Be Excellent To Each Other

Your soldiers can't die in this new one apparently.

So that ain't XCOM.

That sounds all shades of wrong.

But those shades of wrongness can be had for £8 if pre-ordered from GMG

It's the same price on Steam.

Really? That was a load of hot air from GMG then.

It is good.


Piffle. The beating heart of XCOM, in both strategy and tactical layers, is having to make tough choices about how to use limited resources. This game has that.

*cough*reload save*cough*

Yeah, I wasn't being entirely serious

Haven't had a chance to play it yet, but will do soon hopefully.

I will entertain your notion that Commander/Ironman is The One True Approach To Xcom when you beat Commander/Ironman.

Ironman is absolutely the One True Approach To Xcom, but not in a world where glitches exist that you can only realistically avoid by reloading a save

Yeah, "bronzeman"/"honestman" is a better approach IMO. If only to guard against misclick moves, which I did to myself quite regularly.

Chimera Squad has Ironman, BTW. As usual, you only get one save slot, so you can never change a decision. If you fail a mission, you can re-try it. However it also has a separate Hardcore toggle; if you fail a mission in Hardcore, you fail the entire game. You can combine these.

But I don't like the end of the game!

/throws toys out of pram

Actually, maybe I do like it, I don't know. But I don't really like the middle - becoming a rampaging six-man/lady/person who knows better/alien/etc army gets a bit dull.

Also, it seems to happen really suddenly. Like, the start of XCOM is brutal, and then suddenly your squad never misses and rarely dies and the biggest issue you have to deal with is "what do I build next". The WotC expansion had promise, but even the Big Bads weren't that big or bad.

Were you playing it on the hardest difficulty setting?

No, I find the start is impossible on the hardest one.

I suspect there's a very specific pattern you need to use to get through the first few missions.

Based on what I've read on r/xcom, yes. There's talk of people doing 40+ restarts to get a "good" one before they go past the second mission. For example a key factor is if you get a power vent in the centre-column-third-row slot on the Avenger, as if you don't, you're really going to struggle in the strategy layer. It doesn't sound very fun.

Given that I have no X-Com, which of these is best value?

[edit] I know that technically 77% off is. But I mean bang for your buck.

That bottom one looks a good bundle.. I am tempted

Others may disagree, but I'm not sure how much of the bottom bundle one really needs.

XCOM2 War of the Chosen can be had for £11 on Steam and that gives you all the XCOM 2 you really need, in my opinion.

But you also need XCOM 2.

Yes, quite.

Everything in the bundle except the base game plus WOTC can be skipped, but the bundle is easily worth it for the base game plus WOTC.

The only meaningful question really is "should I just play the base game and not get WOTC" and the answer to that is "no, WOTC is cool."

The mob has spoken!

Thank you for the advice.

Oh really? Sorry, I thought wotc came as a standalone, my bad.

Xcom2 wotc finally finished!

I started xcom 2 years ago on PC, then head was turned by WOTC, so restarted on that.

Got 75% of way through when it was released on switch, so restarted there. And now I'm done.

Felt the final level was a touch underwhelming, lacked the drama of set piece missions like defending the avenger or when avatar project is completed.

By the end I found I'd drifted away from having my preferred squad, as was overwhelmed by the options available. I went from a ranger being a gimme, to having more grenadiers because of Rupture, plus the psi ops guys (who I don't really like, hard to have the affection for them that one has for the other soldiers you've built up). Still, my trusty Templar dealt the killing blow.

Will leave six months before contemplating an Ironman attempt, which I've never tried.

My standard team right the way through was a Ranger, a sniper, two heavies, two specialists. Mainly so I could make best use of all the endgame toys. A Ranger in berserker king armour with the chosen sword? Magnificent.

So no factions? Aside from the Templar, I did generally find it hard to justify a spot in my squad for the Skirmishers and Reapers.

My issue with the factions is that they can't use any of the cool WOTC gear so they get left behind

Why would I take a reaper when I can have a sniper with the deathlance and Icarus armour?

I'm with you. Their guns are peashooters in comparison. A sniper with death from above, gunslinger, face off, the chosen rifle and pistol and talon rounds is a thing of beauty.

But then so is a ranger or Templar with reaper.

Such a good game.

Reapers are mostly useful for scouting, and can be amazing on the 'Save the people in this camp under attack' as they can just run flat out to save everyone right away without being seen.

This weekend I set for the youngest off on his first xcom campaign. Starting with war of the chosen. So far he's rapt, but as a child of anxious disposing I'm not sure how long it will last. Rather hoping it teaches him resilience.