XCOM: Enemy Unknown - Strategy Game - Developed by Firaxis

Finally finished it:

Spoiler:

"What direction is it going!? WHAT DIRECTION IS IT GOING!?!"

Was my third playthrough on Normal (first two weren't 'unwinnable' or anything but I just decided I wanted to do a bunch of things differently having never really played this type of game before).

The final boss was easy for my characters. I was concentrating on taking down the first Ethereal while staying out of sight of the others (didn't have mind plating so I couldn't risk being in sight of all three) and the game ended after taking down that middle one before they even got a chance to get a shot off.

I didn't reload my save much so I might play through on Normal Ironman next. Game 2 was in Classic mode and I got my ass handed to me so if I did that I'd leave saves on I think.

So much fun!

Paleocon wrote:

I ended up having to take an alien abduction mission in Egypt (and ignore calls from Germany and Mexico) in order to get my second sniper (a Lieutenant that I tricked out as my mobile shooter and renamed Atom Egoyan). On his first mission, he took out two floaters before getting bum rushed by three chrysloids.

Quoting this for love. It's awesome how well this game lends itself to narration.

I jumped down from Classic to Normal in order to run through the story. Classic: I had to restart tons of times either because the panic level was too high or my team had gotten wiped out by critting Thin Men from across the map into full cover. Normal: My team are unstoppable angels of death, with one lost country (Argentina, whatever) and one low-level casualty on a Very Difficult terror mission.

The difficulty of this game is very multidimensional. By changing several of the dimensions beween Classic and Normal, the increase in difficulty is very nonlinear. Combine that with the nonlinear increase in alien difficulty anyway, and there really isn't any way to come back if you get even a little bit behind.

Some people have talked about the mod that removes the +30% crit chance for mobs, and how much that changes things. Consider what would happen if Classic difficulty started with the OTS instead (and left the +30% chance to crit, extra alien health, etc.). The experience would be very different, but I think the difficulty would be similar, but in different ways. Add in both, and the game is still tougher than Normal, but the fiscal constraints and elevated panic are still there.

This isn't a criticism of the difficulty, BTW; clearly there are people having a blast on Classic and Impossible. It's more an argument for modding as a way to fine-tune the difficulty. There are a lot of ways to tweak the game that would be fun to try out.

I think I might have screwed up on my base architecture. I have way more power than I need and have a surplus of engineers, but haven't built enough satellite facilities or any labs. I have only 5 satellites and, when I do the math, no matter what I do, I can only get enough uplink capacity for 10 more without building overcapacity (uplink-nexus-uplink gets me to 10 and they don't intersect the original two linked uplinks).

I read someplace that if a nation requests a satellite, you can launch it immediately and it doesn't take up your uplink capacity. Is this true? If so, this could very well be the answer to full 16 point coverage.

Also, I haven't upgraded any of my fighters. The folly of this became apparent when a largish alien ship shot down one of my fighters. I managed to scramble another to finish off the alien craft, but it was a costly mistake. I don't have enough cash to upgrade all the fighters in my coverage areas and even if I did, all I have the tech for is silly Phoenix Cannons and Aiming technology. I have the ability to research advance fighter tech, but that brings me to another issue.

My squad tech lags behind as well. I have the ability to manufacture carapace armor and laser rifles, but I can't decide if I want to bypass beam weapons entirely now that I have the ability to research plasma. I built two suits of carapace before running out of alloys and need to save up my alloys for other projects (sat nexus), so my heavy and assault are taking point while the others pray not to discover anything nasty. And I am concentrating on massed firepower to deal with mostly mutons, floaters, and chrysalids.

How fcked am I?

Paleocon wrote:

How fcked am I?

Not in the least, but you'll have to make some changes.

Paleocon wrote:

I think I might have screwed up on my base architecture.

Maybe, but it's not impossible to recover. The optimal layout for satellite uplinks is a square of two regular uplinks and two Nexuses, which gives you 16 satellites (2+2+4+4, +4 from the link bonuses).

I read someplace that if a nation requests a satellite, you can launch it immediately and it doesn't take up your uplink capacity. Is this true? If so, this could very well be the answer to full 16 point coverage.

I'm not sure if this was ever true, but I tried it today with my single uplink maxed out, and it did not work.

Also, I haven't upgraded any of my fighters. The folly of this became apparent when a largish alien ship shot down one of my fighters. I managed to scramble another to finish off the alien craft, but it was a costly mistake. I don't have enough cash to upgrade all the fighters in my coverage areas and even if I did, all I have the tech for is silly Phoenix Cannons and Aiming technology. I have the ability to research advance fighter tech, but that brings me to another issue.

Don't worry about it - Ravens are actually pretty cheap, and when you get the North America bonus, they become almost throwaway. It's advantageous to wait until you get the North America bonus before building the Firestorm, and a couple Ravens with plasma cannons will do the job on any UFO you can catch - the Firestorm is really about catching the fast UFOs, not firepower for taking them down.

My squad tech lags behind as well. I have the ability to manufacture carapace armor and laser rifles, but I can't decide if I want to bypass beam weapons entirely now that I have the ability to research plasma. I built two suits of carapace before running out of alloys and need to save up my alloys for other projects (sat nexus), so my heavy and assault are taking point while the others pray not to discover anything nasty. And I am concentrating on massed firepower to deal with mostly mutons, floaters, and chrysalids.

That's fine. One thing to realize is that once you've researched plasma weapons, you don't have to build them - if you use the Arc Thrower to stun wounded aliens, you'll capture their weapons. This works best if you have the upgraded arc thrower and a ghost suit for your tagger, but it can be done safely earlier if you're careful.

Aetius wrote:

This works best if you have the upgraded arc thrower and a ghost suit for your tagger, but it can be done safely earlier if you're careful.

But it's also a good way to lose soldiers too!

I wondered about the whole capturing the weapons thing . It had me thinking it was a good idea to stun alien types I have already captured.

I wondered about the whole capturing the weapons thing . It had me thinking it was a good idea to stun alien types I have already captured.

Yeah, early on a capture can be a good way to get plasma weapons you can't afford to build, or don't have the raw materials.

Suppression fire makes it significantly safer to approach an alien when attempting a capture. Often the suppressed alien will simply hunker down instead of moving or shooting.

Suppresive fire, smoke, weakening the target with pistol fire and the sniper ability to disable the target's weapon for a turn. I gave the arc stunner to the assaults, their defensive abilities combined with the above makes for a (basically) safe takedown, I never lost a man doing so. Rushing in unsupported and failing a 90% stun, that's a different story, sent a few assaults to the injured list trying that.

LtWarhound wrote:

Suppresive fire, smoke, weakening the target with pistol fire and the sniper ability to disable the target's weapon for a turn. I gave the arc stunner to the assaults, their defensive abilities combined with the above makes for a (basically) safe takedown, I never lost a man doing so. Rushing in unsupported and failing a 90% stun, that's a different story, sent a few assaults to the injured list trying that.

Just remember to switch to pistol if your Assault is a Close Combat Specialist and you have to spend a turn to get in range. It's no fun to have him/her gun down the alien you were trying to capture, simply because it moved too close to him/her.

The difficulty of this game is very multidimensional. By changing several of the dimensions beween Classic and Normal, the increase in difficulty is very nonlinear. Combine that with the nonlinear increase in alien difficulty anyway, and there really isn't any way to come back if you get even a little bit behind.

I would have liked to see the difficulty separately scalable for the tactical mode and the strategy mode. You'd think a game from the makers of Civ would have this sort of option but I suspect (cynically, I admit) that the need to add console-style achievements helped make this what it is. Whatever the reason it's disappointing.

Well, I haven't commented in this thread yet despite lurking for weeks. I had never played xcom, but the enthusiasm for it on the podcast (as well an xcom let's play thread from one of the old games) got me pretty excited about it, so I picked up on steam.

I set it to normal non-ironman, which seemed safe enough as I didn't know what I was doing but refuse to play easy as a matter of principle. I lost some soldiers early and was really having a good time paying for my mistakes, despite playing non-ironman. I never reloaded a save to save a soldier, for instance. I just keep the saves there in case something goes horribly wrong. I lost a playthrough of Fallout:tactics one time and have been forever traumatized. My limited gaming time is too valuable to throw away on a bug.

The bug hit on a mission...

Spoiler:

... in a huge ship. (A downed battleship). I had not realized that I should bring my A-team (I was trying to stay as spoiler free as possible) for the battleship, and most of the ships I'd downed had become quite easy. I had only one support along with healing abilities and I'd used up my medpacks. A squaddie panicked (because a Heavy Floater I'd mind controlled and used to scout ahead was killed!? Squaddies are dumb) and shot my lieutenant in the back, dropping her into critical. I went into rush mode, trying to clear a huge room consisting of a sectopod and several mutons/elites as quickly as possible in order to keep her from bleeding out. I cleared the room with a turn to spare and realized...there was another room. The rest of the squad said their goodbyes and moved up into a heated battle with an etheral and some mutons where a mind controlled soldier killed a support soldier.

So we're cleaning up safely with the remaining four squad members when the screen scrolls hard left and won't stop. I tab to another soldier, figuring it will stop. No dice. The screen continues scrolling hard left again. I try playing under the conditions, but clicking on a square is impossible. My only choice is to reload my last save, which was way back when the lieutenant had just been shot by the panicked squaddie. With the added knowledge of the remainder of the ship, I managed to finish the mission without any further losses, thus accidentally saving a soldier who was actually killed.

I felt dirty, but this sort of bug was exactly why I was playing non-ironman, and I can't say I regret it. It may have saved my playthrough, but I can't help but feel cheated, (or like I cheated).

I have a very short time left on my normal campaign, so I would have been devastated if my playthrough had been ruined.

Anyway, that's my little anecdote, and my opinion on bugs, ironman, and casual gaming, all wrapped into one meandering, hard-to-read post. Thanks for the recommendation, goodjers. I've loved this game and will continue to do so.

For science! (an article on whether or not the RNG is unfair -- with actual data).

ebarstad wrote:

For science! (an article on whether or not the RNG is unfair -- with actual data).

I don't think the RNG is unfair, but I do think it's very ... well, streaky. He noted the incredible strings of hits, and I've experienced some really incredible strings of misses as well. The streakiness problem is exacerbated by the game's unforgiving nature, especially on terror missions - a single bad streak will end the mission for you against even one Chryssalid. A further indication of this problem is that using a lot of explosives drastically increases the odds of your soldiers surviving, because they rarely miss and secondary explosions don't miss either. Also, as several of his commenters noted, the state of the saved PRNG is somewhat predictable, and a player can manipulate the order of events via savescumming to optimize the outcome.

Aetius wrote:
ebarstad wrote:

For science! (an article on whether or not the RNG is unfair -- with actual data).

I don't think the RNG is unfair, but I do think it's very ... well, streaky. He noted the incredible strings of hits, and I've experienced some really incredible strings of misses as well. The streakiness problem is exacerbated by the game's unforgiving nature, especially on terror missions - a single bad streak will end the mission for you against even one Chryssalid. A further indication of this problem is that using a lot of explosives drastically increases the odds of your soldiers surviving, because they rarely miss and secondary explosions don't miss either. Also, as several of his commenters noted, the state of the saved PRNG is somewhat predictable, and a player can manipulate the order of events via savescumming to optimize the outcome.

That's going to be true of any game where the PRNG is saved. There's no real way around it. Civ (IV at least, I don't know if V has the same thing) tries to sidestep the issue by having a 'new random seed upon reload' option. So the player, upset that their tank lost to a spearman, can reload with a new random seed until the tank wins. Even if the player decided they didn't want that option, though, they can still game it by performing another attack first and then coming back to the tank vs. spearman battle and keep doing that until a good result comes up. Maybe games should have a 'I should have won that encounter' button so people don't waste time trying to game their game.

Edit: Also, streaks happen in random systems.

Random percentages make this a bad tactical game You get severely punished for not playing it safe, especially in Ironman.

A damn shame.

oMonarca wrote:

Random percentages make this a bad tactical game You get severely punished for not playing it safe, especially in Ironman.

A damn shame.

Maybe it's because I come from a place of enjoying RPGs (both pen & paper and computer) as well as board games but I don't agree with that, as randomness has had a place in gaming for ages and ages. Dice rolls are all over the place in computer games whether they are expressed explicitly or not. Taking a gamble should be a gamble. The randomness makes things exciting, and chossing to play to or against the odds is a big part of decision making in games.

However What irks me about the XCOM system is that only a tiny portion of the dice rolls (the hit percentage of your own shots) is exposed to the player. You don't know what the chances an enemy had to hit when they take a shot, what the chances of doing a particular amount of damage are, you don't know how moving into a new position will affect your shots, critical percentage, or damage, you only have a general idea if a soldier is likely to panic, etc.

What makes this game less than it could be is the fact that only the barest minimum of the chance is exposed to the player. I'm not actually that interested in pure simulation - I want the game to be a game, but there's not enough exposure to the system for the player to really understand why something went wrong when it did, which for me leads to frustration.

I understand they wanted the emphasize uncertainty and fear of the unknown by obfuscating lots of things - but I'm not sure loss of tactical awareness was entirely worth it. Certain moments in the game for me feel like a guess followed either by a frustrating conclusion or a winning choice I don't necessarily feel that I earned, rather than a tense an meaningful decision to play the odds.

I should add that I'm NOT complaining about hidden movement or line of sight or anything like that, or even the "reaction move" that aliens get. If I make a dumb move that reveals a bunch of hidden aliens, so be it. But I would like to know thing like how far my line of sight is going to extend when I do move, and I'd love to know how moving to a new position impacts the odds of hitting the aliens I do see before I move, so I can understand whether it's worth it or not to do so. It's too hard to tell how a move might affect line of sight and aiming due to the unusual manner which cover and line of sight works.

I guess you placed it better than I did if more of the variables were exposed, I think it could be better. Sometimes stuff happens and I don't get why. Why did I have 25% chance to hit, missed the shot (as expected) and then the alien fires back at me, and I'm in full cover, and still scores a critical? Or the other way around. I don't get to feel if I'm doing the right move or not. There's always that feeling the game will f*ck you up.

As for revealing bunches of aliens, I wouldn't find it to be so bad if we got more scouting options sooner, like the sniper ability or the ghost armor. As it is, sometimes you're either boxed in, or have to risk moving into the unknown to get a good flank.

Something along the lines of bigger maps, with the ability to spot aliens (and be spotted) before coming into fire range. And then have to maneuver around them and set up ambushes? Oh man, oh man...

I don't think anyone's posted this yet.

Gremlin wrote:

"(Fake) XCOM Enemy Unknown movie trailer"....I don't think anyone's posted this yet.

LOLOLOL! Took me a few seconds to realize how the video was compiled. I dare anyone to name, shot by shot, all the movies/games/shows from which the clips were taken.

I don't think it's so much that the RNG is unfair, it's that it's so central to this game. A single bad roll can reduce your strength by 17%, perhaps more, depending on how strong the dead soldier was. Having six soldiers, and only one shot per soldier per round, means that a few bad numbers in a row can easily cause total squad wipe and mission loss, in turn causing a whole game loss.

They like to say "that's X-COM!", but it's not, that's just bad luck. The real game, by allowing either 14 or 16 soldiers, and multiple shots per soldier per round, allowed you to use skill, positioning, and overwhelming firepower to overcome a few bad rolls. It didn't matter much if your sergeant missed with your only plasma rifle, when there were ten more laser rifle shots available because of your clever tactical play.

In this version, you have so few tactical options that the influence of skill and experience is greatly diminished. It's still important, but Lady Luck is the dominant feature in Enemy Unknown, and your ability to mitigate this is very limited, no matter how good you are.

This is why I don't think the game, at least as it originally shipped, is going to have anywhere near the staying power of the original; the skill curve is shallow and short. Randomness has much too strong a role. Mods have a good chance of improving or entirely fixing the problem; we'll see how that plays out.

Keithustus wrote:
Gremlin wrote:

"(Fake) XCOM Enemy Unknown movie trailer"....I don't think anyone's posted this yet.

LOLOLOL! Took me a few seconds to realize how the video was compiled. I dare anyone to name, shot by shot, all the movies/games/shows from which the clips were taken.

I would watch the sh*t out of that movie.

Keithustus wrote:
Gremlin wrote:

"(Fake) XCOM Enemy Unknown movie trailer"....I don't think anyone's posted this yet.

LOLOLOL! Took me a few seconds to realize how the video was compiled. I dare anyone to name, shot by shot, all the movies/games/shows from which the clips were taken.

Heh, shot by shot? Too many. But I did see (I think) some Transformers, Armageddon, District 9, Battleship, Independence Day, Avengers.

Prometheus...

Hmmm, Charlize.

One shot was from X-Men (1) (I think).... the station?

ebarstad wrote:

For science! (an article on whether or not the RNG is unfair -- with actual data).

Good stuff.

I didn't go into nearly as much depth as he did, but there were a few instances where I got "caught in a loop." I'd fire from a position multiple times, and the alien would also elect to do the same thing every time (e.g., Overwatch or fire at someone), so the exact same situation came up repeatedly. I kept track of the number of times it took me to get a hit and checked the likelihood of requiring that many trials against the binomal distribution to see how out of line it was. The very few times I did this, the probabilities of it taking that long weren't really that low -- IOW, the RNG seemed to be behaving.

There are lots of other ways it could fail, of course, and I didn't collect enough information to say anything remotely definitive. But it was comforting to have some evidence, however minimal, that those "sure shots" that weren't were really all in my head.

...wait, that's not comforting at all!

I don't really have a problem with the RNG or randomness in the game, which is to say that there are tactics (and upgrades) that can account for this and swing the balance back into the player's favor.

Basically, any game with dice or card-draws relies on probability, and XCOM is no different except. Granted, it helps a lot if you know the alien accuracy percentages.

http://www.ufopaedia.org/index.php?t...(EU2012)#Alien_Stats_Table

Quintin_Stone wrote:
Keithustus wrote:
Gremlin wrote:

"(Fake) XCOM Enemy Unknown movie trailer"....I don't think anyone's posted this yet.

LOLOLOL! Took me a few seconds to realize how the video was compiled. I dare anyone to name, shot by shot, all the movies/games/shows from which the clips were taken.

Heh, shot by shot? Too many. But I did see (I think) some Transformers, Armageddon, District 9, Battleship, Independence Day, Avengers.

You know I really hate the cliche 'the first and last line of defense'. That makes no sense, your just the defense then, there are no lines...

Ugh. I think I screwed up my build.

I have way too much power and a huge surplus of engineers, but I only have five satellites and am cash poor. I also don't have any advanced weapons and am very limited in my armor. Ugh. Worse yet, a bunch of nations are in the orange panic levels.

I should have built more satellite uplink capacity earlier.