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XCOMUFO & Xenocide

? on replaying the raid of an alien base


kzsoci

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Hi

 

As I've written in another topic, I've been knowing this game for "decades", but I have never became such a master like many people here. I didn't go deep into it that much, however, I've finished the final mission once.

 

I'm playing a new campaign right now. I understand that most people think that it's unfair to save (and reload) quite often, and I agree as well, but I do save before important missions and sometimes (not as often as I thought, fortunately) reload, too.

 

I'm in the beginning of the game: I've solved some terror sites with floaters and reapers (latter one actually is a very useless unit), shot down some small UFOs, also got a navigator alive etc (also got small launcher and stun bomb - I don't remember getting that toy so soon). I realised that there was an alien base in Australia; of course, I know one must react to this fact with an attack, otherwise he gets bad reviews later. I had 8 soldiers on board, 2 other as a rookie at home. All of them wore personal armor. Mostly, I use laser rifles, small launchers with stun bombs and sometimes grenades.

 

These 8 soldiers were quite veteran then, most of them had much higher TUs, firing and throwing accuracy, strength etc than rookies. Some of them have lower bravery, others higher. I haven't had the opportunity to research psi labs and such, so I don't know anything about the psi strength of these people.

 

Unfortunately, I had to find this out on this mission. Regardless of the bravery, the sectoids were able to mind control almost everybody in the team, and they let almost everybody panic and/or get mind controlled. After a few turns, although we also killed some of them (and a cyberdisc, which was quite funny, because there was another cyberdisc next to it, and it also exploded after the first one (killing a sectoid as well)), only a couple of people was left alive. One of them (otherwise a good sniper :( ) paniced and went beserk all the time, but the other one, a rookie was able to get to the control room or what, destroy it, and kill the leftover sectoids. I won the mission with an "Excellent!" rating, although almost everybody of the "dream team" died there.

 

The question is: I do have the opportunity to reload the pre-mission geoscape. Is it worth? I'm not just asking this if it is fair or not (strictly, it isn't, I know that), but I don't see due the preparedness of my troops and the equipment that I may solve this situation with more survivors. Should I try it again (and again, and again, and again...), or should I say I don't look back, I recruit some new people instead, and try to train them so they get just as good (and better) as/than the old team.

 

Actually, I would send there 12 rookies, and they would somehow slaughter through the base until we win, and I wouldn't care if only one of them survives - but I don't have so many people on my base, and recruiting them would take so much time that I'd have very bad reviews at the end of the month, wouldn't I?

 

What do you think?

 

P.s. excuse me for the length :)

Edited by kzsoci
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First two tips that you might find useful:

 

- Bravery doesn't tell you how strong your soldier is against psionic attacks. The only effect it will have is perhaps reduce how much morale you lose after each panic attack, but if your soldier is already weak to psi attacks, then it's not going to be of any use. I know it takes a long time to find out what psi strength is (or hard if you do it the hard way and test untested soldiers against psionic aliens), but high psi strength is the only sure way to defend against psi attack.

 

- Alien bases generate 5 area activity points a day. So in a 30 day month, they'll generate 150 activity points. To keep the countries happy, just do a mission in the area and exceed the 150-155 points that the base will generate. The supply ships that land at the base are an excellent way to cover these points - and you will also find that they're a great supply of experience and equipment as well.

 

Now, as for your question: My advice to you is to continue playing the game. You may have lost some soldiers, but that doesn't mean you have lost the game. Considering how tough sectoid commanders/leaders are when you don't know your psi strength, it's probably best that you get on with it and put it all behind you.

 

One thing I've learned over the years is that even though it's always nice to have some super soldiers, you can actually get away with great results even with a team of average soldiers. I guess you have to put a little faith in them even if some of their stats look horrible. ;)

 

- NKF

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Well, thanks for the advice, I also decided this way. And I think it was the right thing, because the next mission was a terror site in India. I went there with my new people. Of course, sectoids and cyberdiscs were the terrorists which was kind of bad, because they tried to make my people mad, but I had luck: I finished the mission in less than ten turns with some casualties (but I didn't care anymore), captured a medic (which was quite unhelpful, because I "discovered" through him the great secret of... the cyberdisc autopsy :( ). I hoped to catch someone more important so that I can research the psi stuff.

 

Anyway, I have snakemen now who are quite tough guys, but at least they don't make us panic or control us mentally. I already use the plasma rifle, which is quite good against them, and my people also have a laser pistol or rifle in case of shortage of plasma rifle clips. :) So I think, things are going quite well, I'm glad I didn't waste much time with that base... I think the only problem is that I may have founded the second, reconnaissance base too late; I hope I didn't. But that's another story. :)

Edited by kzsoci
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allow me to throw some of my opinions

 

first of all

alien bases are GOOD !!!

 

yes, these missions are harder to complete

but ... reward is so much greater, as is in the entire game

 

personally I PREFER ... yes, I prefer sectoid bases, for few reasons

 

- MAIN REASON: I can use psi screening, with no psi labs build at all !!!

yes I know, its dangerous .... and sometimes boring -> with camper tactics, and lot of soldiers

but quite effective, just add number at the end of your soldier name

and watch who is mind controlled, reload and sack them, buy new ones

 

this way you can end with team of 90 in psi strength

just remember, even 100 psi strenght soldier CAN BE PANICKED, but NOT mind controlled !!

yes, it can be PANICKED by sectoid commander, so ONLY mind controlled soldiers should be sold, not all panickers

 

I observed that even 80-89 psi strength ( with no psi skill -> psi skill 0 technically )

CAN be mind controlled, so this is not perfect method

 

of course to me this method IS PERFECT, why?

answer is simple, because you have soldier that you know FOR SURE,

that cannot be mind controlled, and YOU know it from REAL mission

YOU have tested it, YOU can prove it, ... YOU are sure, period

 

 

 

- SECOND REASON: a lot of loot, specially with camper tactics ( see ufopaedia.org )

yes I know, those cyberdiscs can blow your precious loot, but .... with small launchers ;)

you should be able to disable them with ease, and some live aliens if you need them

I prefer to use plasma rifles, which gives comparable results, to me of course

and corpses cash instead of live alien horde of soldiers to research ;)

 

that way, you dont need to build factory base producing laser cannons,

why to build it, when you can get 2-4 milion of loot, EVERY DAY from alien base raids?

if alien base is close enough to your base, even few times per day !!!,

 

not to mention elerium-115 pods, but only if you are lucky enough

 

 

 

- ANOTHER REASON: soldier training -> again with right setup, you can train firing accuracy

of your soldiers VERY fast, i mean light speed fast

and psi skill, and reactions, and ... even bravery

 

for firing accuracy try this:

get psi weak soldier ( or the one who is frequently mind controlled )

give him power armor, block him at exit area, so he wont escape when mind controlled

allow the aliens to mind control this psi weak soldier

then shot him with standard pistol, no worry, you won't harm him, even if shot in the back

when you are finished with training, kill aliens, except one, collect loot, abort mission

 

for bravery,

kill all but sectoid commander, put your soldier NEXT to him, and keep pressing end turn

be warned that commander sometimes has alien grenade,

so stun him with stun rod, and wake him with medikit stimulants,

when he wakes up ... he is just harmless walking training bag ;)

 

 

now you see why alien bases are good, yes they are ;)

 

ps.

yes, I'm maniac of alien bases, specially sectoids

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Sectoids are also the easiest way to unlock the psi lab lab research. The supply ship that visit the base are the best way to capture a Sectoid Leader, since there's only going to be 1 present in the entire map. That means there's a limit to how many times the sectoids can use psi on your soldiers.

 

If you arm pistols/rifles and power suits, you will also be immune to your own bullets but the sectoids will not be.

 

Since I take a more relaxed approach to the game, I quite like leaving Snakemen bases around just for the supply ships. Without the chryssalids, they are probably one of the easiest races to fight. They do have some good combat stats, but they have low TUs, which means their reaction abilities are going to suffer a bit more than most of the other races.

 

- NKF

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well, to me sectoids are the fastest way to unlock psi

 

not all the time the easiest

I agree its easier with supply ships, but ...

terror ships/missions are much faster than alien bases

and those cyberdiscs .... you know

 

thats why I love this game so much, so many tactics/stategies can be applied

 

actually I tried once multiple alien bases strategy, and it was fun

let aliens build alien bases, and leave alien bases alone, then ... assault supply ships when they show up

it was like supply ships orgy to me, very profitable, especially in elerium-115

I had so much elerium ( 2000+ ) that my bases was build up of general stores mostly ;)

 

 

and I STRONGLY recommend playing ironman run

you can save as many times as you want, but load is restricted ONLY to exits from game and crashes

its TOTALLY different experience, making xcom MUCH harder, and fun is much greater

 

for example raiding alien bases its too risky in ironman runs

compared to supply ships mentioned earlier by NKF

 

and ... no more reload from stategic/tactical errors !!

lost skyranger, interceptor, base or favourite soldier

too bad ... its YOUR error, so learn from it

 

my last superhuman ironman run ended, when aliens retaliated ALL my bases in a window of a SINGLE day!!

 

It was May, I had lot of cash ( ~8 milion ), psi labs under construcion ( not lucky with sectoid leader ),

avenger reasearching on the way ( 150 scientist ), factory base up and runnig ( 200 engineers )

 

developed bases, located in:

poland ( main + research )

canada ( factory )

east china ( radar + psi + interceptor )

and central africa ( freshly build, under construction )

 

then ...

when first assault squad was returning from terror site

battleship showed up ... before they returned, and ... undefended main base is gone, grrrrr

 

I had second base with skyranger, so I didn't give up ( yet ;) )

second assault team went to crash site, when en-route battleship showed up ...

yes, you guessed, second undefended base is gone

 

left me with one radar base, and one base with interceptor

I decided to play, since I had ~8 milion cash, started to rebuild my 2 left bases

and ... battleship showed up ... radar base is gone

 

now I was really PISSED off to aliens, I decided to play until dead, either me or them,

and ... few hours later battleship showed up ... last udefended base gone

 

result ... 'winner' campaing ( as I saw it ) is lost, and in single day

and my jaw is on the floor, and I was under deep shock for the rest of the day

 

holy GOD, that was ... alien blitzkrieg !!!

Edited by yarrow
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Sectoids are also the easiest way to unlock the psi lab lab research. The supply ship that visit the base are the best way to capture a Sectoid Leader, since there's only going to be 1 present in the entire map. That means there's a limit to how many times the sectoids can use psi on your soldiers.

 

If you arm pistols/rifles and power suits, you will also be immune to your own bullets but the sectoids will not be.

 

Since I take a more relaxed approach to the game, I quite like leaving Snakemen bases around just for the supply ships. Without the chryssalids, they are probably one of the easiest races to fight. They do have some good combat stats, but they have low TUs, which means their reaction abilities are going to suffer a bit more than most of the other races.

 

- NKF

 

You brought up a point I always wanted to know, would you mind listing all the weapons that power/flying suits are immune to please?

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It's not a great big list. Of the selections, the safest are: Pistol and Rifle. Absolutely no damage felt, but it still hurts Sectoids and even Ethereals. Wouldn't try to use them against Cyberdiscs or Sectopods.

 

If you want a bit more firepower, the Autocannon with HE shells is very good. You are immune to the splash damage when wearing power suits/flying armour - even if the target is in the tile right next to you. Direct hits however may cause a tiny bit of damage. It's still a lot safer than the Heavy cannon, which can hurt thanks to the small increase in damage.

 

The laser pistol is okay as long as you only take damage from the front plates. Getting hit from the sides or rear will hurt.

 

Most other weapons will deal lethal damage, bar the stun rod and small launcher, of course.

 

- NKF

Edited by NKF
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  • 3 weeks later...
Guest soloalien

Personally I always take out a Sectoid base no matter the damage. I hate mind control. Any base except for Sectoid is kept alive for score- and equip-farming.

 

I attack a non-sectoid-base everytime my skyrangers are refueled. If I have to I build 4 more hangars with skyrangers and rookies with laser rifles (or heavy lasers vs mutons). Then I stay in the green area of the base and go out every now and then to snipe some aliens. After about 18-22 kills the last aliens panic and the soldiers start the equip/corpse retrieval. I never kill the commander. This way the rookies become veterans in a safe way, my score is like 3800+ every month (+300-550 per raid) with just 2 skyrangers and my bases get filled with tons of heavy plasma's and blaster launchers (On superhuman atleast). On a rare occasion a blaster bomb finds it way into the green area.. Reload a save game.

 

Easy but lame win.

Edited by soloalien
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  • 2 months later...

Hi,

 

after some months of intermission, I chose to continue my game I wrote about.

 

Now, I'm nearly at the end, I almost know every alien technology, all my soldiers are wearing flying or at least power suit, we use heavy plasmas, and some people are very talented at psi-warfare etc etc.

 

So, I have already won some sectoid and ethereal bases. At the first ethereal base, I used the tactic that was written here: I equipped all the people with traditional rifles, and some reliable soldiers got a laser rifle, so they could fight the sectopods as well. Only one or two people died this way. Thanks for this advice, btw. :) Actually, I already did this tactic at the second sectoid base where I had to capture commanders and leaders. It was a total success. :)

 

But, at the second ethereal base I used a much more efficient tactic: I brought only 6 people and two hovertanks with plasma (my Avenger is under construction, so I still use my old skyranger). These tanks cannot be mind controlled, so I stayed with my people in the green entry zone, and sent the two tanks on a nice hunting session. :) As I thought, I shot the "bugs" one after the other, it was very easy. Actually, I lost one of the tanks, because I was too clumsy and unwary, but the other one won the battle in a couple of turns. I went to the command center, and killed strictly only one ethereal per turn, so the tank was able to get out of the room in every turn. Of course, every time I saw an alien, I tried to mind control it without success, but somehow this made the AI know where my soldiers were, and he also tried to mind control us (with success, but I didn't care, since the rifles couldn't hurt anybody). The funny thing was, I went into the commander room for the last alien, but he somehow sneaked away. I was looking for him for at least 4-5 turns, meanwhile he either went beserk or tried to mind control my people. Finally, I had an idea: I turned around one person in the green zone, and saw him standing in the elevator without weapons. :D That was hillarious. Actually, I remember turning people in a way so they were headed to the elevator, but when they paniced, they went away from there. :)

Edited by kzsoci
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'My brain hurts' Gumby says. So does mine...

 

After defeating a muton terror ship, a floater battleship with the mission 'alien retaliation' flies directly to my scanning-and-manufacturing base in North America. Although the battleship flies next to an other base, my Firestorm cannot pursue it, beacuse it's a little bit slower... No problem, I have some soldiers there, and I clearly remember transfering some weapons there they can use in such cases. Floaters? They are the easiest, hah. It will be nice, and I can try my easy-to-defend base structure.

 

The battleship arrives, I see my soldiers. Four rookies without armour... Okay, what do we have? 20 clips of traditional rifles... Hmmm... I was manufacturing heavy lasers (since they are one of the most profitable items to manufacture) there, but it seems none was available at the moment.

 

Blimey.

 

Would it help if I threw the clips at the monsters? :)

 

Actually, I did reload several times to try two things: first, to find an angle from which I can intercept the battleship, and second that maybe I could transfer or buy some things to that base. None of them was succesful...

 

Then, I decided to dismantle the base, so I don't get bad points at least. The battleship also came this time, but nothing happened, it vanished. After a short period of time I decided to build a new base in South America, to cover that part of the globe, the USA or Canada made a contract with the aliens anyway, so I wanted to protect the loyal states like Brazil and such. I placed the airlock on the side, and began to build a hyper-wave decoder and a hangar.

 

After a day, I got this message (or something like this, I forgot it while I was writing this comment): 'Undefended base SAmerica was captured by the aliens'.

 

Bugger.

 

Now what?

Edited by kzsoci
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If I remember correctly you came onto one of ufo bugs

and dangerous one ( it crashes the game )

 

the bug trigger is:

when battleship is sent to alien retaliation ( direct attack against your base, not to seach for your base )

and you scrap/remove that base in meantime

< insert unforseen errors text here ;) >

 

I came to this bug only once, since I rarely scrap my bases ( I just rebuild them again )

from now on game crashed constantly ( unmodified version of collectors edition )

each time when entering battlescape ( after equipment screen )

so I gave up, and loaded older save

 

I suggest closer look to 'ufopedia.org' bugs section

or alien retaliation mission section

 

perhaps you should consider loading your older save, if you have one

I mean, that one before you scrapped your base

 

yarrow

 

ps.

the message should be more like this

'undefended base %BASE_NAME% was destroyed by the aliens'

destroyed not captured :D

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Well, I did actually reload.

 

I dismantled the base, but I didn't found a new one in South America immediately. I sent the Skyranger to North America, and found the landed battleship. I assaulted it. :) Floaters can easily be mind controlled, too. :)

 

And afterwards I made the new base, and noone ever cared about it anymore.

 

To the main topic: I've found a snakeman base, and I used the enhanced version of the hovertank-tactic: I scouted the base with both tanks, but instead of shooting the aliens I mind-controlled them for fun. :) Fifteen snakemen and only one chryssalid... I liked it, but I can understand those people who don't like mind controlling - the game gets too easy. But when I encounter ethereals, it gets too hard. Arrgh. UPDATE: nope, I have a soldier who can control three ethereals per turn, that's enough. It was fun to find a navigator, who was carrying a blaster launcher, and two other were standing next to him. :D KABOOM! :D

 

I've already got the Avenger, but I dread to travel to Mars... UPDATE: I'm not so scared any more... ;)

Edited by kzsoci
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Yeah! I've finished the game! I destroyed the alien mastermind! :D

 

My greatest concern during the mission to Mars was that the game crashed at least four times, and I feared that I will never finish the game, because I ran into a bug.

 

Otherwise, the last mission wasn't so tough as I thought. On the surface I met only sectoids and some cyberdiscs. They were quite dumb, I used three hovertanks and some psi, but I think I would have been able to solve the situation without using psi. Or scouting only with tanks also counts as cheating?

 

If it does, then I cheated in the second part, too. :) It was quite like an abandoned base, I hardly met any aliens, mostly celatids and chryssalids. And an ethereal with a blaster launcher, yeah. Dull. At the end, I found the small cinema where the mastermind resided. Well, without psi it would have lasted a little bit longer, but it wouldn't have been fundamentally different - two of the ethereal commanders have already dropped their weapons etc.

 

I enjoyed it very much this time! :) I might try to play again without using psi (so much), but now I am going to start TFTD. :) I didn't want to begin that until I've finished UFO: EU.

Edited by kzsoci
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Anyway, I found a very annoying bug: I mind controlled an alien who had a blaster launcher. I fired it and wanted to drop the weapon so it can't attack me some turns later (if I can't kill it). But I didn't have so much TUs, so I wanted to see his inventory. I realized that he was carrying a blaster bomb in his right leg(!), clicked on it to drop it to the ground. But then there was another blaster bomb at the same location. I clicked on it, too... I couldn't put it down or place it anywhere else because I was already out of TUs, but also couldn't put it back into the pocket. It stuck into my cursor and I had to alt+tab and close the game with the program manager, because I couldn't do anything...
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first, let me join to the congratulations comitee ;)

 

the bug you describe ( touching alien inventory item with low time units )

ha, I came to it too :D and many, repeat many times

mostly by accident and not to be so careful as the game requires :)

 

terrrr....rrror :D is more difficult than ufo

wait for sonic pulser thrown into your triton ( skyranger )

full of unarmored aquanauts ( soldiers ) .... oh yeees :D

 

and for some nasty research tree bugs

and ... you will see :D

 

good hunting

 

yarrow

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Thanks to both of you. :)

 

Yeah, I know that tftd is much harder, but I'll give it a try. :) I've read a lot about it at xcomufo.com and here, in the forums; and watched Yaeri's "xcom 2 no reload gameplay" on youtube. :D Does anybody know if he is anywhere here?

 

I may create a topic about my experiences in the tftd section as well. News flash: I hate jet harpoon, but gas cannon rules. :)

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Try the dart guns - you'll start loving the Jet Harpoons again. :D

 

- NKF

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Nah, I never used any pistols in UFO even. I started with traditional rifle, I had to research the laser pistol in order to get the laser rifle, but never used it, and I didn't even research the plasma pistol. :)

 

So I sold all my dart guns with a kind of a disgust. :) And I can imagine how awful they are. :)

Edited by kzsoci
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They're the submachine gun of the laser family.

 

TFTD's two pistols beyond the Dart Gun are quite good. The Gauss Pistol is a great replacement for the Jet Harpoon and a good substitute for the Hydrojet Cannon/AP. The Gauss Rifle is better balanced, but the pistol has its uses in close quarter combat.

 

The Sonic Pistol is a powerful sidearm that packs 20 rounds (which is high for TFTD) and has the power of UFO's plasma rifle. You'll probably be using the Blasta-Rifles more, but the speed and compact nature of the sonic pistol along with its high damage make it handy for scouts, grenadiers, drillers, medics, probers and as spare sidearms for heavy weapons (including Sonic Cannons).

 

 

- NKF

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