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Newcomer to this Game, any Tips?


Dancing Mad

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Just started playing this two days ago on normal, I'm really loving it. I'm not doing too bad, but the further in I go, the more it kicks my ass. I never really have enough money for anything, or when I do, I don't have enough engineers, for example. Haven't lost the assistance of a country yet, but that's by the hairs of my ass. I drop one country's panic down to two squares, but then three other countries get into orange. There's always something. Lol.

I made a bad mistake by skipping out on a mission, thinking I could go back to it later...but you can't. Thankfully another mission came in that country again, which helped me reduce its panic. So like, do you lose a country once its panic level is all filled up, and you do nothing before the council comes and checks out your report?

 

One thing that helps me out is that I leveled up a lot of soldiers, so this way, when some are in the hospital, I don't have to start out with rookies all the time. I always have a decent pick of soldiers to go with, but progress is very slow, and I still end up losing a good soldier every now and then. I heard this game was tough as nails, and it sure is, but I'm really having fun with it. Thing is it seems deep and complex, and I'm pretty sure there's a lot of stuff I'm not understanding. My guess is, I will do as such as I keep playing. But in the meanwhile, are there any tips you could share? Thanks.

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Tips? Oh man, here we go :whistle:

 

1) follow the roadmap to avoid unecessary playthroughs, despite game being fun, it's not a fast one - even rushing.

 

2) as soon as your rookies have a specialization and enemies do not get killed by normal grenade, change it for a SCOPE.

 

3) get squadsight and doubletap for your snipers, make 2 of them get it, snipers are the core of all things :D (a spare sniper is nice too).

 

4) move everybody, then the heavy, then the snipers. In this order if your first movers reveal enemies, your heavy can still use rocket and snipers can still shoot at this turn.

 

5) enemies never attack when revealed, so use it at your advantage and get better positions if your team is flanked.

 

6) use first move for all squad (in the order i told before), never dash to avoid reveal enemies and run out of movements.

 

7) turn off tutorial, as it messes the HQ slots a lot !! :rolleyes:

 

8) use the wiki to discover wich constructions can be removed after get all benefits. Well, read a lot the wiki, some nice info there.... :think:

 

9) rank up at least 2 support guys, so faster you can use 3X the medkit and rez your soldiers during mission.

 

10) don't worry about run out of alien material/weapon fragments because you exploded - instead of weapon killing - an alien. If it's good, blast them all !!!! :cool:

 

11) you can aim higher to get those flying enemies while using the free aim weapons - like rockets or grenades, just pay attention at blast range.

 

12) don't go solo just to get a civilian to safety, usually if you let the civilians unrescued after reveal enemies, they will kill some of them - decreasing the damage on your soldiers. Ofc this will decrease the panic reduction, wich is attached to # of saved civilians. :think:

 

13) develop weapons or armors soon after you have good satellite coverage, don't go both ways or it'll take longer. Usually weapons are better way. :)

 

 

well, it's long enough, could talk all the day, cya...

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Yeah, like Terminator said, you play the tutorial, trophy pop and you can start a new game, you don't need to finish the playthrough after playing the tutorial.

 

Forgot to add this tip:

 

14) develop all armors you feel into, but the best ones are skeleton suit (at beginning) and ghost (at middle to end).

 

15) defense always work, except when you're flanked, so the three armors (skeleton, ghost and psi) that come with defense bonus can save your a** if you don't have good cover to finish your round. However, consider that Psi add the smaller defense bonus and don't give you more movement.

Edited by BerserkerBR
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Thanks guys, have been doing pretty decent lately.

 

Got a couple more questions...seriously, what armor is better? Carapace or Skeleton? Skeleton seems to have more perks, but with those on, my guys die twice as fast. I seem to do better with carapace. I leave skeleton on the snipers so they can climb, but otherwise I switched back to carapace for my assaults. I move very slowly on the map, so I don't quite benefit from the extra moving space that skeleton gives you. (granted, it is useful in some levels and situations) Thoughts?

 

Also what about selling items? Can I just sell everything that has already been researched? I always keep 5 of everything in case a country asks for donations though. Otherwise money is so hard to come by in this game. (just like the real world haha)

 

And yeah, I get about the satellite coverage...but it's very hard to get a lot of satellites up there early on. I only got five up so far. Got access to the uplinks that can handle 4 satellites, but those come way too late and I spend space building normal ones. :/ Plus they cost like 300 bucks to build. And satellites take like 20 days to be ready.

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what difficulty are you playing? On impossible everything but titan and psi are useless, just skip past them. On easy or normal carapace armor is ok, better than skeleton though.

 

Sell only if you absolutely have to, you get a lot more if one of the countries asks for items rather than selling them for so little, and on the harder levels, those items are much rarer.

 

Yeah satellites are expensive, but once you have full coverage there will be no more alien abduction missions, making the game more manageable, spend everything at the beginning getting the uplinks and satellites and engineers, it will pay off in the long run. Makes the game much easier.

 

I am playing on impossible now, the most important rule is move slow and save very often, even using multiple saves on every mission

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Got a couple more questions...seriously, what armor is better? Carapace or Skeleton? Skeleton seems to have more perks, but with those on, my guys die twice as fast. I seem to do better with carapace. I leave skeleton on the snipers so they can climb, but otherwise I switched back to carapace for my assaults. I move very slowly on the map, so I don't quite benefit from the extra moving space that skeleton gives you. (granted, it is useful in some levels and situations) Thoughts?

 

Also what about selling items? Can I just sell everything that has already been researched? I always keep 5 of everything in case a country asks for donations though. Otherwise money is so hard to come by in this game. (just like the real world haha)

 

And yeah, I get about the satellite coverage...but it's very hard to get a lot of satellites up there early on. I only got five up so far. Got access to the uplinks that can handle 4 satellites, but those come way too late and I spend space building normal ones. :/ Plus they cost like 300 bucks to build. And satellites take like 20 days to be ready.

 

If only Carapace and Skeleton are the options, i pick Skeleton. Carapace sux. When you play classic or impossible, you go research weapons first, then when you get Carapace it's already too low health gain that Skeleton's defense bonus and movement bonus are way more important. :think:

 

Defense works always (unless flanked) and each 10 defense reduces 10% chance enemy hit you. If you follow the "always finish your turn using high cover" rule, then you get 50% (40% full cover + 10% Skeleton's defense).

 

Carapace gives 4hp, while Skeleton gives 3hp, 10 defense and 3 movement.

 

Movement > defense > hp. Movement is everything, better positioning, easier to find cover, easier to use frog leap tactic. Defense can save you when you don't find full cover for all your 6 soldiers and is always active. Hp just increase chance to survive a shot, but that is already too low cause XCOM is a cruel game since DOS version, better to invest AT AVOID GETTING SHOT !! :think:

 

Don't sell weapon frags, alloys, elerium and stuff critical to build what you need. You can sell corpses leaving a litle as reserve (maybe 10 of each one), the only things you can sell always are those with green inscription (usually broken stuff).

 

Yeah, Satellite Nexus (4 slots) comes too late, usually too late at higher difficulties. Build a square (4 spaces using 2 rows and 2 columns) of 4 Satellite Uplinks. Using that square of Uplinks you get 12 slots, then the rest goes like you desire. :whistle:

 

 

what difficulty are you playing? On impossible everything but titan and psi are useless, just skip past them. On easy or normal carapace armor is ok, better than skeleton though.

 

Hey man, can't see why - at endgame and impossible or classic difficulties, ofc - the Psi and TItan make the rest of armors useless. :confused:

 

At endgame you already researched Ghost armor, it gives 10 defense and 1 movement MORE THAN Psi armor. Ghost also gives you the ghost ability, usefull to avoid detection while using leap frog tactic or to give you 100% critical chance.

 

Unless your game style is to only use Mind powers, Psi armor is only useful for the "chosen one" at last battle and if it wasn't mandatory i wouldn't use even at last battle. :D

 

However, i can understand some ppl like Titan armor cause of sheer hp bonus. Some ppl say that cause game's math is broken and you always miss with 99% and enemy always hit you, it's better get all hp available... :)

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Cool, thanks again. I put skeleton armor on my assault guys, and those soldiers are all at max, so the only time I ever die is if I screw up and place them right near to say three chrysalis appear. Those guys NEED to go far.

My main problem is satellites, but next game I'll go all out on getting as much coverage as possible. (although you have to build a bunch of generators way before you can ever get 4 uplinks up) I really didn't do it for this game.

 

Also what is best to equip your interceptors with? I find that the laser canon works awesome, anyway. Except you have to get close, hard not to take damage if it's something like a barge or some other tough UFO.

 

But how the hell are you supposed to do ironman? I save before every fight so I can reload if I mess up, but on ironman the only thing you can do is either play perfectly or quit game (before enemy turn is over) and go back in.

Doing that sounds like a bitch. XD If I can ever get that trophy out the way, the rest I think will come easy with patience. But that one is nuts.

 

Oh and something I really want to know...how can you tell, among your rookies, who will evolve into what? Say I want some snipers, but I just keep getting assaults? Any way to tell what the soldiers will become, or is it all random? Because that's really annoying.

Edited by Dancing Mad
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Regarding Ironman Classic (or impossible), you'll get it with experience : )

 

To ease the process : Once starting a playtrough, I usually pick Asia as a starter, and choose to "force panic" on some country (like India and Australia), if all goes to plan, India and Australia quit and I cover Japan, no longer any abduction mission coming from here. Second month same story, while you choose a target to cover (Africa or America or South America) you let Europe go to hell. You'll end up losing a bonus (not so great one compared to the other, except for trophy purpose*) and 6 total countries (for 8 maximum) Panic won't be a problem by month 3 and sometimes you can even get one or two european countries to stay and milk them for goodies without the risk of them leaving (well except if you fail the mission ^^)

 

Another way to ease considerably (DLC with chinese dude only) I'll avoid using this but I can understand the will to avoid those early pesky thin men : Allow for DLC missions, they'll take prority over normal council mission, do the first one (not to bad when you know what you'll face). When the second one is given to you, let it slide, you'll have no malus (no panic etc ...) and you can do it at will. It also prevent you from getting early "disarm" mission. Bear in mind that you will "loose" rewards since you're not doing council mission at all and DLC missions are rather rewardly ^^ (the second mission is quite difficult if attempted too early)

 

 

Speaking of "having more ressources" one easy tip : let the very first UFO of your playtrough go unchecked, later that month you'll have a bigger one (wich will drop as easy as the first) without any risk for your satellite. A little more aliens means more experience but also a little more everything else : )

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Cool, thanks again. I put skeleton armor on my assault guys, and those soldiers are all at max, so the only time I ever die is if I screw up and place them right near to say three chrysalis appear. Those guys NEED to go far.

My main problem is satellites, but next game I'll go all out on getting as much coverage as possible. (although you have to build a bunch of generators way before you can ever get 4 uplinks up) I really didn't do it for this game.

 

Also what is best to equip your interceptors with? I find that the laser canon works awesome, anyway. Except you have to get close, hard not to take damage if it's something like a barge or some other tough UFO.

 

Oh and something I really want to know...how can you tell, among your rookies, who will evolve into what? Say I want some snipers, but I just keep getting assaults? Any way to tell what the soldiers will become, or is it all random? Because that's really annoying.

 

First month you build an Uplink, power generator and workshop (in that order of priority). If you can't build, save to near the end of the month when you get money from selling broken alien stuff from UFO crash and get paid from Council Mission.

 

I equip my interceptors with Plama Cannon, cause range, hit chance and power are good, only rate of fire is bad. You don't need better plane weapons before month 4, so you can keep Avalanche Missiles until research Plama Cannon.

 

Some players say you can direct you rookie into desired class by the way your promotion kill happen. It's not confirmed, but i found it's somewhat useful. Kill from far to get sniper (as far as a normal rifle can aim), from close for assault and using grenade for heavy. The medic is imprevisible...

 

 

Speaking of "having more ressources" one easy tip : let the very first UFO of your playtrough go unchecked, later that month you'll have a bigger one (wich will drop as easy as the first) without any risk for your satellite. A little more aliens means more experience but also a little more everything else : )

 

Used that "let it go" strategy before, it's nice, but i found more important to fight first UFO, despite getting less money on a Small Scout. The earlier you get money at first month, better, a workshop is cheap, a power generator is cheap, but both require some time to build. You'll be more prepared at second month if you built more at first with that little money.

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Some players say you can direct you rookie into desired class by the way your promotion kill happen. It's not confirmed, but i found it's somewhat useful. Kill from far to get sniper (as far as a normal rifle can aim), from close for assault and using grenade for heavy. The medic is imprevisible...

 

Good to know.

Maybe you get medics by using a rookie who often uses his health pack on another?

 

Also random but, alien entertainment; lol. I can picture all the sectoids dancing around all like, pvv tss pvv tss pvv tss pvv.

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Ppl already tested it, using medkit as a rookie won't result always a medic. I did it too, never worked for me.

 

Maybe cause you have to kill for promotion and when you do the "kiling style" overwrites you good action of healing your friend and gives you another promnotion according to how the death went. :think:

 

Also, it's rather inutile carry a medkit as rookie, a grenade or a SCOPE are much better option... unless you're on easy, then you can kil even without a weapon :rolleyes:

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