After capturing with lots of losses a Etheral commander (so many losses in that mission that i had to bring the unconscious etheral in a squaddie inventory back to the entrance and run away to avoid losing the whole mission and the prisonner) in one of the alien bases we discovered in the USA (that had made a pact with the aliens a long time ago) , it was time to interrogate him before being able to research the Cydonia mission.
After everything required was researched, we finally completed the mighty Avenger.
It was time now to set our sight to Cydonia.
Hired a bunch of rookies in order to filter the best guys in term of psionic strength (to avoid the huge screwup we had in the Etheral base) to complete my assault team.
Only 2 losses due to the rookies missing too many shots (the guy selected in my screenshot was my first loss, poor rookie, first on Cydonia and first to die), but at least they resisted the psionic assault from some of the sectoids, and once we cleared the pyramids ground , it was time for the assault of the alien headquarter underground
A big battle, lots of blaster launchers
and unfortunately half the squad was killed, but the survivors finally managed to find the elevator to the aliens mastermind room, and to show my willingness in negociating, i used the best tool for that
Blaster launcher ! Lyudmila saved the world !
(odd the "deadliest alien" is a Floater, Mutons and Etherals have been pure nightmares)
So happy to finally get a victory, even if it's in beginner difficulty, the game is hilariously unforgiving, 160 xcom operatives were killed in that run !
Not mentionned in the stat was the loss of 2 interceptors and 1 skyranger, this set me back for a lot of time in early game.
Oh and plasma beam weaponry just rules the sky, destroy nearly everything from far enough to be out of alien range, only battleships are a threat if you don't research and build more advanced aircraft.