I am getting skullfucked by Long War. Fucking ayys.
I have already tried a France start (for the extra requisitions, but I oversold my stuff and lagged behind in tech), a Nigeria start (we wuz mobile n shiet, but my air game suffered too much) and now I tried a Mexico start with Wealthy Benefactor, but I just feel like I'm behind pretty much everything - cyberdisks are about to appear and I don't even have T2 laser weapons, or better body armour. Air game is better this time, but I have eached rock bottom in materials, so I'm abandoning this game.
Help me out here, anons. How the fuck do I succeed at this game? How do I achieve a balance between my tactical and my air game? Should I just fuck it all and go for an Egypt start? I was considering another run with Nigeria.
Long War isn't a very good mod, it has some nice ideas but it's bogged down by unfixable core mechanical issues. Long War only serves to highlight some of NuCom's biggest flaws.
Jonathan Davis
How do you mean?
Hudson Clark
What difficulty are you on? I almost always do a USA or Mexico start. I'm a big fan of the super cheat OTS upgrades and I find the NA bonus to be essential to keeping up with the air game. What was your research order? How many satelites do you have? Have you been capturing aliens? I feel like you should remember that LW is balls to the walls hard due to a variety of reasonable and bullshit factors. But more importantly, don't be afraid to keep going if things look bleak. With solid tactics and a good bit of luck you might last long enough for that crucial tech to arrive in your soldiers hands (speaking of which, it's entirely normal to not have advanced beam lasers by the time cyberdicks arrive). The devs intended for the game to be a struggle. Really though, is right. The game itself is still buggy and fucked at a fundamental level. Play a better game.
Jordan Wood
My research order has been basically a beeline for Advanced Laser so I can get a decent weapon for my interceptor. I started with Xenobio for sectoid council requests, and went with Alien Materials for requests as well once, but in my other playthrough just went straight to laser.
Should I consider a France start and going for a gauss rush ignoring laser? I have been thinking about this, as that would let me get the +1hp bonus from a Russia satellite before any assault or infantry promotions.
I'm playing on Classic. I just started playing the game, didn't even play the unmodded version for more than a couple of hours.
Ayden Martin
2-actions-per-turn system replacing AP, class-based equipment, tying basic mechanics to class-specific abilities, all weapons functioning as single-shot hit/miss guns with no modelling of actual projectiles, being forced to ignore missions due to having only one skyranger and the inability to pull one squad out of a mission and send a second squad in are just a few of the core mechanical issues that dampen NuCom's potential gameplay depth.
Jack Perez
When you did that in the old game, would the aliens you killed with the first squad remain dead? Also, would the game maintain the same map, or was a new one generated?
Blake Brooks
Gauss rush is ill advised unless you have extreme confidence in your tactical skills. What I've done a couple of times is skipping gauss and going straight from beam to pulse, and then taking gauss when I can in order to get the gauss sniper and recoiless rifle. Your research order is reasonable enough, but I tend to go for xenoneurology for the captures once I have basic beam lasers and body armour. I find that advanced lasers can wait for a bit, and the interrogations not only give research credit but allow trading captives for money or troops (mutons almost always give sergeants). I do hope you have at least 5 or 6 satelites up by the time cyberdisks arrive. Not so much for the country bonuses but for the money.
Hooooooo boy. Be prepared for hours of unexpected frustration. You'll have the joy of experiencing all the buggy glory of this game in one of the most unforgiving mods that exist. I hope to sweet baby Jesus that you're not playing in Ironman.
Easton Barnes
I already experienced the bugs alright. Plenty of random crashes, at least one per game session, so I ditched ironman pretty early. I'm also playing with aiming angles and red fog, not sure if that changes anything.
How important are chem grenades in the first 6 months? I couldn't manage to fit them in my research path so far, but I figured since its mostly thin men, sectoids, mutons and lids I can manage with flashbangs mostly. Also, build wise, should I spec my soldiers mostly for survival or damage dealing? I abandoned my campaigns pretty early but from the HP bar of the cyberdiscs I can already see there's gonna be a huge jump down the line.
Oh, one last thing. What can I sell and what should I avoid selling in the gray markey? I know I shouldn't sell alloys and meld, but what about the other things? Will selling Elerium set me back in the future? Because that shit stockpiles easily.
Carter Cox
Learn how to box strat, user. Your boys deserve better.
If you're having a hard time with the tactical game you're going to have to git gud at keeping your guys alive. nuCOM suffers from a huge problem where 90% of your tactical power and options come from troop levels. Long war makes it even worse, except hey your rookies can carry two shit grenades lmao.
dude why Selling elerium early is fine but try to keep some. After a point you're going to be grinding large landeds and there's nothing you can do to stop that.
Camden Gomez
That was a google image result, not mine. That mission is easy, I just equip shotguns on everyone and activate one pod at a time. After the map is clear, I keep everyone on the big whale while a runner activates the computer and then everyone rushes to the objective. If anythiog, the Thin Men are more bothersome than the lids.
I dunno, I thought it would add an extra layer of strategy and make the game more, I don't know, slightly realistic or something. Is that going to make the game too hard in the future? Because so far, I think it has actually been helpful and makes weapons like carbines and SMGs more relevant.
Daniel Rogers
Red Fog just ups the stakes. It gives you more options to deal with ayys, but at the same time you can get fucked super quickly if things don't go your way.
Adam James
Eh, it really doesn't do much I like it. Makes captures easier and explosives useful even if you can't expose or outright kill the enemy. Try playing with the one that makes your interceptors more accurate. The air game has enough bullshit without it.
I usually get them around month 4, just in time for mechtoids if I remember correctly. They're essential if you're not packing shredder or HEAT ammo against big scary enemies like mechtoids or berserkers. Enemies can't hurt you if they're dead. However, keeping a couple of medics specced for support grenades will save your ass past the early game. Never leave home without a gunner, suppression is a great defensive tool. To conserve smoke grenades and LMG ammo remember that you can always pull back and stay out of sight for a bit while you reposition and reconsider your options.
Sell: Do not sell:
Benjamin Morgan
Sorry you said you were getting skullfucked and I just assumed. All red fog does is make the game harder. You should wreck shit so hard in almost every mission that red fog will only affect you negatively. Additionally, the further into the game you get the more that getting shot will become a necessary tactic. It also doesn't help that some missions take so fucking long that you'll be sporting red fog effects for like 15 pods.
Levi White
Oh yeah, don't be shy about selling meld either.
Jackson Nguyen
I'll give a try without it, and I'll try the game on normal this time.
Ah, it's mostly from the balance of research paths / air game just falling apart completely. My tactical game is fine as long as the aliens don't get too much ahead of me.
Alright, I'll keep that in mind. Though I have to say I'm a bit shit at getting meld. The whole "rush to the meld" strategy was only serving to bog me down with multiple pods while the meld evaporated. I started playing more defensively, using motion tracker in the early game before battle scanners are available, but that doesn't really help me get fast to the meld.
Asher Sanders
Is Phoenix Point going to have TUs or should I just wait for Xenonauts 2?
Fuck I wish PP wasn't fighting The Thing. I much perfer aliens to mutant monsters
So I guess basically like the new XCOM, but your movement can be interrupted upon enemy discovery etc.
Charles Cruz
USA start is really good, free elevators already built saves a nice chunk of cash and allows you to dig for early thermal vents, and the halved digging cost also helps out a decent amount.
Biggest thing though is that it's the NA start with the best bonus, so you can early grab the NA continent bonus which is the best in the game.
Early game, rush for lasers, and fit out your aircraft with laser cannons, armor rushing is a trap, and mech rush is a meme. Also assaults and shotguns in general are godlike in 90% of early game missions, abuse the fuck out of them.
Jonathan King
You can do every single mission in longwar, unless you straight up get 20 missions spawning at once, and the time it takes the sky ranger to move from point A to B 20 times is greater than like 24 hours. Which never happens by the way.
Ryder Long
Red fog is actually a buff from xcom 90% of the time. Since you should be starting the vast majority of engagements if you are playing and scouting correctly, yes shit does happen but you should also be planning to mitigate that as much as possible. Anyways, the point is that red fog also effects the enemies, so that muton you brought down to 1hp, is now being cripped with like -50 aim and -5 mobility and is essentially useless, instead of it being 100% of the threat it would normally be without red fog.
Dylan James
I ended up starting on Nigeria again. I bought an extra interceptor and a satellite, and I plan to launch it on Russia when I'm ready to mass promote my infantry and assaults (suicide satellite, not gonna defend it). So far I have about 12 soldiers waiting to be promoted, but I'm aiming for 15 - 20. I also started a second satellite which I will launch in Africa, in the country that gives more defense to newly promoted scouts and snipers, which I'm also holding back on promoting for now.
This, however, will delay my laboratory and workshops, so I might make 2 phoenix cannons instead of saving for laser cannons. It's quicker and cheaper. Let's see how it works out.
Tactical has been fine with just one recruit dead so far. I decided to start abusing grenades to compensate for the lack of assaults which I use a lot. I just hope this won't fuck me too much due to the loss of materials.
Isaiah Robinson
Play a game with ballistic physics, environmental destruction, no arbitrary headcount limits, no free turns for enemies, no magic perk powers, and an actual strategy layer.
Asher Scott
It'll also help if your game of choice has things like fire propagation and enemies that are actually still simulated when you can't see them instead of just turning into teleporting danger zones.
Noah Murphy
There isn't much choice in the TBS department as far as new games go, and I already played the old ones too much. I want new things..
