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[werty892]

So my X-COM RTD is live. See my Sig for the link.

[crazysheep]

Also, thought of running the XCOM project along the lines of the Deathwatch, since the setups seem quite similar (small force insertions, combined tactics from different armies united under one banner, revolutionary weapons that everyone wants later). Thoughts?

This is now a thing rather than  pure thoughts :3

[Jelle]

Woo finished my game finally. Classic difficulty 3 casualties and some modifications to make the lategame more challenging. Finished with a genemodded squadsight sniper and shotgun assault, a heavy and support mec, a supressive fire oriented heavy and a psionic support with lots of smoke and gas. Very pleased with the results.

Going to rebalance a bunch of things for next playthrough around I think. On that subject, does anyone know how to alter class skills and abilities? I've not done any of that before, but I'm feeling creative!
Edit: Only possible through hexediting it seems. Think I'll pass. 

[Sean Mirrsen]

Easiest way to shuffle up the class skills is using the Training Roulette option in Second Wave settings. Guaranteed to make every soldier a lot more unique.

[Jelle]

Actually never mind what I said, you can move them around. Must be new to enemy within.

So I've had a stab at redoing the skill trees. Harder then I imagined, had to put quite some thought into it. Is it alright if I bounce some of my ideas in here? Could use the feedback!

Spoiler: If not, don't open this! (click to show/hide)

Support
                          Smoke Grenade
Field Medic                                        Covering Fire
Holo Targeting                                    Deep Pockets
Revive                                              Opportunist
Dense Smoke                                     Combat Drugs
                         Smoke And Mirrors
Savior                                               Sentinel


Sniper
                          Battle Scanner
Squadsight                                       Gunslinger
Headshot                                         Disabling Shot
Snap Shot                                        Executioner      
DamnGoodGround                              Low Profile
                         Vital Point Targeting
Double Tap                                       In The Zone


Heavy
                          Fire Rocket
Suppression                                       Close And Personal
Opportunist                                      Extra Conditioning
Shredder Rocket                               HEAT Ammo
Mayhem                                          Bullet Swarm
                         DangerZone
Rocketeer                                       Will To Survive


Assault
                         RunAndGun
Sprinter                                           Grenadier
Aggression                                       Tactical Sense
Close Combat Specialist                      Rapid Fire
Lightning Reflexes                                 Flush
                         Killer Instinct
Resilience                                        Bring Em On


Mec
                         Barrage
Auto Threat Assessment                    Jetboot Module
Advanced Fire Control                        One For All
Damage Control                                Expanded Storage
Rapid Reaction                                 Repair Servos
                        Absorption Fields   
Reactive Targeting Sensors                Overdrive

Probably going to change them some more, this is just some initial ideas. Fire away though if you have an opinion.
Going to have to touch the random settings for skill roulette as well, but that's for later.

Edit: Snap spoiler messed up the tabs.

[GiglameshDespair]

I dislike snipers with squadsight. I have never chosen the other option but for dedicated operative-sniper in Enemy Within.

[umiman]

What exactly did you change?

It's hard to see when the formatting is all messed up.

[GiglameshDespair]

I think the problem with a lot of the abilities is that increasing offence is almost always better than increasing defence. Defence is irrelevant when the enemies are killed before they get shots off.

[MetalSlimeHunt]

So I finally took the time to finish the Normal run, and holy fuck Mental Feedback is powerful when you have high Will soldiers. Two of the three final Ethereals were killed by Feedback, including the Uber-Ethereal.

[Jelle]

I think the problem with a lot of the abilities is that increasing offence is almost always better than increasing defence. Defence is irrelevant when the enemies are killed before they get shots off.

I complete agree, vanilla xcom puts way to much emphasis on kill strategies, making support or defense moot. Wich is why that's the first thing I changed on my previous playthrough, it was a lot more fun when combat didn't always boil down to decimating the enemy first turn if not outright taking them out before they can even attack.

I dislike snipers with squadsight. I have never chosen the other option but for dedicated operative-sniper in Enemy Within.

It's good that they nerfed it, it was a little crazy before. It's still quite strong combined with damn good ground if you have a map with a high ground with vantage. My squadsight sniper last run ended up with the most kills in the team, although that might be because she never really got injured and joined every mission as a result.

What exactly did you change?

It's hard to see when the formatting is all messed up.

Errything. Changed the formatting. Ugly ugly spaces.

[EnigmaticHat]

Well first of all, I approve of any change that takes opportunist away from snipers.  That's a broken skill if there ever was one.

I do think that as many "no brainer" skills as you've taken away, you've added new ones.  My list of no-brainer skills on your trees that didn't exist in the original: Lightning Reflexes/flush, Jetboots/auto threat assessment, sprinter/grenadier for assaults (it might be a question on another class), deep pockets/holo targeting, field medic/covering fire, almost literally every choice on the sniper tree (which granted was like that in the original, but its moreso here), rapid reaction/repair servos, opportunist/extra conditioning.  If this seems harsh remember that the original had a lot of no-brainer choices too.  As a general rule, if no one picked a skill in the original, don't put it next to a skill that people did pick.

Giving snipers battle scanner as their first ability is questionable.  Its hard enough to level a squaddie sniper already, now their damage is only as good as a squaddie heavy?  Which is OK, sure, but remember that all heavies can move and shoot, and also fire rockets.  Also remember that in Impossible there is no enemy with 3 health, which means non-criting snipers can fail to kill a sectoid.

I dislike your changes to heavy even though they might not be exactly disbalanced.  Close and personal with an LMG makes no sense either from a gameplay or logic perspective.  You've also seriously nerfed demolitionist heavy, my favorite playstyle, by making all its skills unavailable until rank 4 and also requiring the loss of will to survive and HEAT ammo, both important heavy skills.

Finally, if you look at the old skills they never asked the player to choose between active and passive skills, which meant that all builds would have the same number of activated abilities.  You don't have to follow this rule but should you should at least think about why they would do that.

[Jelle]

I dislike your changes to heavy even though they might not be exactly disbalanced.  Close and personal with an LMG makes no sense either from a gameplay or logic perspective.  You've also seriously nerfed demolitionist heavy, my favorite playstyle, by making all its skills unavailable until rank 4 and also requiring the loss of will to survive and HEAT ammo, both important heavy skills.

Yes some good points, thank you. However you'll have to elaborate on your demolionist setup, I'm not sure what you mean by it. Is it a setup with rockets+heat bullet swarm, maximum damage heavy? If so yes I did intentionally force a choice there between heat and shredder, and added survivability and the extra rocket. On the plus side you can however get both mayhem and rocketeer, so I wouldn't call it a nerf.

Also your choices for sniper, I'd like to know. Can I guess...squadsight, headshot, executioner, ground, doubletap? I don't know, I guess some of them need context to make sense.

[Mageziya]

I agree that the sniper would allow for the most overpowered unit in the game.

  The ability to have Snap Shot AND Squad Sight together makes the sniper absurdly useful in any position with the strongest guns in the game, to the point where the Devs made it impossible to happen with Training Roulette. The opposing choices have nothing on them. More pistol damage (Which would only be useful versus EXALT if you choose Squad Sight, which you would.) versus killing a unit from across the map? Slightly higher chance to hit a enemy that would die to non-sniper fire, or the ability to move to a better position, still be able to shoot, and live if the shot misses, or alternatively, reach an alien you can't see?

Then there's DGG versus Low Profile. DGG is situational, which Low Profile is constant and significantly increases survivability. That, and allows abuse of Mimetic Skin. Also, people on roofs need escorts now due to seeker, which takes away someone who could be killing aliens to stop a seeker from killing your sniper.

Head Shot vs Disabling Shot is the only one that can be debated. The ability to kill an alien to stop it from killing you versus disabling an alien to capture it, or in the case where it can't be killed, stop it from killing you.

[umiman]

Yeah, you'd get Low Profile all the time if you could. The mimetic skin thing just makes it broken. I've won entire missions with just one mimetic skin guy running around killing everything.

[EnigmaticHat]

^^What they said.  Except imo headshot vs disabling shot isn't a debate either, because in EW you need it to crit when using squadsight.