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[Pavellius]

Ptw

[Pavellius]

Operation Soaring Fall (4): Chiefwaffles, Happerry, Madman, Pavellius

[Strongpoint]

Probably too late but...


Operation Hellfire

Spend 1 VP Token on Talon.

Combined Arms: Bogeys 022 - 024 (Australia, Landed)
1 Talon
1 Raptor w/ Phoenix + SMART missile
2 Skyrangers w/ Phoenix
1 Skyrranger
2 NOTSOFTER w/ XH-2 Rifles
1 NOTSOFSTER w/ XH-2 rifles & TAVs


I believe that difference between 3 and 2 land units is very significant for the outcome of the battle. We are looking at aliens who focused all their ground forces there AND we see no new UFOs so I expect some new land tech. Furthermore, I believe that in the landed scenario one Talon is enough to challenge their fighter one on one. 1 Raptor used as a ground attack aircraft should help us to knock out that mortar. With railguns it still can help Talon in the aerial combat.  Also, I think that TAV is a type of equipment that have diminishing results on getting more of them to the battlefield. 1 unit with them is sufficient.

While roaring soar is better at stopping aliens from going should they win
the land battle, my plan looks like the one that gives us more chances to succeed in the land battle.

Operation Soaring Fall (4): Chiefwaffles, Happerry, Madman, Pavellius
Operation Hellfire (1): strongpoint

[10ebbor10]

Operation Soaring Fall
Classification : X-1

"How had it all gone so terribly wrong so quickly" Corporal Ellis thought, as he looked over the remainder of his squad. The five men and women with him were all that remained of the 2 elite teams that had dropped in not 20 minutes prior. They'd expected to find a vulnerable enemy, weakened by the force they'd engaged here before their arrival. What they found was an abbatoir, the human combatants slaughtered to a man, and the aliens waiting for them as well.

Their Skyrangers had been torn from the sky, a missile bearing down on each of them and destroying them utterly just after they'd disembarked. They themselves had been surrounded, and then the big gun on the UFO had opened up, raining mortars down upon them. They'd fought back, of course, but the enemy was numerous.

A thundering explosion snapped Ellis brought back to reality. A piece of the building crumbled under the distant mortar impact, pushing dust and smoke through the corridors. Ellis snapped up his TAV, peering glancing down the big factory hall. In the distance, the aliens were gathering, flickering outlines appearing and disappearing in the dust as the machine tried to keep track of the skulking figures. He gestured, and the team fired. A few of the figures dropped, other breaking into a scramble for cover.

They had to move now, before the enemy closed in. Being pinned down meant death, either being blasted apart by the big cannon, or simply by being overwhelmed. He secured his TAV (carefully, the squad had only 2 left), then signaled his team to move.


In the skies above, Therekova cursed. Another alarm popped up on her visor, and she quickly dismissed it to join the others. Her Talon was wounded. The missile had torn a hole through the armor, had torn away her missiles, had even damaged a gravity array. But though the wounds may have nicked her wings and stripped her claws, she could still fly and fight. She still had a dangerous bite. Both internal railguns had survived the exchange perfectly intact.   

Her prey, the larger type of fighter UFO, has not been unhurt either. They'd send a good 12 missiles into it's fiery plasma shield, and they'd hurt it. Small scars stood out all across it's hull, and one of it's plasma cannons was emitting smoke and fire. Even so, the small craft was quick and nimble. Chasing it down, even with her wingmate close at hand, was going to take a while.

She just hoped the troops on the ground would be able to hold out.


Ellis struggled to open his eyes. When had he decided to lie down? Where was the rest of the squad? He lifted his hand to his eye, wiping away the dust and blood. Blood? A flash of memory came back, the mortar tearing into his squad, the aliens storming towards him. Why was he still alive?

In the distance, the Alien UFO's silently lifted off the ground. Rushing towards the skies. Talons followed, leaving behind the smoldering wreck of the UFO they'd killed already. New explosions rippled of the UFO's hull, but too little, too late. The ships made speed, climbing vertically into the sky, leaving behind their damaged pursuers.

Loot retrieved : Exalt Intel, Alien Computer Core Token

Note: I feel the need to explain the combat results here, as they're counter intuitive. Your Talons are capable of defeating the enemy vessels. Not unharmed, and the new missiles are quite dangerous, but the result should be better than this update makes it seem. However, there are a set of rules that dictate what happens if a ship is shot down. Yours fell into the "Shot down but repairable category", which normally would mean a ground assault. However, since your ground assault already got stomped, that wasn't really an option.

So, that's why this occurred. The enemy escaped. The best way to fluff the mechanical results, in my opinion.

As for why I didn't upgrade to full destruction. The entire point of that rule is to ensure that people can't monofocus air (it's the same reason that the aliens can't just blow up all your troops transports until after they've (partially) dropped troops). Upgrading would defeat the point.

Spoiler: Technology (click to show/hide)

Vehicles

Raven (Interceptor) : Way beyond the bleeding edge of technology, the Raven is far beyond any other jet fighter ever build on Earth. With upgraded avionics, adjusted tracking, and advanced pulse detonation engines, the Raven is capable of pursuing even high speed alien craft. If needed, it can use it's avalanche missiles to shoot down any intruders.   Cost :   2  VP
      - Rockslide Missiles : An upgraded targeting system, that increases missile effectiveness.
      - Ground Combat Package : Replaces half of the Raven's Avalanche missiles with high tech air-to-ground SMART missiles

Talon (Interceptor) : Integrating copious amounts of Alien Technology, the Talon is grav-wave propelled, heavily armored interceptor. Has 18 hard points for missiles and 2 nose mounts, fitted with a railgun by default.  Cost :   3  VP

Skyranger (Troop Transport) : World's first supersonic troop transport. The Skyranger is high speed, heavily armored troop transport, capable of deploying and retrieving a single squad of soldiers in various situations. Cost : 1 VP    [1 Free Skyranger available]
 
Equipment

Basic XCOM Rifle : XCOM's standard rifle. Cutting edge, custom designed, yet still affordable. Part of standard equipment.
Cost : 0

XH-2 Railgun Rifle : An effective semi-automatic rifle. Fires a powerful railgun round with tremendous velocity and penetrative power. In addition, it's equipped with a smart SCOPE to allow it to identify enemy drone targets.
Cost : 1

Basic XCOM Grenade : A simple grenade. Activate, throw, explode. Part of standard equipment.
Cost : 0

BASIC XCOM PISTOL : A simple, highpower pistol. It packs a pretty heavy punch, making it an effective if chalkenging sidearm Part of standard equipment.
Cost : 0

Phoenix railgun pod : A modular gun pod containing a light railgun. Relatively low firerate, but decent armor penetrating capability. Can be attached to Skyrangers and Ravens, though the latter looses 4 of it's missiles to make room. Cost: 1 EP for 3

Rockbreaker Missile: A missile coated in a very thin alien alloy and equipped with a volatile destabilized elerium powercell as warhead. Will detonate if exposed to shock or heat. Cost : 1 EP for 8.

TAV-2: A cobbled together combat visor that can identify and highlight aliens, including disguised ones. Fragile, cobbled together and decidly unergonomic.
Cost : 1 EP

Training Program

Rookie Training Program : A basic introduction to the entire Xcom project. The absolute minimum that any soldier needs to know to operate successfully at XCOM. Cost : 1 Unit Points.

NOTSOFTER training regimen : A hard, effective international training regime, that gives our soldiers the tools and capacity to deal with aliens. Trains forces to a standard marginally higher than that attained by most special force units Cost : 1 Unit Points.

Inter Agency Cooperation teams : As part of ties developed through the NOTSOFTER training regime, we now have the capability of drawing upon special force teams. They're not as well suited to fight aliens as we're however, and nations will object if we keep losing them. Cost 1 Unit Point    [SPECIAL : Can't use XCOM GEAR, No vehicle needed for deployment when used in North America or Europe]

Mission Profiles

Interception : A simple mission profile that focuses on intercepting an alien vessel as soon as it's detected, destroying it before it can do any damage to any innocent people.

Down and Capture : A more complicated mission profile that focuses on downing an alien vessel (or waiting for it to land), and then storming it with ground forces.

Combined Arms : A mission profile that integrates air and ground forces to storm UFO's, using aerial bombing, reconnaissance and strafing runs when available to take out enemy strongpoints or UFO armor.

XCOM Resources

Island Mountain HQ [An isolated, hidden underground base on a remote island in the Aegean]
       - UFO Power Core
       - Railgun Defenses
       - Heuristic radar
       - Improved production
Aereal reconnaissance program : A simple program that allows us to requisition drone reconnaissance on suspected UFO sites.

6 VP
3 UP
4+1 EP

2 Alien Equipment Token, 1 Unit experience Token, 1 VP Token, 1 Exalt Intel Token , 1 Alien Computer Core Token

Spoiler: PANIC METER (click to show/hide)

Africa
---> Egypt
---> South Africa
---> Nigeria

Asia
--->Australia
--->China
--->India
--->Japan

Europe
--->France
--->Germany
--->Russia
--->United Kingdom

North America
--->Canada
--->Mexico
--->United States

South America
--->Argentina
--->Brazil   X

Design Phase

Turn 8

Month end : Gain 1 free VP; UP or EP point

Challenge: The victor of the Contest is ChiefWaffles. He recieves 1 free token, that can be spend to get 1 point worth of any design for free, forever. He also gets a snippet.

AABBCCDD

[Madman198237]

...

Personally I feel a better way to force not mono-focusing is a lack of tokens if you blow everything to tiny pieces, instead of having them escape the now-really-upgraded fightercraft that we poured effort into. Unless the aliens got nothing from them escaping, which would suit me (and presumably the mechanics, seeing as how we stomped them in the air battle/they can't make it back to orbit without getting shot to pieces) much better than "by the way you get almost nothing and they escape anyway".

Or, you know, make destruction something that actually occurs, since we almost never seem to get complete destruction of enemy aircraft, even though there's no logical way for even gravity-manipulating alien tech to survive a fall, especially not when any sign of recovery SHOULD lead to them getting shot repeatedly by our presumably-not-stupid fighter pilots. Faking a kill (faking a fatal descent) is one of the oldest tactics in the dogfighting book. If they're going to land soft, our pilots are presumably not going to stop shooting until they hit the dirt. This last complaint, obviously, only applies when you have clear aerial superiority. Which we do.

Did we at least figure out how those missiles track us? Or at least confirm that they're not using radar?

I'd presume we have flares on these things (all warplanes and most military cargo planes do), did anyone try those?

As for our design... I dunno, maybe a tank? If they want to play with heavy artillery that somehow blows up the entire area over and over again, enough to destroy two entire squads, I guess we should just retaliate in the same way.

[Happerry]

So it looks like they got inspired by our Skyrangers providing fire support for our ground troops, and either made a new UFO with a mortar or upgraded one of their current UFOs with a Mortar. That'll be annoying.

Idduno, maybe make a railgun tank that point defense fires the mortar shells out of the air? I've been wanting to get HWP tech out for a while anyway, so we can make an Electrolaser HWP/SHIV and start lightning-bolting people into stunned captivity.

Or we could pass on it this turn and make an alien alloy transport. We already have proof that an alien alloy vessel can survive being shot by the missiles that struck down our Skyrangers, and if we build a railgun into the Alloy-Ranger instead of having it be an optional add on, the Alloy-Ranger could maybe use said railgun to blow the alien's mortar off their craft. If probably with some collateral damage to the UFO, but that's better then loosing the ground fight, right?

Or on the gripping hand, since we still wonish when we both threw a 'everything in one group' task force at each other, we could go make that new base. Which hopefully will give us more tokens, which should mean that if this happens against next attack round, we might be able to afford another Talon or maybe a Raven+potentially more troops.

Token wise, I'd like to spend our monthly token on a Vehicle Token, which would allow us to send out three Skyrangers+two Talons, instead of two and two like we had this turn. Anyone have a better idea/counter argument to that?

[10ebbor10]

Personally I feel a better way to force not mono-focusing is a lack of tokens if you blow everything to tiny pieces, instead of having them escape the now-really-upgraded fightercraft that we poured effort into. Unless the aliens got nothing from them escaping, which would suit me (and presumably the mechanics, seeing as how we stomped them in the air battle/they can't make it back to orbit without getting shot to pieces) much better than "by the way you get almost nothing and they escape anyway".

Not getting Tokens is not really a deterrent when your method also allows you to deny the enemy tokens.

That said, having their escape ship torn apart resulting in a loss of loot is a thing, it happened a few turns before. Also, if the enemy gets unlucky and isn't spotted until after their landing, then chances are you kill part (or all) of their ground troops in the air.

Or, you know, make destruction something that actually occurs, since we almost never seem to get complete destruction of enemy aircraft, even though there's no logical way for even gravity-manipulating alien tech to survive a fall, especially not when any sign of recovery SHOULD lead to them getting shot repeatedly by our presumably-not-stupid fighter pilots. Faking a kill (faking a fatal descent) is one of the oldest tactics in the dogfighting book. If they're going to land soft, our pilots are presumably not going to stop shooting until they hit the dirt. This last complaint, obviously, only applies when you have clear aerial superiority. Which we do.

The enemy being hit non-fatally and recovering is a relatively rare event, having occurred twice. It's also a thing that you're going to have to live with, just like the enemies have to live with the fact that they can't bomb you into smithereens from orbit.

Fundamentally, in order to prevent a mono-focus on air from winning, there must be things that air can not stop . This means that ships will slip past your radar (but not entirely, I don't want the reverse either), or that sometimes a dead ship gets fixed. It also means that XCOM has to live with the fact that whatever they do, they don't get to kill (all) of your troops by blowing up Skyrangers.

Did we at least figure out how those missiles track us? Or at least confirm that they're not using radar?

Missiles were unresponsive to common countermeasures, suggesting a multi-sensor approach and a fairly advanced guidance system. Recovery from the shot down fighter makes it seem that the missiles are quite big and complicated. They basically acted like fully fledged miniature suicide UFO's.

As for our design... I dunno, maybe a tank? If they want to play with heavy artillery that somehow blows up the entire area over and over again, enough to destroy two entire squads, I guess we should just retaliate in the same way.

Bugger. Adjusting that part of the description.

They have one mortar (mounted on top of the big UFO) that fires relatively irregularly. They're just very good at aiming it.

[Chiefwaffles]

I really don’t understand how a single infrequent grenade mortar managed to obliterate our squads. I’d expect higher levels of tactical competence from NOTSOFTER. At least a strategy that isn’t “stay clustered in one place and wait for a mortar to blow you up.” Hell, if the mortar is so good then why aren’t their grenades annihilating squads?
It does not feel like a single mortar firing a grenade every now and again should be able to decide the battle so decisively.

A new transport could work. Make it resistant to the missiles and better able to provide ground support.
We could use the computer core and an equipment token (I think we have one?) to make a point defense module against both their apparent god-like mortar and their suicide UFOs.

We could copy their plasma shield thing and use it to counter grenades and missiles while also somewhat reducing the effectiveness of other weapons.
I kind of like this one. Seems like it could be a good entrance point into Tier 3 weapons, and it makes sense with our current experience.

Also possible is designing a new base using the computer token.

Finally, another good one is just personal armor. We have enough alloy experience that a token is definitely not required, and XCOM alien alloy is just thet good.

Or we could use our Unit Experience token to design “don’t somehow get obliterated by a single mortar.”


I’m mostly annoyed because the sheer effectiveness of their mortar makes it seem like a counter is required when a mortar isn’t really something you can properly counter.



Also if their missiles are small suicide ufos then we can at least assume that they’re spending VP on what amounts to “a small fighter rigged to explode.” They definitely get more than one for one VP, but it’s nice to know.

[Madman198237]

Personally I feel a better way to force not mono-focusing is a lack of tokens if you blow everything to tiny pieces, instead of having them escape the now-really-upgraded fightercraft that we poured effort into. Unless the aliens got nothing from them escaping, which would suit me (and presumably the mechanics, seeing as how we stomped them in the air battle/they can't make it back to orbit without getting shot to pieces) much better than "by the way you get almost nothing and they escape anyway".

Not getting Tokens is not really a deterrent when your method also allows you to deny the enemy tokens.

My problem with this logic is that it basically says "you win half the battle, they win half the battle, you get nothing, they get something". At least, it does in this case, with the minor exception of the one we shot down.

What is the aliens' gravity manipulation capable of? And someone please explain to me why we can't just utilize gravity generators to crush them like a bunch of tin cans, because otherwise that's what my next proposal is going to start us down the road to doing.

[10ebbor10]

I really don’t understand how a single infrequent grenade mortar managed to obliterate our squads. I’d expect higher levels of tactical competence from NOTSOFTER. At least a strategy that isn’t “stay clustered in one place and wait for a mortar to blow you up.” Hell, if the mortar is so good then why aren’t their grenades annihilating squads?
It does not feel like a single mortar firing a grenade every now and again should be able to decide the battle so decisively.

A single mortar + an overwhelming numerical advantage. They outnumbered you more than 3 to 1.

As for why grenades don't do the same thing, sectoids are not that good at throwing. Also, higher yield in the mortar.

[Happerry]

I'm pretty sure the Mortar fires bigger shells then they have grenades. That's usually one of the points to Mortars.

A single mortar + an overwhelming numerical advantage. They outnumbered you more than 3 to 1.

Ack. This means that with the ships they sent, between the small lander and the medium lander they had at least six units of aliens deployed. The mortar might be more flashy and attention getting, but I suspect that this was a bigger reason why we lost on the ground, and it encourages me to go for the 'make a new base, get more points' approach this turn and then see if we can revise up some alloy armor to make the lethal splash damage radius smaller. And maybe make those small pistols they seem to insist on using less effective too. Right now I think we're in a position where whenever someone gets a solid hit they die, so if we can soak a hit or two that'd be good.

[Madman198237]

-snip-

A single mortar + an overwhelming numerical advantage. They outnumbered you more than 3 to 1.

As for why grenades don't do the same thing, sectoids are not that good at throwing. Also, higher yield in the mortar.

This is not sufficiently reflected in the battle report.

[Happerry]

Anyway, I'm just going to throw up a base design or two.

Chinese Industrial Park
Hidden in the backwaters of China, this base takes advantage of the multitude of cheap, easily conscripted labor that is also easily concealed with the traditionally 'delicate' Chinese views towards censorship to create a powerful production center of airframes, air weapons, and infantry equipment for XCOM's use. It also has a small lab setup to help put new prototypes, probably developed elsewhere, into production, a barracks to host the base's security troopers, and several concealed missile launchers and ground to air defense railguns to help ward off enemy base attacks. A single solitary hanger and airstrip allow air missions to be staged out of this base in an emergency. As well, a small experimental facility is also built to hold any alien captives taken in good health (until they are interrogated) and to prevent them from committing suicide and a minor dedicated exterior agency interaction facility is added on in case outsiders need to be worked with. However, these last two facilities are marked to be built last, and only if there is sufficient extra time, on the build plans.

American Mountain Base
With most of the facilities hidden underneath and inside one a fairly large mountain, this base hosts a powerful and high tech production center that takes advantage of easy access to high technology experts and designers in America to build and prototype the most advanced gear that XCOM needs with all the speed made possible with modern automation technology. These facilities, buried as they are, are armored in literally tons of rock, and defended by a team of security troopers that put the bases natural fortifications to best use. The base also has a set of missile launchers and railcannon turrets to help ward of air attacks, normally concealed, and a small lab for use in prototyping new designs. A small hanger is attached for emergency use, but the base is not designed as an offensive installation. As well, a small experimental facility is also built to hold any alien captives taken in good health (until they are interrogated) and to prevent them from committing suicide and a minor dedicated exterior agency interaction facility is added on in case outsiders need to be worked with. However, these last two facilities are marked to be built last, and only if there is sufficient extra time, on the build plans.


Brazil Jungle Base
Hidden deep beneath the jungle canopy, and half buried besides, this base takes utmost advantage of it's backwater positioning to conceal its network of workshops and factories from interested eyes. Here, new gear, both air and ground, is built for XCOM's use, and some prototype equipment put into production with the help of a small research station. Also hidden beneath the jungle canopy are a network of missile launchers and ground to air mass drivers, as well as a hanger with an attached airstrip (which is the only part of the base viewable from above, given the needs of vehicles to take off from it). A few scattered barracks facilities hosts a defensive group of security personal to ward off lost explorers and serve as a last line of defense if the aliens attack. As well, a small experimental facility is also built to hold any alien captives taken in good health (until they are interrogated) and to prevent them from committing suicide and a minor dedicated exterior agency interaction facility is added on in case outsiders need to be worked with. However, these last two facilities are marked to be built last, and only if there is sufficient extra time, on the build plans.

[Chiefwaffles]

I'm pretty sure the Mortar fires bigger shells then they have grenades. That's usually one of the points to Mortars.

Possible, but I honestly doubt that they're notably bigger than alien grenades. It's a mortar attached to the top of a UFO, for crying out loud.

Okay. We have two options, the way I see it:
Fighter-Transport. So we have a better way to mediate differences in VP/UP. If 1 Talon is underkill and 2 is Overkill, then we can do a 3 VP fighter-transport that lets us get the proper air advantage without hurting our ability to transport troops. It sure works for the aliens.
New base. Possible. Just increasing our production points. I'm hesitant about this one because we already have 2 extra production points this turn and honestly Ebbor's been pretty conservative with letting us "buy" production points with designs. We'd get some more points, but I'm not confident it'd be enough to be worth it just now. We should do this soon, though.

I don't think we should bother fixing Rockbreakers in our revision just yet, by the way. According to what Ebbor said, we pretty much had a very definitive advantage in the air - it just got diminished by our loss at ground. We should revise something for infantry instead.



Also looking back it's almost definite that they're in space. Considering that all their UFOs are coming from, y'know, space. Kind of a giveaway, that.
Design: Falcon Fighter-Transport ('cuz falcons have talons)
Alien Computer Core Token
At some point, an engineer realized we have a superlight superstrong alloy, gravity-based propulsion, and a notable logistics problem regarding infantry transport. This is the result of a coffee-fueled all-nighter and a whole lot of "WHY DIDN'T WE DO THIS SOONER?!"

The Falcon Fighter-Transport is our second hybrid craft, allowing us to truly start getting familiar with the way stuff works. We're not aiming for any big improvements over the paradigm-shift that was the Talon. It's mostly the same components. Some bigger, some smaller. But the same components nonetheless. We just know what we're doing this time and are not trying acting like children trying to make a CPU with their parents' soldering kit.

It's big. We estimate/hope that it can carry two squads. A dual-railgun turret linked to the power core is placed on the bottom, near the front. The auto-loading systems have been refined to allow for a greater rate of fire, and the barrel length (among other things of course) increased to allow for greater range. The angles of fire are done in such a way to allow the turret to serve as a very competent weapon in both interceptions and close air fire support.
Most importantly, this turret is linked to a new computer core based on an alien computer core salvaged earlier (and some tips/"what to never do" from the salvaged remains of the TAV1 project regarding to alien computers). The computer core is uplinked to the Falcon's many sensors as well as sensors on the ground (which are, at this point, mostly TAV2s). So not only can the turret "see" whatever our soldiers see, our soldiers see what the Falcon sees from the air above. Expert fire control from the computer allows for expert precision aiming. A soldier on the ground practically has to point at an enemy highlighted by the TAV2 (which should be more effective w/ aerial sensor coverage) and they'll be smited hit by a railgun shell from above. Furthermore, the computer should allow for better targeting and engagement of/with UFOs in interceptions.

But yes. Aims to carry 2 squads, the standard Grav Pulse Drive, standard Elerium power core, standard composite (like the Talon) alloy armor, no missiles (to save space), and a bottom-mounted turret with two slightly-upgraded railguns for interception and ground support. It has an advanced computer core to get the most out of this turret in interceptions/air support and to uplink targeting data between it and TAV2s on the ground in a mutually beneficial arrangement.

While we really shouldn't get the Falcon shot down (and it'd be hard to do so), it shouldn't experience tremendous casualties if it does. A simple mode of the grav drive can help counteract the impact with the ground, we have really really good armor, and we know from experience that alloyed transport craft do fairly well when shot out of the sky thanks to the aliens' lander craft.
As a side note, the Falcon is rated for space travel; which is remarkably easy thanks to the grav drives. It wouldn't be tremendously simple and no super long term missions, but it should allow for missions in, y'know, space. We'll work on the "letting our infantry not suffocate and die" part of space missions later. ((If this isn't trivial for some obscure reason just forget this part.))

TL;DR: New hybrid fighter-transport. Uses a 2x railgun turret w/ computer core uplinked to other sensors for maximum targeting in both interceptions+ground support. Holds two squads. Otherwise pretty much just the Talon again.
Okay. Think about this:
1.) We know how to make aircraft with majority alien tech.
2.) Something with this amount of alien tech with any consideration given towards interception/dogfighting/whatever is going to be really good at it. Maybe not as good as the Talon, but still really really good; better than a Raven. Gravity drives and superarmor and railguns do that.
3.) Alien tech is practically biased towards a fighter transport. Alien Alloy is actually really light. Not "light for its strength", but it's light. I'm going off of memory, but in XCOM 2 the aliens use alien alloys to make the bulk of their infantry rifles because of how light it is in comparison to other materials used to make weapons. Gravity propulsion can make up for increased weight even despite that.
!!! 4.) The Talon was made with scrapped-together experience of some of its component elements. The Falcon will be made with all the experience we've gained from the Talon. That will help a lot.

I'm not saying that the Falcon will/should be better than the Talon, but it should be able of giving us significant aid in interceptions. Just not quite as much as a talon.

Chinese Industrial Park (0):
American Mountain Base (0):
Brazil Jungle Base (0):
Falcon Fighter-Transport (1): Chiefwaffles

Also Ebbor, what does the "Exalt Intel" Token do and why do we have it?

[Happerry]

Possible, but I honestly doubt that they're notably bigger than alien grenades. It's a mortar attached to the top of a UFO, for crying out loud.

Idduno, compare an oldcom alien grenade to a blaster bomb. The alien grenade has 90 explosive power, and the Blaster Bomb has 200. Meanwhile, in newcom, alien grenades do 5 damage, and the blaster launcher does 9 damage. Even assuming that a mortar shell isn't as strong as a blaster bomb strike, that still leaves easy room for a shell to be at least 50% more powerful then an alien grenade. And if we compare the alien grenades to normal grenades, in both games they're just a hair under being twice as strong as a normal grenade.

Take into account the lots greater range a mortar is going to have over manually throwing grenades, and doing the lowball guess of 'only 50% stronger then a normal alien grenade', that still leaves it plenty of space to be deadly and annoying.

...Even if it probably isn't as deadly as being outnumbered 3 to 1.

I almost want to suggest putting a Railgun turret on top of the Falcon Fighter-Transport and seeing if we can add in anti-mortar point defense to that design. Something like that would probably also help if the aliens start deploying bomber drones in ground combat or something alike too, but I think that adding something like that to our first alloy transport when it already has a ground fire support turret might be an extra feature to far.

Also Ebbor, what does the "Exalt Intel" Token do and why do we have it?

I've been assuming that we have the Exalt Intel token because of the bolded line in the mission description I've copied out below.

We've spotted another large alien force landed in Australia, consisting out of 3 craft. Contrary to previous alien operations, they've know landed in an abandoned mine. UAV footage has shown an ongoing conflict between an unidentified armed group and the alien forces. Mimics (or Skincrawlers), sectoids and drones appear have all engaged the enemy, supported by what appears to be a sort of heavy mortar on top of the medium lander.

Maybe we can use it when we get around to making a 'check for alien bases/infiltration/mind control/Cult of Sirus presence/Exalt Cell presence' mission as any kind of intel token would seem useful for that?

Also, looking back, it seems the Mortar got mentioned before we sent troops out. Pity none of us noticed (or at least mentioned) it before hand, but honestly I'm still pretty sure the major reason we lost was being outnumbered so much.

Also looking back it's almost definite that they're in space. Considering that all their UFOs are coming from, y'know, space. Kind of a giveaway, that.

Pretty much, yes. Depending on how the design goes, we could revise up a 'point a really big telescope at any UFO which gets away and see how long we can track it' plan.

...And or put up our own Hubble to do such once we've got easy spacelift.

Chinese Industrial Park (0):
American Mountain Base (0):
Brazil Jungle Base (1): Happerry
Falcon Fighter-Transport (1): Chiefwaffles

Vote wise, I think either of a new base or an alloy transport will be pretty helpful, but I really want to get a new base out just so we have data on how much having more bases helps with resources. (And therefor help us figure out how important it is to smash the alien bases when they start building them on earth). Voting for the Brazil one because I'm hoping that the previous attempt to make one in Brazil will make it at least a bit easier.