you all know will probably have to spoiler the hell out of it.

[X-Kalibur]

I do not believe battle scanner qualifies for spotting BUT battle scanner is amazing because it will detect guys wtihout "triggering" them or notifying them of your presence. And ocne their detected they stay highlighted. Makes a great way to set up ambushes for patrolling enemies or encircle a coven.

You are correct, the scanner does not qualify as a squad mate, therefore, squad sight does not apply.

[CanRay]

Skeleton Suit unlocked... Grappling Hook is SWEET!!!

[LurkerOutThere]

Alright, beat the game. I'm going to spoiler some of the stuff below.

[ Spoiler ]

I played through on normal difficulty, non ironman. I didn't save scum for shots or such but did occasionally reload to an earlier turn or part in the geoscape to correct tactical mistakes I made, more often then not because of interface/camera angle stuff. This was also my 3rd or 4th attempt at playing the game implementing some strategic tips i found based on someone who'd had an early look at the game as well as my own failures. What that meant is I knew what to research and when, i knew which council requests to fullfil and which to ignore.

On the whole while awesome the game started to get tedious towards the end. The ending felt rushed and was explained poorly by gravely voiced etherials. There felt like there should have been another cutscene between interacting with the etherial device and the final mission. Also the last base was a slog, not even a hard slog, just a slog.

I liked the game, I really did but once I figure out some of it's systems and learned the tricks to staying alive and wasn't in such a resource crunch some of the games charm started to wear off.

Annoyances:
The aliens will always get a free move after they see you bullshit: This is the games single biggest problem, especially as the demos seemed to promise that the aliens will be doing things or patrolling or something. Instead they always leap up from what they were doing and take a free move. Depending on your disposition of your troops when you trigger them this can either lead to fish in a barrel from overwatch shots or the beggining of an ass raping as the aliens take their free move and then immediately take their actual move and shot. The reason I don't like this is it forces the gameplay into slog mode leapfrog cover, advance advance, fight, heal/reload resume.
There just aren't enough ships to shoot down! I remember in the old x-com there's this feeling of alien ships being all over the place going about their business. In the current one they seem a rarity and more or less driven by the story. That bugs the shit out of me. Especially since I found myself with more money then I knew what to do with but a lack of corpses and alien nav computers in the late game. Yet I kept getting hit with the stupid abduction missions.
Forced scarcity: This ties into the above. The whole concept that you can't replicate the alien tech is alright to start. I dug ellerium being precious in the previous game as it couldn't be replicated on earth. But now we need corpses too? And alloy, and weapons fragments? All this stuff that no matter how much your research progresses you can't replicate no matter how much money you had. I reached the point where I literally had 2 grand in the bank and very little to spend it on while I waited for a ship to fly over that I could actually shoot down somewhat intact.
ONE TEAM: There was a point in the game when my roster numbered like 20+ soldiers in varying states of development. But once I got more core squad going and got the fast healing benefit out of the officers academy and learned good tactics for dealin witht he aliens there was little incentive to use anyone but the same six guys.
Mind Controlled Enemies Dying Counts as lost soldiers for morale: This little bug got most evident at the end where the mind controlled enemies getting killed by their fellows got me taunted by the aliens. Very strange and annoying bug.

So yea on the whole I enjoyed the hell out of the game, it just seems like it needed a bit more polish as once your no longer fretting every action of every battle it gets a little tedious. To be fair the original did that too in the late game.

[taeksosin]

<3 my skele suits, though I need to start splashing more UFO's so I can start making more stuffs.

At the moment, with some minimal save scumming (restarted a mission when I misclicked and sent my Cpt. Assault directly into a swarm of already visible chrysallids, whoopsies, things like that) playing on the normal/default difficulty, I'm finding it lots of fun. Two Colonels (Heavy with some bad skill choices in retrospect, and a sniper who I <3 and protect like she's an innocent babe in the woods) and minimal losses of non-rookies once I got past the first few missions and got the game play down. Looking forward to finishing this game up (just finished the skeleton key mission stuffs) however much longer it takes and taking a test drive on a higher difficulty.

I've spent a lot on troops though. Those poor rookies up on the wall...

[StealthSigma]

So yea on the whole I enjoyed the hell out of the game, it just seems like it needed a bit more polish as once your no longer fretting every action of every battle it gets a little tedious. To be fair the original did that too in the late game.

That's the general pattern for most squad tactics game. At some point the game trivializes unless you intentionally gimp yourself or made really bad early choices (which could involve rushing). I've yet to see any that scale well with buildup.

[Falconer]

Not much to add on X-kal's comments on classes. Except that you'll find as you take wounds prepare to mix up things a bit. Especially as the game goes on I'm finding i'm retiring my colonels so I can continue to level up other troopers!

Been playing my way through classic game with the tutorial enabled by default (lousy starting... already ripped out the containment facility move it so I could put another sat system in.


Squad boosts to buy early... 5man squad, 6man squad. Increased willpower for leveling (more willpower == less panic and such). I'm completely unaware if this helps soldiers who have already leveled up?! I know when I bought the squaddie perk all my rookies suddenly were squaddies. Anyone else find this out?!


That said... timing seems to be everything in this game. Especially at the strategic level. That and resources are always very tight.

I found that I was launching my satellites after multiple abduction events to reduce the panic guages but before month end to get the extra $$$$. I timed the base raid to do it when I had about 3 bars at mid levels and 3 more at high levels.. instantly put out all those fires. Decide your raids not based on payout but keeping panic levels down or you WILL lose member countries.

Found this out late... but putting up all the sats on a continent also gets you the continents perk just as if you built there to begin with. As an aside, this also means you can skimp on putting sats up on your first continent except to reduce panic levels as needed or convenient.

Forget laboratories... workshops help a lot more! (no good to research things you can't build due to lack of resources... that and capturing aliens alive for the tech speed boost helps a good deal).

I found I was micromanaging things around my workshop builds... intentionally timing them to finish just after the workshop did for bigger rebates. (2x2 cluster of workshops is 28% rebate, 3x2 49%...).


I'm not quite sure how this happened but I got the interceptor upgrade along with the EMP cannon at the same time with no steps between... prior to that the phoenix cannon worked fine (didn't waste my precious alien materials to build either!).

There may be something to be said for skipping laser and going straight to plasma weaponry... I didn't but that light plasma is pretty much identical to laser but with a +10 accuracy. I found all my assaults/supports were armed pretty much exclusively with rifles.

Old school xcom of putting core 'gunmen' up high and then moving forward with scouts still works... just buy the squad sight on your snipers! That plus overwatch on those guys is amazing... save their shots for last as they can and will drop charging chrysalids in one shot oftentimes saving your forward units.

I haven't been able to use laser rifles and the like to make doors as I see fit though... shame really :(. Making my own door was always a great trick. I miss the old proximity grenades as well. Clearing maps still takes forever.. especially when the cowardly mutons are hiding in the far back corner of the map and refuse to come out and be blown away!

Unknown if you can keep more than one alien alive at a time in containment. I was playing like this because it ws old school xcom... i mostly ended up stunning enemies so I could get their weapons intact though rather than needing to build them.

XP is based on kills.. so if at all possible try and steer kills to those you want to level (in my case the lowbies...). You never know when the RNG won't like you and you'll lose someone important. (biggst shock to me was when a sniper had a car blow up in his face taking him to 1... spent a lot of time in the hospital).

A full fledged rocketeer is godsend if you're using 2 snipers... wall in the way... what wall... especially if you can damage but not kill the enemies in the process. Rockets will destroy your equipment rewards if they kill or waste corpses. I had abysmal luck with each heavy I tried to go down the suppressive fire route with. Simply blowing stuff up and taking cover with it made things remarkably easy for all my rifles to clean up messes.

Also, if you are using 2 snipers... make sure you have at least one and preferably both in position before moving forward. You're rarely on a clock, and this also gives your people time to reload... reaction shots are pointless if they're out of ammo. (lost my solid medic to a damn chrysallid when i suddenly spawned 3 of them and was only able to gun down one wound another before they had a chance to act again. Which brings the next bit.

Always wait to declare reaction fire until everyone is in position... had I not put one person on reaction fire already. I could have retreated the scout group then gunned all the chrysalids down after they closed again.

Support with +3move, or Assaults make the best scouts. Support can move forward fast... trigger spawns then run like sissies back out of range/behind cover. Assaults can do this and declare run and gun to still fire/overwatch or go on full offense with fire twice and the like. Depends on if you like a more offensive scout or not. Assaults ability to avoid reaction shots also plays a big role.

Supports with 2 slots make great stunbunnies! One slot for the medkit second for the stunner. On top of +3 move... and forward duty they're good at being there when needed to put things down. (I also tried this with assaults in titan armor... but the inability to stun after run&gun was disappointing!).

[Tanegar]

Can you only interrogate one of each species? I captured a second Sectoid Commander, but there's no option in the Research menu to interrogate it, and clicking on the holding pen does nothing.

[taeksosin]

Is it just me or is this game BEGGING for a Shadowrun mod?

If this game opens up to modding, gonna start learning the lingo and get the wife working on graphics for me. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

[CanRay]

Is it just me or is this game BEGGING for a Shadowrun mod?

If this game opens up to modding, gonna start learning the lingo and get the wife working on graphics for me. (IMG:style_emoticons/default/smile.gif)

IIRC, they were talking about opening it up to Modding, as they found it was popular from their Civilization roots.

[_Pax._]

You are correct, the scanner does not qualify as a squad mate, therefore, squad sight does not apply.

Now, see, that IMO is either a bug, or a poorly thought-out design issue. It really SHOULD count towards that, simply because the synergy is so bloody obvious, and other classes have skills with clear synergy too.