XCOM 2

Yeah I know, that's what OG XCom hair was referring to.

Started playing this Tuesday, first thing i want to say is HOLY RNG BATMAN. From hacking to what you get from Proving Grounds projects to how soon you get Domination for your Psi Ops, they have added too much rng to the game. An Ironman run would be obnoxious at the high difficulty levels. Dominate that Andromedon? Yay. Fail to do it? Things might get very bad. I am playing at non-Ironman Commander difficulty and at this point i think i have the game wrapped up. Between 4 Mimic Beacons, Haywire Protocol and Domination/Stasis i doubt i am ever getting shot at again. Also, is it me or Snipers suck in this game? I am thinking it'd be best to forego them completely in my subsequent Ironman run(s) and save the resources needed to upgrade them for the other classes.

Fuck, I suck and get screwed by RNG in Ironman mode. I have failed three campaigns so far. But I keep coming back like some abused wife.

I actually failed my first mission ever today in my legend/im campaign. Not even any wounds, but I accidentally blew up the truck with the objective inside. Cost me a big ass chunk of intel and an extra dark event for the month, it sucked.

I started my L/I run last night. Came up with a new drinking game during the first mission (which took me like 6-7 tries to complete). Every time a soldier misses a point blank flanked shot, you take a drink. Fun times.

DrLifetilt_sl said:

Started playing this Tuesday, first thing i want to say is HOLY RNG BATMAN. From hacking to what you get from Proving Grounds projects to how soon you get Domination for your Psi Ops, they have added too much rng to the game. An Ironman run would be obnoxious at the high difficulty levels. Dominate that Andromedon? Yay. Fail to do it? Things might get very bad. I am playing at non-Ironman Commander difficulty and at this point i think i have the game wrapped up. Between 4 Mimic Beacons, Haywire Protocol and Domination/Stasis i doubt i am ever getting shot at again. Also, is it me or Snipers suck in this game? I am thinking it'd be best to forego them completely in my subsequent Ironman run(s) and save the resources needed to upgrade them for the other classes.

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Definitely just you. I had dual snipers up through until the last push where I swapped one for psi. Get to a perch, rain death, move forward, repeat. Sniper with ext mag, auto loader, and repeater is a recipe for destruction. That first time you kill 6+ enemies in a single round with serial or your overwatch/kill zone starts executing new pods wandering into the battle is glorious. No joke, first time I met a Gatekeeper he aggroed himself from patrolling into my kill zone and died immediately from repeater.

Raes_sl said:

I started my L/I run last night. Came up with a new drinking game during the first mission (which took me like 6-7 tries to complete). Every time a soldier misses a point blank flanked shot, you take a drink. Fun times.

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You are lucky you didn't kill yourself with alcohol poisoning.

Kinda funny how some people think snipers suck and other people think snipers are godlike. Think that proves that Firaxis did a great job making just about every class combo/strat viable.

Here's a nice chunk of mods people might want to consider. Some cosmetic stuff, some QoL stuff, and some balance stuff.

Steam Workshop :: Hamster's XCOM 2 Essentials

Snipers are fucking fantastic if you mod their weapon and them ammunition, like the +1 damage & burning ammo.

The only problem is when you start moving into a building and your sharpshooter is on a building on the back of the map, but god damn if 'Death From Above' isn't one of the best abilities in the game.

I lost my commander difficulty ironman campaign. I rushed PSI, if you can even call it that because you HAVE to wait until the first supply depot to even start building it. Then it requires 5 power, so you have to neglect every other building, or build a power core. It ends up being SO much strain on your supply. You won't have many regions, because you have to neglect radio due to power demands. You won't have a six man squad. You won't have predator armor. You won't have Mag guns. You won't have gear your troops need.

...even with 0 KIA's I lost. Not having the AWC early on hurt, and then my avatar bar just filled up too fast before I could really start spreading out. By that point, I had PSI with mag guns & predator armor, 5 man squad, and yeah they were raping things but you have to sacrifice all your map control. So unless you get lucky and have Avatar facilities spawn in, or around, your territory you are pretty much fucked.

Long story short: Barring tremendously good RNG, like having a power core in a good location, or great Avatar spawns, rushing PSI troops very early is NOT a viable strategy.

I love how unforgiving this game is. It's the Dark Souls of the turn-based strategy world. The only thing really comparable is the Total War series, but even on the highest difficulties that game is fucking cake due to the limitations of the AI. TW: Warhammer does look pretty amazing though.

Losing a campaign with 0 killed soldiers, 0 failed missions, is damn well disconcerting.

Sulrn_sl said:

Definitely just you. I had dual snipers up through until the last push where I swapped one for psi. Get to a perch, rain death, move forward, repeat. Sniper with ext mag, auto loader, and repeater is a recipe for destruction. That first time you kill 6+ enemies in a single round with serial or your overwatch/kill zone starts executing new pods wandering into the battle is glorious. No joke, first time I met a Gatekeeper he aggroed himself from patrolling into my kill zone and died immediately from repeater.

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I really wouldn't want to wait till late game for them to be good, every class looks great with full abilities, gear and a bunch of mods. I guess i got tired of them missing all the time in early/mid game, not enough guaranteed damage.

Use a grenadier to blow away cover & armor, then snipe.

Sniper is probably the easiest class to keep alive since they are an entire map away. The only real danger to them is the extraction missions, and them not being able to reach the EVAC on time and getting captured. If you want to rush a class to Colonel, they are pretty good considering their incredible uptime. Once you get to Death From Above, it's smooth sailing. Ranger love doesn't make sense to me. Yeah the Shotgun is incredible, but they don't have the utility of a Grenadier or Specialist. Specialists with upgraded hacking are absurd since they basically have a Mind Control for anything mechanical.

Just have to upgrade your Gremlin to Mk II or higher.

Rangers- its the whole being able to run from ludicrous range, hack the guy in half, then run off into cover all in the same turn thing that I love.

VariaVespasa_sl said:

Rangers- its the whole being able to run from ludicrous range, hack the guy in half, then run off into cover all in the same turn thing that I love.

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Are you really able to get far enough away to guarantee that you won't get flanked?

The only thing I dislike is starting a new campaign and getting four chicks with butch cuts and flat tops. Insta-restart.

Seems like it happens so fucking often too, like getting four females alone is 6.25%. Then to make them all ugly as hell, well... yeah. I get fucked by the RNG in different ways, not in combat.

Woolygimp_sl said:

The only thing I dislike is starting a new campaign and getting four chicks with butch cuts and flat tops. Insta-restart.

Seems like it happens so fucking often too, like getting four females alone is 6.25%. Then to make them all ugly as hell, well... yeah. I get fucked by the RNG in different ways, not in combat.

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You can change them after you get them, even swap their genders and nationality. You can change them at any point in the campaign even.
It's not like EW. (It's why I said the character pool was not needed earlier--you can remake any random person you get into whatever you want.)

Are you really able to get far enough away to guarantee that you won't get flanked?

Late game? Yeah, especially because you'll have untouchable, so the first shot is an auto miss. (In general).

As far as snipers, yeah, because Squad Sight has a penalty now, early game they are a little weak. They really start to become immensely powerful mid game. Some people like repeaters on them because of kill zone, but for me, the best part about a sniper is you can focus solely on their aim stat. By mid/late game my sniper, if she's perched on high ground, can often get 90%+ on people even in full cover. I use an Aim PCS (+10 ish) and a superior scope (+15), combined with their really high base accuracy and the squad sight penalty is a non-factor. (As others have said, the best combo is Grenadier/Sniper. I use my grenadiers to destroy cover, and weaken, then mop up with two snipers. One uses AP rounds so I essentially have guaranteed 8-10 damage regardless of target, one uses Blue Screen to pound mechs.) Early game if you get tracer ammo is combos really well with Snipers.

But as said, it is all about aim. They do get fucked over because they can't flank usually and because of the SS penalty. But they also get the benefit of being able to stack nothing but aim, because they don't have to be super mobile or survivable.

Btw, some reallygood info in this thread on Reddit.Shows how not all damage ranges are direct rolls--but rather some are chances at bonus damage. (For example, grenades are base 3 damage and a 20% chance at +1 damage. That's why they almost always hit with 3 damage.)

Crits are also not double damage (Which is pretty apparent.)...Shotguns have the highest bonus crit damage, with +5 at plasma. Snipers get +4. Which means Talon rounds are essentially worse than most other +damage ammo, except for late game shotguns (Talons are +1-2 damage on crit, and 20% crit). Late game shot guns that means 20% increase to do 6-7 extra damage, or around 1.3 damage a shot. Compared to poison and fire, which provide +1 base damage, and debuff the target and dot it. However, I still use them on my rangers because they push his crit over 100 at close with superior laser sight (Laser sight +15% crit, or more at very close range, then 40% from flank, and 20% base from plasma shot gun). The ability to count on 19-38 damage (Double shot and +3 flank damage from GTS) because you know you're going to crit is massive. (Like most things in this game, it's more important to do big chunks of damage than to do more damage over a few turns. Because it is more important to keep the target from firing back.)

Snipers have decent crit with the GTS perk (+10) and steady hands, plus the base for sniper rifles (10). 30% base chance, with the rounds it would be 50%, for a bonus 5-6 damage. The problem is, unlike the rangers it's not consistent; especially because I can't always count on blowing cover before the snipers can shoot. IMO, the best sniper ammo is either tracer (Mid game), or AP.

One of my Grenadiers got Run & Gun... MUAHAHAHAHAHA!

Woolygimp_sl said:

Are you really able to get far enough away to guarantee that you won't get flanked?

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Yup, especially since the ones who could have flanked you are likely the ones you and your two other ranger buddies ginsu'd in the face and any enemy survivors are further back. And if something goes horribly wrong and you miss or you activate another pod you hork out a mimic beacon placed to lure the enemy to its pointy doom and slaughterise them next round. This is said with the understanding that theyre using SMG's for the extra mobility, mind you. Its part of why snipers dont really work for me in xcom 2- I'm moving too fast among too much terrain for the snipers to keep up in useful positions.