Anyone Tried Rookie 'scouts'

[Maltara]

I am in the middle of a veteran game and am struggling to keep up because I use minimal in-mission saves; mostly I try to complete missions without loading at all. This means I go through a lot of rookies ^^.

 

Anyway, one my brave soldiers opened the door to a terrorship and right in front of him was a cyberdisc. I hate those buggers! I did the only sensible thing I could and cleared all my other troops away from the blast area (around corners mainly) and then good old Squaddie Yamashita took one for the team as blasted the cyberdisc to smitherines, which unfortunately took him with it.

 

It got me thinking; for demolition I don't use a lot of alien grenades, since heavy rockets are my choice. But what about sending in some rookies with a plasma pistol or laser weapon and a 0 turn grenade on his belt well in advance of the squad, i.e. into UFOs or UFO command rooms? If the aliens kill him he just blows up the next turn. Could this be a viable strategy?

 

A sad strategy maybe, but I find using rookies in general to scout is cheaper than hovertanks and large-scale blaster bomb demolition. Rookies also provide great human walls for the Colonel.

Edited December 14, 2005 by dipstick

[[dipstick]]

Check here

 

Edited title of thread for obvious reasons.

 

Edit: I have heard of this many many times, yet can't seem to find a specific post on it..... strange.

 

Quite a lot of people use rookies to 'scout' the area... though I didn't because I don't like losing men. I *really* don't like losing men....

Edited December 14, 2005 by dipstick

[[stewart]]

Rookies are SOOOOO much cheaper than tanks. On the other hand tanks cant be mind controlled.

 

Rule-of-thumb never sack or fire a rookie when they can be "fired" by the bugs.

[Sectopod]

I usually stick about 20 High Explosive or 50 Alien Grenade on a rookie, then spend 50 or so turns priming it, then running him into a tight group of aliens. (no armour, armour is too expensive, and well rookies suck, so let's use them for different purposes shall we?) Edited December 17, 2005 by Chmmr

[[NKF]]

That works great in TFTD, but not UFO. You'll just end up destroying the other grenades before they can go off. In TFTD, they've given the grenades enough armour to withstand their own blasts, allowing a chain of armed explosives go off sequentially.

 

---

 

The suicidal rookie strategy is certainly a strategy, but not one I'd personally bother with, and not just because of the ethics involved.

 

It's a two edged blade. One the one hand, any morale loss you get from losing the soldier can probably be regained if the grenades manage to clip a couple of enemies and damage them. On the other hand, you'll often get shot the moment their reaction level drops under the defenders' reaction level and drop the grenade just out of range. This will result in a global drop in morale. If done too much, you'll lose control of your veterens as they either go berserk or panic until they are exhausted.

 

There are many ways you can tackle a problem, and if you have to forcibly sacrifice one of your rookies in such a manner, it's time to step back and reevaluate your strategy.

 

Instead, as long as you're not being bombarded by psi attacks, you can do what the aliens do. Wait for them to come to you, and if you can get them to walk through a door, it's a perfect place for a firing-squad (a scattered semi-circle firing squad, of course) ambush party armed with reaction-fire friendly weapons.

 

A whole mess of fresh new rookies not only create a huge number of potential targets (and the aliens only have a limited number of shots), they can provide a lot of reaction fire, which will do wonders to their stats if they manage to live through to the next mission. Believe me, you'll definitely notice the change in your hopeless rookies if you can get them to score a few hits (but not necessarily kills) in their first few missions.

 

As for using rookie vs tanks as scouts - seriously, exept for the first few weeks, how hard it is to finance a few tank replacements? They may be expensive, but it's better for the tank to take a fatal hit than a soldier with hidden potential. Mind you, I'm a bit of a cheapskate and finance my laser tanks with surplus heavy plasmas, and unlike the hovertanks, they're highly expendable. Hovertanks are fine and all, but I want something I won't feel bad about losing if I mess up that can still hold its own. The laser tank fits that bill just nicely.

 

I do indeed use rookies to do a lot of scouting, but that's just it. They scout. It's inevitable, as there's only so many tanks you can carry on your ship or none at all when using the Lightning. I try to have them avoid performing anything risky like attacking or running flat out across an open field unless I can get do it unseen, or when I'm sure of a hit. The rookie sniper squad and the used-only-as-a-last-resort veterans at the back do the majority of the dirty work.

 

Well, there you, that's my stance on this issue.

 

- NKF

Edited December 17, 2005 by NKF

[Dover]

I use this stratagy all the time! Only instead of alien grenades I use High Explosives and I have two primed at 0 (Just in case a good throwing oppertunity presents itself.

 

Personally, I don't think there's anything morally wrong with sacrificing rookies, In fact, I buy rookies I have no intent on using en mass to be able to promote my veterans further, then I sacrifice the lot of the rookies.

[Pherdnut]

No need for suicidal tactics in this game. Use one guy to spot the aliens and people behind him that the alien can't see (or react to) to shoot it.

[Dover]

No need for suicidal tactics in this game. Use one guy to spot the aliens and people behind him that the alien can't see (or react to) to shoot it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I agree--when outdoors.

 

Indoors (Especially in the beginning, when your guy's reactions SUCK) and in UFOs, you don't wanna open a door and get a heavy plasma in your T-shirt wearing face...

 

I mean, might as well take the effing sectiod down with me, eh?

[Kharille]

Yeah, even though my officers tend to be in the power armour they tend to queue up behind two rookies to ensure that any stray shots get stopped. Actually, can I change the definition to using rookies as 'cover'? When they spot an alien they move out of the way just so that the officer can get his shot off, preferably over the head of a crouching rookie.

[Pherdnut]

No need for suicidal tactics in this game. Use one guy to spot the aliens and people behind him that the alien can't see (or react to) to shoot it.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

I agree--when outdoors.

 

Indoors (Especially in the beginning, when your guy's reactions SUCK) and in UFOs, you don't wanna open a door and get a heavy plasma in your T-shirt wearing face...

 

I mean, might as well take the effing sectiod down with me, eh?

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

 

That's what motion scanners and proximity grenades are for. If things look bleak for an agent, I'll arm that grenade just in case, but generally I find an "everybody lives" approach to the game gets me a lot more agents I'll be happy with in the long run. You never know who is going to end up having a psi strength of 80+

[Dover]

I never found much use for motion scanners, since it's the camping aliens that give me trouble, and with proximity nades I end up blocking my own path to the UFO and having to retreat.

 

Much easier to waste a rookie. Consider that you get your money back if he takes two aliens with him/her and you recover the corpses.

 

Finding high-psi rookies is no problem. I built a base in Hawaii to do just that. Eight psi labs to screen for up to 80 psionically-capable soldiers every month. 100 psi-str become psi-ops soldiers. 90+ get to do some fighting. 80-85+ get to hold the stun rods and extra rockets. The rest get fired.

 

No more panicing/MC.

[Pherdnut]

Smoke grenades will get aliens moving and the smoke goes through walls. Usually if you wait a lot of turns, they'll move eventually anyway. That's not to say that "Glass Jaw Butterfingers Joe" doesn't go through the doors first if I have a choice between him and my best sniper/reaction fire guy.

[SprCobra]

They can be good scouts but i usually use a vet and 2 covering men for scouting as thier reaction fire and accuracy is good.i mainly use rookies when it comes to UFOS when its time to say "no way are the good guys going in first" they open doors and take a shot move then the accurate ones who were standing one at each side of the ship to catch aliens coming out if i end the turn when too many enemys are inside step over and kill all inside but most of the work is done by the best men in power armour and heavy plasmas everyone else just sits in the transport enjoying the show as the heavies rip apart all opposition with great ease.

There nothing wrong with giving them normal armour if your rich and have some spare suit laying around,gives them more of a chance to live and keep the target in sight for the snipers