Poll of the Day > XCom 2 is awful

(+) Yeah! (+)

Didn't really play the first one, but holy shit this grinds my gears. I don't even mind the RNG so much. I can understand missing a "90%" hit no problem.

What I don't fucking get is moving my character to pretty point blank range(maybe a square away from the enemy) to go from a 65% shot to.... 55%? Silly me, if I understood this game's logic I wouldn't have fucking risked moving him out in the open like that if I realized I was just going to get fisted by this nonsense.

This is on top of the camera being fuck-awful.

Everything else about the game seems sweet, but this shit tanks the whole game for me.

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Some guns such as sniper rifles and LMG's aren't that good point-blank. Then you have to consider whether moving will get you a flanking shot bonus or whether you'll be shooting them from a spot where they are covered.

Some enemies also just have inherently good dodge, in which case you may need to rely on other ways of dealing with them (ie use explosives, stun control them, shotgun/melee rush)

also git good

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I get that, but this dude just has a straight rifle. It's not a sniper or anything. I literally had the same angle, it was just closer.

And "git gud" implies I'm playing a game where conventional logic follows. That's clearly not the case here.

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I liked Xcom2 except for the ridiculous time constraints that they for some reason felt the need to put on every level

Combat is already a challenge but even when you are doing well suddenly youve taken too many turns and now youre totally outnumbered and screwed

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Me thinks you're over looking a factor.

Anyways this is what xcom is known for. Cant just gun it all down gotta plan and position it isn't call of duty.

Hated the time constraints on each level and on the campaign

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Krow_Incarnate posted...

if I understood this game's logic I wouldn't have fucking risked moving him out in the open like that

Well, in this sentence you say part of this game's logic. Shouldn't risk moving just about anyone out into the open.

Man I loved that Reaper ability!

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It wasn't exactly in the middle of the level, mind you.

There were two enemies left that I was in the process of finishing off.

It's one thing if I just got fucked by the RNG on high percentage chance-to-hit or whatever. I can completely understand that.

But moving my soldier with an assault rifle closer to the enemy whose only cover is on the other side somehow lowers my percentage?

I didn't even move right up on him. I left a block of space between my character and the enemy.

I decided not to attack and move back into cover, and he got fucked by an overwatch attack and died on the enemy's next turn.

Joshs Name posted...

Hated the time constraints on each level and on the campaign

This is also kind of ridiculous, but it's an intentional design mechanic and I respect that much.

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XCom 2 is a TBS masterpiece. That said, all the XCom games do need a bit more "readibility", in terms of when you're in range, cover advantages, when walls actually protect/cloak you, enemy ability/shot range, etc. You get used to it after playing the series after a while (almost all cover is just that, cover, and it's pretty hard to be untargetable in the game, etc.). At the very least, they should borrow from the Fire Emblem series, and allow you to backtrack your movement in order to see what the best shot you can get is, and how vulnerable this leaves you to an enemy. What likely happened to you is you moved into an area that had an unfavorable angle on how the enemy was covered.

That said, the XCom2 DLC makes the game such an ass-kicking of a good time. Had a level with one of the super-mutant things and a Chosen, and a super tough boss. My elite squad barely made it through it.

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Super Xcom2 pro here.

Mission Timer constraints:
For one, the time constraints never should bother you if you have the Faction Alliance power for starting ALL units mission in stealth!

The Timer doesnt tick down as long as you remain in stealth, allowing you to set up a nasty ambush first. Every mission with a timer you should be getting your Reaper to do reconnaissance because Reapers have decreased detection radius (range at which enemies see through stealth)! You can set up a claymore, among a group of enemies and have your reaper shoot it or have a grenadier blow the whole thing up for massive splash damage, BONUSES for fall damage too. If you still think that wont kill all enemies in that group, try putting a few units on overwatch so that when they try to scramble, blast them with reaction shots before they can reach cover. By the time you have taken out an entire squad, the rest of the mission should be a piece of cake and easily finish able.

For some timed missions such as setting charges, I was usually able to send one Reaper in stealth on a commando mission to set the charges weaving in and out of sightlines and setting the C4 before the timer even began countdown.

Aiming better:
As for missing shots, theres a lot of great ways to mitigate this. Try reading your info screen every time you take a shot to see what positively effects your aim and what negatively effects your aim. High ground gives a bonus to aim, where as low ground negatively effects it, as does enemy cover level. Remember, flanking your enemy only increases critical hit percentage! Everything else is tied to your weapon's most effective range, such as how shotguns prefer close-up shots but sniper rifles are less effective here.

What increases accuracy:
-Scope Weapon Attachment
-Aim+ PCS (rare)
-Going on covert operations (permanent)

Last thing is remember that Skirmishers and Grenadiers have inherently bad aim and you should have them do some of the above as their aim is atrocious, but if you can get rid of this weakness they become some of your most powerful units in the game. A Grenadier can pick up an ability called Chain Shot that with an aim penalty can shoot twice, coupled with their ability to armor pierce with 'shredding', this ability can one shot most enemies in the game, even a sectopod if you gave them blue screen rounds (ammo type which does bonus damage to robotic enemies).

Op solider types:
-Templar w/ bonus movement and reaper ability, preferable with a dodge PCS
-Ranger w/ bonus dodge from covert ops+Spider/Wraith Suit, add AP rounds or Talon rounds
-Grenadier w/ bonus aim from covert ops/AimPCS Chainshot shredding
- Sniper with pistol abilites, escpecially Fanfire/Faceoff + Armor piercing rounds and spider/wraithsuit
-Psi OPS with War Suit and movement PCS and loads of psychic powers
-Reaper high ammo capacity, banished ability / lots of Claymore abilites, especially homing claymore+banished for oneshotting most enemies in the games even the Chosen.

Also WAR OF THE CHOSEN gives the game way more depth, totally buy it for the best campaign experience.
Last gift of Shen grants a new Mech unit.

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they are supposed to be the elite of the elite, but they miss from point-blank with a shotgun.

shots are predetermined (which is stupid). if you reload, take a different action
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Krazy_Kirby posted...

they are supposed to be the elite of the elite

I'm pretty sure this was never stated.

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Joshs Name posted...

Hated the time constraints on each level and on the campaign

turn based strategy with timer limit? No thx

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FatalAccident posted...

turn based strategy with timer limit? No thx

There was stuff to collect that would self destruct if you didn't get it. I don't recall the missions themselves having timers most of the time. (It's been 2 years since I played xcom 2 could be forgetting something)

The timers always seemed pretty generous to me, and it was only a few missions. I didn't play on the hardest difficulties though.

The missions themselves are kinda rng with the type of missions they're going to be. I think most of the mission types have some sort of time to complete, even if they don't have an actual timer counting down turns until failure. For example, there's missions where the ADVENT attacks civilians and you have to go in and save them. In these missions, there's no timer, but there's only x amount of civilians and the ADVENT kills one civilian per round.

https://xcom.fandom.com/wiki/Missions_(XCOM_2)

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FatalAccident posted...

turn based strategy with timer limit? No thx

The timer actually improves the game encouraging more active gameplay instead sitting back, playing passively.

And as I already said, Stealth is a great way to get around the timer.

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Krazy_Kirby posted...

they are supposed to be the elite of the elite, but they miss from point-blank with a shotgun.

shots are predetermined (which is stupid). if you reload, take a different action

If you are shooting a shotty at point blank range instead of using their sword, what?

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deoxxys posted...

If you are shooting a shotty at point blank range instead of using their sword, what?

Swords can kinda suck if you don't spec into them and shotguns can oneshot a lot of enemies.

Duke_Lion posted...

Swords can kinda suck if you don't spec into them and shotguns can oneshot a lot of enemies.

True
Well the base sword isnt good (upgrades have decent base damage) but its guaranteed to hit which is what someone was upset about.

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deoxxys posted...

The timer actually improves the game encouraging more active gameplay instead sitting back, playing passively.

And as I already said, Stealth is a great way to get around the timer.

I think a better incentive would be to tie rewards at the end of the mission to the number of turns used or something. I liked XCOM2 a lot but the endless time restraints were not fun at all to me and are the reason I prefer Enemy Unknown overall. That game confined a timer to things like terror missions but for most of the game you could play at your own pace.

With the timer in place every mission it starts to feel like if youre not playing exactly the way the developers want you to that youre just being punished for it.

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That does sound like a good incentive.

Though maybe I played post-patch when they eased up on the timers? Because I'm 80 hours into my run and asides from once or twice, I dont think I have ever had less then 5 turns leftover, unless I was purposely sitting around waiting for reinforcements to farm for XP.


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Mead posted...

I liked Xcom2 except for the ridiculous time constraints that they for some reason felt the need to put on every level

Combat is already a challenge but even when you are doing well suddenly youve taken too many turns and now youre totally outnumbered and screwed

This is basically why I didnt finish it.
it became more frustrating than fun.
I remember liking the first game more, although I dont remember specifics. I should go back and play it

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@ZBug_
>See post #10 for tips on timed missions.

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People keep talking about timers guess I'll need to load it up and see. I don't remember it being bad.

I remember really disliking the timers in xcom 2. Not because they were overly demanding, but simply because the pressure of having to worry about them made the experience less fun.

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BlackScythe0 posted...

People keep talking about timers guess I'll need to load it up and see. I don't remember it being bad.

Timers for me aren't bad it's just about 'em existing. Pathfinder Kingmaker has timers but also a difficult setting that literally makes it impossible to fail and it still turns me off the game. Timers for quests and tasks are fine, but for overarching stories I'm just not interested in them it turns out.

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deoxxys posted...

That does sound like a good incentive.

Though maybe I played post-patch when they eased up on the timers? Because I'm 80 hours into my run and asides from once or twice, I dont think I have ever had less then 5 turns leftover, unless I was purposely sitting around waiting for reinforcements to farm for XP.

Thats certainly possible, I played it back when it released

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deoxxys posted...

That does sound like a good incentive.

Though maybe I played post-patch when they eased up on the timers? Because I'm 80 hours into my run and asides from once or twice, I dont think I have ever had less then 5 turns leftover, unless I was purposely sitting around waiting for reinforcements to farm for XP.

This. I played XCOM2 twice, once when it was released, and again after the Chosen DLC (and I got all the other DLC, too). I don't remember them being on that many missions, or feeling like they overburdened me.

A big drawback of TBS games is how easy it is to turtle and cheese most of them, and this was a big problem for XCOM 1, where Overwatch was a bit OP and you could just hunker down and overwatch your way to victory a majority of the time. Some missions being timed is an obvious solution to that. And honestly, sounds a bit like a casual vs. hardcore preference, since being forced to move and think faster, and less able to cheese it makes for a harder challenge.

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I'm playing through now (with War of the Chosen) and there's an option to both double the main game timer and the timer for each individual mission and I've had no problems with time constraints so far.

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im alright with it but i hated the timed stuff

Krow_Incarnate posted...

Didn't really play the first one, but holy shit this grinds my gears. I don't even mind the RNG so much. I can understand missing a "90%" hit no problem.

What I don't fucking get is moving my character to pretty point blank range(maybe a square away from the enemy) to go from a 65% shot to.... 55%? Silly me, if I understood this game's logic I wouldn't have fucking risked moving him out in the open like that if I realized I was just going to get fisted by this nonsense.

This is on top of the camera being fuck-awful.

Everything else about the game seems sweet, but this shit tanks the whole game for me.

I warned you about xcom games TC. you didn't listen. :P

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Mead posted...

I liked Xcom2 except for the ridiculous time constraints that they for some reason felt the need to put on every level

i wasn't a fan myself, ok?

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I played through Xcom 2 + DLC for the first time last month and the timers didn't really bother me. A few missions it got close but most of the time I still had a few turns to spare.

I had way more trouble with the bullshit 90%/95% misses though.

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I played long after realease and I can't recall nearly as many timed mission people talk about. Besides playing like a snail and inching through a map one square at a time is boring so I don't mind encouraging more engaging playstyles.

I had a massive issue with the half assed stealth though, I go through all the hassle of getting to the objective undetected, surrounded by enemies and I still get detected for doing the obj successfully? Or I fire with one unit across the map and they immediately know where my other guy is despite being 100ft away the opposite direction behind 2 concrete walls? That's fucking stupid.

Also TC sounds like he doesn't understand the game mechanics. Never let your guard down, never put anyone out in the open for whatever reason unless you know they'll get an extra action point somehow or it's the very last enemy and when you do you should be right in thier face And cover is still cover, it doesn't matter if you're on the other side of a waist high wall, the enemy still has cover bonus.

The best way to make advantage of stealth is buy setting up a nasty overwatch ambush usually starting with a claymore (which isnt movement triggered but more of a c4) and triggering it with grenade launcher for bonus damage. If you want a true stealth team where only the guy who fired gets revealed, you need to take people with Concealment (Reapers and Rangers). Rangers are more like super-crit stealthers and Reapers are the true stealth class which only have A CHANCE to be revealed after firing and have decreased detection radi, making them harder for aliens to detect in stealth.

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Xcom games have many things I like about it & I know they are set in their ways on the challenge they make for people playing it.

But it was an interesting when I saw a clip online of someone who had made it far into xcom 1 after using one of the secret characters and saying that they could now enjoy all aspects of the game.
(for the record though, if my hit percentage says 99% and the game throws that into its number cruncher algorithm and comes back saying that it will still miss, Im done)


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