XCOM 2

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Fadaar

Fadaar

That guy
11,043
12,062
Gavinmad_sl said:
There's no linear progression in the difficulty levels. Commander is basically just a ramped up Veteran, all they really did was fudge some numbers, hence the shorter avatar countdown among other things. Legendary is a completely rebalanced difficulty.



I don't know what's scarier, losing nuclear weapons, or that it happens so often there's actually a term for it.
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Oh there's more than one.

United States military nuclear incident terminology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read about what happened back in 2007 (2007 United States Air Force nuclear weapons incident - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia). My MTI (drill sergeant basically) in basic training was a missile tech before becoming an MTI and toward the end of basic (March 2010) he told us the entire story about this. Pretty scary something like that can happen, and good lord did a lot of people get shitcanned for it.
 
Gavinmad

Gavinmad

Mr. Poopybutthole
43,921
52,663
Fadaar_sl said:
Oh there's more than one.

United States military nuclear incident terminology - Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Read about what happened back in 2007 (
rrr_img_2007.jpg
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Jait

Jait

Molten Core Raider
5,035
5,317
Twilight Sparkle_sl said:
XCOM | Age Gate


Pretty stiff nerf to mimic beacons, but I still see them being invaluable.
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When you posted "stiff nerf" I assumed you meant 1 per mission. Wasted my time.
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They get hit now, no dodge, no cover. Makes sense. They were ridiculously overpowered.

I will fondly remember bringing 2 mimic beacons on most missions and walking through the mission at 2+ kills per turn.
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Gavinmad

Gavinmad

Mr. Poopybutthole
43,921
52,663
They should still absorb an entire pod worth of enemy fire in the first half of the game or so, and later on they're still worth it for taking the heat off on multi-pod activations. I imagine people using beacons as a crutch to compensate for sloppy gameplay should find the game a lot harder now.
 
Sulrn

Sulrn

Deuces
2,159
360
I can understand the intent, but I can't understand taking away cover bonus. An illusion behind cover is still behind cover. Dodge I agree with, but cover. . . This is coming from someone that only used 3 the entire course of my campaign, one of those being so I could see how it worked.
 
Mures

Mures

Blackwing Lair Raider
4,014
511
Its a pretty big nerf, no cover also means higher chance to crit doesn't it? Many beacons are only going to absorb 1 shot, don't see any beacon absorbing more than 2.
 
Gavinmad

Gavinmad

Mr. Poopybutthole
43,921
52,663
mures_sl said:
Its a pretty big nerf, no cover also means higher chance to crit doesn't it? Many beacons are only going to absorb 1 shot, don't see any beacon absorbing more than 2.
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Hmm, that's a good point. They should at least be changed to not count as exposed if they don't get cover anymore.
 
Jait

Jait

Molten Core Raider
5,035
5,317
It's just trying to fix something that's broken fundamentally.

Mimic beacon mechanics are bad. They shouldn't taunt/have priority the way the do. That's the real problem. Having them get whacked after one hit is a dumb fix. I have no issues with a good squad throwing a mimic beacon from cover, to another covered spot which is flanking the enemy. If that's the case, then damn straight the enemy is going to go after it until it's revealed as a mimic beacon. That's just good gaming. But mimic beacons were retarded to the point where you could walk your squad down the street, and as soon as they exposed an enemy, just toss a beacon behind full-full cover and watch the enemies all pile up. And that's if you're a retard. Better players set ambush and overwatch then lure with the beacons and rack up the kills.

In any event, I'm rambling. I'm not smart enough to fix it, but I think the "fix" is bad in principle. They should revamp the mechanics not give it a quick fix like this.
 
Gavinmad

Gavinmad

Mr. Poopybutthole
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52,663
Yeah in enemy within they just attracted the enemy, which could make them break cover in stupid ways but not nearly so powerful an effect.
 
khorum

khorum

Murder Apologist
24,338
81,363
I avoided reddit/spoilers and this thread when I saw spoiler tags so I never used mimics until my 2nd legendary playthrough heh.

My first play was as ironman/commander and it was pretty fucking long and gruelling. But when I did my first legendary playthrough I went ahead and tried the mimics and yeah, they kinda heave a large chunk of the risk calculus out of the game when you get enough mats to make 2 or 3 of them.

Mid-game was pretty rough without them on my legendary FoH Asshat All-Stars playthrough, though. Kegkilla got raped by a viper and Szlia was captured when he couldn't make it to the evac in time. BUT a neat feature of the game is that soldiers who are captured in that way can be RESCUED through VIP extraction guerrilla missions! It was pretty cool to pop open an Advent cell and see Szlia in there.
 
Seananigans

Seananigans

Honorary Shit-PhD
<Gold Donor>
13,893
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I haven't yet tried new mimics, but if they don't use cover, wouldn't they abide by the same LOS rules as non-cover entities?

A normal cover-using unit basically counts as existing in its own space, plus any "step-out" space, for LOS. Things that don't use cover (chryssalids, aboms, etc) can be tougher to get LOS on, because they only exist in that one space, so if behind heavy cover, you have to move to the (probably roughly 45 degree?) angle that lets you finally see that thing. This was especially annoying in EW/Long War with Mechtoids.

If so, this is almost less of a nerf, and more of a side-grade. They absorb fewer hits, but without a change in taunting mechanics, you can just make the aliens make stupid moves forward trying to get into LOS to see the mimic.
 
Mures

Mures

Blackwing Lair Raider
4,014
511
Will they attack it if they can't see it? I aggroed two groups last night, used a mimic beacon, and the pod further away from the mimic definitely ignored it.
 
Jait

Jait

Molten Core Raider
5,035
5,317
mures_sl said:
Will they attack it if they can't see it? I aggroed two groups last night, used a mimic beacon, and the pod further away from the mimic definitely ignored it.
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From my observations they will ALWAYS attack the beacon first as long as they have the action points to do so and have LoS.

There are times where that might not seem to be the case but some aliens get very few movement points.
 
Seananigans

Seananigans

Honorary Shit-PhD
<Gold Donor>
13,893
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My somewhat educated guess would be that they're coded to do their best to attack the beacon, but if impossible (via extreme range or w/e), they're released and can attack something else. I'd guess it tells them it's there and that they want to attack it. My point was simply that you can cause the AI to have to move much more unfavorably just to be able to see the thing now, if it abides by the rules I think it should.
 
Gavinmad

Gavinmad

Mr. Poopybutthole
43,921
52,663
Well part of that problem is that the AI 'cheats' and knows where you are even when they can't see you...which means they know where the mimic beacon is too. Only thing I've ever seen ignore a beacon is a stun lancer. I verified the cheating thing when an advent trooper rushed forward to shoot at an exposed sniper that had never been in LoS of the enemy at any point during the mission. Completely terrible move unless you knew you were getting an exposed target to shoot at.

Waiting another day or two for broken mods to be sorted out before I start another playthrough, wanna see how much the diablo loot mod has been improved. Hear he has unique pistols now.
 
Mures

Mures

Blackwing Lair Raider
4,014
511
Jait_sl said:
From my observations they will ALWAYS attack the beacon first as long as they have the action points to do so and have LoS.

There are times where that might not seem to be the case but some aliens get very few movement points.
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Yeah, that makes sense, it was a commander and the two units were on complete opposite ends of the battle taking place so he probably couldn't move in range and get a shot.
 
Dandain

Dandain

Trakanon Raider
2,092
917
If you find the entire notion of the beacon to be broken, then just don't use it. Its a single player game. I saw people say it was broken, so I haven't even thrown one. If it ruins the game for you don't use it, if you like the op-ness of it and feel like a boss when you fool the AI then mimic away. We can do what all nerds do. Feel superior when we don't use a crutch.
 
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