XCOM tips and my sob story (Converted to a mild Let's Play!)

[tippy2k2]

EDIT IN
This has converted into a mild Let's Play! Feel free to give your tips as well as volunteer for duty if you'd like. If you are killed and would like to respawn as a rookie, let me know!

I have created a thread for my "Let's Play" as suggested by our supreme overlord Nasrin.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/groups/view/Tippy2k2-s-XCOM-Army-Let-s-Play

Good luck and God's Speed soldiers!
EDIT DONE

Being the macho, chest-beating, giant gamer-score to compensate for something, awesome guy that I am, I decided to play XCOM.

I absolutely love hardcore tactic games. I'm not sure why I hate myself so much but a game that punishes you for trying to do too much too soon is my idea of a good time. So, being the sexy stallion of sweetness that I am, I decided to play Iron Man mode...

...well that's five hours of my life down the drain. That's about how long I am in it now and everyone is dead and we're out of money. Sorry mankind

So XCOM veterans: What tips and/or helpful hints do you have so that the newly humbled tippy2k2 does not have to kill a lot of time once again? Anything work particularly well or did you just kind of stumble through the game? Also, please be nice and don't spoil stuff since I'm not terribly far into the game.

EDIT: I'll offer the same thing to everyone in this thread: To thank you for your service, you will get to become cannon fodder a hero in my army. If there is a specific class you want, say the word and I will name someone after you! Just put it in your post somewhere.

CURRENT GROUP:

Spoiler: Current group

scorptatious (assault class; abbreviated to SCORP; German)
shrekfan246 (heavy class; abbreviated to SHREK) KIA via Floater
bananafishtoday (Sniper class; abbreviated to SHEPARD; American)
firelightning1 (none yet, I do not have an additional sniper unlocked yet but that will be you)
Easton Dark (assault class; abbreviated to DARK; Canadian)
Souplex (Assault class; your user name fit!; German)
janjotat (support class; your user name fit!; French)

Free classes:
Three Supports
One Heavy

 

[scorptatious]

Well for starters, you definetely shouldn't be reckless during missions. Battles can be won or lost depending on how early you gain the attention of a group of aliens. So when moving your troops, have one guy inch his way forward and everyone else following his/her trail. It makes missions go on for a much longer time, but it's a better alternative to having one guy dash in, spawn a group of aliens, and then having the turn end immediately after. Always have your soldiers stay close to each other. Spread out too far and you may accidentally gain the attention of more aliens. But not too close either, as some aliens can throw grenades.

Building satellites is a MAJOR priority. So try to focus on building satellite uplinks and satellites so you can start covering countries and gaining more income as soon as possible. When deploying satellites, try to wait until right before the monthly council report. That way, if there was a series of abductions that spring up late in the month, you can place satellites in the countries you didn't help out and lower their panic and keep them in the council longer.

Also, when deploying satellites try to focus on covering entire continents. When you place satellites on all the countries on a continent, you gain a bonus from them. NA reduces the cost of interceptors by half, Africa increases your monthly income by 30%, and SA makes autopsies and interrogations instant. Start out in one of those three continents and focus on covering the other two as soon as possible.

Also, when building uplinks make sure you're building them in a 2X2 kind of formation. Uplinks gain an additional satellite slot for every uplink built around them.

When it comes to which countries to help out during abductions, Prioritize engineers over everything else. Unless a country is about to enter full panic and you don't have any satellites to give by the end of the month. Having more engineers means you can build more stuff at a fraction of the cost.

When researching things, try to get carapace armor as soon as you can. Preferably before the first terror mission that starts at the end of April. Then laser weapons, and then focus on researching alien biology. You'll need better equipment as soon as possible as the aliens won't wait for you, but at the same time, the story won't progress until you're ready so you can put priority research on hold while you focus on other things.

Finally, build power generators over steam. It increases your energy by 30 or more depending on which kind of power generator you use.

Hope this helps!

 

[tippy2k2]

Holy wall Batman!

Thanks! On the plus side, except for the "Rush in cause 'Merica! FUCK YEAH!!!" attitude of my missions, I tended to stick near the helpful hints you have given me (specifically Armor and Engineers). I got completely blind-sided and destroyed on the first base operation when these...purple...zerg things went all Alien on me and started just destroying my team in one bull-rush shot. I'm hoping that in this next shot, I'll be a TINY bit more careful about how spread out my guys get.

Spoiler: This mother fucker is the nightmare that my team couldn't handle

To thank you for your service, you will get to become cannon fodder a hero in my army. If there is a specific class you want, say the word and I will name someone after you!

 

[scorptatious]

Ah, the Chrysalid. The bane of most people's existence in the early game. (And late game too if you let them kill too many innocent bystanders) One thing I normally like to do against those guys is to have a heavy use Suppression on one. Suppression has a 100% chance of hitting enemies who try to move while under Suppression, and since Chrysalids have to move to attack you, they'll always get hit by Suppression.

Also, it doesn't matter which class you have me on. I'm just glad to join the cause.

 

[Daystar Clarion]

Get a British female sniper.

Call her Lilith Valentine after your Fallout New Vegas character.

Give her the nickname 'Casino'.

Why 'Casino'?

Because she always hits the jackpot.

 

[shrekfan246]

Chryssalids can go to hell. Their movement speed is insane.

Get a Sniper. Give them a Scope and Double Tap (Colonel-rank ability, so... not quite as useful of a tip for early-game stuff). Lol your way to your Sniper getting over one hundred kills. Squadsight is a really good ability, but it gets annoying when you keep getting missions in towns or UFOs and your sniper never gets the one-up because you can't move and fire in the same turn, so Snap Shot might have more utility depending on the situation. ... maybe just get two Snipers. I don't know, my team was usually a Heavy, Sniper, two Assaults, and two Supports, but I wasn't playing on Iron Man or Classic difficulty.

 

[Andy Shandy]

Get a British female sniper.

Call her Lilith Valentine after your Fallout New Vegas character.

Give her the nickname 'Casino'.

Why 'Casino'?

Because she always hits the jackpot.

Just started playing XCOM (well beat the tutorial) and with my first batch of soldiers...Not a single Brit D=

[HEADING=1] Extremely disappointed! [/HEADING]

 

[bananafishtoday]

It's worth experimenting with different styles to see what works for you. I was lucky in that I discovered how I work best rather quickly, but there are a lot of different ways to play successfully. When I listened to the XCOM bonus podcast, I was actually really surprised at the variety of tactics the crew used. I thought I'd just found the "proper" way to play--turned out, I'd just found the way that worked for me.

Basically, I had my three "all-stars." Sniper with double-tap and squadsight who racked up more kills than the rest of the squad put together. Heavy with jetpack for advance scouting and suppressing fire. And support with triple medpacks and movement speed boost for keeping them alive. Then I'd have three assaults/heavies/whoever was lying around. Their job was to strap on some titan armor and die protecting the first three. (A lot of close calls where an all-star might have been killed the next turn were averted by running a meatshield out of cover to be a more attractive target for the enemy AI.) I brought as many grenades and rockets as possible on UFO levels. Since my sniper was Death incarnate, I'd just punch holes through the UFO walls to set up shots for her. In the end, I lost two all-star supports and countless

But yeah, something totally different might work for you. And I will say my strategy almost wiped my entire squad (I play on ironman) a couple times I encountered the real late-game heavy hitters, so it wasn't all good. Including one romp inside a UFO: everyone died except my heavy and sniper, and it was them vs my first ethereal... several chain-mind controls with my non-MCed character running for dear life from their ally, often in circles. While I was horrified that I might lose these characters I'd grown so fond of, it really seemed like the Benny Hill theme should have been playing during it.

Come up with your continent priorities from the get-go. I didn't realize this until I'd experienced it ingame, but satellites serve a dual purpose: launching one drops panic in the affected area, and blanketing a continent prevents abduction missions from firing there. (Thus, there are no abduction missions to ignore on the continent, so panic doesn't go up.) Decide which continents you'll refuse to give up, which you'll try to fight for, and which you'll ignore completely, and deciding which abductions to respond to becomes a lot smoother. Trying to keep panic down everywhere would require a player to be really, really good... and tbh it isn't necessary. (Sorry, 1/3 of the human race.)

I would be honored if the sniper Rachel Shepard, hero of the war against the XCOM aliens and the Reapers, could give her life in service to your army.

Chryssalids can go to hell. Their movement speed is insane.

Get a Sniper. Give them a Scope and Double Tap (Colonel-rank ability, so... not quite as useful of a tip for early-game stuff). Lol your way to your Sniper getting over one hundred kills. Squadsight is a really good ability, but it gets annoying when you keep getting missions in towns or UFOs and your sniper never gets the one-up because you can't move and fire in the same turn, so Snap Shot might have more utility depending on the situation. ... maybe just get two Snipers. I don't know, my team was usually a Heavy, Sniper, two Assaults, and two Supports, but I wasn't playing on Iron Man or Classic difficulty.

I got a high level sniper from a mission and tried a couple double sniper battles, with him as the snapshotter, before he met his end. It worked really well actually. The squadsight one sat in the back and anything that she could draw a bead on died, while the snapshot one had the flexibility to move around to get proper angles in cramped environments.

How'd the two supports work out? Was each specced for their own side of the skill tree? That's something I want to try my next playthrough, seemed good but couldn't level the non-medic to suppression before they died.

 

[shrekfan246]

Chryssalids can go to hell. Their movement speed is insane.

Get a Sniper. Give them a Scope and Double Tap (Colonel-rank ability, so... not quite as useful of a tip for early-game stuff). Lol your way to your Sniper getting over one hundred kills. Squadsight is a really good ability, but it gets annoying when you keep getting missions in towns or UFOs and your sniper never gets the one-up because you can't move and fire in the same turn, so Snap Shot might have more utility depending on the situation. ... maybe just get two Snipers. I don't know, my team was usually a Heavy, Sniper, two Assaults, and two Supports, but I wasn't playing on Iron Man or Classic difficulty.

I got a high level sniper from a mission and tried a couple double sniper battles, with him as the snapshotter, before he met his end. It worked really well actually. The squadsight one sat in the back and anything that she could draw a bead on died, while the snapshot one had the flexibility to move around to get proper angles in cramped environments.

How'd the two supports work out? Was each specced for their own side of the skill tree? That's something I want to try my next playthrough, seemed good but couldn't level the non-medic to suppression before they died.

I started leveling a Snap Shot Sniper before the end of the game, but never got him to a high enough level. My Squadsight/Double Tap Sniper had more kills than every other soldier too, though. Only guy who even came close was my Heavy, Carlos 'Doomsday' Vega, who survived the Tutorial. Thought it was fitting that her nickname was 'Athena'.

And yeah, I had a Medikit-specced Support and a Smoke Grenade/Suppression-specced Support. For the most part it worked out all right, but my Suppression Support always got injured in combat so for half of my missions I'd be running around with a lower-leveled second Support.

 

[DeimosMasque]

Just started playing XCOM (well beat the tutorial) and with my first batch of soldiers...Not a single Brit D=

[HEADING=1] Extremely disappointed! [/HEADING]

My first entire playthrough I didn't get a single US or Brit soldier. Scottish, South Korean, Brazil and Japan seemed the only ones to send soldiers.

 

[firelightning1]

Get the best armor first and laser weapons as soon as possible. You will need to prioritize your sniper over most of your other units, If you can get your sniper to a good vantage point you can just have the rest of your team bunker down with overwatch and have your sniper pick enemies off while your squad shoots any who run away.

As for the "purple zergs" suppression and close combat specialist skills, that seriously wrecks their battle plans when they run up and you get free shots on them.

In your base build two labs, two workshops, and two satellite relies as soon as possible this will help you early on and prepare you for later when you can build more.

Also inch by inch and its not running away its a tactical regrouping. (don't run into battle and don't be afraid to abort a mission if your squad is in serious risk)

I want to be a sniper of Either American, British or Israeli descent.

 

[Easton Dark]

I have not even seen the attack animation for the chrysalids used on one of my soldiers. Maybe I can help.

- Unit upgrades are not created equal. There are clear options half the time which should be taken.

Notable ones:

1. 3 medkits instead of one? Heck yeah.

2. Give the sniper unlimited opportunities to fire in one turn? Heck yeah.

3. Make every shot against the target after the heavy's be more likely to hit? Heck yeah.

4. Squad sight for sniper. Get it.


- Keep your units ranged. Shotguns are not so overly effective that you should risk any of your high level soldiers getting in close. Rifles do the job for any class, even assault.

- If you don't move forward, the chance of more aliens joining the current fight is almost 0. Do not move forward to "better cover", run backwards if you have to and finish off the aliens you already have to fight.

- Satellites are the most important purchase early game. Gotta get those coverage bonuses. If you're hurting for money, cover Africa, but try to disperse satellites over countries with more panic. Losing one is not good (but it is expected, so don't fret if it happens).

- Grenades kill low level enemies and completely destroy the cover for higher ones. On that note:

- Cars and stuff explode. When they get hit and start on fire, move your troops away. If aliens are near it, hit it with an explosive and they'll die unless they're end game level aliens.

- Concentrate fire on Chrysalids. You need to take them down before they do any damage. It's worse if a chrysalid kills one of your troops rather than a muton or something, because they'll come back to life.

- Shredder rocket does not change your heavy's rocket into a shredder. Your heavy now has two rockets to fire, one normal, one shredder. Think about how useful that is.

- Interrogations are nice, but unnecessary. They only give you reduced research time, which doesn't ultimately matter. Don't risk your troops to capture anything.

- Get the squad size upgrades. If you don't, you're gonna have a bad time.

- Don't waste money on SHIVs unless you enjoy the prospect of mobile cover.

- Do research into weapons and your troops can pick weapons up that they find after a fight. They can have plasma without you spending a cent.

- Keep your squad together (not all bunched up, but let them have the same area in their sights). Splitting up is not a good idea and ultimately not worth it.

- Don't research priority stuff until you've gotten everything else as well. Aliens get harder the farther in the story it goes.

And words of encouragement:

Once you've given your first upgraded weapon to your troops, know the game is turning in your favor. I actually skipped over laser weapons completely and went straight to plasma. The hard game at the beginning turns easy when most of your troops can one or two shot any alien.

*based on my successful playthrough that lasted a few days with a squad consisting of 3 heavies, an assault, a sniper, and whatever the medkit holding one is. They all survived up to the final mission*

I like assault.

 

[Ham Blitz]

One of the best strategy I learned for beginning is focus on satellites and air support. Getting every nation covered early can have you earning massive income early on.

 

[Bostur]

On Ironman it does get that rogue-like quality, that even if you play competently you may get totally whacked without a chance to recover. The older games had a bit more room for recovering from disasters.

So you encountered something completely unexpected, and you didn't know how to react. Thats probably going to happen again.

My best piece of advice is, don't try to rush it. Play it safe, focus research on personal survival and economy. Armor and early weapon upgrades tend to make a huge difference.

Don't take unecessary chances. Dr. Vahlen gets giddy at the prospect of "Interrogating ze aliens", but don't risk your soldiers lives to stun an alien if it is too dangerous.

In terror missions you may get the impulse to try to save as many civilians as possible. But you need to think of the survival of your soldiers first and foremost. Saving two more civilians isn't worth it if you risk the future of humanity in the process.

When things start to go downhill in a mission, it's time for having a good long thought. Chances are it will only get worse from that point. Keep in mind that you can abandon a mission if you have no hope of turning it around. Its better to fail a mission with a few survivors than failing it with no survivors.

Also engineers, engineers, engineers. In most cases when you get a choice of rewards choose engineers. There is such a thing as too many engineers, but it's rare. Sometimes you will need to choose missions based on panic, but otherwise go for engineers.

 

[ShindoL Shill]

Research and Satellites are probably the two best things to work on, which means you should get labs and workshops ASAP.
No use having satellites over every country if you don't have the firepower to handle the missions you get. But there's also no use letting UFOs run rampant, increasing panic.

I got completely blind-sided and destroyed on the first base operation when these...purple...zerg things went all Alien on me and started just destroying my team in one bull-rush shot. I'm hoping that in this next shot, I'll be a TINY bit more careful about how spread out my guys get.

Yeah, those are Chryssalids. They show up on Terror Missions, too (Terror Missions also reduce panic for entire continents, and you only get one at once, so if you complete it, you get a lot of panic reduction and no panic increase, unlike with Abductions).
IIRC, the Chryssalids robotic units, which means Suppression Heavies with HEAT ammo are super-effective, and I think one of the other classes has an Anti-Robot ability.

Snipers are really useful. Squadsight helps, sometimes, but Snapshot gives them more mobility, and I've found that, more often than not, Squadsight is much more restrictive.
Assault units should be sent in first, because if you need to retreat a bit, or dash into cover and spot a new enemy, they have Run and Gun.
Support units should always carry Medikits, and you should always have one in your team. Keep Support units a little out of the way of direct combat, so you don't lose your Medic.

You should invest in the Officer Training School and Psi Labs when possible, because that stuff is useful.
And don't Overwatch until you've got everyone in position. You might have to retreat.

 

[tippy2k2]

I see a nice running theme here

Engineers!
Don't rush it!
More Engineers!
Snipers are your best friend!
Don't be afraid to retreat!
Did I mention Engineers yet!?!

Now this is just a little gushing here but:
Holy shit! Unless skipping the tutorial gave me a brand new game, every mission map that I am replaying (since I abandoned the first game) are all completely new maps! This is freaking sweet!

 

[Headdrivehardscrew]

Well, unless you know the game, I strongly advise you to not start playing it in Iron Man mode. I guess that's exactly why they called it 'Iron Man' and not just 'hard' - people are meanwhile conditioned to hate the 'normal' experience as today's 'normal' is yesterday's 'easy mode' - you might remember that bit from another thread.

Even as seasoned gamers that still vividly remember the old one, we had to start out with the standard difficulty offered; as we had no clue as to how the devs translated the IP to a 2012 A.D. game.

Once you internalized the basics (and then some), do give Iron Man mode another chance. Iron Man is fun, but only if you know what it is you're doing. Even if you're pretty much an expert, the game can still plough something broken or unfair into your face and kill a random (important) member of your team. If you start out with Iron Man, you'll perform like just about 100% of the macho men at our office: You'll quit and make crap up and lie about you beating the game when all you did was watch someone play it on Youtube.

 

[BloatedGuppy]

Holy shit! Unless skipping the tutorial gave me a brand new game, every mission map that I am replaying (since I abandoned the first game) are all completely new maps! This is freaking sweet!

Don't get used to that feeling. I really enjoyed XCOM, but map variety is an Achilles Heel for that game. Way too many repeats. I'd sometimes get the same map twice inside of 3-4 missions.

This is the original list of tips I gave and I still stand by most all of them for Classic difficulty. Impossible is a different game altogether, but for Classic or Normal these are more than adequate.

http://www.escapistmagazine.com/forums/read/9.392446-I-find-XCOM-really-difficult#15829154

 

[Souplex]

Try not to dash if possible.
Take squad-sight for your Sniper's first rank.
Take the left tree for your Assault. The only exception should be when you take rapid fire.
While overwatch does have an aim penalty, it hits about as much as firing on an enemy in light cover as moving enemies don't get a cover bonus.
If you want to name a soldier after me, go nuts. I'd prefer an Assault class.
First Name: Soup.
Nickname: Awesomegasm.
Last Name: Lex.
Don't play Iron Man in the console version. It's a bit buggy. I have no idea if the PC version is buggy, but my bet is probably.