I suppose you could say the Kiryu Kai were overdeveloped. That is, the technology of their air force were probably superior but they got lugged down by it so much that they couldn't catch up with the UFOs.

 

Since I kept getting my posterior handed to me in a take-away bag on classic, I decided I needed to understand the game first before tackling the harder levels. Not all games aer kind enough to let you learn as you play on the harder settings. So launch into a normal ironman game (got lazy saving). The difficulty on this is incredibly variable. The start felt too easy, then proceeded to lose an acceptable 1 - 2 soldiers every so often. Interceptor got shot down by a big-ish UFO (a third of the screen actually), so suddenly what was a brilliant no-fault month turns into a D and 3 countries pull out - but the Silhouetted American is pleased. Eh? Everything's still fine, then pigs have started to fly. Armoured floaters. Tougher than a flipping muton!? Absurd. Either way they wiped out my team thanks to the surprise element and now my game's gone from reasonable to the point countries are pulling out left and right and I'm just scraping by.

 

Still loving it.

 

Out of all this I learned two things:

 

You've got to keep some veterans alive. Fodder in the late game is murder, even with super awesome equipment.

 

The SHIV is brilliant - at least as a suppression vehicle. Better than a Heavy. Managed to pin down a Berserker (this game's answer to the Reaper - a melee Mr. Angry Redshirt?) so that an assault trooper can scoot behind it and shoot it in the back over the course of 2 - 3 turns.

 

- NKF

Still loving it.

 

It's nice to see people enjoy the game even when it kicks you in the balls.

 

 

I also was very surprised that in my second game the layout for Alien Base was different then last time and the location of the base was also in other region.

 

I wish the story would be longer and more such mission were available.

Since I kept getting my posterior handed to me in a take-away bag on classic, I decided I needed to understand the game first before tackling the harder levels. Not all games aer kind enough to let you learn as you play on the harder settings. So launch into a normal ironman game (got lazy saving). The difficulty on this is incredibly variable. The start felt too easy, then proceeded to lose an acceptable 1 - 2 soldiers every so often. Interceptor got shot down by a big-ish UFO (a third of the screen actually), so suddenly what was a brilliant no-fault month turns into a D and 3 countries pull out - but the Silhouetted American is pleased. Eh? Everything's still fine, then pigs have started to fly. Armoured floaters. Tougher than a flipping muton!? Absurd. Either way they wiped out my team thanks to the surprise element and now my game's gone from reasonable to the point countries are pulling out left and right and I'm just scraping by.

 

Still loving it.

 

Out of all this I learned two things:

 

You've got to keep some veterans alive. Fodder in the late game is murder, even with super awesome equipment.

 

The SHIV is brilliant - at least as a suppression vehicle. Better than a Heavy. Managed to pin down a Berserker (this game's answer to the Reaper - a melee Mr. Angry Redshirt?) so that an assault trooper can scoot behind it and shoot it in the back over the course of 2 - 3 turns.

 

- NKF

 

My original intention was to go straight to Classic until I saw a video of the developers advising fans of the old game not to do so. And I'm to stop my 5th game (already built the Gollop Chamber and I have 12 Colonels but I want to see the end of the game Classic) and finally move to Classic but there's quite a few things I noticed and that you mentioned above. Things can (and will) go badly even if you think everything under control. Example: squad with Titan armor and plasmas on Abduction. First I spot 3 Mutons, no problemo, I kill 2 of them but suddenly 9 more are activated, there's no exit point where you started and you have almost no cover.

 

Only half my squad walked out alive out of that one.

I went for classic and spent a few hours sweating and scrambling rookies all the time. I realized Ironman was a no-go, I don't have the time for not having fun. I started reloading on the worst catastrophes, but soon after alien base I swapped to normal and now it is fun at last.

I went for classic and spent a few hours sweating and scrambling rookies all the time. I realized Ironman was a no-go, I don't have the time for not having fun. I started reloading on the worst catastrophes, but soon after alien base I swapped to normal and now it is fun at last.

 

I started Classic Ironman several times but I decided to switch to saving because of the difficulty on the tactical missions. Afterwards it's going ok - October, only 1 country lost, 7 Colonels, 5 Majors and building the Hyperwave. Even the Sectopods don't scare me anymore.

Classic is fine. Impossible, though... I can't get through the intro mission. Tried four times.

Classic is fine. Impossible, though... I can't get through the intro mission. Tried four times.

 

Do you need a save?

Classic is fine. Impossible, though... I can't get through the intro mission. Tried four times.

 

Haha, I thought I was the only one!

Perhaps I'll be ready to torture myself after I at least finidh the game once. Right now fun get the priority. I kay need to start over anyway, I lost plenty of funders while on classic.

More game rocking moments. Had my first supply ship mission. Half way through I felt like a horde of Covenant Elite decided to crash the game, but turns out I had merely woken up 6 elite Mutons and 2 Sectopods. Didn't lose anyone, but I think I used every soldier class ability I had on hand to complete this one.

 

Of course, the game had the last laugh as it stalled at the cycling video of the Skyranger returning home. But that was what I'd call an epic battle which I'll have to do again.

 

A bit heavy for a supply ship crew.

 

- NKF

More game rocking moments. Had my first supply ship mission. Half way through I felt like a horde of Covenant Elite decided to crash the game, but turns out I had merely woken up 6 elite Mutons and 2 Sectopods. Didn't lose anyone, but I think I used every soldier class ability I had on hand to complete this one.

 

Of course, the game had the last laugh as it stalled at the cycling video of the Skyranger returning home. But that was what I'd call an epic battle which I'll have to do again.

 

A bit heavy for a supply ship crew.

 

- NKF

 

And I just had a bit of a sweet revenge. I mind controlled 4 Mutons and 1 Bezerker and sent them against 2 Sectopods. The 'pods killed them in two turns.

One thing that irritates me is that there's no safe and easy way to end mind control. You have to remember exactly how many turns are left on the MC (wait, was that the second turn, or the third?), and you can't force fire on friendlies. When your MC turn ends, the aliens have full control right away so your MCed unit can turn around right away and blast you in the face.

One thing that irritates me is that there's no safe and easy way to end mind control. You have to remember exactly how many turns are left on the MC (wait, was that the second turn, or the third?), and you can't force fire on friendlies. When your MC turn ends, the aliens have full control right away so your MCed unit can turn around right away and blast you in the face.

 

Totally agree. You can't shoot at walls or your MCed enemies. Very annoying. Nor can you drop his gun or unload it.

 

I tend to get the guy to run about and then throw his grenade at his feet. That usually gets him dead before it runs out.

It's a bit like the Sniper's double-tap. I fell into a situation where I had moved all but my sniper, and there's this hapless floater I wanted to capture. Since I didn't want it to start shooting my men, I decided to use the sniper's disabling shot skill. It worked brilliantly and left the floater with 1 HP. Joy! Only, double tap, which is otherwise a brilliant and utterly cruel ability, kicked in. There seems to be no way to cancel the move, go into overwatch or hunker down. The only way out was to shoot, and with the only target available being the disarmed floater... you can tell this proved to be very annoying.

 

-NKF

Couldn't you just end turn ?

I'm sure it is possible.

ending turn works. Button that looks like a cross on the bottom(ish) left

Shhh or someone will feel stupid

Eh, no one will feel stupid. We're all still learning the workings of the game, nobody is an expert. I have troubles finding the obvious solutions usually, too.

 

And just when we'll get to know it all, there will be a patch to change it all.

End turn keyboard shortcut is Backspace if you like using the keyboard like me.

 

But yeah, I feel for you man. I had a similar problem of capturing live aliens after upgrading my Assaults to Close Combat Specialist. They would always take down the poor sod after I so carefully took it down to 2-3HP on its turn when it moved. This was especially annoying since I assigned the Arc Thrower to my Assaults.

The PC version has an obvious end turn button? Guess I now have an even stronger case to go buy the PC copy as well! (and a better PC, cart before horse and all that)

 

Despite the many grumblings about this game being made for consoles, this game isn't console friendly ....

 

- NKF

Try pressing F1 while targeting an alien, BTW. Nice tip from another place.

 

Not exactly obvious...

I thought all the shortcuts were in the manual? I seem to remember Steam offered me the option of RTFM, but I didn't.

 

Thor also posted the manual somewhere too. I think they're all on one page so that would be a good one to print out (remember old flight sims where we used to do that? I do ).

Some even came with cut-out overlays you stuck over the keyboard to explain what every key did... those were the days. EU2012 came with a slip of paper that says to go download the manual off the internet. Turns out the end-turn command is one of the tiny buttons I've almost never ever used on a modern day dual analogue stick controller. Select. Fancy that.

 

Oh, hey, the 2012 Ethereals get 16 digits. That deserves four thumbs.

 

- NKF

Reading a manual - that is dead tradition today