XCOM: Long War

[BloatedGuppy]

Anyone tried this mod?

I loaded it up for the first time about a week ago, and have been slowly progressing through a campaign. I'm actually quite fond of some of the balancing they've done. Larger squad sizes (apparently up to 12, although the base size achievable via OTS seems to be 8), more class diversity (8 classes over 4), some nice re-balanced or totally revamped traits, fixed Red Fog to apply to both aliens AND humans (shot accuracy decreases as you take damage), re-balanced explosives, more aliens on every map but a removal of the vanilla game's accuracy bonus on Classic and Impossible (thus negating the base game's horrifying difficulty spike when Thin Men appear), a revamping of the strategic layer, the need to have multiple capable squads on hand due to fatigue, etc, etc, etc. All in all it feels a bit closer in spirit to the 1994 original.

Difficulty wise it's definitely designed to appeal to series veterans as opposed to newcomers, but I find it has hit a nice sweet spot...so far. A few missions have been ludicrously hairy, to the "are you kidding me" point. But it feels less arbitrary to get outflanked and outnumbered than to have a thin man crit you from across the map in full cover because the AI rolled an 80. The game feels less binary, less in need of guaranteed kills, less "gamey", and a bit more tactical.

All that said, I'm still pretty early on, and XCOM is known to have serious problems with difficulty collapsing in the final half, and poor pacing overall.

So, anyone played this? Like it? Dislike it? Have any tips? Or questions?

Tippy I'd recommend it to you unreservedly, but you're on a bloody console.

 

[tippy2k2]

Tippy I'd recommend it to you unreservedly

You would? Well I'll just get right on...

but you're on a bloody console.

Foiled once again...

I know that Drummodino played it so I'll send up the bat-signal and see if they respond to you here. If not...well....someone is bound to have played it

Holy Jumpin Jupiters Batman!

If you are around Drum, do you have any thoughts for your brother in arms?

 

[Drummodino]

If you are around Drum, do you have any thoughts for your brother in arms?

I come to answer your summons!

Sadly I didn't play very much of the mod, only a couple of missions or so. I did enjoy the little I played though, it really made me think my decisions through.

I have been meaning to give it a proper bash sometime, maybe when semester is over.

 

[Elfgore]

Walking into this thread makes me feel like the scrubbiest of scrubs when it comes to X-Com. I can't even beat the game on easy... with cheats... God I suck at video games. So, if you can't guess, I will not be touching this mod with a ten foot pole. It does sound really fun though.

 

[Redingold]

Long War's great, though personally I found the progression to be very slow. There are just loads of missions to go on and I found it a bit draining. Still, when I'm in the mood for it, it's fantastic.

I highly recommend Beagle's Long War Ironman Impossible playthrough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6zQwHEUK9I&list=PLXctaw5JGF4Inwdinw7ijDafjKlVC2oDo

Dude's crazy good at the game, and you can pick up a lot from watching him.

 

[Joseph Harrison]

I highly recommend Beagle's Long War Ironman Impossible playthrough: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=i6zQwHEUK9I&list=PLXctaw5JGF4Inwdinw7ijDafjKlVC2oDo

I am currently watching one of his videos whilst typing this post. Yeah, I'm a fan of the mod although I don't like the focus on the "Air War" in the mod because I don't particularly care for the air battles in XCOM, although that's more of a matter of taste more than anything. Otherwise, I like the greater variety and the increased squad sizes in the game.

 

[The Madman]

I've looked into that mod before but it's always looked like one of those 'make it harder and more extreme!' mods so despite the praise I've hesitated to try it myself. Still if the mod is indeed fairly balanced and tactical as opposed to just difficult for difficulties sake I might just have to give it a try. I loved the challenge of the original X-COM after all and have no problem with a game being hard so long as it feels like it's being fair about its challenges, if that makes any sense.

 

[GloatingSwine]

Whilst it looks to some degree like they've restored the strategic layer of the old UFO, it also looks to me like they've fallen into the trap that all the bad X-Com clones did in the intervening years of making everything too granular and fiddly, too many too similar weapon types, for instance, rather than strongly distinct ones with defined roles.

If you want a modern game that's Moar Classic UFO then pick up Xenonauts instead.

 

[KenAri]

Aye, near the end of a game on Impossible with this mod. I found it made the game a little easier, just because you've got a lot more options open. It does demand smart and slow play, though. A lot less forgiving. That said, this is also with the Enemy Within dlc, so having a Mek on my team helps tremendously, haha.

It's good fun! Would recommend to anyone, since (IIRC) it has extensive enable/disable options for its features, so you can tweak it as you like.

 

[Neverhoodian]

Oh yeah, they weren't kidding when they named it "Long War." I'm watching an LP'er in the process of a full playthrough, with each upload consisting of 30-50 minutes of gameplay. Right now he's on episode 70, eight in-game months have gone by, he's still on laser weapons, he hasn't built a single MEC yet...and he's doing great (no save-scumming and not a single soldier lost, just a few SHIVs). He would have beaten the vanilla game twice by now. Good thing there's the "Not-So-Long-War" mutator for those that aren't interested in tests of endurance.

I played a bit of the mod myself, but I didn't get very far before it got updated. I plan on starting over with a fresh install when (if) I can find the time. You definitely want to pace yourself with the mod, otherwise you run the risk of getting burnt out by near-constant alien activity. That said, the tweaks made to combat are very satisfying. It strikes a good balance between the "six unstoppable badasses" that vanilla XCOM became and the "army of redshirts" in the 1994 original. It's impressive what they've managed to squeeze out of a game that never got official mod support. Free bit of advice: under NO circumstances should you donate Elerium or meld to nation requests, as you'll need every sliver you can get later on.

I really appreciate that the creators give you the files and instructions necessary to tweak the mod to your liking. For example, I removed certain ridiculous aspects of the alien/Exalt research tree (62 max HP Chrysalids?! Are you insane?!) and toned down the panic values for terror missions and rearmament time for interceptors (I don't care how advanced these weapons are, it should not take five days to swap hardpoints!).

 

[Megalodon]

One thing that put me off this mod (and major, non-aesthetic mods in general) is a combination of ease of install and removal/integration with the main game. Specifically, can you still play vanilla with the mod installed, or does it require a full reinstall to go back to normal Xcom. (Also, the Enemy Within version wasn't done)

Plus there's the grinding noise my computer started making when my soldiers got shot, which kinda scared me off playing Xcom a few months back.

 

[The_Blue_Rider]

Oh yeah, they weren't kidding when they named it "Long War." I'm watching an LP'er in the process of a full playthrough, with each upload consisting of 30-50 minutes of gameplay. Right now he's on episode 70, eight in-game months have gone by, he's still on laser weapons, he hasn't built a single MEC yet...and he's doing great (no save-scumming and not a single soldier lost, just a few SHIVs). He would have beaten the vanilla game twice by now. Good thing there's the "Not-So-Long-War" mutator for those that aren't interested in tests of endurance.

I played a bit of the mod myself, but I didn't get very far before it got updated. I plan on starting over with a fresh install when (if) I can find the time. You definitely want to pace yourself with the mod, otherwise you run the risk of getting burnt out by near-constant alien activity. That said, the tweaks made to combat are very satisfying. It strikes a good balance between the "six unstoppable badasses" that vanilla XCOM became and the "army of redshirts" in the 1994 original. It's impressive what they've managed to squeeze out of a game that never got official mod support. Free bit of advice: under NO circumstances should you donate Elerium or meld to nation requests, as you'll need every sliver you can get later on.

I really appreciate that the creators give you the files and instructions necessary to tweak the mod to your liking. For example, I removed certain ridiculous aspects of the alien/Exalt research tree (62 max HP Chrysalids?! Are you insane?!) and toned down the panic values for terror missions and rearmament time for interceptors (I don't care how advanced these weapons are, it should not take five days to swap hardpoints!).

*spits out drink* 62 HP CHRYSALIDS!!?? WHAT THE HELL

Im just on the finishing stretch of my Enemy Within playthrough, its really fun, and i really cant wait to try it on a harder difficulty.

Im gonna leave Long War til ive thoroughly explored everything in EW, but it sounds super interesting

 

[Fdzzaigl]

I played XCOM: Long War on Impossible difficulty. It's a great mod which rekindled my interest for the game. However, Long War is also simply TOO long in my opinion. Therefore I would never play it again, maybe I would play the "not so long war" option.

To put it into perspective: I think I spent 200 hours of played time on that one impossible difficulty campaign. The problem is that Long War MASSIVELY drags out the part of the game where you're barely coping to manage against even the simplest aliens. I remember this one ingame moment where I was about to complete my first laser weapons when I literally got 7 long missions over the course of 3 ingame days, with each of them taking me more than an hour to complete. That's just too long imo.

Finally, some mechanics by Long War are also kind of bullshit in the later game. Certain enemies get INSANE amounts of damage resistance. So that even your elite hero soldiers do almost nothing against them.

Issues with the core XCOM game, like the strange workings of LoS, are also amplified in Long War. A sectopod the size of an apartment building being invisible behind a waist high wall is common in the endgame of long war.

Still haven't finished the campaign either, even though I'm very close. I kinda got too obsessed with it and just dropped the whole thing at a certain point.
The things I enjoyed most were the added weapon options and the psi training though. As well as the better class division.

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

I played the in-game Marathon mode on Classic and that was challenging enough for me. Everything in the game takes longer, requiring a lot more forward thinking. The missions come in at the same rate however so it is a lot harder. The player gets one benefit however...because the aliens are delayed but the missions come in at the same rate, it's quite possible to have a much better ranked squad of soldiers by the time, for example, the mutons and floaters start appearing.

I don't know what this mod specifically does that the Marathon mode in-game does not, but from the sounds of it, I'm not sure it's my cup of tea. Anyway, I even found marathon quite taxing and tho I did finish that run, I don't think I'd play it again. My next run would be classic with the random skills modifiers to make soldiers unique.

 

[Garriath]

I don't know what this mod specifically does that the Marathon mode in-game does not, but from the sounds of it, I'm not sure it's my cup of tea. Anyway, I even found marathon quite taxing and tho I did finish that run, I don't think I'd play it again. My next run would be classic with the random skills modifiers to make soldiers unique.

I'd actually really highly recommend that you try giving it a try. I don't know that the mod is significantly more difficult than vanilla. However, it significantly expands the depth of the game in a way that makes me wonder why on earth the devs didn't think of some of these changes. For instance:

-There are now a total of eight infantry classes. When upgrading, you can now choose between three potential perks instead of two, meaning you can make every soldier essentially unique in their abilities.

-Squad sizes start at six, with two equipment slots already unlocked, meaning that you have much more flexibility from the get-go as to what sorts of troops you're deploying.

-A huge amount of new kinds of weapons are available from the beginning. Instead of the generic "assault rifle" that you're stuck with in vanilla, you have the basic rifle, a carbine (+accuracy and mobility, -damage) an SMG (-acc, +mobility) a battle rifle (+damage, -mobility), plus multiple sidearms and several different unique weapons per class (several sniper rifles, machine guns, etc.).

-You also have a full array of inventory items from the start, which means you get to decide at the beginning if you're carrying HE grenades, AP grenades, smoke grenades, or flashbangs. Or medkits, laser sights, alien trophies, extra ammunition, or a couple of other options.

-As mentioned above, missions no longer arbitrarily come 3-at-a-time, but rather once, but more frequently. This theoretically means that if you have a large, diverse, and well-trained body of troops, you can effectively combat every single alien attack.

All told, I really feel like one can't really call the Long War a mod that makes the game harder, but rather one that makes it significantly deeper and far more interesting than vanilla.

Hope this piques your interest- it's really a fantastic piece of work!

 

[KingsGambit_v1legacy]

snip

I can tell your also a big fan of XCOM so we're both on the same page in this regard. I only played it this past Feb, and while I realise it was out in 2012, it's probably my fav game of 2014 (since that's when I played it). I've done five playthrus (from each starting location, tho missed out on the cheevo, I suspect because those were split between EU and EW) including one marathon classic and one ironman impossible. I think the game is sublime and thoroughly enjoyable.

I'm not sure what I make of the changes you've described. I love the idea of more classes and a third skill tree per class....that's depth I can get behind. It would allow a multitude of team configs and adds a lot of personalisation.

The missions coming sequentially instead of as a choice of three however I'm not quite sold on. As well as tripling the amount of play, I would imagine that it removes the panic management element. The point of having to choose between the three is that the two we *don't* do increases the panic on those continents. It adds the strategic choice of picking between panic level and different rewards. eg. go for the 4 engineers or keep panic in Asia low. Wouldn't being able to do every mission mean panic levels all stay low (and additionally, the troops get more missions to level up on)? When do the mid-range enemies start appearing, out of curiosity?

I like the idea of having 2 equip slots and choices from the start. It makes rookies a little more adaptable and survivable.

I'm not convinced by the new weapons. I appreciate the choices but, unlike the addition of entirely new classes/skill trees, weapons with minor bonuses seems more like choice for the sake of choice.

I've actually modded my game myself somewhat. One main change I made was to allow the stun gun in the pistol slot. I also thoroughly enjoyed the Not Created Equal, Hidden Potential and my favourite, Training Roulette modifiers. It meant some soldiers would be less useful but others would shine. Training Roulette in particular made for some wonderful combinations. I had a sniper with sprint, an assault soldier with all the medic abilities, another assault with the HEAT ammo perk and so on.

I might check it out out of interest, tho I'll have to be certain to back up my existing game files first. Don't suppose you have the bubonic achievement by chance? It's one of the two achievements I haven't unlocked and haven't met anyone who has it to play in multiplayer

 

[Garriath]

snip

Thanks for writing back!

In response to your concern that the sequential missions take away strategic choice, I forgot to mention a key feature: troops now become "fatigued" after a mission and are undeployable for a number of days. This means that your resources are very limited in choosing which threats you respond to- actually being able to confront every attack as it happens would only be possible with an extremely efficient, well-designed team. Which means that every time a mission comes up, you need to make a frank evaluation as to whether or not taking it on is feasible. As such, I think there's a lot more strategic choice than in the original game's system, which (as an earlier poster suggested) seemed to imply that XCom, for all of its research labs, workshops, super-sonic fighter jets, and highly trained supersoldiers, could only afford a single helicopter. With the Long War, your limits are the manpower and resources you have before you- which are things that you have control of, which keeps the strategic gameplay going.

Honestly, I more or less agree with what you said about the weapons- it's a small feature that's nice if you're trying to develop an especially accurate light infantry or a heavy-hitting close-combat specialist, but it's also entirely viable to just keep all troops equipped with their basic rifle.

Honestly, from the tweaks that you're describing, it sounds like the Long War would be a really good fit for you, especially with what you said about Training Roulette. Worth a try, at least- I don't believe it's a large download at all!

EDIT: Oh, and sorry- I actually don't have the bubonic achievement. Good luck, though!

 

[GloatingSwine]

The missions coming sequentially instead of as a choice of three however I'm not quite sold on. As well as tripling the amount of play, I would imagine that it removes the panic management element. The point of having to choose between the three is that the two we *don't* do increases the panic on those continents. It adds the strategic choice of picking between panic level and different rewards. eg. go for the 4 engineers or keep panic in Asia low. Wouldn't being able to do every mission mean panic levels all stay low (and additionally, the troops get more missions to level up on)? When do the mid-range enemies start appearing, out of curiosity?

From the point of view of the original X-Com fan though, having those three missions that you always had to choose one of felt artificial and forced.

In the original X-Com the aliens followed their own set of rules, anything they were doing had to spawn a UFO to be doing it, and those UFOs could be detected and intercepted before they did their thing. (In principle, when they decided to attack a base they'd send infinite waves so you couldn't really stop them other than doing the base defence)

Because you always had those "pick one" events no matter how much satellite coverage you had or how many interceptor bases fully loaded it always felt like the geoscape was more scripted than before.