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[Flying Dice]

I said it before, (as long as you're not on Impossible) the best way to deal with high-priority threats is to rush them down before they can act. Most pods spawn in such a way as to allow you to hit both the alium/shock lancer/whatever and at least one weak other thing with a grenade. If you get gas grenades that becomes markedly easier (and also helps tie up loose ends if you don't have enough shots).

Grenades are your friend even more so than in EU Long War, especially since they don't destroy loot. If two enemies are within range, you should probably lob a grenade at them. Once you've taken out the trash, follow up with the appropriate counterpoint to Shock Lancers:

Spoiler: Take one guess (click to show/hide)

--
Also guess at how much RULES OF NATURE got into my Codex mission. 

Had a fun organic-story moment, actually. My suspiciously Boss-like Ranger had split off to save civilians hunt down a Shock Lancer hiding in a garage playing with corpses. After she nailed him, a Faceless pulled a Kool-Aid Man through a wall and knocked out the pillar she was standing beside. She booked it up a ladder and out onto a balcony, where she encountered the rest of the squad running from [early-game happy fun time spoilers]. I like to imagine that they had one of those mutual >look~< moments before the three gunned down the Faceless and the Ranger jumped down to say hi to the [still a spoiler].

--

List of WHY:
1. Enemies still get free movement turns when you see them.
2. Obnoxious timers have been shoved onto 80-90% of the missions.
3. Graphics look identical to the old game yet it runs far worse.
4. Stealth, which could be great, is super simplistic. And I find that it often ends up going poorly for me because of issue 1. Hard to do a good ambush when the enemies can just run away and flank you the moment you appear.

It's already been said somewhat, but I'll cover it myself.

1, 2: Because difficulty. If you got to shoot at every enemy while they were out of cover and had no time limit on any of the missions, even a chimp could beat it. EU's pinnacle of tactical acumen was creeping through maps by inches making sure that every single thing was executed perfectly. Long War doubled down on the same thing. I really like that Firaxis put a stop to it; things flow a lot more organically now, even if it's tougher.

4: The basic "start of mission" stealth? Yeah. Enemies running away? Should have been more careful and not yellow-moved into fog of war unless you were prepared (yeah, I know this sorta contradicts what I just said--it's a balancing act, a matter of calculating risk--I lost one mission because I was too careful and physically couldn't reach the objective in time, but I've gotten troops hurt rushing too much). It's pretty easy to set up an ambush. I can only think of maybe two missions where I didn't wipe the first pod I found in the surprise round. One was really spectacular: hacked a MEC, then sniped out a propane tank to kill two grunts and heavily wound a snektit that responded to it.

That said, you can have a lot more stealth fun with the Scout track for Rangers.

3: Blatantly false, at least if you're running it on a decent rig. I've got everything set to max (except the AA, natch) and it looks a damned sight better than EU did. Some things are kinda wonky, but unless you're playing with everything turned way down it isn't anywhere near the blurry-potato-textures of EU when zoomed in.

[Chiefwaffles]

Graphics definitely aren't cutting edge, but the game as a whole is very pretty. The aesthetics are done perfectly, and the game as a whole looks much better than EU.

The game mechanics changed from EU are pretty interesting. Like how you only need to spend resources on a 'main' weapon/armor once for it to be unlocked for every soldier, and how reloading only takes one action. I've already wasted a decent amount of action points on moving and reloading when I could have just reloaded and fired.

Also, stealth is extremely useful for VIP missions. With certain evacuation points and tactical use of grenades (WHO NEEDS DOORS), you can sprint the VIP from where you picked them up to the evac zone. So if you stay in concealment up until rescuing the VIP, you can just nab the VIP and evac without ever getting attacked.

[EnigmaticHat]

There are really two counters to shock lancers.

The first is to kill them first, like you would a thin man.  Annoying buggers.  Alternately, have as many flashbangs as turns you intend to wait before killing them.

The other way is to just endure.  They try to grab cover when charging so they'll split their attacks in general (and can be manipulated into doing so).  They do only a few points of lethal damage; if you direct them to a blast armor grenadier it'll be only 1-2 points.  The only problem with this strategy is the status effects they inflict.  In particular unconsciousness can ruin missions.  That's why you want a level 2 specialist with revive protocol.  Failing that, aid protocol works against melee attacks (I assume?), which is better than nothing.  You could also try to stack a smoke grenade with aid protocol but considering you're up against a melee enemy you do that at your own risk.

Anyway, once they've done their charge just murderize them at close range.  Pistol focused snipers are great for this, especially if they're the charge target (return fire FTW), and shotguns are just ideal.  Pretty much anything except a chaingun is fine for this.  You should be able to get an upgraded shotgun that will take out the early shock lancers in one hit using the alloys from a single room of alien machinery.

[BFEL]

Just saw a muton MISS a civilian on a terror mission.
Bloody hilarious that.

[Krevsin]

Neonivek, did you "not see" the part where the troops are having orders beamed directly into their brain and are basically a hive-mind?  Whenever you talk about stuff like this I can't help but feel like you're sending us messages from a different universe and that's why there's this block in communications.

Frankly I have no idea why we are having this communication problem. Especially since I am talking about how I feel about the game, rather then an assertion as to what it is.

As for "Did not see" I saw it... it isn't too important. You can be an evil slave.

All I am saying is that the lowest level troops being alien hybrids feel far too much, to me, like the game is trying to avoid the sort of ambiguity, to the person playing not in objective terms, that killing possible innocents would have created... especially since you are a terrorist cell.

Geez, what'd you expect, a big name american publisher making a game in which terrorists kill ordinary people who just happen to be working for the wrong people?

Too big of a moral quandry, too real a problem. You need to dehumanize your enemies to make it seem less like you're playing as a terrorist and more like you're playing as a freedom fighter.

Now if there were a mod that completely removed all the stuff about ADVENT being mutants, I'd be all over it. But I never expected Firaxis to fully commit to the idea of ADVENT being just random guys who are hopelessly deluded into believing they're doing the right thing.

[Egan_BW]

Let alone the idea that XCOM are that.

[BFEL]

HOLY BALLS.

I have a grenadier with Killzone and a Sniper with Shredder.

Granted, the grenadier was a blast padding one, so hopefully I can reset their skills without hurting that one.

[Aklyon]

Blast padding exo suit grenadiers are great at tanking non-shredder hits if they have to take hits.

[BFEL]

Can confirm that cross-class abilities AREN'T lost when you retrain.

So, with the weapon upgrades I installed, I now have a grenadier who can fire overwatch on 4 enemies, hit for at least one damage on all of them, and thus guaranteed to shred all targets.

And soon my sniper will have something similar

[piecewise]

1, 2: Because difficulty. If you got to shoot at every enemy while they were out of cover and had no time limit on any of the missions, even a chimp could beat it.

The original x-com didn't do that shit though and it was way harder than this.  In the original they just moved around with the same rules as you, with spheres of vision. You could ambush them, they could ambush you. And if you got the drop on them it actually meant something.  In the firaxis games you just have squads of enemies standing around at set points  and when you see them, they sense your murderous intent and immediately run into cover before you can act. That whole "inch along" strategy that people employed was specifically the result of this "Random encounter" style of setting the ai's up rather than having them patrol around or act independently. It's the natural response to this condition.

And if you don't like that you change the conditions. You don't railroad players into acting differently using contrived or unfair gameplay mechanics while the original system remains completely unchanged.   

Also, stealth is extremely useful for VIP missions. With certain evacuation points and tactical use of grenades (WHO NEEDS DOORS), you can sprint the VIP from where you picked them up to the evac zone. So if you stay in concealment up until rescuing the VIP, you can just nab the VIP and evac without ever getting attacked.

How? I've tried that on a few missions and literally every time I can get up near to them but then they're saturated with people looking at them. There was one where I had to get someone from a car and literally every space around the car was a "don't go" space.

I mean, I suppose I could sit and wait to see the guard movements and such...wait, no I can't. I have an arbitrary timer again.  I feel like the game really wants me to use stealth too, because it seems hideously stacked against you, at least in the early game. I mean, that first big mission in africa, with the vial, has you using 4 people and low tier weapons to fight like 25 goddamn enemies, including several turrets and mechs. Even if you're tactically perfect, eventually some jerk AI is gonna hit you for half your health or more despite your full cover.  Or the suicidal melee units will just run in and whack you. I got out with two gravely wounded soldiers out of the 4 I started with and even that was heavily due to luck and a ranger that danced through bullets and explosions like she was the RNG's main squeeze.  She killed a mech, 4 soldiers and a Sectoid just in melee. Didn't get her a promotion though, somehow.




Also, the fact that the dominant tactic in a lot of these missions is just to sprint straight through enemy lines and get to the evac point where you can then evac without using an action is pretty damn silly. We traded plodding tactical missions for games of Red Rover.

[Chiefwaffles]

Successful use of evac is really satisfying to me.

I just had a facility assault mission after I finally upgraded all my stuff to the second tier, and had my best soldiers available. First time I got the "Flawless" rating. I didn't get fired at once, killed tons of advanced enemies, and was able to immediately evacuate off of the roof of the facility after placing the charge.
Mmm. Satisfying.

[Man of Paper]

how long until stormtrooper equipment mod

[KaelGotDwarves]

Spoiler: "Sir, I don't think Sergeant Bryant is taking our mission seriously enough" aka what happens when you download your friend's characters on XCOM2. (click to show/hide)

[Krevsin]

Even if you're tactically perfect, eventually some jerk AI is gonna hit you for half your health or more despite your full cover.  Or the suicidal melee units will just run in and whack you. I got out with two gravely wounded soldiers out of the 4 I started with and even that was heavily due to luck and a ranger that danced through bullets and explosions like she was the RNG's main squeeze.  She killed a mech, 4 soldiers and a Sectoid just in melee. Didn't get her a promotion though, somehow.

Dunno, all that sounds pretty true to oldcom's spirit to me. You can be tactically perfect, doing the slow tactical movement thing, covering your approaches and laying down smoke grenades. But eventually a guy is going to run up and not trigger reaction shots and then murder your goddamn commander whom you've spent bloody ages training up. Or a chryssalid is going to appear out of nowhere, run up to your firing line and just fuck your shit up.

[KaelGotDwarves]

Maybe it was just me but after the tutorial I got bombarded with like 6 timed missions in a row and I almost ragequit.

"Here, take these rookies that can't hit the side of a building and you have to rush them into double sectoid ambushes."

Yeah, not fun. There's no way to be tactically perfect when you're rushed to an objective across the map and got 8 turns.

Praise RNGesus.