Help wanted: X-Com UFO Defense

[Pogo]

I like grenades, especially if you're trying to kill an alien on a second floor. Just blow it up beneath them and they'll take fall damage.

Dang. Fucking aliens attacked my base mid-way through the first month! Xcom wiped from the face of the Earth.

I didn't even know this was possible. Is this on a harder difficulty setting?

[Kemper Boyd]

Surprised the hell out of me. I was only on the 2nd difficulty level. Base in northern Italy with tons of early activity - I had already had 4 encounters. Suddenly there is a very large UFO flying over and so I figured that I could just leave it alone and not waste two very under powered interceptor on it. Bastard lands right on my base and my seven hapless guys put up the good fight for a bit before complete destruction. Actually kind of cool since it was so early and I didn't lose much.

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[Strollen]

That is very unusual to have such an early base attack on such a low difficult.

[Kemper Boyd]

That is very unusual to have such an early base attack on such a low difficult.

My best guess is that I just happened to place my base very close to an alien base and they got sick of me shooting down all of their ships and stealing their stuff.

[ElGuapo]

I like grenades, especially if you're trying to kill an alien on a second floor. Just blow it up beneath them and they'll take fall damage.



I didn't even know this was possible. Is this on a harder difficulty setting?

I didn't know this was possible. You've actually seen aliens fall? I have never seen anything fall after a roof / ceiling / floor was destroyed. I thought it was a feature added in XCom 3.

[Zak Gordon]

base attacks wipeing you out early and aliens falling through blown up structures beneath them are all there in X-com.

The first is unusal on low difficulties, but i have had it happen a few times (probably being too close to an alien base as kemper mentions). The second is hard to see, in all the fire and smoke on screen you can miss it happening. I didn't know it caused actual damage though (but it would make sense, does that mean your guys take fall damage also?).

[Lantz]

Lots of really good advice in here, so I'll add a couple minor things:

I assume you've figured it out already, but your soldiers don't need to see an alien to shoot them. So move one person forward and let you other soldiers stay a bit back and shoot from range. This is key particularly once you start developing some better soldiers. Keep the valuable guys back hitting from a distance to protect themselves and morale.

Research plasma rifles as soon as you can, they are awesome. As the mission is ending, try and pick up and eject the clips from any alien plasma rifles paying around. It will help with your ammo status.

[Malkroth]

4 guys armed with rocket launchers and carrying backup ammo is much cheaper than a tank, and you can fit all four in the Skyranger in place of one tank.

Soldiers require a monthly fee (salary) and also have morale. Tanks just drive out and if people die or they come under fire, they will not panic.

[Kemper Boyd]

As the mission is ending, try and pick up and eject the clips from any alien plasma rifles paying around. It will help with your ammo status.

Okay, really stupid question time...

How the heck do you unload guns?!?

Nothing seems to happen when I click on the button that looks like a clip popping out of a rifle. Is that not the right button? Very frustrating as I have moved on to heavy plasmas and I would love to be able to save my partially used clips at the end of the missions.

[RichVR]

Drag your weapon to the button. Totally counter intuitive.

[Greybriar]

....As the mission is ending, try and pick up and eject the clips from any alien plasma rifles paying around. It will help with your ammo status.

Don't just take the ammo, take the plasma rifles as well. If you have any leftover after equipping your squads, you can sell them.

[Lantz]

Don't just take the ammo, take the plasma rifles as well. If you have any leftover after equipping your squads, you can sell them.

Yeah, of course take those too. I just meant that it's not obvious that you need to eject clips to keep them.

[ElGuapo]

I love the sound that clips make when you load/unload them. I kinda wish they'd keep that.

[Pogo]

The second is hard to see, in all the fire and smoke on screen you can miss it happening. I didn't know it caused actual damage though (but it would make sense, does that mean your guys take fall damage also?).

I suppose I'm not 100% on whether damage actually occurs from the fall. It was in my experience that falling aliens survived explosions less frequently than when hit by the blast radius of a grenade.

[Kemper Boyd]

Okay, I just found an Antarctic alien base fairly early on. How safe is it to leave it alone for now. I tried to dive in with a 12 person team and had a pretty hard time - mostly due to psionic attacks. Maybe go back and bolster my troops with a couple of rocket tanks?

[dfs]

Okay, I just found an Antarctic alien base fairly early on. How safe is it to leave it alone for now. I tried to dive in with a 12 person team and had a pretty hard time - mostly due to psionic attacks. Maybe go back and bolster my troops with a couple of rocket tanks?

Without Plasma Rifles and armor I wouldn't raid the base just yet.
But knowing where it is can be a tremendous boon. Take out the supply ships and treat it as the gift that keeps on giving.

[Alan Au]

So for base defense, you know about redesigning your base layout, right? There's a mod that starts your base in a better configuration, but if done manually, you should relocate your hangars and use the access lift as a chokepoint.

I always keep ~20 proximity grenades on hand for base defense purposes. Basically, I line up in the hallway near the access lift and chuck proximity grenades at the intersection. Er, don't thrown them all at once; wait for the first couple to explode, and then deploy new ones as needed. Also avoid the temptation to cluster your squad together, because the aliens sometimes bring blaster bombs.

[Woolen Horde]

So for base defense, you know about redesigning your base layout, right? There's a mod that starts your base in a better configuration, but if done manually, you should relocate your hangars and use the access lift as a chokepoint.

http://gamerationy.com/reviews/pc/xc...BaseLayout.jpg

[Alan Au]

http://gamerationy.com/reviews/pc/xc...BaseLayout.jpg

The UFOpaedia has an excellent Base Layout Strategy article .

[Zak Gordon]

Yeah a super important extra layer of tactical loveliness for the long game. I'm sad the base has become a mere eye-candy piece in the new X-com, as it was in the original game (and the use of more than one) it opened a whole heap of strategic goodness you could mess around with (this base is recon-base for finding all the alien bases, this one is for manufacturing etc).

I really hate the dumbing down we do in games currently, we are just going to raise a bunch of 'consumer kids' rather than critical thinkers.