Print

Please login or register.
1 Hour 1 Day 1 Week 1 Month Forever
Login with username, password and session length

[Parsely]

I don't get the Archangel + Sniper combo. I thought it wrote somewhere in the help page that flying doesn't give a height bonus?

Are you sure? And why not? It does give you a defence bonus though, right?

Using it in combination with squadsight to nail enemies is the best use for it anyways.

[Muz]

Hmm.. are smoke grenades really any good? I find very few situations where they actually help. Most of the time, if you're doing it right, you shouldn't be giving aliens any hope of firing back at you. There might be one or two situations where you get overwhelmed, but it should be extremely rare.

And it seems like an extra bit of firepower would help more than a smoke grenade (dead alien can't shoot back). Since Support often has high Aim, it seems better to have them shoot back.

I see it being useful if maybe someone got caught in half-cover, or if you want to discourage the aliens from shooting at the guy who's retreating with just 1 HP. But that's about it.

I don't get the Archangel + Sniper combo. I thought it wrote somewhere in the help page that flying doesn't give a height bonus?

Are you sure? And why not? It does give you a defence bonus though, right?

Using it in combination with squadsight to nail enemies is the best use for it anyways.

Something about the flying status doesn't grant height bonus. But then again, I swear that those floaters are getting height bonus on my guys. And I thought another disadvantage of flying snipers was that they lose the "half cover treated as full cover" perk. Something like ghost armor gives them the same kind of defense bonus too.

But yeah, I suppose that it's still safer than shifting them about the map, since I've lost a couple of snipers while jumping up on an alien infested roof.

[Parsely]

Hmm.. are smoke grenades really any good? I find very few situations where they actually help. Most of the time, if you're doing it right, you shouldn't be giving aliens any hope of firing back at you. There might be one or two situations where you get overwhelmed, but it should be extremely rare.

And it seems like an extra bit of firepower would help more than a smoke grenade (dead alien can't shoot back). Since Support often has high Aim, it seems better to have them shoot back.

I see it being useful if maybe someone got caught in half-cover, or if you want to discourage the aliens from shooting at the guy who's retreating with just 1 HP. But that's about it.

Sometimes you mess up. A lot of the times when you're doing what you 'should' be in XCOM you can still end up losing men, and that's if you're lucky. I like them because they enable my supports to safely get close to the enemy and also cement a good full cover defensive position.

I like supports because they have such high aim without having to stand in the same place, but they still don't do much damage. Spending an action to toss a smoke grenade can sometimes be the best decision if you've got more than one man in a vulnerable position or there's more than one alien ready to shoot.

It really is impossible to remain in full cover all the time, especially on abductions. Smoke grenades are great for getting assaults and supports close to the enemy so you can better guarantee hits so that you don't need that same support to fire. 10%~ firing accuracy increase for 2-3 men to break the 70% mark is a good trade. 4 mediocre shots for 3 better ones.

[lemon10]

Flying on its own doesn't give a height bonus, but if you go up higher then the default flying height you do get a height bonus.

It is questionable if it is worth giving up the bonus of heavy cover, but the bonus accuracy all the time is worth it for me (assuming that there isn't any nearby roof to land on), especially with squadsight, so that nearby land doesn't mess up the sniper's land of fire.

[EnigmaticHat]

I like smokes because they're a safe way to help an ally if killing all the enemies in a turn isn't an option and you've already moved said ally.

In your position I'd use grenades instead of smokes, because the aim boost from blowing up cover is better than the ~10% buff you mentioned, and because assaults shouldn't need smoke to advance.  Also I still think supports are better as damage control than as fighters.  Assaults with rifles are basically the same thing as supports but their abilities make them tougher, higher damage, and more likely to hit.

[Mephansteras]

I find Archangel with Squadsight to be very useful. Get up high on most maps and you can hit just about anything without being in danger of getting shot back at since you're so far back.

Archangel is also surprisingly useful for heavies, since the height opens up some rocket angels you couldn't get other wise. Harder to use, but I've had some good luck with it.

[Mageziya]

Spoiler: Another Impossible Ironman playthrough comes to a screeching halt. (click to show/hide)

And it was going so well. Fuck bomb disposals.

Also, what is with XCOM's oddly prophetic mission names?

[USEC_OFFICER]

Also, what is with XCOM's oddly prophetic mission names?

Selection bias and a limited selection of name possibilities.

[WillowLuman]

Spoiler: Another Impossible Ironman playthrough comes to a screeching halt. (click to show/hide)

And it was going so well. Fuck bomb disposals.

Also, what is with XCOM's oddly prophetic mission names?

I lost a guy, who had %99 chance to hit, on "Operation Shattered Shield."

[MetalSlimeHunt]

Spoiler: Another Impossible Ironman playthrough comes to a screeching halt. (click to show/hide)

And it was going so well. Fuck bomb disposals.

Also, what is with XCOM's oddly prophetic mission names?

I lost a guy, who had %99 chance to hit, on "Operation Shattered Shield."

I just had a 90% stun fail, ruining the mission....in Operation Broken Spark.

I am not a superstitious man, but this has happened too many times. It knows, man. It fucking knows.

[nenjin]

Well I think I finally managed to hit the end game. Funny how much easier it was when I focused 100% on Satellite coverage for the first few months. Not sweating over losing countries does a lot for your "fuck it" attitude.

It felt like the game went from "Some sectoids, thin men and floaters" to "2 squads of mutons with berzerkers, a cyberdisk and co, some chrysalids and a squad of heavy floaters" in the span of like 3 missions. By that point it's all doable....but it's still fun rolling up on the front of those abduction craft when ALL that shit piles out the door to greet you in the same turn.

I've found that if you clear the perimeter of crafts, you're way more likely to get groups individually, which are easy to deal with...versus the direct approach which usually sees you activate every single group of aliens on the map, sans the commanders.

[EnigmaticHat]

I'm cutting myself off from this thead until Enemy Within comes out and I play it.  Maybe I'll actually be surprised by a new alien for once, I was way too spoiled for the base game (mainly from previews).

[Sharp]

I've found that if you clear the perimeter of crafts, you're way more likely to get groups individually, which are easy to deal with...versus the direct approach which usually sees you activate every single group of aliens on the map, sans the commanders.

See that's a bonus with a heavy squad, if you do somehow activate every single alien on the map they generally have to group up in their little bit of cover making it easy to just fire rockets and get so many kills.

I think the most I ever killed with one rocket was 8 sectoids, 3 mind melders and 2 other melded xD. Although I have also killed 6 floaters and a thinman as well with one, fun times.

[nenjin]

I've found that if you clear the perimeter of crafts, you're way more likely to get groups individually, which are easy to deal with...versus the direct approach which usually sees you activate every single group of aliens on the map, sans the commanders.

See that's a bonus with a heavy squad, if you do somehow activate every single alien on the map they generally have to group up in their little bit of cover making it easy to just fire rockets and get so many kills.

I think the most I ever killed with one rocket was 8 sectoids, 3 mind melders and 2 other melded xD. Although I have also killed 6 floaters and a thinman as well with one, fun times.

That generally doesn't happen in the later game. Stuff is durable enough to survive one, maybe even two rockets. Tough enough that 2 heavies can't quite decimate 14 guys in one turn unless they are all packed into the same spot.

[GlyphGryph]

But he was talking a heavy squad. Six heavies can do what 2 cannot!