Support NeoGAF

[Jintor]

anyway once i got over my fear a lot of the new units aren't nearly as scary as i thought.

spectre: instantly takes one of your guys out of the game but then buttswarms to the other side of the room. Flank his ass and get your guy back. Almost never does anything else.

purifier: absolute garbage. don't cluster, sets you on fire for 2 damage, barely ever does anything of note. Worst part is that his corpse explodes when you don't want it to and never explodes when you do.

priest: like a sectoid commander but squishier.

chosen assassin: you'll take that first hit but then follow her ass and flush her out. even with immune to explosives you can just shred her cover, dump a status effect on her ass and fill her full of holes

chosen hunter: an idiot.

chosen warlock: i don't know yet and i'm excited to get murdered by him soon

 

[Incendiary]

Well, her critting is just you having bad luck, but she will hit for sure.
When I did this mission, I did with 4 rookies.

She didn't kill my guys but stunned them for a few rounds.

She's really annoying to kill though. I never tried the sensors you can build in engineering. Those could maybe help.

Okay, so it was just XCOM luck that both tries resulted in a Crit from her. Makes me feel slightly better about facing her in the future, that it won't always be insta-death.

Lost are a fun new mechanic, but I can see them being more nuisance than interesting once you get mid & late game powers and weapons. New XCOM always has weird balance issues where you feel unstoppable at the end, but they can't really tweak anything or make late-game harder because even your unstoppable squads can still get team wiped if you make one slight error.

 

[Jintor]

as always the problem is that you encounter four fuckers at once while you're halfway out of ammo and low on resources

 

[LurkerPrime]

The Purifier is all fun and games and then he throws a fire grenade out of nowhere and onto your guys and kills everyone

oh god why won't the fire stoppppp

Okay, so it was just XCOM luck that both tries resulted in a Crit from her. Makes me feel slightly better about facing her in the future, that it won't always be insta-death.

Lost are a fun new mechanic, but I can see them being more nuisance than interesting once you get mid & late game powers and weapons. New XCOM always has weird balance issues where you feel unstoppable at the end, but they can't really tweak anything or make late-game harder because even your unstoppable squads can still get team wiped if you make one slight error.

I feel like the Lost need a slight HP increase or stronger pods or something (even on Veteran; not sure about higher difficulties). They're not really designed for the verticality of the maps, making them free kills rather than an endless menace.

Like, I've played WotC for hours and received maybe 10 damage in total from them (most from a single Brute), vs. hundreds of them slain.

Edit: Do the Lost have dodge? That might fix it up nicely. Just needs to be enough to break those huge kill chains from a single pistol.

 

[Syrus]

This expac is so fucking good.

I just goy mission start of second month from skirmishers

104 intel , engineer , 2 corporal grenadiers.

Ill have 2 engineers and 3 scientists by day 3 of third month.

 

[RunTheGhouls]

Started playing this on PS4 last night. Load times are still rough as shit.

It's kind of astounding that they got most of the cast of Star Trek TNG to do voice work on this.

 

[wamberz1]

If you melee a purifier will they explode?

2/3 of my current team is made of rangers lol

 

[Syrus]

Started playing this on PS4 last night. Load times are still rough as shit.

It's kind of astounding that they got most of the cast of Star Trek TNG to do voice work on this.

On xbox one. Reload times feel like they went from one minute to 40 seconds. Still long but feels a little faster.

No crashes yet either. I feel mission loading is alot faster

 

[Akronis]

If you melee a purifier will they explode?

2/3 of my current team is made of rangers lol

They have a chance to, yes.

 

[LurkerPrime]

If you melee a purifier will they explode?

2/3 of my current team is made of rangers lol

Not always. I think it's based purely on their death, not the type of attack?

But man, when they do... woof.

Don't ever risk it if you don't have to.

 

[wamberz1]

They have a chance to, yes.

Not always.

But when they do... woof.

Don't ever risk it if you don't have to.

That's even worse then if they always did, because now I'm tempted to do so in rough situations. Goddamit RNGCom

 

[Syrus]

Guys, phantom isnt worth it for first ranger skill now. The sword damage has saved mr many times on legendary.

You can always buy phantom too.

Pistol sharpshooters are improved too

 

[Profanity]

Not always. I think it's based purely on their death, not the type of attack?

But man, when they do... woof.

Don't ever risk it if you don't have to.

Yeah, I think people found it's a 50/50 flip on whether they explode.

 

[Syrus]

Yeah, I think people found it's a 50/50 flip on whether they explode.

Claymore plus grenade plus purifie equal pod wipe

 

[Apharmd]

Oh bugger. That's the kind of information I was waiting for. I bought the base game while it was on sale and was thinking about buying the expansion for the patch.

Seems like there's no patch.

Hey don't get me wrong, the base game performed flawlessly on a normal ps4 when I played it back in May/June. All my issues are with WoTC.

 

[Belker]

Hey don't get me wrong, the base game performed flawlessly on a normal ps4 when I played it back in May/June. All my issues are with WoTC.

Really? Performance on my PS4 is anything but flawless. Frate drops when destroying terrain or enemies entering, audio skipping, tearing and very long load times.

Are you on disc or digital?

 

[Sullichin]

Holy shit I should have built the training center sooner. My whole squad is instantly much better cause I had a decent amount of AP banked.

 

[Gamer @ Heart]

Hey don't get me wrong, the base game performed flawlessly on a normal ps4 when I played it back in May/June. All my issues are with WoTC.

What?!?!

The original performed like shit. Constant stutters especially when environments get destroyed, 2 minute loads, frame rate dropping to the teens with any sort of fire or smoke, etc.

I want your mystical copy of X2

 

[LurkerPrime]

Figured out the "unit is being flanked but is still in cover" bug. It's a display bug; the unit is shown in one place, but actually exists in another place.

Observe:

The Assassin appears to be on the train, as per the first image. But the Assassin is actually further back, between the house and train in cover, as per the second image (just above the tile Yura is in). Meleeing the Assassin revealed the correct position, but there appeared to be no other way to know. She stealthed and was revealed at the end of her turn, appearing on the train... but I don't think that's the cause--it's happened to other, non-stealthy units.

Pretty big, if rare, bug. I hope they fix it ASAP.

 

[mikespit1200]

Does anyone know if a USA region WotC key will work with a CDKeys global region XCOM2 key? I'm in USA if that matters.

 

[jon bones]

If you melee a purifier will they explode?

2/3 of my current team is made of rangers lol

only at the worst possible moment yes

 

[Apharmd]

...Really? I felt like my copy's performance was great. Maybe I was thinking it's great compared to the what we're experiencing now.

 

[Sblargh]

Man, I'll be the dissenting voice on stop wasting my time and the avenger transition menus.
They rob the game of a lot of its rhytim and makes it look ugly.

Yeah, you do save time, but it's like bumping the graphics quality down in order to get performance. You get more in this region, but, on this other one, you definetly lose.

SWMT makes the game feel more frantic and stressful. Even tho it is a turn-based game, there is that psychological trigger that, if you can act, you should act. The enemies intro and their initial dialogue gives you a few seconds of pause for you to absorb the fact that "now I have to deal with this pod" or "this is a new enemy and require a new line of thinking".

There's a flow to the game; these mods break the flow and make it a worst exprience, imo.
-
The instant transition menus makes the whole experience choppy. It's like having the Suicide Squad editting team on your game.

 

[Grimsen]

Man, I'll be the dissenting voice on stop wasting my time and the avenger transition menus.
They rob the game of a lot of its rhytim and makes it look ugly.

Yeah, you do save time, but it's like bumping the graphics quality down in order to get performance. You get more in this region, but, on this other one, you definetly lose.

SWMT makes the game feel more frantic and stressful. Even tho it is a turn-based game, there is that psychological trigger that, if you can act, you should act. The enemies intro and their initial dialogue gives you a few seconds of pause for you to absorb the fact that "now I have to deal with this pod" or "this is a new enemy and require a new line of thinking".

There's a flow to the game; these mods break the flow and make it a worst exprience, imo.
-
The instant transition menus makes the whole experience choppy. It's like having the Suicide Squad editting team on your game.

I agree. I didn't like those mods in vanilla, either. I understand why they exist, though.

The new gotcha mod also feels like cheating to me. It gives away too much info. The new preivew option built in WOTC is enough for me.

 

[Erheller]

Man, I'll be the dissenting voice on stop wasting my time and the avenger transition menus.
They rob the game of a lot of its rhytim and makes it look ugly.

Yeah, you do save time, but it's like bumping the graphics quality down in order to get performance. You get more in this region, but, on this other one, you definetly lose.

SWMT makes the game feel more frantic and stressful. Even tho it is a turn-based game, there is that psychological trigger that, if you can act, you should act. The enemies intro and their initial dialogue gives you a few seconds of pause for you to absorb the fact that "now I have to deal with this pod" or "this is a new enemy and require a new line of thinking".

There's a flow to the game; these mods break the flow and make it a worst exprience, imo.
-
The instant transition menus makes the whole experience choppy. It's like having the Suicide Squad editting team on your game.

The game definitely looks better without those mods. When I played through XCOM 2 and WOTC for the first time, I played without SWMT and the related mods. But I'm a person who put hundreds of hours into the original X-com, Enemy Unknown/Within, Long War 1, and the various iterations of XCOM 2. The game can be pretty, but I've had plenty of time to look at the pretty XCOM 2 graphics. It's the gameplay that keeps bringing me back. And SWMT lets me experience more of the gameplay in a shorter period of time.

I agree. I didn't like those mods in vanilla, either. I understand why they exist, though.

The new gotcha mod also feels like cheating to me. It gives away too much info. The new preivew option built in WOTC is enough for me.

You could already figure out everything that the gotcha mod tells you if you tile-searched. It's fine if you prefer the new preview option (I like it too!), but it's not like Gotcha is letting you see into fog of war or anything. It's just streamlining the process for players like me that need to know if we're going to activate a pod or not.

 

[Poodlestrike]

I agree. I didn't like those mods in vanilla, either. I understand why they exist, though.

The new gotcha mod also feels like cheating to me. It gives away too much info. The new preivew option built in WOTC is enough for me.

If I could turn off just the pod activation alerts from Gotcha it'd be a perfect QoL upgrade over the built-in option, but with those in you're right that it does feel a little cheat-y.

 

[ISee]

We had a NeoGAF character pool for vanilla Xcom2. Do we have something similar for WotC?

 

[Trey]

We had a NeoGAF character pool for vanilla Xcom2. Do we have something similar for WotC?

I believe Jintor is doing a roleplay run or sorts that incorporates NeoGAF members.

http://m.neogaf.com/showthread.php?t=1428680

 

[Incendiary]

Man, I was just absolutely delighted remote starting a car a Sectoid was hiding behind and just eliminating it from the fight in one stress-free move. Best ability ever.

 

[Trey]

Man, I was just absolutely delighted remote starting a car a Sectoid was hiding behind and just eliminating it from the fight in one stress-free move. Best ability ever.

Best part is that it doesn't even break concealment. Reapers are gods.

 

[Incendiary]

Are the XCOM abilities that the new classes get set, or randomized?

Best part is that it doesn't even break concealment. Reapers are gods.

Reaper basically are the stealth class I wanted Rangers to be in vanilla. The ability to do things and not break concealment is almost too powerful. Almost.

 

[TheThunder]

Man, I'll be the dissenting voice on stop wasting my time and the avenger transition menus.
They rob the game of a lot of its rhytim and makes it look ugly.

Yeah, you do save time, but it's like bumping the graphics quality down in order to get performance. You get more in this region, but, on this other one, you definetly lose.

SWMT makes the game feel more frantic and stressful. Even tho it is a turn-based game, there is that psychological trigger that, if you can act, you should act. The enemies intro and their initial dialogue gives you a few seconds of pause for you to absorb the fact that "now I have to deal with this pod" or "this is a new enemy and require a new line of thinking".

There's a flow to the game; these mods break the flow and make it a worst exprience, imo.
-
The instant transition menus makes the whole experience choppy. It's like having the Suicide Squad editting team on your game.

Playing xcom 2 without SWMT is like watching a snail cross the street. If you are playing xcom for the first time then I can understand trying to "get the full experience" but once you put 200-300 hours in and seen everything, you just want the damn aliens to move already instead of sitting and wating for the sectoid's let me rise a zombie dance.

Also without the mod the avenger flying around feels like a zeppelin rather than an alien spaceship.

 

[Baalzebup]

Are the XCOM abilities that the new classes get set, or randomized?



Reaper basically are the stealth class I wanted Rangers to be in vanilla. The ability to do things and not break concealment is almost too powerful. Almost.

Randomized. You aren't even guaranteed to get the tactical rigging for that extra item slot.

 

[Shake Appeal]

If I could turn off just the pod activation alerts from Gotcha it'd be a perfect QoL upgrade over the built-in option, but with those in you're right that it does feel a little cheat-y.

You can turn its features on and off individually, I believe.

I think it's only cheat-y in that it saves you counting tiles or otherwise guesstimating some bullshit LoS.

 

[Incendiary]

Randomized. You aren't even guaranteed to get the tactical rigging for that extra item slot.

Hiss. Boo.

 

[Trey]

You can turn its features on and off individually, I believe.

I think it's only cheat-y in that it saves you counting tiles or otherwise guesstimating some bullshit LoS.

That's the kind of cheat-y I'm okay with. Cuz fuck counting tiles.

 

[Sblargh]

On vanilla, you had robojump's various speed-ups that removed pauses (among other things I believe) without removing the openings or speeding up the gremlin. It was the perfect middle ground, I think, and I hope he re-do it for WotC.

 

[Basileus777]

The only SWMT feature that I like is the pod reaction removal. The rest the game is probably better with.

 

[Erheller]

That's the kind of cheat-y I'm okay with. Cuz fuck counting tiles.

*Long War flashback*

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twe - fuck. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen. Phew, that tile's safe, I can move my infantry there."

*Muton football team activates*

 

[platypotamus]

Best part is that it doesn't even break concealment. Reapers are gods.

Ya'll keep saying this but they are by FAR my least favorite of the resistance classes. Like it's not even close.

 

[LurkerPrime]

The only SWMT feature that I like is the pod reaction removal. The rest the game is probably;y better with.

Yeah I've been playing with it for a few hours and I'm starting to miss some of the slower stuff. It didn't remove some of the weird pauses, and Specialist drones are still kinda slow to evac, which are my only real problems with the game's flow.

I'd like tighter action scenes, animations, and transitions, not so much faster ones, I guess.

 

[Jintor]

i dunno once i realised that with the lvl 2 ability kills with vector don't break concealment reaper has fucking shot up in my estimation

can you upgrade her claymore outside of her ability tree?

 

[NumberThree]

Man, I'll be the dissenting voice on stop wasting my time and the avenger transition menus.
They rob the game of a lot of its rhytim and makes it look ugly.

Yeah, you do save time, but it's like bumping the graphics quality down in order to get performance. You get more in this region, but, on this other one, you definetly lose.

SWMT makes the game feel more frantic and stressful. Even tho it is a turn-based game, there is that psychological trigger that, if you can act, you should act. The enemies intro and their initial dialogue gives you a few seconds of pause for you to absorb the fact that "now I have to deal with this pod" or "this is a new enemy and require a new line of thinking".

There's a flow to the game; these mods break the flow and make it a worst exprience, imo.
-
The instant transition menus makes the whole experience choppy. It's like having the Suicide Squad editting team on your game.

As far as pod reactions go, I'd honestly be fine if the mod only removed those from the Lost. I'm not exaggerating when I say I've had close to ten of those play during a single turn.

Or maybe disable the animation from enemies I can already see (because I have a concealed unit/reaper near them) and only show it for ones that spot me the same time I spot them.

 

[Sblargh]

i dunno once i realised that with the lvl 2 ability kills with vector don't break concealment reaper has fucking shot up in my estimation

can you upgrade her claymore outside of her ability tree?

Not afaik. I don't even think biggest booms affect it.

 

[Jintor]

Lost shitty incoming vids don't even have all the lost in there, it's usually just a single zombie, which is not threatening in the least

 

[Erheller]

Not afaik. I don't even think biggest booms affect it.

What about Volatile Mix on the off chance a Reaper gets it?

 

[TheThunder]

Got cocky during the psionic gateway mission and lost my Reaper (Dragonova). Apparently chryssalids are a counter to the "let me have my reaper run around and tag all enemies with its infrared vision while the rest of my squad is hugging the corner of the map".

It sucks because I lucked out and had tactical rigging on her too, at least my skirmisher has it too and I'm getting another reaper from covert ops so hopefully I will luck out again (probably not).

 

[Freeza Under The Shower]

Not afaik. I don't even think biggest booms affect it.

That upgrade is only for grenadiers, aka the "nuke it from orbit" class.
(superior scope + PCS for an additional 18 aim + salvo = tonight we dine on turtle soup)

All in all I find Dragunova more of scout with some nice hidden kills abilities, but not that useful from a damage and hits point of view (while taking up a squad position). A good sharpshooter makes your Reaper somewhat useless, especially with either the DLC weapons (gun that can't miss) and in particular the Hunter's weapons, which are just crazy (gun has 5 armor piercing, rifle can be used after moving).

Then again, normal with save scumming really isn't a good way to test tactical skills. For instance, Mox getting two gun actions per turn (you can give him a third one too through teamwork, I think) with 'lock in' can be an effective 'delete unit' too, in particular when his grapple can get him a free move action to a better position.

But then none of that is as good as a simple ranger with bladestorm and a high aim. Lost and Chryssalids are not a threat when you put a bladestorm ranger in front of them (with the katana in particular), even Berserkers can be easily dispatched if already damaged.

I doubt this translates to Commander and Legend difficulty though.

Also: on Normal at least, the Avatar Project is basically dead in the water. I'm in November and the Avatar bar is at 1 block. Sabotaged the fuck out of it.

 

[Trey]

*Long War flashback*

"One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twe - fuck. One, two, three, four, five, six, seven, eight, nine, ten, eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen, fifteen, sixteen, seventeen. Phew, that tile's safe, I can move my infantry there."

*Muton football team activates*

I laugh to hide the pain.

Ya'll keep saying this but they are by FAR my least favorite of the resistance classes. Like it's not even close.

Their ability to be effective while maintaining stealth is very powerful. It allows useful tactical benefits in scouting and positioning, which are always helpful.

 

[Sblargh]

Bigger booms affects gives all grenades a chance to crit, not only the grenadier's. But I don't think it affect the claymore.
As for the reaper getting volative mix, I don't know, would have to read the text.