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

[ArchAngel]

How can u guys suggest him Long war 2 if he is playing Xcom 2 for the first time, cmon.

he need to take confidence with the game before overwhelming him with complicated stuff.

Because vanilla Xcom 2 is only a bit better than vanilla Xcom 1 and that game was pretty bad (once novelty of playing it ran out 1 week after release).

 

[ArchAngel]

i want the ultra hardcore experience.

Then ignore Xcom 2 vanilla and expansion and just buy Xcom 2 vanilla and install Long War 2. Start on Veteran difficulty, if you find it too easy after 10h (I doubt you will) restart on Commander difficulty
Also you might need to read a bit on the long war 2 wiki about some of its mechanics, not everything is explained ingame.

 

[Mazisky]

He wanna the most hardcore experience possible, let him start with LW2 and let him cry. It is what he asked for

 

[ArchAngel]

Of course, going from WOTC back to LW2 means giving up the new classes, new enemies, new map types, new mission types, the entire faction/covert ops system... LWOTC, if it is ever finished, will be a sight to behold.

LW2 has new classes that are better balanced that shit WotC brought.
LW2 has new mission types (some of those were "stolen" by WotC) and again they are better.
WotC does bring in some new map elements but nothing really important that you cannot live without.
Faction/covert ops system in wotc only has a nicer UI but it way worse than LW2 infiltration system.
LWOTC can not turn out good for 2 reasons:
1. Firaxis completely borked balance in WotC, not sure you can really repair that shit anymore
2. It is not being made by guys behind LW2 as Firaxis decided to not pay them anymore so they moved on to making their own game. We can't trust random few people to do a good enough game. Modders that start complex mod projects and actually finish them are few and far between.

 

[Zombra]

Just freakin wait for Phoenix Point.

 

[ArchAngel]

Just freakin wait for Phoenix Point.

That is 6+ months of waiting.

 

[razvedchiki]

is there a mod to remove the forced "camera follows npc when he moves"?it drives me crazy.
also a mod to show your team in a list during a mission?

 

[ArchAngel]

is there a mod to remove the forced "camera follows npc when he moves"?it drives me crazy.
also a mod to show your team in a list during a mission?

There is a mod that puts all their images on top of the screen in a row with relevant stats showing.. but I don't know its name.

As for removing following camera, I don't know.

 

[razvedchiki]

is it advisable to take recruits in missions to lvl them up or you are pretty much locked into the first 10 recruits you have lvled up?

 

[ArchAngel]

is it advisable to take recruits in missions to lvl them up or you are pretty much locked into the first 10 recruits you have lvled up?

Is this a Xcom 2 or LW2 question?
For Xcom 2 there is no reason to take anyone into missions except your A team if members of A team are not injured.
For LW2 you will want to use everyone as there are many more missions per month.

 

[razvedchiki]

LW2,if a lvled up soldier gets killed in midgame is it possible to lvl up another or will he get creamed?

 

[ArchAngel]

LW2,if a lvled up soldier gets killed in midgame is it possible to lvl up another or will he get creamed?

With LW2 you will need to have at least 3 or 4 teams to go on missions and extra ones that heal or train in base. So losing one is not a huge deal. In base you can train them to become Squaddy and you will be able to get high level ones through missions later.
Also LW2 has made it so that soldiers have less chance to die outright and more chance to start bleeding on the ground and then be critical wounded if you manage to extract them and then need to heal for a long time.

 

[ArchAngel]

Best way to play is to always balance teams to be part high level and part low level dudes so lower level ones can level up a bit easier with help of more powerful guys. Also LW2 works in a way that areas where you do lots of missions aliens send a lot of troops to reinforce and missions become much harder.. but max number of enemy troops are limited on the global map and that means other areas now have less enemy strength and are now easier to do mission in. So you can use lower level guys to do missions there and high level guys to do missions that you feel you must in tougher zones.
But my recommendation is to abandon Strength 5 or stronger zones and move your operations to another zone. Most of the time it is not worth it as risk/reward ratio moves too much towards risk.

Also a important bit of info for new players. Like in vanilla Xcom 2, aliens have a win counter called Avatar Project. When it fills up you got very limited time to try to sabotage something to lower it for a while.
But unlike vanilla Xcom 2 your team does not know about it until you liberate one region (there is a set of missions that end up with you storming their local HQ) and then you know all the time how close are you to losing your campaign.

Trying to Liberate a region is also main reason to stay in one region even if its strength has risen to 5 or more (but once you unlock last two missions they don't go away and you can do them at any time, like waiting until region strength drops first by leaving the region alone for 1 month).

 

[razvedchiki]

better stick with xenonauts,this is not my cup of tea.

 

[razvedchiki]

i really hope phoenix point have a change of mind and replace the horrible generic art style of the new xcoms to something less vomiting.

 

[Mazisky]

i really hope phoenix point have a change of mind and replace the horrible generic art style of the new xcoms to something less vomiting.

Did you see the last PP video? the art is pretty nice.

 

[Galdred]

i really hope phoenix point have a change of mind and replace the horrible generic art style of the new xcoms to something less vomiting.

I don't think now is such a good time to start an art overhaul. UI change would be possible, but anymore than that would probably kill the studio.

 

[razvedchiki]

ok i i will give it another try (lw2)

so how to
-keep the first 10 man squad in full health (if they get injured they get hospitalized for 10-30 days)
-whats the best squad set up for stealth missions?do i need a hacker to hack succesfully?
-what missions to avoid?
-what to prioritize in research/buildings?

 

[ArchAngel]

ok i i will give it another try (lw2)

so how to
-keep the first 10 man squad in full health (if they get injured they get hospitalized for 10-30 days)
-whats the best squad set up for stealth missions?do i need a hacker to hack succesfully?
-what missions to avoid?
-what to prioritize in research/buildings?

1. You play well and you will have less injuries. Also buy more rookies and start training them to become squaddies. In LW2 everyone gets 2 buffer HP from armor, if you just lose that they will not spend any time in hospitals. Flashbangs and high cover are your friends.
2. For stealth missions you want one shinobi 100%. Hacker is a bonus and recommended. Anything else after that is your choice.
3. Troops column ambush missions are really hard. Any missions with under 100% infiltrations are harder and some almost impossible. Prioritise missions that you can do at 100% or more infiltration. If missions is critical but you cannot get 100% infiltration spend that 25 intel to boost it. Don't use that boost for non critical missions as you need it for other stuff (like missions that lead to Liberating an area; infiltration for them takes forever so many people just boost them to reach 100% and go immediately).
4. For research you want to rush weapons or armor, there is a tech tree for LW2 to find online. Worst tactic is to research everything a bit. For buildings you want the one that lets you train troops and lets you train officers (GTS I think). AWS that lets you heal your troops faster is also useful if you are getting lots of injured soldiers.

 

[razvedchiki]

also,is it possible to do stealth missions without firing a shot,if i time the evac correctly?
i use the true concealment mod.

i should get the commander choise mod to get more shinobis.

i almost did one hack mission without any fight,i left 3 out of 4 squad members where i started and i used the hacker to hack the objective from a distance.then as i got the hacker back to my team a drone decided to take a look at the rooftop i was hiding (dont know if it was its predetermined patrol route or a bug).the whole map got alerted and my hacker got shot to pieces.

 

[Mazisky]

Are psionics op in LW2 like they are in vanilla?

 

[razvedchiki]

does anyone reccomend the red fog option?

 

[Alienman]

I recommend it, both sides.

 

[ArchAngel]

also,is it possible to do stealth missions without firing a shot,if i time the evac correctly?
i use the true concealment mod.

i should get the commander choise mod to get more shinobis.

i almost did one hack mission without any fight,i left 3 out of 4 squad members where i started and the used the hacker to hack the objective from a distance.then as i got the hacker back to my team a drone decided to take a look at the rooftop i was hiding (dont know if it was its predetermined patrol route or a bug).the whole map got alerted and my hacker got shot to pieces.

Many missions were at one point hard to do with group by going offense so everyone did them with single shinobi or shinobi and one hacker and they were fairly easy to do that way unless you got unlucky (with those drones). But in last patch they changed it so they are now harder to do full stealth but easier with 4 man party by fighting (they took enemies on map and moved them into more smaller groups so you can kill smaller groups easily but since they cover more of the map it is harder to stealth through them). You can still go full stealth but you will want to scout ahead with a stealth focused shinobi (smg + stealth perks). You can probably solo these missions with such a shinobi. Anyways you need SMG as main weapon to have any chance to do it full stealth as it both reduces enemy detection radius and lets you move more.

You should not be using true concealment with LW2, concealment already works differently in LW2. Timers don't start until you are out of concealment and enemies don't get alerted all over the map once you break concealment, they got sight and hearing radius and don't move towards your team just because.

Drones are there to frack up your stealth tactics, they can move a lot and patrol all over the maps including rooftops so to be able to detect stealth approaches (which makes sense that a small flying unit will be checking locations other troops have harder time getting to)

EDIT: While concealed, Hacker can successfully hack stuff and not break concealment. Use this to stun drones so you can move by them without being detected. Also works on those towers. High level hacker can get perk that lets you hack stuff and ignore penalty if you fail.

 

[razvedchiki]

You should not be using true concealment with LW2, concealment already works differently in LW2. Timers don't start until you are in concealment and enemies don't get alerted all over the map once you break concealment, they got sight and hearing radius and don't move towards your team just because

does it not make more sense for the timer to start after you break concealment?