On Classic (and I guess more so on Impossible) it's really hard not to lose at least one country at the beginning. You just don't have enough money to get the satellites up and unless you're lucky and get a panic lowering mission in the right location, there's nothing you can do.
Shame it was the US though, they were pretty generous.
Shame it was the US though, they were pretty generous.
The game is challenging and almost every mission has plenty of tense moments.
I lost India, China is also not too happy. Every mission brings casualties, but it fits the situation of fighting aliens with superior and unknown abilities and technology.
Thin Men suck, especially when they drop from above in the escort missions, when you're on your way back to the Skyranger.
I lost India, China is also not too happy. Every mission brings casualties, but it fits the situation of fighting aliens with superior and unknown abilities and technology.
Thin Men suck, especially when they drop from above in the escort missions, when you're on your way back to the Skyranger.
So, everything was fine, I got into the game's rhythm on my 3rd attempt on Classic Ironman. I was blazing through missions without casualties, got new shiny armors and laser pow-pows, life was good. Hell, I even took out 3 mutons when they showed up for the first time without even being hit.
A small scout UFO lands and I'm off to wipe it off aliens besides the Outsider, which I plan to capture alive. The forest path to the UFO provides suspiciously little cover.
3 mutons run out, throw a grenade and 2 of my assaults have a NDE. Then 3 floaters dive in. After the most dramatic shootout I had yet 2 of my people are dead, 2 more wounded. Last muton runs away back into the UFO, so I think to myself - OK, I'm in control now, just this guy and the Outsider and it's over.
Then the cyberdisc shows up. Throws a grenade killing one of my peeps. My other soldiers all miss their shots. Then another one is down. And another one. So there's just one soldier left. They guy with the stun gun. All alone in the woods with aliens.
He manages to kill the cyberdisc. Then, he kills the muton after a brief exchange of shots. And then the Outsider shows up. I'm already pissed off at the whole situation so I leave my soldier standing there, hoping that his armor stands the plasma rifle. It does, my soldier is left with 1 HP, standing in front of the alien, with a 38% chance to stun him. For a second I recall him killing the cyberdisc and the muton all by himself and wonder if he will be THAT lucky. He is, he stuns the outsider and the mission is over. Last man standing. A hero.
When we go back to base it turns out that he doesn't even get promoted...But never mind, this games has so many battlefield stories...
A small scout UFO lands and I'm off to wipe it off aliens besides the Outsider, which I plan to capture alive. The forest path to the UFO provides suspiciously little cover.
3 mutons run out, throw a grenade and 2 of my assaults have a NDE. Then 3 floaters dive in. After the most dramatic shootout I had yet 2 of my people are dead, 2 more wounded. Last muton runs away back into the UFO, so I think to myself - OK, I'm in control now, just this guy and the Outsider and it's over.
Then the cyberdisc shows up. Throws a grenade killing one of my peeps. My other soldiers all miss their shots. Then another one is down. And another one. So there's just one soldier left. They guy with the stun gun. All alone in the woods with aliens.
He manages to kill the cyberdisc. Then, he kills the muton after a brief exchange of shots. And then the Outsider shows up. I'm already pissed off at the whole situation so I leave my soldier standing there, hoping that his armor stands the plasma rifle. It does, my soldier is left with 1 HP, standing in front of the alien, with a 38% chance to stun him. For a second I recall him killing the cyberdisc and the muton all by himself and wonder if he will be THAT lucky. He is, he stuns the outsider and the mission is over. Last man standing. A hero.
When we go back to base it turns out that he doesn't even get promoted...But never mind, this games has so many battlefield stories...
I got caught with my pants down by a group of mutons, killed one before I ran out of moves except for one support guy. I threw a smoke grenade with him to try and protect my group but he wasn't in it's radius.
He was the only one to be taken down. Saved the rest of my group though AND I captured one of the mutons alive.
He was the only one to be taken down. Saved the rest of my group though AND I captured one of the mutons alive.
It's evidently clear you guys are having a lot of fun... 
I may pick up this little gem in a few months. But from what I've seen and heard, in "classic" difficulty they will totally hand my ass to me.
I may pick up this little gem in a few months. But from what I've seen and heard, in "classic" difficulty they will totally hand my ass to me.
JackintheGreen said:It's evidently clear you guys are having a lot of fun...
I may pick up this little gem in a few months. But from what I've seen and heard, in "classic" difficulty they will totally hand my ass to me.
At some point they will, just like my little story showed
But in this game it doesn't frustrate somehow. Even if you lose, you start from the beginning with that "this time I'll show them" attitude and with a better understanding of the game systems and tactics. So next time you start you make less mistakes, you do some tuning to your research and engineering and so on.Even on classic the enemies happen to make some stupid mistakes just like in the original, but most of the time they are deadly. I wonder how much fun insane difficulty is.
Congrats Costin, my classic ironman playthrough felt apart so I have to start another one.
What tactics did you use? Last time I started in South Africa and concentrated on satellites. But that didn't help. Even if a region had satellites and interceptors it still panicked the hell out.
What tactics did you use? Last time I started in South Africa and concentrated on satellites. But that didn't help. Even if a region had satellites and interceptors it still panicked the hell out.
gregski said:
The key is to do all the missions obviously and not lose any one, if you do you generally will lose the campaign.
Build satelites but only use them after a country panics from an abduction mission and the council report is about to come. Don't fail terror missions especially.
Focus on snipers, heavies and support, in that order. Assault guys aren't that great. Don't get shotguns.
Use Arc Throwers on Support guys. Use support as a scout due to their greater move distance.
Finish the first three or four missions without anyone dying, that's key as well.
EDIT: My squad of badasses at the final mission. ALL Colonel Rank, ALL in the best armor, ALL with Plasma Weapons. 2 Snipers, 2 Heavies, 1 Support and 1 Assault
Personally I love the assault troopers. If you buff them well, they can critical hit pretty much every time(in the right circumstances they can actually do more damage than a heavy), adding chition plating makes them handle chryssalid & berserkers with ease. Plus they have the most choices in primary weapons. They shine in ghost armor.
For my standard squad I prefer: 1 sniper, 2 assault, 2 support(one medic & one combat) and 1 heavy. The sniper stands back to swat floaters, potshot at any side spawns and soften up sectopods, elites and cyberdiscs(the medic stays nearby in case the sniper gets flanked or someone gets really hurt). The heavy and combat support are the engagers while the assault guys do the sweeping and or finishing.
Its your basic squad tactic:
Pin 'em
Flank 'em
Kill 'em
Of course the game does its best to spoil my flawless execution
Try to get total coverage in South America-you get instant interrogations and autopsies and it only costs 2 satellites
Shivs are very handy on terror and bomb missions-for finding civilians and bombs.
One thermal and two elerium generators will give you all the power you'll ever need
For my standard squad I prefer: 1 sniper, 2 assault, 2 support(one medic & one combat) and 1 heavy. The sniper stands back to swat floaters, potshot at any side spawns and soften up sectopods, elites and cyberdiscs(the medic stays nearby in case the sniper gets flanked or someone gets really hurt). The heavy and combat support are the engagers while the assault guys do the sweeping and or finishing.
Its your basic squad tactic:
Pin 'em
Flank 'em
Kill 'em
Of course the game does its best to spoil my flawless execution
Try to get total coverage in South America-you get instant interrogations and autopsies and it only costs 2 satellites
Shivs are very handy on terror and bomb missions-for finding civilians and bombs.
One thermal and two elerium generators will give you all the power you'll ever need
Game is ok, but for me Classic Ironman was way to easy. I wanted to play on Impossible since beginning but someone thought that being unable to turn on tutorial for this level of difficulty will be a good idea .
Early game was kinda challenging, but after first terror mission I didn't lost a man through the rest of the game. Often I was kinda bored because whatever showed up it died in first round of combat. Sometimes even overwatch volley was enough to kill group of enemies. Final mission was one of the easiest missions in the game - small groups of enemies that couldn't even hurt me and final fight with boss took me literally two action - my sniper shoot him twice, boss died, the end.
Game could be more polished. Often I can't see which enemy will be affected by grenades/rockets because of camera angle - enemies that will be affected should be outlined. Another annoying thing are problems with multifloor places - especially cargo and abduction ships - camera goes crazy in there. Throwing grenade is tricky too, especially near edge of the map - damn mouse goes crazy. Also idea of basic commands like 'hunker down' and 'overwatch' being under different hot keys for every solider is stupid as hell.
But biggest disappointment was lack of alien invasion on our base and lack of alien infiltrating governments and quitting X-COM project. Those features in original X-COM added a lot of tension and atmosphere of not being safe.
Early game was kinda challenging, but after first terror mission I didn't lost a man through the rest of the game. Often I was kinda bored because whatever showed up it died in first round of combat. Sometimes even overwatch volley was enough to kill group of enemies. Final mission was one of the easiest missions in the game - small groups of enemies that couldn't even hurt me and final fight with boss took me literally two action - my sniper shoot him twice, boss died, the end.
Game could be more polished. Often I can't see which enemy will be affected by grenades/rockets because of camera angle - enemies that will be affected should be outlined. Another annoying thing are problems with multifloor places - especially cargo and abduction ships - camera goes crazy in there. Throwing grenade is tricky too, especially near edge of the map - damn mouse goes crazy. Also idea of basic commands like 'hunker down' and 'overwatch' being under different hot keys for every solider is stupid as hell.
But biggest disappointment was lack of alien invasion on our base and lack of alien infiltrating governments and quitting X-COM project. Those features in original X-COM added a lot of tension and atmosphere of not being safe.