XCOM - Terror From the Deep SG

[haphazard1]

I guess I got left behind to cuddle my new best friend on that mission tho! (The gas cannon ...obviously )

You were on the mission. Just one of those random things, you ended up exploring areas which had no aliens and never took a shot.

Woot, three kills. One of them was a civilian, but I'm not choosy.

And it's all still adding up to XCOM being the actual threat, isn't it?

That theory is looking stronger and stronger, isn't it?

Obvious case of misidentification, will be renamed/deleted next time I play a turn... I gave all the soldiers named after turn players good stats

I just assigned names in order from Brackard's list. Really!

As for mass hire and fire - we don't have the cash atm because we rushed to double labs and are trying to scrape up a transmission resolver. Just use the mediocre troops as scouts, if they survive a few missions they tend to improve anyway

Yes, we are a bit short of cash for hire-and-fire. And MC Labs are far enough away, might as well just use the rookies and see who survives. But it is an option for later.

Tanks as scouts is more of a matter of personal play style. I usually prefer to have the additional bodies to help cover the map, although once larger transports and more advanced tanks are available I may take a tank or two along. I also have a distressing tendency to get my tanks reduced to scrap metal, which is expensive. Losing a mediocre rookie instead is a lot cheaper.

Wow that was nicely done. No casualties except civs

Being in daylight helped a lot compared to the previous terror mission. And calcinites also made this easier, since they have only melee attack. There were three or four cases where I was able to leave calcinites alive between rounds without getting hurt, where Deep Ones would have been taking shots at our troops.

The aquatoids also used a couple of grenades on civilians, which is always greatly preferable to their being used on our soldiers.

But the biggest thing was using the scout/grenade/sniper tactics, freezing to avoid drawing reaction fire. The aliens only took one shot at our troops during the entire mission, and that was during their movement phase.

I also got pretty lucky with the MC results. Only 1 turn of alien control, and plako was not in position to shoot anyone. The panic results were annoying, especially Mardoc running off to find a calcinite. But with three MC aliens, this could have been a lot worse than it was. It helped that we were killing aliens fast enough to rapidly rebuild the morale of anyone who got panicked.

But overall, yes, I am pretty pleased with how it turned out.

Welcome to the team and good luck, Catwalk! A video report will be a change, but do whatever works best for you. I tend to take notes as the mission goes along, and my report is just an edited transcript. If it is too wordy, I can try to cut down the verbiage.

[pling]

I guess I got left behind to cuddle my new best friend on that mission tho! (The gas cannon ...obviously )

You were on the mission. Just one of those random things, you ended up exploring areas which had no aliens and never took a shot.

Too much time "bonding" with the cannon, too little time looking for things to shoot ... daft avatar Letting Krill steal all my glory!

[Dicorion]

Woot! Nice play. I hate calcinites. First I was playing I was thinking that those MC attacks during terror missions were form calcinites, so i was scared everytime I saw them
So thanks for a nice revenge and I hope no kids watching because playing with fire is USUALLY a bad idea!

[dazedroyalty]

Great play! I'll take civilian losses before soldiers any day. You did a great job leveraging sonic pulsers---something that I rarely do when I play! Way to go.

A small note:

This is actually the Thermal Shock Launcher, I believe, not a dropped cannon. It's a lighter greenish blue than the cannon. It's a good distinction to make because Aquatoids with Thermal Shock Launchers are usually medics or technicians. Plus, you can charge them more recklessly because even if they shoot you, soldiers survive. Of course, with the weapon already on the ground, it's a moot point.

[Brackard]

Mission 5 Update, if I'm missing something let me know!

Mission 5 Roster update:

Active:
Krill
Pling
Amelia
Refsteel
Ug
Dicorion
haphazard v2
David Corperial v2
Selrahc v2
Serdoa
Mardoc - mind controll issues
Novice
Plako - mind controll issues
TheShiningOne
Uberfish
Meiz
Kyan
Brian Shnahan

Mission 5
No losses!

Mission 4
Tatan - Ambushed by alien behind rock - loss of internal organs (Aquatoid)
Fire and Ice - ambushed from behind same rock as Tatan - loss of head (Aquatoid)

Mission 3
Sareln - Killed by shot of sudden appearnce of gillman
v8mark - Killed by gillman in response to Fire and Ice disgracing it with a grenade shot
ASM - killed by gillman who suddenly appeared
Zakalwe - Fried by deep one leading the charge between some buildings

Mission 2
Dazed - shot in chest by Aquatoid
Sunrise - shot in the back by Aquatoid when scrambling for cover
Cyneheard - killed by grenade by Aquatoid
Brackard - killed by grenade by Aquatoid
David Corperial - killed by grenade by Aquatoid
Selrahc - killed by grenade by Aquatoid

Mission 1:
Bob Chillingworth - Shot by Aquatoid ending in crumpled heap
Haphazard - shot between the eyes by Aquatoid
Man Behind the Mask - Reaction fire from hiding Aquatoid
Rego - shot in head by Aquatoid
Dave - shot in heart by Aquatoid inside ship

Recruits:

Kronoz
Jkaen
Sandover
Ichabod
Darkmantle
Pocketbeetle
Lewwyn
NobleHelium
T-Hawk
Iainuki
Seifer MD

[haphazard1]

Great play! I'll take civilian losses before soldiers any day. You did a great job leveraging sonic pulsers---something that I rarely do when I play! Way to go.

I am a big fan of grenades, especially sonic pulsers. Even among fresh recruits there is usually one or two with 70+ throwing accuracy and reasonable strength. Give them 3-4 grenades and they can rain down death on the aliens.

And once you get someone with 75+ throwing accuracy and about 40 strength (such as my current avatar), you can kill aliens from halfway across the map. One or two such soldiers can hang back where it is safe, and still support anyone who gets in trouble.

You do have to be careful about obstacles such as towers and tall buildings. But you can easily throw over shorter buildings or the Triton, which I did several times on this mission.

A small note:

This is actually the Thermal Shock Launcher, I believe, not a dropped cannon. It's a lighter greenish blue than the cannon. It's a good distinction to make because Aquatoids with Thermal Shock Launchers are usually medics or technicians. Plus, you can charge them more recklessly because even if they shoot you, soldiers survive. Of course, with the weapon already on the ground, it's a moot point.

OK, helpful to know. I thought it was a sonic cannon. The sonic blasta rifle and sonic pistol are easy to recognize, but we did get both some sonic cannons and a thermal shok launcher in our loot. But being able to recognize them is helpful, although we do not need to capture any aquatoids alive for the tech tree. I did have some thermal tazers in the Triton, and could have tried to take some aliens alive, but with the ongoing MC attacks it did not seem worth the risk.

[Brian Shanahan]

Brian Shanahan throws a pulser at its feet.

IBT the pulser kills the aquatoid. Another walks through the now missing wall of the building and fires a shot but misses everyone. Three MC attacks occur, two on Mardoc and one on someone (not sure).

...
- Brian Shanahan spots an aquatoid on the dropped pistol tile. He kills it with a snap shot.

Told you I'd create a good clone, eventually. Could I get a look at my stats maybe?

[haphazard1]

Told you I'd create a good clone, eventually. Could I get a look at my stats maybe?

I would have to check the save once I get home from work, and hopefully some of the stats went up after the mission. But my notes for your avatar (yes, I keep a list of all soldiers on the mission with a summary of their stats -- helps to pick which weapons to assign to which soldier, and who to use to make that critical shot) show:

Firing accuracy: a bit below "average" (but actually decent compared to most of our soldiers....)
Thowing accuracy: excellent
Strength: a bit below average (but pretty typical for a recruit, strength is one of the stats that tends to go up steadily with survived missions)

At this stage of the game I do not worry much about bravery, reactions, or base TUs. And of course we do not know MC strength yet.

By comparison, Kyan was the best of the new recruits with firing accuracy a bit above average, throwing very good, and strength above average. The other two new recruits (Uberfish and Meiz) were well below average for both firing and throwing, with average or below strength. That is all too typical of the average recruit, and is just something you have to work with as best you can and hope stats improve.

Or you can mass hire and fire, screening for good starting stats. But this requires significant amounts of cash, as you will likely be immediately firing about 70% of the initial pool. And unless you have extra living quarters space available, it also requires a lot of time as you cycle small groups with a 3 day delay each time.

Dealing with weak recruits is part of the fun, really. Getting that important hit from a rookie with a 42 firing accuracy always feels good. Of course, having that same rookie screw up and shoot a fellow XCOM solider in the back -- despite being 45 degress away from where he was supposed to be aiming -- is not so good. Especially when the soldier shot is a vet worth 10 roookies.

This is why rookies tend to be put in the front lines as forward scouts. They get to do the majority of the 'killed by alien' action, and anyone shot in the back is likely to be only a minor loss.

[Catwalk]

Sorry, I'll have to wait a day. If anyone is jumping to get at the save, go ahead and I'll play later.

[Brian Shanahan]

Thanks haphazard1. I'd love to be able to play the games, but I'm too poor at the moment.