Very Late On Psi Lan Reseach..

[kasumimi]

I have 5 Avengers spread throughout the map, my bases laugh at retaliation missions, my infinite elirium supply crushes any ufo attempt, very large or tiny to function on earth.

Yet I can't touch crush sites, let alone attack Cydonia since my zero psi skill Captains get mindblasted and humiliated by killing each other on the 3rd turn. Alien vessels are manned 90% by etherials...

 

I had forgotten that in order to get MC lab I needed an Section Leader but I got it now. Is it worth it trying to down UFOs and defend against bases attacks only till my troops grow stronger from psi training? How many months roughly to stand a chance? : ()

 

Maybe restart or load that save that is MONTHS behind? ;x

[Zombie]

I had forgotten that in order to get MC lab I needed an Section Leader but I got it now. Is it worth it trying to down UFOs and defend against bases attacks only till my troops grow stronger from psi training? How many months roughly to stand a chance? : ()

You don't necessarily need only a Sectoid Leader for Psi. Any Psi alien will work (Sectoid Leader, Sectoid Commander, Ethereal Soldier, Ethereal Leader, Ethereal Commander), so whatever you run across first is fine (though I prefer to reserve a commander for Cydonia research). But if you have air superiority with multiple Avengers and bases, you can take a breather from missions and get your points only through downing UFOs. It's a viable strategy, and one that I use a lot in later stages of a game to reduce the monotony. Alien missions are much more varied later in the game, so don't think that you'll only see Ethereals from now on. But Mutons and Ethereals seem to be more popular later.

 

In order to train your Cydonia squad in Psi, I'd put them (and keep them) in the Psi Lab semi-permanently. That'll give them a minor increase in Psi Skill Every month. But the fastest way to train Psi is to send your troops on non-psi missions and have them attempt to MC/Panic aliens there (Panic attacks have a greater chance of succeeding so you should focus on that form of attack to train initially). Both successful and failed MC attacks help to improve skill in this area, but successful attacks need less actions to see the max increase. So just plan on psi attacking 11 times for each soldier which should guarantee they will the get into the biggest increase bracket. If you can disarm a bunch of aliens on a mission safely, by all means do it and use these aliens as training targets. If your psi troops go on every mission for a month, they will probably be ready for Cydonia, though training them into the low-100 psi skill range gives you almost guaranteed success in Cydonia.

 

Hope this helps.

 

- Zombie

[[NKF]]

If you just want to get back into the swing of fighting the ethereals as you would normal aliens, you'll need to simply screen your troops to find the ones with high end psi strength levels. I'd say 70 up are fairly reasonable. 80+ is even better.

 

It unfortunately takes one month per initial screening for each set of soldiers you have in training to find out their psi strength levels. As Psi strength will be so variable between the soldiers, you won't get a perfect squad of psi immune soldiers that quickly. Losing the high psi strength soldiers in battle is also a real blow due to their rarity.

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

If you just want to get back into the swing of fighting the ethereals as you would normal aliens, you'll need to simply screen your troops to find the ones with high end psi strength levels. I'd say 70 up are fairly reasonable. 80+ is even better.

Possibly. Though one campaign I ran a long time ago I had a guy with 56 Psi Strength and he did fine with resisting psi and directly attacking with it. Of course, his skill was something like 80-90. But it just goes to show you don't necessarily need an uber-psi squad to send to Cydonia. As long as you have some high skills to back the strength up, it'll work. Still nice to send nothing but 90-100 strength and 60-70 skill though just to be safe.

 

It's a funny story why I remember that mission though. Tis the PSX version I was using, and the first guy off the craft was always a guy named Don "The Mon" Nash. He was my heavy weapon specialist and preferred the Heavy Cannon over everything. Well, I spent so much time training the guy up only to find his Psi Strength was 56. Instead of reserving him for non-psi missions I decided I was going to use him for psi attacks in spite. It was fortunate since he was a great overall soldier and turned out to be fine for psi.

 

- Zombie

Edited April 6, 2009 by Zombie

[kasumimi]

But the fastest way to train Psi is to send your troops on non-psi missions and have them attempt to MC/Panic aliens there (Panic attacks have a greater chance of succeeding so you should focus on that form of attack to train initially). Both successful and failed MC attacks help to improve skill in this area, but successful attacks need less actions to see the max increase. So just plan on psi attacking 11 times for each soldier which should guarantee they will the get into the biggest increase bracket. If you can disarm a bunch of aliens on a mission safely, by all means do it and use these aliens as training targets. If your psi troops go on every mission for a month, they will probably be ready for Cydonia, though training them into the low-100 psi skill range gives you almost guaranteed success in Cydonia.

 

Hope this helps.

 

- Zombie

 

Hmmm does increasing MC skill makes soldiers stronger to MC resistance? Or strength also increases while you train MC skill through missions?

 

And one more quick question: I find it very hard to kill Sectopods, I use heavy laser but still it doesn't seem like a very good option.

 

Thanks for reply :>

[[NKF]]

Psi defence is made up of several things. Psi strength + psi skill + distance to alien that's trying to use psi on you

 

Having high psi skill can add a bit to your psi defence. So yes, increasing psi skill will improve your ability to defend against psi. However it's not as effective as having high psi strength, which is the core of your defense - and this value is fixed for every soldier.

 

That is why the 60+ psi strength soldiers that Zombie mentions can often away with it once they've been trained up. The values I listed are actually overestimating it a bit - and probably more appropriate for TFTD!

 

Sectopods - heavy lasers are generally the better weapons to defeat them with, but you do have other alternatives.

 

Laser tanks. They are the most powerful laser weapons in the game, and can severely cripple if not kill a Sectopod outright in a single shot. The tracked tank platforms are not as good as the hover tanks, but its weapon is in a class of its own against sectopods.

 

Small Launcher + stun bombs. Except on superhuman, these weapons are very effective at disabling sectopods . Since large units cannot get back up again, they are considered dead for the purpose of that battle. On beginner level, where aliens get half their normal armour levels, the stun bombs are probably a bit too effective.

 

Then there's always the Heavy Plasma and the trusty Blaster Launcher. Both weapons can be used to take down sectopods. Once you get really good with psi, you can turn the sectopod's own (green) lasers against itself.

 

- NKF

Edited April 7, 2009 by NKF

[nonam]

Panic might be easier to succeed, but you DO NOT know if alien panicked before it`s too late. So if at first you do not succeed and after 7 panic psi attacks sure that you succeed and do not retreat...you will be very very very very very disappointed!

 

P.S. My soldiers are ready to go to Cydonia...but i am not! The picture of losing scares me to death! (the one that shows after x-com is shut down)Please private message me telling how to fix it. I can`t do my first Cydonia mission brilliant not to reload, i am sure!

Edited April 7, 2009 by nonam

[kasumimi]

Mmmm thanks for helpful info. Didn't know there were such detailed mechanincs on Psi.

 

Impressive stuff for a 15 year old game ;x

[[NKF]]

Yes, this game is actually more complex than it often appears to be.

 

nonam:

Psionic training in combat is bit different than regular training with your firearms. Where you don't get any experience for not scoring any hits with your weapons, with psi, you do. A failure counts as a success. A success counts as 3(!) successes. Since panic attacks have a higher chance of succeeding, they're the best choice for training when you're low on skill. Still, you're not missing out on your training if you try to use mind control and fail. Overall you need at least 11 failures or 3 successes to get the best stat increases at the end of the battle.

 

As for Cydonia, it might seem daunting at first, but don't worry. It's ending the game that I usually find more frightening!

 

If you've got psi - run a few training missions on a battleship or alien base. If you can ace those easily (especially vs. ethereals), then the first level of Cydonia will be a breeze to clear.

 

- NKF

[Zombie]

Psionic training in combat is bit different than regular training with your firearms. Where you don't get any experience for not scoring any hits with your weapons, with psi, you do. A failure counts as a success. A success counts as 3(!) successes. Since panic attacks have a higher chance of succeeding, they're the best choice for training when you're low on skill. Still, you're not missing out on your training if you try to use mind control and fail. Overall you need at least 11 failures or 3 successes to get the best stat increases at the end of the battle.

Just a little math error there NKF, you need 4 successful Psi attacks to be guaranteed the maximal stat increase at the end of a mission (3*4=12).

 

The nice thing about training via panic attacks instead of MC is two-fold. First, you can panic attack a single alien with everyone in your team and not worry that you'll need more targets if an attack succeeds like MC does. And because usage of the Psi-Amp always takes 25 TU, you'll need to panic an alien for at least 6 rounds if you have a soldier with 50-74 TU (if soldier TU are 75-81 you'll only need 4 rounds to accomplish the same thing). Another good thing with using panic instead of MC is that the success rate is higher. If you have your whole squad panicking an alien every round you can be almost positive it will be at 0 Morale. When Morale is this low the alien has a 33% chance of dropping it's weapon, running off somewhere or firing it's weapon. If you already removed the aliens weapon by whatever means and blocked it in somewhere, you don't have to search for the alien after every round in case it decides to bolt. Of course, MC ability is what we are usually after but panicking is an easier thing to master, especially with rookies.

 

- Zombie

[Draxo]

One thing that its worth realising.

 

Victory conditions are set by you. Doesnt matter if the game says you did terrible or whatever.

 

Fill a ship with rookies (they are expendable and cheap) on a small UFO etherial salvage, equip them all with small launchers.

 

Drop the launchers at the end of each turn. Now it won't matter if you get MC'd

 

Their task is to stun an etherial and grab it, get it back to the ship. at any and all cost. High bravery is paramount.

 

Throw it if you have to. Keeping one guy in that ship, get out of there at the first opportunity: even if you have to leave a rookie or two behind.

 

You will likely take losses, but that's what rookies are for. (Heck I usually keep a rookie on each squad and run him into dangerous spots to draw enemy fire so I know where they are. Each one is named Sidekick, I think I am up to Sidekick XI right now in my game!)

 

The game will say

 

TERRIBLE! -462! or whatever.

 

You will say.

 

heck yeah, I got psi!

Edited May 4, 2009 by Draxo