Let's Play UFO:Extraterrestrials Gold

[Zombie]

So I kinda switched gears the last week or so and started playing UFO: Extraterrestrials Gold Edition again. For a couple reasons:

1. I wanted to make educated comparisons between Gold and UFO2:ET, and
   
2. I never really finished Gold for some reason.
   

Not sure why I never finished it (at least not on Steam maybe finished it with a physical copy don't remember anymore). I'm making some progress in this game though. Ran 6 or 7 missions to train up some new rookies, got laser shields for my men and my ships. manufactured a crap ton of the personal laser shields, med kits, stun grenades, chem grenades and laser weapon ammo so I should be covered on that for a while. Built some defenses at my first base along with another hanger (need an extra one of these for manufacturing new ships). Alien alloys were taking too long to research so I switched to the advanced cannon for my ships (no idea if this is better than what I have already... we will find out soon). Planning on building a second base after the next mission (need to keep a close eye on funds).

 

So that's what I've been up to.

 

- Zombie

[Space Voyager]

Do tell!

[Zombie]

As usual, still playing UFO: Extraterrestrials Gold to catch-up. One thing I noticed between UFO:ET and UFO2 is that in UFO:ET you have a larger stat range when you are hiring soldiers. I've seen soldiers with stats up to 61 starting, whereas I think UFO2 only goes to 51-52ish? You might also get a larger hiring pool of soldiers to draw from in UFO:ET. When hiring, I try to find soldiers with 50+ firing accuracy, 50+ strength and 50+ bravery. Ideally, if a soldier has 50+ in every stat, I'll hire them outright. The one stat I let slide a little bit is throwing accuracy, as long as it's in the 40's I'm happy. But I've found a few gold nuggets in the bunch so far. Let me tell you, it's so nice having a soldier with 50+ in the "off" stats as you can focus on putting points into the stats that count early on (Agility, Vitality, Strength and Firing Accuracy) any leftover points get put into bravery or reactions (I like having soldiers with good reactions).

 

I hired a couple new recruits today with some decent stats. One was OVNI (of course) and the other was Galfar (he worked on the game, check out the link). So I took them both along on a mission to get their feet wet so to speak. Both got 4 kills each and were promoted, time to appropriate the 5 points.

 

 

Not bad for just one mission. No sooner than finishing that mission, I had to go to another one (crash site). Brought along the same crew, but for some reason OVNI and Galfar were always at the right place at the right time and between the two killed all the aliens on the map (my other soldiers acted as spotters or opened doors).

 

 

This time, they were double promoted so more points to spend.

 

 

And just like that, they are pretty awesome already. In only two missions.

 

Back at base, I finally researched the advanced ship cannon which turned out to be a bust because the laser cannon is better (all my interceptors have these already). I'm currently researching the advanced detection module. When that's done I'll build one of these at the main base and then begin construction on a new base and build one of these there too.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Very nice bit of sleuthing there with the Galfar name origin, Zombie.

 

Curiously he's from Brno, Czech republic, same place ALTAR Interactive (of UFO Aftermath/Aftershock/Afterlight fame) was located. Still, likely no relation.

 

Well, OVNI and Galfar are turning out to be quite the duo. If they continue buffing up in a hurry like that they'll be causing instant panic attacks upon mere sighting by the aliens.

 

Then again, should mind control become a factor expect to go from grinning to grimacing.

[Zombie]

Ran a couple missions in UFO:ET Gold the other day and there's more on the way as I just shot down 3 UFOs and another one even landed. Busy! Anyhow, I was at the first mission on this human base type map (don''t know what it's supposed to be) and I was slowly making my way through the rooms and one of my guys opened a door and got a glimpse of a Vipon (Snakeman type) with a greenish hue to it, the alien spotted icon also had a greenish-yellow border around it. I knew this must be a commander but was surprised to see it on a Cruiser UFO (I guess the UFO:Enemy Unknown equivalent would be a Large Scout). My guy didn't have enough time units to do anything really so I backed him off into a hallway. The next round I had one of my heavy laser guys shoot out a section of the wall and had another guy toss a stun grenade in there blind. The Vipon went down easily (they are 2x2 units or 4 tiles total so they basically take x4 damage from AOE stun). Here's what it looked like:

 

 

 

The commander was pretty stupid as it refused to move at all even though it was spotted, so if it's going to act stupid, I'm gonna exploit that fully. Shoot out the wall ahead of the alien so there's no chance of reaction fire then toss a stun grenade through the hole (again no reaction fire) and let it work it's magic. Easy-peasy. The EOM (End Of Mission) report for the mission was interesting.

 

 

OVNI was a total beast again, killing 5 and earning himself another promotion. My whole team contributed this mission though so it's wasn't a lopsided killing spree. Here's what OVNIs stats look like:

 

 

One more promotion and I'll have his shooting accuracy maxed out at which time he'll be nearly impossible to stop. As I said before, a non-kneeling shooting accuracy of 100% is about as good as it gets. I still wanna put some points into bravery, strength, reactions and throwing to make those stats usable.

 

Haven't finished any research projects in the Geoscape yet, and therefore haven't built my second base either. I've been swamped with cleaning up UFO sites and that's going to be the theme for the near future. Who knows, maybe OVNI will come out of this with another promotion.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Bagged a Vipon Commander like nobody's business - go Zombie!

 

And, shock, horror, OVNI gets promoted again. You might as well nickname him "The Executioner" at this stage because unless RNG starts messing things up he's on the fast track to demi-godhood on the battlefield, boosting everyone's morale while he's at it.

 

EOM report couldn't get much better either, with 12 aliens dead and no injuries at all to complain about when walking out with one's pockets full.

 

If soldier fatigue isn't an issue to contend with those extraterrestrials are going to need to significantly up their game pronto, or you'll be packing their bags for them.

[Zombie]

I have been quietly playing UFO: ET Gold again - more like on again, off again. A mission here, a mission there, a marathon session, another couple missions etc, it all adds up. I'll try to get everyone back up to speed on what I've been up to.

 

The first mission I sent my troops to was interesting. Not a lot of aliens but they were of the tougher variety. OVNI was carrying a Laser Rifle and those are rather weak against the tougher aliens (for example, it'll say a soldier hit an alien for no damage but it was absorbed). The nice thing about that is for every hit you make, you'll get some XP for it (usual is something like 4). It's not much, but if 7 shots connect per turn, that's 28 XP. Now extend that to a mission worth of aliens and it's very significant. So needless to say OVNI racked up a ton of XP in a single mission and was promoted again (Galfar too, though not as much - not everyone can be a GOD like OVNI).

 

 

The next mission was also memorable. Everything was going swimmingly, my men were spotting aliens and OVNI was right there to mop up the mess. Sometimes it all works out like that. Then a hiccup which put OVNI into the hospital.

 

 

There was one last alien on the map and it somehow triggered both OVNI and (directly after) Kathern to reaction fire. OVNI killed the alien but unlike in UFO:EU, the death of the alien doesn't prevent your other queued up soldiers from reaction firing too (I still think this is a bug and not WAI, though I could be wrong). Anyhow, Kathern does an auto fire reaction shot (with a Heavy Laser mind you) at the dead alien, misses and hits OVNI. I was tempted to reload as this is like garbage time points (in American football) or an open net goal in ice hockey. Luckily he was only in the hospital one day.

 

I was messing around in the Geoscape rotating some soldiers out of the dropship and decided I'd take a peek at the new soldier list. Found a new guy with 50+ in every stat so I picked him up, put him on the ship and sacked another newish recruit I picked up a few missions back. On the next downed UFO I sent out the updated crew. Now, with a new recruit I like to buddy him up with a vet (sometimes 2). The vet does the scouting while the newbie hangs back ready to fire. The newbie will hopefully get a few hits and maybe even a kill. Anything not killed by the newbie is then killed by the vet and the process starts over again the next turn. Who better to pair him with than OVNI, right?

 

 

Wally the rookie gets the promotion he deserves with 4 kills and OVNI quietly adds another 7 aliens to his kill count. No promotion for him, but he cranks in the XP on missions like this. Back at base some time went by so I checked the new recruit list and found a "natural" Vincent Price with 50+ in all stats, kind of a no-brainer to pick him up. Instead of one buddy for OVNI he now has two: Wally and Vincent. I had to reel Wally in because I wanted to get Vincent some quality kills.

 

 

Vincent got 6 kills and quite a bit XP from hits too, so promotion time for him. A few other soldiers also got promotions as most everyone participated in some way. That's a good start.

 

About this time I decided to build a new base as I finally had some decent cash on hand. Just as I did that, my research into the Vipon Commander finished. I think it unlocked the ability to build an advanced detection facility. Unfortunately, as soon as I tried to build it at my main base the game crashed. Dunno why and I keep trying ever so often with no luck. It can be built at a new base just fine though. After this fiasco I kinda forgot I built a new base and built another one by accident. No big deal as I have the cash, but now I'm in panic mode getting ready to produce fighter aircraft en-masse to shoot down more UFO's. Have to wait till the hangars are built so that gives me a little time to get the components together (shielding, missile weapon and cannon).

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Covertly exterminating the otherworldly bugs - that's the spirit, Zombie!

 

I see OVNI is feeling so darn powerful he even manages to shrug off Heavy Laser injuries in a hurry. Still, that Kathern bloke had better redeem himself after such a red-shirtish faux pas.

 

You're starting to spread out so, as implied, expect more radar contacts. Continue to up your manpower and buckle up!

[Zombie]

I see OVNI is feeling so darn powerful he even manages to shrug off Heavy Laser injuries in a hurry. Still, that Kathern bloke had better redeem himself after such a red-shirtish faux pas.

 

Herself actually, Kathern is female.

 

Back on the Geoscape, I had some big problems. A UFO swarm showed up which usually isn't too much of an issue, but instead of a scout type UFO for the swarm leader, this time it was a battleship type. There's no way I was going to deal with that as I only have three interceptors with weakish weapons so I kinda made peace with that and decided to ignore it. Meanwhile, there was a UFO scout milling around near my base so I shot it down and retreated my interceptors back to base before the battleships could retaliate. Those big ones left for greener pastures on another continent and with the break in the activity I sent in my squad to mop up the little mess. There were only 8 aliens present, but nearly my whole team contributed and got promotions.

 

 

I suppose you want to know how I spent my points on each soldier. Refugia was a little weak on shooting so I put 2 points into that and one into agility, vitality and bravery. OVNI was maxed out in shooting already so he got 2 in bravery and one in strength, reactions and throwing. I probably could make throwing a dump stat and pour extra points into vitality instead - maybe next promotion. As for the two rookies, I gave them the standard 2 points in shooting and one in agility, vitality and strength. That seems to work out the best.

 

 

Back at base, I did a little housekeeping by manufacturing some items that get used a lot like shields, chem grenades and of course laser ammo. Then a "red" colored scout started sniffing around which got me nervous. I knew that it was part of the swarm so it might raise alarm bells if I engaged. Luckily it moved a fair distance away so I sent out my interceptors and shot it down. The aliens apparently up their game when sending out the red scouts as the crew were carrying ion weaponry instead of plasma. Still didn't help them though. Vincent got promoted again so I spread the points around.

 

 

Again, back at base and some more UFO activity nearby - another scout type. Shot it down easily without raising suspicion and my team went in and fixed that problem quick.

 

 

Vincent got only one kill but jumped up 116 xp points. Not sure how that happened, maybe it was because I hired another rookie? But I had 10 points to spend on him so I put one point into agility, vitality, reactions and throwing, 2 into bravery and 4 into shooting to max him out in that stat.

 

 

I think that's probably the quickest I got someone up to max shooting, and he only had 11 kills.

 

Well, next time I'll recap some bigger missions I ran, so stay tuned.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Kathern is female? What a world world we live in.

 

All this reported activity involving scout ships that you mention, Zombie, makes one wonder if you're not being probed for a good whack.

 

Could be a roundabout way the game is communicating to you that an upgrade to the weaponry in your interceptors is neeeded ASAP or... face the music. Your added number of bases in a short span of time may have triggered that escalation too of course.

 

By the way, Todd Medico - his last name there, means Doctor (as in medical doctor) in Portuguese.

[Zombie]

Still, that Kathern bloke had better redeem himself after such a red-shirtish faux pas.

 

Not to rehash this or anything, just an interesting FYI I found out: The feminine form of bloke is either lass or gal. I did not know that.

 

All this reported activity involving scout ships that you mention, Zombie, makes one wonder if you're not being probed for a good whack.

 

Could be a roundabout way the game is communicating to you that an upgrade to the weaponry in your interceptors is needed ASAP or... face the music. Your added number of bases in a short span of time may have triggered that escalation too of course.

 

Maybe. But when a swarm happens UFO activity (unrelated to the swarm) seems to increase too. I don't know if that's intentional or if I'm concluding this from a small sample size so take that with a grain of salt. Who knows, it may be all swarm related once the event is triggered. I'll know more if there is a Hyper-wave Decoder equivalent facility in UFO: ET Gold.

 

By the way, Todd Medico - his last name there, means Doctor (as in medical doctor) in Portuguese.

 

Makes sense. Should I turn him into a field medic? I was actually thinking about this the other day. If weight becomes an issue late game, I might have to drop Medikits except for a select few... this depends if there is a sufficiently strong rifle type of weapon.

 

Ok, so back to the game. One of those bigger swarm UFO's that buggered off in a different continent actually came back for a visit in my neck of the woods (at least into my detection range). My interceptors shot it down and sent in my crew This was a fairly difficult mission as it was in the dark and the aliens started carrying Ion Rifles too.

 

 

Almost everyone had 2+ kills and I got a nice chunk of cash out of it. Oh, and Wally got a promotion finally. Unfortunately, Vincent Price was never in the right place at the right time to get a kill. He was able to shoot at some aliens and hit them for a little xp.

 

So up to this point, I was focusing primarily on the smallish Swarm UFO's that happened to fly by. But there was a biggie that landed on next continent over that was on the ground for a very long time so I thought I'd mosey over there to see if it would stay put. Luckily it stayed, so my crew went in for one hell of a fight.

 

The place was literally swarming with aliens. There must have been 8-10 larva (which is I guess a Celatid in UFO:EU) either around the LZ or at least within earshot. First round was nothing but clearing the LZ of 4 Larva, and second round was more of the same. Only after clearing the Larva did normal alien units start to appear (Chasers) but it was a slow trickle: 1 alien per turn would take a peek and get blasted. Eventually it slowed so I had to make the long, long sweep around the outside of the UFO to make sure I didn't miss anything hiding in the shadows/fog of war. Breaching the UFO went fine as it was just pushover Chasers but they sure do like to camp out in rooms. Chem grenades will encourage them to disperse though.

 

 

26 total aliens was a lot. But it carried a great monetary reward too and at least the aliens were not too tough to handle. Oh, and speaking of Mr. Medico, he was promoted.

 

So I thought the swarm leader got away as I focused on cleaned up all the other UFO's. Turns out, this was the swarm leader as this popup appeared:

 

 

Look at all that cash! And what's this? Advanced ship parts and two Personal Eternal Shields? I gotta check this out.

 

 

Very cool, that'll help a little as I hopefully will not have to manufacture so many shields for my soldiers. So that's a good score.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

So there you have it, Zombie, Doc has a steady hand and can shoot straight. What more could you ask from a caregiver?

 

But, as per your report, talk about raking in the space bucks...

 

 

Oh, yeah, you hit the jackpot with that beauty of a landed UFO. May not buy you a piece of heaven but at least its shield eternal you now have. Rock on!

[Zombie]

So yeah, time for a little update.

 

Turns out, all that UFO activity was actually a base building exercise because when I sent my interceptors out for a little patrol they found an alien base in the continent to the North.

 

 

No wonder! There must have been a popup mentioning the aliens seized the continent but I never saw it. Anyhow, I had better get over there and flush the bugs out. Alien bases are underground and there are a lot of passageways with short jogs that turn into another passageway and nothing really opens up into a clearing. That's kind of an issue because you cannot rely on your sharpshooters at a safe distance to take out problem aliens. So you end up breaking your squad up into smaller 2-3 man sweep teams and fan them out. However, right at the beginning the base has a medium sized clearing so your men are sitting ducks for a turn or two until you disperse. This also means the aliens are at a disadvantage if they happen to stumble upon your squad early.

 

Take for instance the unlucky Vipon Commander who just happened to show up on turn 2. Would be crazy to kill him so I just stun gassed the thing into submission. What an idiot. And as before, stun grenades make quick work of Vipons as the alien is 2x2 and the stun grenade is AOE which affects all 4 quadrants. Not a bug, but it's pretty easy to exploit on Beginner difficulty. And once knocked out, I don't think an alien will ever recover either - so it's down for the count the entire mission.

 

I'm not gonna lie, it wasn't an easy mission. I had a certain 3-man team pinned down by a different alien almost every round. I eventually wised up and sent reinforcements but not before the rookie in the team had a bunch of kills under her belt. She had decent throwing accuracy so I kept tossing Chem grenades in the general direction where the aliens were appearing from, then shot any that happened to venture too close (my other two men "fed" her their chem grenades to use since she was in a good location).

 

After that area was cleared out, there seemed to be only one spot with aliens left. Just two of them, but they were entrenched into nice hiding spots. One of my soldiers got caught in the open and took a debilitating ion weapon shot (must've been the rifle). I managed to patch him up and kill the final alien.

 

 

I had to divvy up the 20(!) xp points into the different stats and this is what I decided upon:

 

 

Looking back, I probably shouldn't have even brought her along on such a dangerous mission, but she was on the dropship and I didn't want to head back to base to put someone else on instead.

 

I think I'm all caught up reporting missions, so the next ones are gonna be new. Who knows what might happen in the meantime so stay tuned.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

So, that's what the alien buggers were swarming about for - establishing a foothold on Pulsar.

 

A heartening display of prowess under fire there by Corporal Billi "The Kid" Kellog, Zombie.

 

Not only did you let her risk her neck by allowing her on the mission, you've actually had her take point on the very frontline of combat. On the flipside, as a survivor, you buffed her up good, so odds should be stacked a little less against her for the next outing.

 

She could use a new hairdo as well, but I guess she'll be more prepared come next promotion time ceremonies; or not.

 

Be it as it may, and as of right now, I'll be taking spotting position for witnessing any future developments!

[Zombie]

First off, my apologies, that last mission was actually a Battlecruiser UFO which landed to prepare a site for the base. The actual base mission was rather lackluster:

 

 

Galfar was promoted too:

 

 

But now the new issue was that the aliens were starting the same thing except to the "continent" to the Southwest. The Battlecrusier seems to be the UFO of choice for this activity so one of these shows up and the combined efforts of my 7 weak sauce interceptors couldn't shoot it down. Had to let it land.

 

 

I took Billy "The Kid" Kellog off the transport and substituted with a new greenhorn (name = Scottie Siddoway). I have a bunch of newbies which need training - the intention is to sack the original crew due to lackluster stats even after 600+ xp and replace them with upgraded soldiers. Anyhow, I sent Scottie with OVNI and a couple other vets to the right where the biggest fight happened the last time. He has decent throwing accuracy so when a Vipon Commander showed up he threw the final stun grenade to take it out. Near the end, I tried to huff him back to the group to the left to get a couple more garbage time kills but the Vipons were not having any of it.

 

 

Another Vipon Commander nabbed and Scottie put on a clinic on how to kill aliens. Only 10 points to spend this time so I had to pick and choose carefully.

 

 

Then came the popup:

 

 

Another damn base.

 

 

Well, time to take it out. Since my two upgraded rookies are fairing ok I took them both along and figured I'd send 3 vets with each as backup. The rookies always get Laser Rifles with 3 spare clips because their shooting accuracy isn't the best and they don't have high enough strength to carry the Heavy Lasers (the vets do, so 6 of the 8 soldiers have the accuracy and firepower to take down anything). Disclaimer: I've been having problems getting Steam screenshots of the game within a tactical mission which is why I haven't been including any. This time I took a Print Screen screenshot.

 

This was a mission with Destroyers (a mech type android like the Cyberdisc or Sectopod) and Larva (a Celatid-type terror unit). The Larva are pushovers, but the Destroyers are difficult aliens to kill because they absorb or shrug off damage like you wouldn't imagine (pretend you have EU soldiers with normal pistols against a Superhuman Cyberdisc and that is about what it's like with Destroyers). But as I said before, even shots which connect with an alien and are absorbed still get counted as a hit and add to the soldier's XP pool. Laser Rifles are kinda weak against Destroyers and normally take 6 or more shots to take them out but the payout is a big 20xp for a kill. So the rookies can get some good target practice in. As an added benefit, Destroyers don't always reaction fire during their turn so they are sitting ducks. A drawback is that you better have the firepower to take them out that turn otherwise they will mow you down on theirs.

 

So the whole team is deposited in a single antechamber with a large two tile wide door. I set the team up with the two rookies kneeling at the entrance with the vets circling them. The two vets next to the rookies are mainly door openers and occasionally may get a reaction shot in if the aliens decide to take a peek. Everyone stayed put as I wanted to whittle down the forces a bit before deploying. The vets would open the door every turn and the rookies would kill whatever was in their line of sight. This is what the place looked like after 15 turns:

 

 

In the pic are 7-8 visible dead Destroyers and a Larva (with another down the hall to the right). At this point, I completely decided against any type of formal deployment. Even though the alien numbers were fewer, the Destroyers aren't to be mucked with. Besides, the aliens would get to the bottleneck in front of the door to the antechamber and end up with few TU to open the door during their turn and be sitting ducks during mine. It was safer staying in place. I will have to mention that I did reload the game once because a Destroyer was able to shoot through the closed door on one turn and kill one of my vets - that's cheating! The rest of the base was a cake walk and the rookies ended up with most of the kills.

 

 

Time to allocate points for the rookies and also Wally Huzzard.

 

 

I tried to equalize the stats of the two rookies as much as I could. Right now they are great, with another promotion or two they will be exceptional. Not only that, they finally have enough strength and accuracy to carry Heavy Lasers. Time to take off another vet from the transport and replace with a fresh rookie and maybe fire another lackluster old-timer.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

A fine report of the action on Stratos, Zombie!

 

Given the strength of the enemy on location (not only in overall number but also individually speaking as far as them mechs go) it was well advised to take the stance of letting them come to you and not the other way around.

 

This sort of beelining is pretty much a staple of the genre given how limited alien AI remains and makes perfect sense to take advantage of it when facing superior opposition. Besides, we also know the polar opposite would probably prove annoying, sort of artificially making the conflict more protracted on the field, having to sweep every recess and all that.

 

On another front, I wasn't aware that earlier recruits scaled that poorly that, despite the progression, one is better off replacing them with newer ones later down the line, so that's good intel to have.

 

And look at those tallies - you're making very good money and ample promotional advancement of personnel. Hope some further leeway is made on tech side of things as well, as it doesn't seem to be evolving apace.

 

Anyway, convey my congratulations to Sargeant Scottie "Sidewinder" Siddoway if you will and good luck on your ensuing engagements.

[Zombie]

A fine report of the action on Stratos, Zombie!

 

Given the strength of the enemy on location (not only in overall number but also individually speaking as far as them mechs go) it was well advised to take the stance of letting them come to you and not the other way around.

 

This sort of beelining is pretty much a staple of the genre given how limited alien AI remains and makes perfect sense to take advantage of it when facing superior opposition. Besides, we also know the polar opposite would probably prove annoying, sort of artificially making the conflict more protracted on the field, having to sweep every recess and all that.

 

Don't get me wrong, I can handle the Destroyers just fine with my vets carrying heavy lasers. And had it been a mission with just my vets, I would have deployed them after a couple turns in 2-man groups and searched out the entire place. But alas, I had rookies along who I was trying to train up and I wanted to keep them somewhat safe.

 

On another front, I wasn't aware that earlier recruits scaled that poorly that, despite the progression, one is better off replacing them with newer ones later down the line, so that's good intel to have.

 

I don't think your original starting group of 8 soldiers is inherently worse than later recruits, it's just that it's pretty rare to get even one of them with 50+ in every stat. Which means you are putting points into less important stats to get those to a usable level in addition to trying to buff up the more important stats. It just doesn't work out that good as something is going to suffer. Granted, reactions could be considered a dump stat as it really doesn't play much of a role for training itself (you only need kills to get xp which gives you points to spend on stats like reactions, not reaction shots to train the reaction stat). And I never really checked the hiring pool from the start to see if there were any recruits in there better than the ones I already had.

 

Just for giggles, I fired up a new game to see what I would get. If you ignore agility and vitality which always seem to be between 50-70, most soldiers only had one to two stats in the 50s with the remainder in the 40s. When I searched the full hiring pool (which is a lot of soldiers mind you), I only came up with 4 recruits having 50+ in every stat. That seems like a lucky roll though as I waited through 4 classes of new rookies to never find one soldier with 50+ in every stat. I should have been trying to get those good soldiers from the start of my game but I didn't know what I know now.

 

Anyhow, back to the game. I thought things were going to slow down in terms of UFO activity but oh no, I was really wrong on that. This may be hell month folks. Another battlecruiser landed to the continent to the east this time. Before I could head out a green colored cruiser UFO showed up looking menacing as heck. Shot that down and had to divert to this mission first. Took two new rookies along for training too, on my brand new dropship holding 10 instead of 8 soldiers.

 

I'm not sure what map this was on, but it was new to me (maybe a prison)? There were only a couple aliens around the immediate landing zone which the rookies dispatched of quickly. Besides that, a couple other vets got some lucky kills via reaction shots, but everything else was killed by the rookies. I should mention that heavy lasers are superb at opening up holes in walls so you don't have to zig-zag all over the place going through doors in strange places. When my team found the UFO, we all staged at the gate killing off a few straggler aliens then made our way to the door. I used my vets to scout where the aliens were, then sent in the rookies to take them out.

 

 

Was a decent mission. Time to allocate points again.

 

 

A couple more missions like that and these guys will be gods. Getting back to the geoscape and what's this?

 

 

4 guided flame mega rockets? Cool, didn't know aliens used hu-man technology! Meh, I don't use rocket launchers much though. And as you could have guessed, if there was a battlecruiser a base must be nearby.

 

 

So yeah, I'm going to be busy getting rid of yet another landed battlecruiser and alien base. This time I'm a little more prepared though. I can now bring two more people along on every mission and my soldiers are all wearing the new Beekeeper suits of armor.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Appreciate you going the extra mile to explain and verify fresh recuruit seeding stats, Zombie.

 

So, as it stands, getting those cream of the crop rookies is like hitting The Fantastic Four jackpot amid all the chaff. Not an encouraging process to go through, weeding others each game start and, thinking about it, it might skew progression a bit too much in one's favour given growth potential and survivability are likely that much better earlier on when opposition is the weaker kind.

 

But speaking of our kind: greetings, Corporal Phobos 2077 and Owl 208 - fresh off the cloning vats are we? Naming conventions in this game are all over the place.

 

Well, you've got your work cut out for you. Those aliens are hellbent on establishing bases of their own and apparently not that keen on gunning for yours. The green colored cruiser almost felt like a decoy on this instance.

 

*translated from Vipon comms intercept* "Silly humaaanssss - The Slithering sssscore agaiiin!"

[Zombie]

So, as it stands, getting those cream of the crop rookies is like hitting The Fantastic Four jackpot amid all the chaff. Not an encouraging process to go through, weeding others each game start and, thinking about it, it might skew progression a bit too much in one's favour given growth potential and survivability are likely that much better earlier on when opposition is the weaker kind.

 

I disagree because human soldiers are very weak in the beginning of the game. Not only don't they have decent armor but they also start with hu-man guns like shotguns, pistols and rifles which don't do a heck of a lot of damage. Yeah, you'll have some shields to mitigate alien damage, but you need strength to carry them all and you get more strength by killing aliens so we're right back to square one. No, it isn't that bad, but the aliens have the upper hand no doubt. Are a couple "super-soldiers" going to make a difference? Probably not, and especially not if they get damaged in combat and have to sit in the hospital back at base for a few weeks. Then you have to get them a lot of kills to get their stats up. That takes time. So it's not instant gratification. Besides, you could probably put together a kick-ass squad through hiring only those with 50's in the stats you care about most. Having soldiers with 50+ in everything puts the icing on the cake so to so speak, it doesn't make the cake itself. Hope that makes sense.

 

So I tried sending my transport to that landed battlecruiser UFO but it took off immediately when I got close. Pricks! Don't wanna fight on the ground, eh? Well, how about I send all my interceptors from around the globe and shoot you down in the air? Now you can't go anywhere. They are tough beasts in the air though. No sooner than I shot it down a fighter UFO appeared out of nowhere right in front of the full compliment of interceptors. Bad idea.

 

 

One of my interceptors was heavily damaged from the battlecruiser encounter so I just sent him back to base as one errant hit would mean no more ship.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

Understood, Zombie. Humble pie it is at first to get your squaddies fighting fit.

 

Well, that's a good sign, as it means the game is for the most part geared towards keeping things level no matter the hand you were dealt to start with.

 

So - *clears throat*:

 

"We shall fight with growing confidence and growing strength in the air, we shall fight on the beaches, we shall fight on the landing grounds, we shall go on to the end!"

[Zombie]

With all these darn UFO's on the ground I figured I should start clearing some of them. The battlecrusier I shot down has been on the map for a while and I was worried it would vanish so it's first on my priority list. It was kinda a mishmosh of aliens: larva, chasers, predators and vipons but outside the ship it was just larva and vipons. With a variety of alien species came a variety of weapons as well, mostly plasma and ion. I fanned out my squad and got a decent foothold around the LZ with Owl on one side and Phobos on the other. Nothing out of the ordinary on the outside except Galfar got startled by a Larva he ran up on along one side of the ship but it was disposed of in a single snap shot of heavy laser. Inside, Phobos couldn't seem to hit the broad side of a barn which meant Owl was "cleanup duty". My men finally had a chance to deploy one of these new Sensor Bombs (a cross between UFO:EUs proximity grenade and high explosive). Not sure if it really did anything to the Destroyer who set it off, but it was left helpless as I pummeled it with shot after shot of laser rifle fire.

 

 

Of course, Phobos and Owl were promoted again. I made sure to beef up the shooting stat for Phobos hoping that would even the playing field a bit.

 

 

As soon as my transport lifted off from the site, another Battlecruiser materialized out of nowhere and made a beeline to my base. Luckily my transport landed just before the UFO arrived. My base defenses are weaksauce as I can't devote that many slots to defenses in an already crowded base. (This is one of my biggest gripes about the game as you can only have soldiers, research, manufacturing, alien containment, hospitals etc at your main base. So it's a "do everything" base while all your other bases are limited to detection and interception). Needless to say even with direct hits it hardly made a dent in the UFO's hit points.

 

 

Eventually I might get rid of all base defenses at the main base if two of the more powerful types can't take a Battlecruiser out. Depends also on if I can consolidate or remove anything. So time to defend the base I guess. I kinda had a picture of the map in my head but it didn't help much as I think the base was rotated 90 degrees to the left. Anyhow, I made it through okay except Refugia was injured from a chaser's ion rifle hit.

 

 

I did patch him back up during the mission but I guess the damage was too severe to write off. Just a note on how the game decides which of your soldiers to spawn in for a base defense mission: it picks from whoever is in your dropship first. and then whoever is next on your soldier list. If you have a bunch of old soldiers with bad stats they might be called upon in this instance. In my case it didn't really matter as my dropship had the cream of the crop troops on it. I wouldn't have minded if one of my new rookies was tossed in the mix but no. I'm still having trouble acquiring soldiers with 50's in every stat from the hiring pool. Some will get close but end up being a point shy in a decent stat so I have to ignore them. Not sure if the drought is intentional or just bad rolls of the dice but I'll continue to look for quality recruits.

 

- Zombie

[Zombie]

I guess the soldier drought is over! My transport got back to base safely and I was getting a little low on some supplies (like laser shields for my soldiers, heavy laser ammo and even heavy lasers themselves) so I produced these things first. While this was going on I figured I'd check the soldier pool again. It was a new bunch of soldiers and after filtering I found two with 50's in every stat. Say hello to "Tickle Me" Elmo Mullahy and Birdie Sober (love this one).

 

 

Time to get you two some xp, let's get that green cruiser taken care of. Here again it was a mixed bag of aliens: vipons, chasers, destroyers and sentinels (I guess this is the Cyberdisc equivalent). Once I cleared the LZ, I positioned my two rookies together far enough away to not be seen, yet close enough to have a chance of connecting with an alien if it was spotted. Absolutely no dice, the aliens just didn't want to come near. So I sent the rookies out with a couple vets and had them searching through the buildings on the map. They got rid of a vipon inside, and a couple rounds later a chaser too. Easy xp pickin's with these. Then they came upon a door leading outside. With one on either side, the door was opened by the aliens but they did nothing. More easy picking, but it was a sentinel and a destroyer so they took a significant number of shots to take down. The destroyer had to be finished off with a vet.

 

Inside the UFO was a little bit of a mess. One of my vets scouted a room and found a vipon inside facing away from the door. Sent Birdie in there blindly only to find out she was out of movement points and was stuck. I almost reloaded but decided against it at the last second. It paid off as the vipon never moved or even looked in back of itself. Easy pickings again, though this time I sent in a vet to keep her company. Upstairs one of my vets noticed a destroyer and a chaser camped out in the command center. Elmo went over to the lift and took care of the chaser while a vet took out the destroyer. They both ran back out of the central area and next round two destroyers came right outside the door. Birdie took a few pot shots as their attention was elsewhere and then Elmo took out one. The last one was wasted by Scotty who had an itchy trigger finger.

 

 

So this mission was done by mainly new rookies or new recruits which were promoted. Well, Scottie had 5 points to spend:

 

 

He has 60+ in every stat now and still has another promotion available and I know exactly where those 5 points will go next time. The two new rookies had 20 points to spend so I gave them a little bit in everything, with most going in strength, shooting, agility and vitality.

 

 

Both have 55+ in every stat so they will be awesome with a couple more promotions.

 

All that's left is the base to get rid of. I'll be doing that next and then checking the new recruit pool. Just got rid of two long-time vets of the program with lackluster stats so I need some new blood.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

So, having professed your love, you basically sent Birdie to the meat grinder. How very callous of you, Zombie.

 

She valiantly did your bidding without a peep and somehow came out without as much as a ruffled feather alongside her pal Elmo. Those two are going to go places.

 

Maybe not nice places but, hey, totally worth it to boldly go where none have gone before, right? Buckle up - coordinates set to the alien base!

[Zombie]

It's base time! Took along the usual squad plus the two newest recruits Birdie and Elmo. I set everyone up the same as before with Birdie and Elmo kneeling directly in front of the door with some vets around them for backup/door opening duties. I opened the door the next round and found out there was another attached antechamber so everyone piled in there instead. A few guys broke off from the main group, and men being men, shot a hole through the wall into the next chamber. I figured I could use this secondary opening to encircle any aliens but that never really worked out as intended. Here's the setup:

 

 

A "new" strategy I employed later in the mission is throwing a couple proximity grenades into the room to the North (different corners) and also one to the West through that hole I opened up in the wall. This turned out to be a great tool to tell where the aliens are coming from for a few reasons:

1. Primed proximity mines stay visible even after the doors have closed, so you are able to visually identify where they are and which ones are left.
   
2. The explosion is directional in the soundscape (especially handy if you wear headphones) so you can tell where something happened.
   
3. The explosion isn't super gigantic so it doesn't blow out walls or doors if you throw them a few tiles away.
   

So they are like an early warning system giving you crucial battlefield intel about the location of aliens and where they might be (no motion scanners in this game at least so far). I found this very helpful even though the proximity grenade explosion isn't always enough to kill a healthy alien outright. In this case it was mostly Larva and Vipons so nothing too serious.

 

Birdie and Elmo literally cleaned house on this mission. It took a while for the aliens to filter their way over to where the squad was so there was a bit of thumb twiddling going on. But I used that time to reload weapons and to grab proximity grenades from the vets behind. Even if a couple Vipons made it to the door, I could step out and blast them with an auto shot worth of laser rifle at point blank range. There were a couple instances where the Vipons actually made it to the door and opened it but my vet soldiers with high reactions finished them off.

 

Then it went quiet for probably 15 turns or so. No activity whatsoever, no proximity grenades getting triggered, no door opening sounds, and no alien movement sounds. I realized all of a sudden that I haven't seen a Vipon commander yet so maybe it was camped out somewhere crying softly. Then one of the proximity grenades was triggered. I opened the door and saw the commander to the right so I tossed a stun grenade on it instantly knocking it out. Mission over right? Nope, it didn't end. Maybe a Larva was floating around yet? Nope, next round yet another Vipon commander shows up from a different direction. Tossed a stun grenade on it and nabbed it too. Unreal.

 

 

Four promotions from this mission. Birdie and Elmo deserved theirs by killing 8 aliens apiece. Billi Kellog didn't do squat and OVNI was promoted to Warrant Officer. Not sure if this is the equivalent of a commander in UFO:EU but it sounds important. Whatever the case he deserves it as he has the most xp and kills of all my soldiers.

 

 

If he isn't a super soldier I don't know what is. Maxed out shooting along with 80 in strength and 75 bravery means he's a force to be reckoned with. Plus all his other stats are very usable. Here's the other promotions:

 

 

Another promotion for Birdie and Elmo will take them to the next level. Hopefully I can max out their shooting at that time.

 

Right, so a little bit of excitement. Nothing is going on back at base except for some research projects. Manufacturing is on hold temporarily and no more soldiers in the hiring pool with 50+ in every stat. My eyes are open though as I want to get rid of a couple more vets with crummy stats.

 

- Zombie

[Thorondor]

I do declare, Zombie - facing Birdie and Elmo is fast becoming a sobering affair for the aliens.

 

You've set up a fine killzone once again in that antechamber and then upped your game by putting your equipment to the best possible use. Too bad those didn't rack up any multi-kills.

 

I've also noticed a Sensor bomb in one of your prior screen caps but I'm guessing those would take up more carry space and create a bigger danger zone (for both sides).

 

Keeping your distance pays off and having a few "steady hands" on deck like OVNI is literal money in the bank. Even now you're rolling in it so make it sing!