What game are you currently playing

[Restlessdingo32]

...back to a heavily modded XCOM 2 - WotC

You too huh? Just started playing it myself and cannot put it down. Although, I haven't taken the mod plunge yet.

Before that it was Elden Ring. An enjoyable experience despite a flaw here or there. Funnily enough I think Xcom is harder (sorry Souls fanboys....). It's like being tasked with flapping your arms and legs around to stay afloat in lava as they melt. I suppose it does get easier when you start assuming 50% of your 98% chance to hit shots will miss....

 

[Spockprime]

Pick up Pathfinder: Kingmaker - Definitive Edition on sale.
Started on "Easy", turn based combat and indestructible kingdom for now... Time to familiarize myself with the game mechanics and probably another run on a "higher" difficulty depending on how it goes.

I thought it was a really good game. Originally the kingdom management part was so frustrating that a lot of us just modded everything in it to be instantly completed with the best outcome. The developer realized that, and altered a lot of the worst of kingdom management, and also implemented the toggle to basically disable it.

Post automatically merged: Apr 28, 2023

...back to a heavily modded XCOM 2 - WotC

Still one of my all-time favorites, now that Long War finally got updated to work with WotC.

 

[LeKill3rFou]

I thought it was a really good game. Originally the kingdom management part was so frustrating that a lot of us just modded everything in it to be instantly completed with the best outcome. The developer realized that, and altered a lot of the worst of kingdom management, and also implemented the toggle to basically disable it.

Yep, that's what I read from few reviews. Kingdom management could be quite frustrating, so I set it on "effortlessly" and "indestructible kingdom" for now (the same for difficulty, I have pretty much no idea what I'm doing with my character build yet...).
It's a kind of "discovery" run

 

[Draconifors]

Picked up The Talos Principle after two years. Enough time that I've forgotten solutions to the puzzles, not that I ever managed to solve all of the ones in the last part in the first place. I do love a challenging puzzle game, and this one is fantastic.

Reinstalled Witcher 3, too, again, because I missed it and its combat.

Still have Valheim and Hogwarts Legacy going on, too.

 

[Swanky]

You too huh? Just started playing it myself and cannot put it down. Although, I haven't taken the mod plunge yet.

Before that it was Elden Ring. An enjoyable experience despite a flaw here or there. Funnily enough I think Xcom is harder (sorry Souls fanboys....). It's like being tasked with flapping your arms and legs around to stay afloat in lava as they melt. I suppose it does get easier when you start assuming 50% of your 98% chance to hit shots will miss....

Well, one is dicated by anticipation and chance while the other requires knowledge and fast reactions. So I'd say they're both quite different.
That said, XCOM is known to be one of the harder / hardest games around for a reason even without legendary / ironman runs.
The reverse difficulty curve always was a point of criticsm; it gets much better once your soldiers are able to hit the broad side of the barn and you get some upgrades.

Regarding mods, there are several big mods available (LWOTC and Covert Infiltration) although I'm using small mods only, still vastly transforming the overall game experience. And believe it or not, they do have a hashtag #sufferingisfun which puts in some even worse enemies (see screenshot above) over the course of the game.
That said, I'm mostly using mods to fix bugs, add cosmetics (uses LOTS of ram), add new enemies, classes & abilities, fix balance, dejank & enhance the tactical layer...

 

[pliskards]

Reinstalled Witcher 3, too, again, because I missed it and its combat.

I have Witcher 3 and RDR2 both reinstalled at the moment.

RDR2 I am going to try to push through the beginning of the game further than I did on my initial play through to see if I can get into it.

Witcher 3 is just one of the top three games ever made, IMO... and I want to experience the characters and stories again. But when I initially picked it up like three or four years ago I put about 600 hours and three start to finish plays of it in. So I am worried I still might be a bit burnt out on it!

 

[Restlessdingo32]

Well, one is dicated by anticipation and chance while the other requires knowledge and fast reactions. So I'd say they're both quite different.

Yeah, it's probably the chance based component. Pseudo-RNG compounded by more pseudo-RNG.

ER is basically... pattern recognition and timing, with some directional/positional components and a touch of pseudo-RNG. The latter of which can be mitigated and even removed in some cases with optimal play.

The reverse difficulty curve always was a point of criticsm; it gets much better once your soldiers are able to hit the broad side of the barn and you get some upgrades.

Yeah, the difficulty did/does appear to be frontloaded. Later on you get so many OP tools to deal with just about everything. It's still not a cake walk because certain things need to die immediately. Even so, it stops being so intimidating once you get a strong squad or three.

Regarding mods, there are several big mods available (LWOTC and Covert Infiltration) although I'm using small mods only, still vastly transforming the overall game experience. And believe it or not, they do have a hashtag #sufferingisfun which puts in some even worse enemies (see screenshot above) over the course of the game.
That said, I'm mostly using mods to fix bugs, add cosmetics (uses LOTS of ram), add new enemies, classes & abilities, fix balance, dejank & enhance the tactical layer...

I had planned to look into the modding scene. It's just kind of an event in itself. For whatever reason everytime I think of modding a game Skyrim comes to mind. Play the game.... But first.... Spend a month finding, downloading and installing tools/mods then ensuring the mods play well together.

 

[Swanky]

Yeah, it's probably the chance based component. Pseudo-RNG compounded by more pseudo-RNG.

ER is basically... pattern recognition and timing, with some directional/positional components and a touch of pseudo-RNG. The latter of which can be mitigated and even removed in some cases with optimal play.

Yeah, the difficulty did/does appear to be frontloaded. Later on you get so many OP tools to deal with just about everything. It's still not a cake walk because certain things need to die immediately. Even so, it stops being so intimidating once you get a strong squad or three.

I had planned to look into the modding scene. It's just kind of an event in itself. For whatever reason everytime I think of modding a game Skyrim comes to mind. Play the game.... But first.... Spend a month finding, downloading and installing tools/mods then ensuring the mods play well together.

XCOM does have a lot of mechanics and once you play long enough you recognize certain patterns and behaviours so anticipation becomes a good part of the play.

Regarding mods - it's pretty easy overall. Using the Alternative Mod Launcher (because 2k broke the Firaxis one so many times it hardly knows up from down anymore) it's very easy and stable to set up. Modding itself works 99.5% through steam's workshop but it necessitates a lot of reading descriptions and probably some questions asked on the modder's discord which is very friendly and helpful usually.

 

[tru3story]

I'm just keeping up with..whatever next is coming from hoyoverse, lately. But this time for good, I swear
And this one makes me not to skip half of the story content. I'm 85% invested in Star Rail.

Turn-based was never on my list. But turn based was never so smooth to get into, as well, I guess.

 

[Shafir]

Everspace 2 (Gamepass) - Very polished and fun game. Ideal for short excursions into space.

EVERSPACE 2 – Kickstarter Successful!

€503,478 from 7,979 space pilots, thanks so much!

www.everspace.game

 

[MartineDee]

Haydee 2

Time to forget Lara Croft ever existed lolz.

 

[Netrunner2go]

There will never be competition for Lara Croft - she changed gaming history ^^

thought to give it a try but than…

anyone already tried it?…

 

[Shafir]

No, found the first part already rather mediocre. It's also not on my watchlist. Apart from that, the title seems to be in poor technical quality.

 

[rez27772]

Currently taking a break from gaming tbh, a bit of burnout combined with playing the games I like to the point of boredom and waiting for others to be properly patched/fixed. Likely I won't be gaming again until the ESO chapter June - just catching up with a lot of YouTube 'til then.

 

[Swanky]

Thus concludes another XCOM 2 playthrough... now back to putting more mods in it and spend a dozen more hours in the Character Pool editor :>

 

[Shafir]

Cool. What mods can you recommend?

 

[Swanky]

Cool. What mods can you recommend?

Depends on what you want out of the game. If you want to fully transform your playthrough and want the campaign to last longer, get LWotC. If you want to maintain better compatibility, get Covert Infiltration. I'm using neither of those at the moment but general consensus is that both are very good in their own right.

Really hard to recommend specific stuff as modders have come up with so many great things, from small fixes of inconvenience, qol additions to fully transforming mechanics.
To name a few things that changed and / enhanced the way I played the game, all for WotC:
- Alternative Mod Launcher, Community Highlander, Mod Configuration Menu: absolutely essential tools and fixes, requirements for basically everything else
- Stop Wasting My Time, Peak from Concealment, Gotcha Again: Fixes and QoL additions in tactical.
- Narrative Control, Hush Little Chosen & Skip Intro Cinematics: shut down all the unnessecary banter that you don't want to hear after the tenth time of hearing it
- Mechanic, Biotic & Rusty's Psionic classes
- Psionics Ex Machina 3.2: fully reworks psi mechanics in the game including a new psionics lab & Meld resource
- Gene Mods: reintroduces genetic soldier modifications from XCOM EU
- MEC Troopers: reintroduces Soldier becoming MEC Troopers including a new skilltree from XCOM EU
- EU Berserkers: reintroduces the original XCOM 1 Enemy Unknown Berserkers back. They bullrush upon being shot and are more tanky than regular Beserkers, #sufferingisfun
- Ethereals & Berserker Omegas: Endgame bosspod enemies, more pain
- A better ADVENT: War of the Chosen (many, many new enemy variants, couple with Choose your Enemies to select which ones you want)
- WorldWarLost: reworks the Lost faction, adds more visual variation (selectable) and adds new variants: Howler, Boomer, Brute
- Diverse Aliens by Force Level: needed to make all those new aliens play nice with each other. Also lets you customize how many aliens are being spawned in each pod.
- Proving Ground Overhaul: reworks the Proving Ground to be something infintely more useful
- Yellow Alert: Enemies get the chance of using a reflex action upon being activated, enabling them to take a defensive or offensive action based on chance. Greatly changes how pod mechanics work. Needs an indepth .ini deep dive to set up to your own needs.
- EU Aim Rolls: Fixes the jank implementation of hit & crit calculation
- EU style pacing: slows the pace of the strategy layer down


Don't forget to read through each and every description, and don't skip any requirements. Note that modding XCOM 2 works best with the steam version, somewhat with the GoG version and not at all with the EGS version.

I've attached my personal modlist including workshoplinks and grouping, but without my personal ordering or configs (of which there are many - get into mods deep enough and you'll spend half your time editing .ini and text files ).

 

[Shafir]

Thank you very much, @Swanky.

 

[Restlessdingo32]

Thus concludes another XCOM 2 playthrough... now back to putting more mods in it and spend a dozen more hours in the Character Pool editor :>

Nice. I finished my first run of it a bit ago (legend, no ironman). I did do a bit of reloading during the early/mid parts for any misclicks and to kind of learn the game though. Towards the end most things went by without a hitch as my god tier soldiers destroyed all the things.

I started a new legend, ironman run and it's been a rough campaign. Mostly due to the way events have been lining up on the world map. I had an early mission fail when a Ranger whiffed an extremely high percentage hit chance on a Field Commander (like 95%+) shortly after the first Retaliation. Next thing I know the reduce Retaliation Dark Event activated due to the fail, a new Retaliation popped soon after, the month rolled over, a Guerilla OP popped then a UFO caught the Avenger, all back to back.

Fortunately I just finished the Assassin Stronghold with just the one injury while sporting mag weapons. A poor Grenadier took a beating because the Assassin kept spawning far and in full cover (she had the return fire/immune to explosions strengths too.... ughh). That prevented me from wiping her in a turn. Thankfully the two Rangers I brought went to work on her enough due to the brittle weakness.

I'll probably take the mod plunge after this run...

 

[Swanky]

Nice. I finished my first run of it a bit ago (legend, no ironman). I did do a bit of reloading during the early/mid parts for any misclicks and to kind of learn the game though. Towards the end most things went by without a hitch as my god tier soldiers destroyed all the things.

I started a new legend, ironman run and it's been a rough campaign. Mostly due to the way events have been lining up on the world map. I had an early mission fail when a Ranger whiffed an extremely high percentage hit chance on a Field Commander (like 95%+) shortly after the first Retaliation. Next thing I know the reduce Retaliation Dark Event activated due to the fail, a new Retaliation popped soon after, the month rolled over, a Guerilla OP popped then a UFO caught the Avenger, all back to back.

Fortunately I just finished the Assassin Stronghold with just the one injury while sporting mag weapons. A poor Grenadier took a beating because the Assassin kept spawning far and in full cover (she had the return fire/immune to explosions strengths too.... ughh). That prevented me from wiping her in a turn. Thankfully the two Rangers I brought went to work on her enough due to the brittle weakness.

I'll probably take the mod plunge after this run...

95% and a miss is rough, but it happens from time to time seeing that it's still a 1/20 chance of whiffing. Still, seems like you're doing ok in the run. Never done Ironman myself, just not enough of a masochist enough for that. And yes, not all runs are guaranteed to succeed, such is the nature of XCOM.
With everything games, bugs can happen and it's always annoying when it does. XCOM is fairly stable though, even if there's a ton of fixes around for interactions or jank code. Then again, base game AO and aliasing are basically memory leaks, so...
Regarding the pain, I get my dose by adding some really nasty aliens and Yellow Alert. :>