XCOM: Enemy Unknown aka the one where Haphazard dies repeatedly

[haphazard1]

Hmmm, so I am up next with potential alien base assault. No pressure.

Let me take a look at the save before deciding on anything. Be back shortly.

Edit: OK, looks like we can either wait for the next month -- finishing Heavy Plasma research and a bit later the Ammo Conservation project, plus getting a ton of cash -- or go for the alien base now.

I promote Spellman (Heavy - Rocket) and Pindicator (Assault - Run and gun) to their squaddie perks. Other outstanding promotions include xenin (Assault, either Flush or Rapid Fire) and Gustaran (Support, Savior or Sentinel). I would go with Rapid Fire (way more awesome than Flush) and Savior (since we already have a sentinel support).

Other choices if we do go for the alien base is what squad to take. A couple supports with medkits and field medic, plus deep pockets (add a scope each?) seem mandatory for healing. A couple heavies for damage dealing and anti-cyberdisk action also seem like a good idea. One each sniper and assault? Or maybe a pair of snipers? Hmmmm. Also, given the difficulty of the alien base I would probably take mostly our top vets. If we truly plan to replace them all with Iron Will promoted rookies then this will be their last real hurrah, so might as well.

I also start a power generator on the far right of level 3 -- with the bulldozing of the early generators we have zero spare power and thus can not build anything else until we have more power. We never want to have zero spare power, we can't even begin a lift to open level four.

We should also probably start some sats -- we will need some next month and it never hurts to have a spare or two on hand in case some get shot down. And with heavier UFOs due to appear once we clear the alien base we might lose some. I start 2 (we can order more at the beginning of the month once we have more cash on hand).

I also go ahead and send the nav computers to the council request, grabbing the cash just in case. Might as well have it, and we can always get more from UFOs. We lack enough weapons fragments to research the advanced fighter yet anyway, so the only near term demand will be the nexus for next month.

Thoughts? I plan to fix something to eat, and then I guess I will go ahead and raid the alien base (unless the team thinks we should wait). I hate doing it with ammo conservation underway but not finished, but oh well. Let me know if you object to anything.

[Sareln]

Hmmm, so I am up next with potential alien base assault. No pressure.

Let me take a look at the save before deciding on anything. Be back shortly.

None at all. Also, you're slightly undergeared. If you don't mind, could you also capture a live Sectoid Commander for us please?

Also, the Satellite Nexus costs Alloys, so you need to run the base-mission pretty quickly.

[uberfish]

Well I think some lurkers who drew "sniper" would be happy if the other snipers were to suffer unfortunate accidents Competition for the zero sniper slots on my missions is intense

[haphazard1]

OK, the alien base has been raided. Turned out to be pretty easy, actually.

As noted previously I went with a maximum experience squad:

Titan armor went to the supports (got to keep the medkit guys alive) and our assault. Scopes all around -- I wanted the accuracy and did not want to risk going for a capture of the sectoid commander. The layout of the final base area is very open, very hard to get close without someone getting mind controlled. We can grab a live psi alien later from a UFO.

We set out for South America and get our briefing:

After dropping down into the alien base, I send half the squad left and half right. I am careful on the right as there is usually an alien group ahead to the right, but IBT they activate anyway. Two regular mutons plus a berserker:

Uberfish starts the action by shooting the berserker for 7 damage; it tries to intimidate us and fails. It is now right next to Gustaran so he hits it point blank for 6 more. Commodore then blasts it for 7 damage and finishes it off.

Commodore takes a second bullet swarm shot at one of the regular mutons but misses. Uberfish takes his second shot and hits for 6. Haphazard moves and flanks the healthy muton:

He hits for 6, leaving both mutons with 4 health. Ug joins the fun with 85% odds but misses his first shot; the second kills the far muton. Sareln then runs-n-guns to point blank the remaining alien:

The squad takes the next round to reload and reposition, then we begin advancing. Haphazard pops the left door and discovers a cyberdisk with two drones:

Uberfish is in position (I was careful to send one heavy and one support to each side) and laughs at the easy targets:

BOOM! Drones destroyed, cyberdisk heavily damaged by HEAT ammo. No one else is in position, but they shift into overwatch to try to catch the alien death machine on the move. As expected it moves forward and Gustaran finishes it off with a reaction shot.

After reloading again, the squad begins advancing. The right side group moves first, in case anything gets activated -- for some reason, the left side no longer has any cover. Sareln leads the way and triggers a trio of chryssalids on the left side, but they scurry back through the next door and out of sight. Very unlike chryssalids to retreat, they are usually pretty aggressive. We advance extremely cautiously for a couple rounds, with everyone in overwatch, but they do not reappear. Odd.

We keep advancing slowly, then I send Uberfish forward. He spots two of the chryssalids just standing around beyond the door:

What, are these guys taking a cigarette break or something? Ug has been positioned on the high center platform and has squad sight on one, he headshots it for 14 for serious overkill. Uberfish then retreats, as I am not sure where the third chryssalid is and do not want to risk them overwhelming our overwatch capacity. Everyone else positions to cover the doorway.

IBT the alien monstrosity charges out as expected. Haphazard hits one of two shots for 6, Gustaran misses. It runs up to Uberfish:

He calmly fries it with his heavy laser.

After more reloading (Ammo Conservation can not complete soon enough!), the squad resumes the advance. Gustaran leads the way on the right and triggers two drones, which move out of sight. He pulls back and we overwatch, and one drone emerges and is blown away by Sareln. Gustaran then moves up again and kills the other drone.

More reloading, more advancing, and we enter a large chamber containing racks of tanks of some kind, with odd alien devices containing unfortunate human abductees undergoing foul alien experiments. The alien scum will pay for their vile deeds!

We advance carefully after hearing floater noises ahead and to the left. IBT the missing chryssalid charges out of the darkness -- Haphazard hits both Sentinel shots and kills it before it can get near anyone.

Sareln moves forward and triggers a trio of floaters:

Ug was positioned in the center and has 95% odds on two of the enemy. He double-taps both of them. Sareln then fries the last floater using rapid fire. The rest of the squad moves up, and Gustaran spots a trio of mutons on the other side of the chamber. For some reason they do not activate, maybe because he moved into sight and then out of sight without stopping.

In any case, they do not move. Commodore starts the next round by hitting all three with his shredder rocket. They scatter out of sight but still close together, so Uberfish sends his second rocket over and wipes out all three.

More reloading and advancing, and Haphazard spots two more mutons ahead and to the left without activating them.

I advance the rest of the squad carefully, hoping to repeat the easy pickings, but end up activating them. Haphazard hits one for 6 damage on a reaction shot, and Gustaran finishes it off with his own overwatch shot. The remaining muton pulls back for better cover.

Haphazard misses to start the next round but does destroy the muton's cover. Sareln uses rapid fire and hits both shots to kill the alien.

More reloading, more advancing, we take a couple rounds to move up to a large door/force field. Beyond it is a narrow platform and a much smaller door, so after another round we pop that one as well. Two drones are spotted above and to the left. One moves out of sight, and Gustaran kills the other. The rest of the squad goes to overwatch, but the other drone somehow moves back into sight without being shot at. Haphazard shoots it down, and after yet more reloading we cautiously advance into the final area. Somewhere around here will be the sectoid commander of the base....

It takes 5 more rounds of careful movement before Haphazard spots the sectoid commander:

Ug starts the shooting with a miss, then gets a hit for 5 damage. (Headshot was used on the shot that missed, of course....) Haphazard pulls back out of sight, breaking contact so it can not mind control, and everyone goes to overwatch.

This sort of works, as Gustaran hits a reaction shot for 6 more damage, but then he is in line of sight and the alien mind controls him. This breaks contact again as we lose Gustaran's vision.

But we know roughly where the alien must be, and Sareln runs'n'guns to close range and kills the alien base commander to complete the mission.

I guess the armor was not really a concern after all, as no one was even wounded. In fact, other than the sectoid commander's mind control no alien even got a shot off. Maybe we should be playing at Impossible?

Commodore earns a promotion to Major, and I go ahead and promote him as there is no choice involved (Will to Survive).

We scavenge 87 elerium, 99 alloys, 34 fragments, 3 power supplies, and a ton of non-researchable items we can sell for cash. I go ahead and sell all the non-useful stuff for 337 credits, bringing our cash on hand to 487. With our monthly income due soon, we will have lots of cash for construction, hiring new soldiers, etc. We may want to consider purchasing more OTS and Foundry projects as well, although perhaps we should wait another month for more sats and the Asia Future War bonus.

With the global panic reduction, things are looking very good:

We are currently working on Heavy Plasma research (5 more days), not sure if we should finish it or interrupt to autopsy the sectoid commander and research the Hyperwave beacon immediately. We can not start any additional construction for 5 days anyway, as we have no spare power until the new generator completes. So maybe we should just finish Heavy Plasmas.

Uberfish
Haphazard (just played)
Dazedroyalty (UP)
Ug (on deck)
Sareln

Good luck!

The Save - after Alien Base mission

[dazedroyalty]

Great play!!! Yeah since we hand seen heavy floaters or elite mutons yet the base didn't get any harder than it would have been 1-2 months ago!!!

I also think we might want to bump up to impossible as mentioned before. The end game usually gets easier instead of harder. Ill wait a little while to hear everyone's thoughts before playing the next mission.

[haphazard1]

Can anyone list the specific differences between Classic and Impossible? I have never played at Impossible, but given how well we are doing I think we can probably handle it. And I agree that many aspects of the game get easier after the alien base -- we have excellent armor and weapons, highly-promoted soldiers, etc. And we now have plenty of money, good base facilities, etc. mostly in place.

[Sareln]

Good Job on the Base!

We have South America's bonus now, so you can interrupt research to do an autopsy and then go straight back to whatever you were working on with no time lost.

[novice]

Lewwyn fires and misses (he hasn't managed to hit a single shot all mission and I'm thinking this means we should probably lynch him for being a traitor)

Competition for the zero sniper slots on my missions is intense

[Lewwyn]

Lewwyn fires and misses (he hasn't managed to hit a single shot all mission and I'm thinking this means we should probably lynch him for being a traitor)

I didn't know bad WW play was transferable... My bad.

[uberfish]

Most of the stuff which makes Impossible very hard is actually in the early game anyway:

4 hp sectoid, 6 hp thin men, 6 hp floater (the largest gameplay change by far)
Greatly increased alien abduction panic
More spawns per map in general and aliens are more likely to spawn in 3's than 2's
Lots of chryssalids on terror missions
Slightly tougher UFOs

In the late game Heavy floater and muton elite get a HP boost but apart from that there's just more aliens