XCOM: Enemy Unknown aka the one where Haphazard dies repeatedly

[uberfish]

About 1 day after Sareln's save a large UFO shows up and we engage it with a Plasma cannon raven. The UFO is pretty tough and I use one of the Dodge powerups we made earlier to make sure the interceptor survives.

our team for this mission is:



Skyranger drops us off at the side of a long UFO.



the team decides to attack up the ramp.



This is a Supply UFO which features the control room to the left of the screen here and a large semi-open cargo hold to the right. Xenin advanced and run into a muton/berserker patrol

I can't really get good shots on the 2 mutons so Xenin activates run&gun and darts back behind the full cover then Rapid Fires at the berserker. He hits one out of two shots, and then gets another free CCS shot when the berserker charges towards him. Pindicator misses. Dave finishes it off and the rest of the squad take cover. We're out of line of sight of the regular mutons.



One muton runs towards us eating 5 points of overwatch fire damage from Commodore, and the other ducks into the control room. The muton that ran towards us is standing out of cover. Pindicator shoots at it. Misses again. Commodore finishes it off and the team moves to cover the control room.



Pindicator: "Can I get this kill? I have 95% to hit this one for a change"
Dave: "Sure, let me just soften it up for you"

Dave flanks and shoots the muton. Critical for 12! Muton dies!

Pindicator: "....."
Dave: "Ah well, you'd have missed anyway."

We check the back of the control room but it's clear

Unfortunately, while the squad is moving into position to clear the hold Xenin activates 2 sectoid commanders, a berserker, and muton that were hanging around in the hold while being late in the turn order, because I didn't notice there was a hole in the wall to his left. No one is able to shoot the aliens this turn so...



Xenin and Lewwyn get mind controlled!

However one of the commanders put itself in a flanked position to do this. Uberfish has a double 85% shot on it, but hits once with his heavy plasma for 8 and missing once. It's up to the rest of the squad to finish it with their guns, as it has too many HP left to kill with a grenade. But that should be no problem with 3 squad members left to act... right?

Commodore has one shot and misses!

Pindicator (to absolutely no one's surprise at this point) misses!

Dave has to take a risk and stand out of cover on the platform to take the last shot. If he fails this shot someone is probably going to die next turn between the 2 mind controlled guys and the ailens.

Dave hits! The 1st sectoid commander is down and Lewwyn breaks free of the mind control and runs forward. He then takes a pot shot at the 2nd commander which is in cover, and fails miserably.

Alien turn. Xenin turns around and pwns Dave in the face with a 12 damage crit. The commander uses a psi attack on Lewwyn who panics, but only hunkers down and doesn't shoot anyone.



Dave: "Why the hell did he shoot me? He was standing right next to Lewwyn and Pind"
Commodore: "Because the aliens know who isn't a threat?"
Lewwyn: "I hate you all"



The muton and berserker have run off somewhere and I don't see them. I don't want to jump down into the cargo hold in case of berserker ambush though.

Commodore: "no problem, I'll destroy the cover with my shredder rocket"

Unfortunately the cover was made of tough material and didn't get blown up

Fortunately it's still 6 on 1 and we're on higher ground getting an aim bonus and I don't mind taking six 50% shots at the thing. Someone eventually kills it. Don't remember whom, but it wasn't pindicator.



Pind and Lewwyn head up to the UFO roof for better spotting but don't spot the mutons

[uberfish]

Xenin finds the berserker trying to outflank us from the right and promptly rapid fires it, hitting once and getting a second shot in with CCS

The berserker is down to 5 or 6 hp. Pindicator fires.

Pindicator hits!!!!!

... Pindicator does 4 damage and fails to kill the alien.

Uberfish has to finish it off.

Commodore goes up to join Lewwyn and Dave covering on the roof in overwatch. 3 floaters had been sighted last turn and hadn't attacked yet

Alien turn, 1 floater wanders into the roof team's line of sight and is shot and killed. Then suddenly 2 Heavy floaters appear out of nowhere behind us!



Uberfish is the only one in line of sight and checks. the aliens are flank bugged. Commodore decides to rocket the two heavy floaters as the most effective attack he can do from his position on the roof which should hopefully demolish some of the wall.



Uberfish now has a working flank one and kills it with his heavy plasma.

Pindicator misses (sigh)

Xenin flanks the last one and rapid fire secures the kill.

Lewwyn moves up to the low wall at the edge of the roof looking for a better firing position but wakes up another muton and a berserker which run out of sight. Overwatch time

One of the loose floaters comes in and gets shot down. Muton shows up and misses. The berserker climbs the ladder and charges the roof team! Uberfish, Xenin and Pindicator on the lower ground are unable to shoot it this turn. Not that it really matters in Pindicator's case since he will miss anyway.



I decide to have Lewwyn back off while shooting the berserker so that the berserker will run closer to Commodore and his double shot will land.

Dave hits, Commodore hits twice. Lewwyn closes in and decides the difference between 80% stun and 86% light plasma rifle isn't that big and he will try to capture it alive because he can.



The stun lands, capturing the berserker, and the ground team closes in on the muton but doesn't manage to hit it.



It doesn't really matter too much because the muton misses and we have another 6 on 1 situation the next turn which means I can fire something like 9-10 shots at it if need be. Commodore gets the kill shot and Lewwyn picks off the last floater on overwatch.



We finally find the last muton hiding in the front room of the ship where it is killed.



Lewwyn got 3 kills and was promoted to Heavy!
Commodore became a Colonel.



And we got the alloys we needed. Of course, we are now bottlenecked on elerium and can't build more than 1 ghost armour.

I transferred one of our interceptors out of africa and started construction on 3x Firestorm which is all we can build due to lack of Nav computers anyway.

Anyway this was actually a fun and exciting mission due to the Mind control issues and chain activation of aliens in the hold area.


save

https://dl.dropbox.com/u/19168036/xcom/save515

[Sareln]

mind control.

I don't think I've ever rolled the cargo UFO mission where it drops me off near the control room. Nearly always I have to come in the "front" and make my way through the cargo area first.

Also, good show Uberfish. Especially dealing with the double-mind control.

Could someone elaborate the details of the flanking bug? I'm sure I've run into it and have just worked around it, but details would be good.

[uberfish]

No idea what causes the flanking bug, but sometimes if 2 units are on the same side of a wall, they aren't flanked even though they really should be.

Could easily have had a couple of deaths there if I had bad luck. This is probably the most dangerous UFO map and taking low level troops on it was risky.

also I left Dave's name as it was because Molly 'DaveV' Jones is a hilarious name.

[spellman]

This is probably the most dangerous UFO map and taking low level troops on it was risky.

Yeah, considering it's "just a supply ship" it's quite difficult to take down properly. The main bays have horrible cover or good ways to flank and land shots without leaving you badly exposed, and you tend to chain activate EVERYTHING. Plus sometimes things are wandering outside and suddenly show up to flank your butt.

Besides the alien base, I think this is my most hated map.

[Ug the Barbarian]

Well played from a difficult situation. Always a tough map as people have commented - I do prefer starting near the control room which I've done a couple of times but on those I've been lucky enough to take out the Sectoid Commanders without activating other groups.

Who's next to take Pindicator for shooting practise ? Perhaps they can give him a scope

[haphazard1]

Nice work, uberfish! Double mind control could have been very very bad, but you cleaned up the mess and finished out the mission without losing anyone.

What armor do we want for our squad? I am happy enough with Titan armor, but if we want a few specialty sets (archangel for sniper? ghost for assaults? other?) that can be fun too.

Who's next to take Pindicator for shooting practise ? Perhaps they can give him a scope

I believe I am due up next, but I will not be able to play until tomorrow evening (about 28 hours from now). If whoever is after me (dazed?) wants to swap and play sooner, feel free.

[dazedroyalty]

I like Archangel for the Sniper, Ghost for as many troops as possible and Titan for the rest.

[pindicator]

How did I get 2 kills?

[NobleHelium]

Collateral damage, obviously.