That is... one hell of a downgrade, actually. Part of the fun of xcom was your expendable hordes of recruits and their stupendous death rate. With four team members, that's gone. Straight off, gone.Steve Butts said:Squad of four
I agree. It's not being a purist. I've seen and like many changes they announced, like what they did to the cyberdiscs and the movement system. But a squad of 4... it just changes the style and atmosphere of the game. There was a feel of horror when your rookies got butchered by aliens shooting from far away positions, or a soldier being mind controlled who then starts shooting his fellow soldiers or doing whatever you can to stop the chryssalids before your whole squad turns. They said in interviews that they wanted to recreate this atmosphere. But how can you when you only have 4 soldiers? The loss of a single soldier matters more but you also have to give more power to single soldiers or less power to the aliens so that the missions remain doable. We saw this in the "UFO: After(math,shock,light)" series where each soldier could take a lot of shots if you didn't walk to the shotgun wielding biomass-thingy to melee him. If you played smart the enemy would hit you for only a few of your hit-points and with increasing armor this got ridiculous. Compare that to the original game where even in the best armor an unlucky heavy plasma shot could be fatal. And don't forget the Blaster Launcher. If they enable that, if a single unlucky shot of the best non-explosive alien weapon can drop one of your squaddies who is the best armor... well then you can loose a quarter of your team's strength too easily. If not... then one of the things that made the original great, a part of it's atmosphere, to expect the RNG being able to f* you up hard at any point and you still end up pushing onwards since there is nothing more rewarding than iron manning a game... that part of the atmosphere will be lost.GiglameshSoulEater said:That is... one hell of a downgrade, actually. Part of the fun of xcom was your expendable hordes of recruits and their stupendous death rate. With four team members, that's gone. Straight off, gone.Steve Butts said:Squad of four
That is kind of disappointing. The rest of the changes are fine. I just really don't agree with that. Either the enemies are less dangerous to compensate or less numerous, so either way things are on a smaller scale.
Less logical as well. A squad of 26 is slightly better than a squad of four in investigating a crashed UFO or whatever.
I do agree on that but 4 is too few. I always thought the size of the original Skyranger to be pretty balanced. 14 Soldiers or 10 Soldiers and a Tank. A reduction of 2 Soldiers would be fine too, enabling you to split up your soldiers into 3 4-man squads.thiosk said:Do we need 26 units? No.
What do you mean? I can open doors in X-Com without barging into the room. Right-click other side of door while facing door.Steve Butts said:The new XCOM even goes one better than the original by allowing you to open doors quietly without having to barge right into the room. >
Totally agree, this sounds like a pretty bad change to me.GiglameshSoulEater said:That is... one hell of a downgrade, actually. Part of the fun of xcom was your expendable hordes of recruits and their stupendous death rate. With four team members, that's gone. Straight off, gone.Steve Butts said:Squad of four
That's only possible in "Terror of The Deep" or with an extender mod.Tiamat666 said:What do you mean? I can open doors in X-Com without barging into the room. Right-click other side of door while facing door.Steve Butts said:The new XCOM even goes one better than the original by allowing you to open doors quietly without having to barge right into the room. >
I admit, I only used that figure for emphasis. Often, yeah, you would use less, but you still had a back up in case your team got slaughtered, or you would have a tank with you (that seems to have been cut as well, thinking about it).thiosk said:Do we need 26 units? No.
True.BenEEeee said:Also, you can only build 1 base That's pretty sucky.
I think that GameInformer ran a story on XCOM a while ago, and the impression I got from that is that the squad of four was a mission limit. You can have more recruits available at your base, but you only send a team of 4 (or 3, if you send in one of the big support vehicles, which were also mentioned in the same article) on a mission.GiglameshSoulEater said:That is... one hell of a downgrade, actually. Part of the fun of xcom was your expendable hordes of recruits and their stupendous death rate. With four team members, that's gone. Straight off, gone.Steve Butts said:Squad of four
That is kind of disappointing. The rest of the changes are fine. I just really don't agree with that. Either the enemies are less dangerous to compensate or less numerous, so either way things are on a smaller scale.
Less logical as well. A squad of 26 is slightly better than a squad of four in investigating a crashed UFO or whatever.
Wait, when did they say that?BenEEeee said:Also, you can only build 1 base That's pretty sucky.
Are you sure the maximum isn't six?Steve Butts said:...you can only take four soldiers...
What I got from the feature here was that we can build multiple bases, it seems, though we only get one headquarters.NewYork_Comedian said:Wait, when did they say that?BenEEeee said:Also, you can only build 1 base That's pretty sucky.
OT: I never actually played any of the original X-Coms, but this looks like a game that I would really like to sink my teeth into, so I am very excited.
'Players aren?t always constricted to four-unit squads, however. By researching upgrades ? a feature that I?ll explain later ? players can have up to six-man teams, but no more than that. ?This makes for a more compelling tactical experience,? said Murray, who pointed out that the original X-COM allowed players to have massive squads that were upwards of 20 units.'James Joseph Emerald said:Are you sure the maximum isn't six?Steve Butts said:...you can only take four soldiers...
Was it reduced since GameSpy [http://uk.pc.gamespy.com/pc/xcom-enemy-unknown/1220087p1.html]'s preview two months ago? That sucks...
Four is too few, but I think six is actually about right. You have to remember that although the original XCOM was tactically rich, there were a lot of bullshit deaths that came out of nowhere that you never could have anticipated, like a floater who spots you from a mile away and rains burning plasma death down on your squad before you have a chance to do anything. Having 12+ troops was necessary to counter-act the fact that even the best armour seemed to be made of papier-mâché and there was no way to stop them from dying like flies. Until you unlock the psi-amp and become a god.6SteW6 said:It sounds like we start with four man squads and if you don't research properly may be able to play the entire game with them but we have the opportunity to upgrade. I dunno on the one hand I am super excited about a new turn based strategy game but the four man squads alarms me. There really won't be much chance for expermentation I will just always have a heavy, support, assault and soldier. If one dies it will severly limit my tactical opportunities to where losing a man will probably mean losing a mission. I'm sure there will be a retreat option to at least save some of my better squadies but still...I would prefer 8-12 man squads at least. That would give us 2 or 3 four man squads and make for bigger, more engaging battles and more excitement when one squad takes heavy casualties. Bleh, I'll still pick it up but I hope to get a definitive number soon!
That's true. With more tactical options there will surely be less 'Bullshit deaths'. Maybe the 4-6 man squads is tactically viable and you will surely care more about your men and women with such an intimate connection to them through learning what they are good at and how their place in the squad makes them an asset. A loss might really feel like a loss when you lose a squadie in this on as opposed to them just being fodder.James Joseph Emerald said:Four is too few, but I think six is actually about right. You have to remember that although the original XCOM was tactically rich, there were a lot of bullshit deaths that came out of nowhere that you never could have anticipated, like a floater who spots you from a mile away and rains burning plasma death down on your squad before you have a chance to do anything. Having 12+ troops was necessary to counter-act the fact that even the best armour seemed to be made of papier-mâché and there was no way to stop them from dying like flies. Until you unlock the psi-amp and become a god.6SteW6 said:It sounds like we start with four man squads and if you don't research properly may be able to play the entire game with them but we have the opportunity to upgrade. I dunno on the one hand I am super excited about a new turn based strategy game but the four man squads alarms me. There really won't be much chance for expermentation I will just always have a heavy, support, assault and soldier. If one dies it will severly limit my tactical opportunities to where losing a man will probably mean losing a mission. I'm sure there will be a retreat option to at least save some of my better squadies but still...I would prefer 8-12 man squads at least. That would give us 2 or 3 four man squads and make for bigger, more engaging battles and more excitement when one squad takes heavy casualties. Bleh, I'll still pick it up but I hope to get a definitive number soon!
Hopefully, the ability to do things like take cover and peek through doors before you open them will reduce the need to rely on the rather silly tactic of sending out half your team as cannon fodder to spot the aliens and then sniping them with the other half of your team.