Think about how much better this series would be if Austin were here instead. Think how much better EVERY series would be if Austin were here instead...
We as a species do not deserve such greatness. That fleeting moment of the Vinny + Austin combo is all that the world should allow. Honestly tho that short period of time when Austin was around was a resurgence of a golden era of GB for me since Vinny + Jeff G got split into East and West, and this series (turn based, player's character/story driven, harsh consequences, mechs!) is totally Austin's wheelhouse...which actually brings me very conflicting feeling about this feature and what happened in this episode.
Dan rewriting over Lang at face value seem like a shitty thing to do. As soon as the video starts and he asked who is the highest rank in the roster and hover over the customize button I already know exactly what he plans to do, also with Zhang being a locked character it is interesting that he noticed that so quickly :p. The medal was expected as well.
At the same time, I don't think there's enough content to chew on for these characters besides a soldier with a familiar name. It doesn't seem like anyone is weaving a story or tall tales of these "characters", if Austin was around maybe it would have been different. Although from a gameplay perspective it is just tossing rookies into the grinder until someone hopefully survive to be worthwhile and many times their screen time is brief (Ben? :p). From that perspective, it hardly matters who these characters are. Tale of Sandra kicking ass just to die in the same mission is just a self contained story on its own, will they remember Swery's performance this battle? or if he will actually live through the next one? Abby being the first to die, and Vinny is lost because of a game bug/oversight/feature again are already contained in their own. So far no one matters until they die. At this skill level they are tossing bodies at the problem and hope it works and come out positive, nothing wrong with it, we aren't here for expert play, but no one seems to be really keeping record of each feat these characters have accomplish, and most of the time they expire too soon for anything worthwhile to show up. The most veteran soldiers they have came that way as mission reward.
I am also totally on board with renaming, and naming all new soldiers Dan! At least it would be consistent!
Overwatch isn't magic. If you have three shots at 45% chance, you take them.
Yeah, I don't know what they think it's going to solve. If you put someone who has a 45% shot into Overwatch instead, and Overwatch does miraculously trigger during the enemy turn, that Overwatch is going to have a LESS than 45% chance of hitting.
OW fire on a unit that is running out, meaning no cover, at a 0.7 aim multiplier. At 65 aim of a rookie that's 0.7 x 65 = 45.5. A rookie firing at a standard enemy behind low cover is 65 - 20 = 45. A rookie firing at a standard enemy behind high cover is 65 - 40 = 25.
OW can't crit, but makes it more likely for enemy to not move from their location.
Good show by Alex. DLC mission is pretty much exactly as it needs to go, the Overwatch fire looks unusually good dice rolls, but a follow up shot would have likely seal the deal also. Also I guess we are on #TeamSquadsight.
Overwatch itself is fine, the penalty is about the same as shooting against low cover minus the crit for rookie. It is a poor man's suppression to try to keep enemy in place and giving room for the rest of the team to move in. Especially useful if you have covering fire. At normal difficulty you can kind of chance the damage especially with med kits. Grenades on sectoids unless there are a lot of them is just leaving easy weapon fragments on the table.
Nigeria isn't so bad especially with the successful DLC mission they now have two veteran heavies on the team. Too bad Dirt Bike also ended up a heavy (or good as a MEC?). If I were handed that save I might have gone with Nigeria also and see if alien base assault is possible before the end of the month to try to save Asia although it doesn't seem likely.
Lang almost getting picked off was hairy, that ~30% shot with the laser rifle really saved the day. I don't think Vinny's advice is too bad, their knowledge base seems fairly equal. I wouldn't say they are being overly conservative with their tactics, considering they still make overly aggressive moves every now and then. They just need to be snappier with the leap frog advances.
Half reload, half OW and then switch off therefore spending two turns after each encounter is fairly normal considering aliens actually patrol into you at times now. The existence of Meld pushes player to be faster already, if they want to give it up then that's a decision they have to live with in favor of the slow crawl.
Iron Will is a permanent upgrades that affects soldiers' potential Will so earlier is better, but it needs a Major to unlock. Mechs are fine, but at this point only heavies should be turn into mec, and they kind of need a medic following them around. The 10% defense isn't going to do much, without cover they are virtually going to get hit every time they are fired upon.
They start in North America, Air and Space is never going to leave them, Canada is decent, but not critical, Mexico is actually the most expendable (lower income potential than Canada). Here's some foresight, DLC mission should be coming up, if successful Zhang will join them as a Heavy Lieutenant. However a Sergeant from Nigeria now means squad size one from OTS assuming they get enough corpses to sell, Africa also have the best bonus as a whole. They will have very little money next month, hopefully China holds out until then so they get that 100 space bucks, then just let Asia burn. Germany let them start banking cash now along with keeping Russia (second highest income) relatively happy.
Other stuff...
Strictly speaking "Dashing" is when you use up both moves at once for movement. Moving once then moving again isn't Dashing, nor would that grant the overwatch evasion bonus. Therefore Dashing should really technically only be used when trying to avoid overwatch, but of course in combat it saves time and avoid misplacing first step.
Getting Alien base assault to trigger is easy, just have to capture an outsider and research, finishing the mission on the other hand... That said Alien base assault offers interesting trade offs strategically speaking. Success means global panic reduction, "failing" this mission is a little different...you can retry (reload) it again even in Ironman! But that means the game progress is now completely stuck on this mission. Success pushes the game into the next phase where UFOs will be manned by Sectoid commanders instead of outsiders, which are harder to deal with. In Enemy Within it also triggers the base defense mission down the line. In some respect rushing this mission could technically calm things down globally, but I don't think the current soldiers and resources are ready for it, worse yet dealing with escalating threats afterward will likely be difficult unless they plan for it carefully.
The mission had some tough breaks and some lucky breaks, but in the end inexperience failed them. As many have said, standing in the open and grenade the group would have sealed the deal.
Nothing wrong with going with the hardest mission, it only affects number of groups you run into, and IIRC easy/normal limits the number of enemies in active combat. Sure if it was an easier mission the squad probably could have survived with the resources they had on hand, but honestly they could've finish this one also. Only Sandra and Dan ended up as valuable asset by the end.
Scope, Med kits, grenade. Personally at this stage of the game I like to go with med kits. Thin man poison is just too annoying. It also helps in attrition tactics (more on that later.) Scope really isn't that bad, Ben was able to have >50% shots because of it. I don't like to use grenade since they bust up the fragments. Although playing in Classic and Impossible despite can't kill aliens outright grenades are crucial.
Dashing, blind dashing while not in combat is usually bad, take the second move if in a hurry but at least take the "blue" move first then take the "yellow" move if the coast is somewhat clear. The two moves should almost always be taken one after the other if the situation really calls for burning both moves to movement. EXCEPT if shit hits the fan and someone really need to roll the dice on breaking enemy overwatch (or think there might be one but can't see) and don't have Lightning reflexes; in that case dash away!
Overwatch and shooting. Here's the deal. Yes overwatch have a penalty, but it is % base. Which means, lower the aim lower the penalty, meaning rookies actually have the least to lose. While shooting against cover is a flat penalty. Debating between shooing or OW probably means shooing against cover which has penalty anyways. Against low cover with decent % it is probably worth trying a shot, at bad % OW might not be the worst course of action. Of course prolonged OW vs enemy firing is a losing game, but that's where other tactics come in.
It is probably time to think one or two moves ahead and start guessing AI's action and weight what's the best/worst outcome. If you OW, the enemy could either move and risk getting hit, shoot you or OW themselves. If they shoot that means you took the risk of getting shot, but now you can move other units freely. If they OW you didn't get shot, but now it might be risky to move up. If they trigger OW you took a shot, they moved and do whatever. OW locking enemy, move up in place, and Run and Gun shotgun to the face is fairly handy early on. Pay attention to the surroundings what are the covers available, where to move, etc. Hunker is also an option, but depends on what needs to be done.
If there is no good move consider hiding all troops from sight (no line of sight for you or the enemy which could be taking one step back or a full retreat) and then OW to set up trap for the enemy to come closer, perhaps with some risk involve. This is handy if the environment of the engagement isn't favorable or if you don't want to move from your location (good high cover, elevation, mission objective, etc), basically force the enemy to make mistakes.
Strategic speaking, this run is kind of a wash or not really worth investing more time in. The toughest part is not building satellite in time to launch by the end of April. Therefore no extra income and staff by May. It might have actually turn out pretty decent if they get it in time and if the terror mission later this month is in Asia, which had been on the chopping block for a while anyways. China's satellite could have been better serve elsewhere also. At this point I wouldn't say it is completely unsalvageable. DLC Council mission should be coming up, it will be hard if unprepared, but it is somewhat cheese-able if you know what to do. Pray the terror mission is in Asia or in North America (ideally Mexico) so losing or ignoring doesn't matter. Focus on money and maybe scientists to get laser weapon and carapace armor to prepare to deal with muton and second terror mission in May. Refocus to Satellite afterward, and pray for panic to stay manageable while getting squad size OTS upgrade sometime in May before terror mission and DLC mission. Skip second DLC mission if not confident (shame, but priorities!), but terror probably can't be ignore. Ideally Plasma should be researching hopefully with Muton interrogation during that time. Air defense just have to tough it out with 2 ships per continent for now, maybe even 3. Put that Air and Space bonus to good use. New ship is far and away.
Demolishing the alien jail is...well to be fair tutorial locking that spot isn't the greatest, the Officer training school is also kind of blocking the way. In some weird ways the tutorial and lower difficulty of the game actually screw you over. Fixing the Workshop would have been much more ideal, placing it in the other side of the base would have been perfect with cyber labs and foundry bonus next to it down the line. Live and learn. Honestly Dan and Vinny talking it out despite a little clumsy is still a net positive, they didn't achieve the best outcome, but you can see thoughts and reasoning behind their plan, and paying attention to the strategic game is honestly more important. They actually visited the Grey market and sold the junk! Yea there are interceptors problem, yea they probably should talk about building satellites before the 10, but hey, one step at a time.
Load-out. We know Dan is going to be Dan, we know he is going to be a coward when it comes to himself. Switching to assault rifle and med kits to be honest really isn't a bad move, especially in an escort mission without lightning reflex. Med kits blocks poison, range is needed to shoot thin man from afar, I could see myself going with this load out in his shoes. Probably not his reasoning, but totally valid. Arc thrower without alien jail, believe it or not, somewhat valid. This is the first time thin men appear, at 3 hp you can try for a capture without needing to deal any damage. Interrogate gets UFO research bonus, but even without that option (no jail) you still get the sweet light plasma rifle, while sectoid gets you plasma pistol although with an insane research time at the current pace. At higher difficulty the DLC mission could spawn a muton in April, it sounds scary, but if you can capture and interrogate it you get the plasma weapon research credit, meaning you can start fielding plasma weapon by May. Successful utilization of Xenobiology is the most aggressive play style.
As for Dan's tactical decisions, honestly he really isn't any worse than Abby, Alex seem to be slightly more careful, but he also has gaps in his knowledge. Dan tries to be safe when it comes to himself, but he really didn't do that. He left himself totally flankable, and I don't think he understood the AI enough to purposely leave other members to draw fire, perhaps he wanted that, and I think it just ended up that way since he just never moved at all. The rocket was sad, but that's really not him being selfish (which might be worse? :p). Even if he wanted to play carefully with everyone I don't think it was going to work anyways. Escort mission is a different beast, if you know the spawn points and how they work you can clear them out with overwatch and follow up shots pretty easily. Head on fights against thin men at this stage of the game (superior mobility, poison, and the best fucking aim in the game) is going to be rough for the unprepared.
The funny thing despite Dan trying to keep himself alive is that the initially squad of soldiers overall aren't usually the good ones you will keep, after some OTS upgrades your later batch of trained soldiers are usually the ones with higher Will and are more likely to be force positive psionics and can comfortably get the late game skills while less likely to have suffer Will penalty from injuries.
Save scumming vs Ironman is really not as hardcore as you think. After a while you sort of know the path you want to take, and you can kind of estimate the timing, and know what could screw you over. If the game decides to screw you over, you can either save scum or just cut your losses and start anew. No abduction super early in the game? Start over. Bomb disposal early in the game? Start over. Panic went out of control because you are forced to focus on engineers in the beginning? Might as well start over. It is fun to dig yourself out of a hole, but once you successfully did it a few times the appeal kind of fade and it just feels like the game decide to let you go this time. RNG goes both ways at times.
Oh almost forgot, the gross disregarding of the smoke grenade is worse than the incorrect usage.
Face it, they will wipe. Countries will leave. This is XCOM baby. Making poor tactical decisions, placing wrong buildings while frustrating, is totally expected, that's not a dis against the crew, that's part of the grander scheme of the game, and watching them go through it is entertaining in its own right as long as they learn from their mistakes, and some mistakes don't rear their heads until much later. I just wonder will they start again after failing, and if they know when to cut a game short knowing that it isn't worth salvaging.
What I want to see is them discovering tactics and strategy on their own separately, and hopefully get the chance to share with each other after a wipe. Some kind of after-action-report episode after something went wrong where everyone share ideas and figure out how to do better next time. The cool thing about having them split up besides the obvious chaos inducing aspect and manpower/production timing aspect is to see different perspectives without too much group-think. Sometimes the same strategy might work at times but fail in another; I want to see that and see how they handle it.
This goes about as expected for someone not too familiar with the game, and given the game's poor tutorial for tactics. It is almost as if they encourage dashing and burning turns in the order it is given.
Other's have mention already, saving turns until everyone already moved is a good habit. Most of the time enemy won't engage you until you run into them. Very rarely do they walk/teleport into you (usually in terror missions or scripted missions.) Using a point man to lead the way while everyone follows behind and not ahead to maximize turn usage in case of engagement is a safer route. Limited time to get Meld toss a wrench in the strategy. Such is the risk vs reward.
Since fights usually don't start until you run into someone, knowing how wide to spread out and how closely to bunch up is an issue in itself. Wider team means you run the risk of activating extra groups. Tightly packed team is susceptible to AoE attacks like grenades. Also keep in mind number of firing ports available. Get use to relying on high cover, low cover isn't reliable, high cover isn't foolproof either, but the best you have, also keep in mind of exploding and damageable covers, study what triggers, how they trigger, and how they behave. Sometimes they can work to your advantage :p
Assault's Run and Gun, as demonstrated by Dan, is great for getting kills this early in the game. There's no other tide turner this early in the game save rockets and grenades and those are limited use. Prepare to build more med kits and equip them over grenades to save you headaches and heartaches for multiple purpose. Also get Lightning reflexes for your assaults when it becomes available.
The Strategic game (ant farm, base management) hasn't really been mention much. Don't gloss over those decisions lightly, they are possibly more important than your battle decisions. You can win all the fights you want, but the game is won and lose by the number of countries you keep and lose. You can only fight in one location at a time while abductions come in 3, it is a losing battle. No choice you made in your base is without trade offs and consequences. The alien jail for instance, cost money to buy, money to upkeep, power upkeep, and occupies a slot for base expansion, in turn it offers bonus research IF you manage to capture an alien, and you need to do the research and buy the item to even attempt to capture one.
It seems like everyone knows the importance of getting Satellite, but how to get there? You have to build the satellite (money, time), have enough Uplink to house it (base slot, money, power, time, upkeep), also building subsequent Uplink needs more engineers. How to get engineers? Completing mission is one way, end of month Council report is another, but you will likely be building Workshops to essentially "buy" engineers (base slot, money, power, time, upkeep), building subsequent Workshops also need more engineers. Need engi to buy more engi.
At this stage of the game Workshop takes 10 days to build, after getting the engineers the Uplink takes 14 days afterward. At 24 days That's nearly a month. Together they also take up 8 power, a standard power gen gives 6 power with 2 extra per adjacent bonus if you are lucky, and takes 5 days to build. The lovely thermo generator gives 20 power. Need space? excavate takes time and money, building the lift takes time, money and power. Also as the tutorial said, you probably want to protect your satellites with fighters, again time, money, upkeep
You should be looking at the calendar, base layout, money (current/incoming/expenses), and the world map (panic level, each countries' and regions' reward) very closely. Sometimes you have to make the tough choice and cut a country lose even if they look salvageable.
Also Dan is probably going to award himself all the medals given the chance isn't he?
Normal Iron man in EU is totally doable as long as you are willing to make sacrifices (low funding countries in Asia/Europe) and willing to accept bad rolls and start over to cut your losses. Other minor tactical strategies can (hopefully) be easily taught and learn. (don't rush, don't spread out too much, don't bunch up, reload often, overwatch trap)
I don't remember much about EW, I think you don't really need to rush to get meld since there's usually an "easy" meld and a "hard" meld, just picking up the easy one. DLC missions are more hassle than they are worth unless you know exactly how to exploit them.
Standard opener, tutorial gets you a free satellite, starting location is going to be North America, (under normal conditions it is either NA or Africa). All rookies have to survive first mission, if not just re-roll. First abduction go for engineer reward. If first council mission is bomb mission, re-roll or skip it if it isn't one of the country that you didn't pick for abduction.
I wonder if they will have the great Squadsight vs Snap Shot debate, and wonder how many of them will make a "wrong" skill path decision. Did they ever fix the Sniper overwatch cheese where you can overwatch with a pistol then manually switch to a sniper rifle?
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