So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

JM01
Posts: 69
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 2:29 pm

So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JM01 »

So as we all know that the 0% supply raids are getting nerfed as a lot of people have stated it is kind of cheesy to be able to just brute force your way through supply raids to get so many supplies and a ton of corpses (which equals even more supplies) which pretty much just breaks the economy. From the looks of it the max amount of people that you will be able to bring to a supply raid is going to be lowered to 8 so supply raids are basically just going to be "Ambush Troop Column" missions that reward more supplies.

I don't have too much of a problem with that myself but my question, is there going to be an adjustment to supply raids to make them more easily detectable to compensate? After finally getting far into a campaign of Long War I have found that doing troop column missions are not enough to keep the advent strength from going up too fast, you also need to try and get supply raids done so that you can prevent the strength from going up. Mind you I understand it is not the goal (nor is it possible to) keep the strength down indefinitely due to not only supply raids and troop columns but also off world reinforcements. I have found that I would not be able to make it so far into the game if I didn't have the chance to go to so many supply raids and keep the strength down so I find that if we won't have the option of doing low percentage supply raids we need to be ale to detect them easier so that we can at least infiltrate enough to either be able to get 100% more often or be able to boost more of them (I think this would be a good trade off because now you can choose to trade off some intel to get a supply raid done). I say to compensate make supply raids only slightly harder to detect than troop columns so that we can at least attempt to do them a little more (not saying you should be able to do them all but the way that Long War 2 works you definitely need to be able to do more than you can do now without cheesing them).

I understand that supply raids as they are pretty much break the economy but making them less doable than they are now will make a game unbearably hard. Hopefully there will be a balance done here.
gimrah
Long War 2 Crew
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Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by gimrah »

I certainly hope so. I have literally never had a supply raid on a do-able timer. Which means I'm always starved for resources, can't build armour and then lose in the mid game.
stefan3iii
Posts: 319
Joined: Wed Feb 01, 2017 3:49 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by stefan3iii »

I don't really see how nerfing it to 8 soldiers is going to be enough, they're still going to be doable.

I think it'd be more interesting if supply raids were easier to detect, but if it isn't detected by 5 days remaining (or whatever number makes sense), then it never shows up at all. I'd actually consider a rule like that for missions in general, once the number of days falls below some threshold they're never detected.

Would eliminate UI spam of 1 day missions.
Would reduce the benefit of doing 1-3 man stealth missions.
Basically reduces the number of overall missions, but increases the number of "high quality" missions, where you can send a bigger group.
Jadiel
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Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Jadiel »

Have you tried a campaign without doing 0% supply raids? I'd recommend you give it a go before you assume it will make the game too hard. The game was balanced around not doing them, and I found the economy worked just fine, even without going on any supply raids at all.
JackDT
Posts: 44
Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2017 7:07 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JackDT »

Do we know the fix is they are limiting it to 8 soldiers? That just changes the threshold at which you break the economy and nothing else matters. It will still be the case that once you can do ONE 0% with 8 soldiers, you can keep using the same soldiers since there's no infiltration time and do them all. Then the other missions feel kind of pointless.

The houserule fix many streamers are using is only allowing themselves to go on Supply Raids if they get to 50%, so they have vastly fewer of them, and when they do go on it, they have to actually tie up their soldiers.
JM01
Posts: 69
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 2:29 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JM01 »

Jadiel wrote:Have you tried a campaign without doing 0% supply raids? I'd recommend you give it a go before you assume it will make the game too hard. The game was balanced around not doing them, and I found the economy worked just fine, even without going on any supply raids at all.
Yes in fact all of my 6 other campaigns that I have tried before this one I have not done supply raids unless I had enough time on them where I could get to at least 56% to boost to 100% (I have been playing on veteran) if I could not infiltrate to 100% by default. This is why I have made the claim that I did about the difficulty. Advent strength ramps up way too fast even if you do take on every troop column there is to take. Being able to also prevent the strength from going up takes a lot of strain off the campaign.
JM01
Posts: 69
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 2:29 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JM01 »

JackDT wrote:Do we know the fix is they are limiting it to 8 soldiers? That just changes the threshold at which you break the economy and nothing else matters. It will still be the case that once you can do ONE 0% with 8 soldiers, you can keep using the same soldiers since there's no infiltration time and do them all. Then the other missions feel kind of pointless.

The houserule fix many streamers are using is only allowing themselves to go on Supply Raids if they get to 50%, so they have vastly fewer of them, and when they do go on it, they have to actually tie up their soldiers.
Yeah the thing is though is that 0% supply raids, even with a squad of 10 is still super risky. I only go on them if I can take at least 2 gunners and 2 - 3 grenadiers (I always take needle grenades as sapper has been way to unreliable for me so I don't worry about losing corpses). Even with this kind of manpower you have to be super careful, especially if it is in the early game as your soldiers have less options to deal with large groups and it's easy to pull more than 1 pod at a time on those since there are so many of them close to each other and each one is a pod of 8 on 0% runs.

With 8 people it will be to high risk to try 0% supply raids, I think they will still be somewhat doable but not really worth risking.

I get that we aren't supposed to do every supply raid, but with the pathetically low times you get on so many (even with all people in the haven going full intel job) it becomes very hard to even do some. I am ok with them lowering the limit of soldiers to 8, just make the supply raids a little easier to detect, doesn't have too be by a ridiculous amount but you definitely do need to be able to do more.
JackDT
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Joined: Wed Jan 11, 2017 7:07 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JackDT »

Maybe a good mechanic for Long War in general would be minimum infiltration amount just to get to 0%, for some mission types. Being able to bypass the 'fatigue' is a big part of what breaks it.
JM01
Posts: 69
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 2:29 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JM01 »

JackDT wrote:Maybe a good mechanic for Long War in general would be minimum infiltration amount just to get to 0%, for some mission types. Being able to bypass the 'fatigue' is a big part of what breaks it.
Yeah I get that being able to take the same squad to do supply raids over and over is really what breaks it which is why it is better that they reduce the number of people you can take to 8 and then force you to have to infiltrate. Again taking 8 people on 0% would be super risky, more so than what it is worth due to the potential of pulling so much. This would make it so that the squads are forced to infiltrate and would tie them up from being sent on another raid or even a troop column. This would inadvertently put a higher amount of interest on hiring people for training for something other than just being a haven adviser. This would also require more thought in playing to try and avoid wound times to have the maximum amount of people available for these missions.
Goumindong
Posts: 193
Joined: Tue Jan 24, 2017 11:04 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Goumindong »

JM01 wrote:
JackDT wrote:Do we know the fix is they are limiting it to 8 soldiers? That just changes the threshold at which you break the economy and nothing else matters. It will still be the case that once you can do ONE 0% with 8 soldiers, you can keep using the same soldiers since there's no infiltration time and do them all. Then the other missions feel kind of pointless.

The houserule fix many streamers are using is only allowing themselves to go on Supply Raids if they get to 50%, so they have vastly fewer of them, and when they do go on it, they have to actually tie up their soldiers.
Yeah the thing is though is that 0% supply raids, even with a squad of 10 is still super risky. I only go on them if I can take at least 2 gunners and 2 - 3 grenadiers (I always take needle grenades as sapper has been way to unreliable for me so I don't worry about losing corpses). Even with this kind of manpower you have to be super careful, especially if it is in the early game as your soldiers have less options to deal with large groups and it's easy to pull more than 1 pod at a time on those since there are so many of them close to each other and each one is a pod of 8 on 0% runs.

With 8 people it will be to high risk to try 0% supply raids, I think they will still be somewhat doable but not really worth risking.

I get that we aren't supposed to do every supply raid, but with the pathetically low times you get on so many (even with all people in the haven going full intel job) it becomes very hard to even do some. I am ok with them lowering the limit of soldiers to 8, just make the supply raids a little easier to detect, doesn't have too be by a ridiculous amount but you definitely do need to be able to do more.
They really aren't that hard, especially if you've got some good specialized soldiers. My suggestion might be that you're taking too many grenadiers and not enough gunners.

My ideal set is

3 gunners
1 specialist (medic)
1 Shinobi (Combat Tank if you have one high enough level, otherwise a technical)
2 sharpshooters
2 technicals (tank set) (assaults OK here, grenadiers less OK)
1 free.(Support Grenadier ideal)

The Gunners primarily area suppress. Get them in good cover, make sure they have a med kit or hazmat suit, and cycle two on area suppress while the third destroys cover/kills. Basically you're going to be cooldown swapping to clean cover and kill high value targets.

To accentuate the power of your gunners you're going to want to keep them in smoke if you can, deep smoke is better but of course level dependent. You should have 5+ smoke among your team in order to keep their defense up (you don't want them getting hit and losing suppress on a dangerous target)

The Shinobi is your forward tank. Once they have evasive they're almost invulnerable when hunkered down. I mean literally if you go right down the middle of the tree, at 7 tiles away from a friend, are hunked down and have evasive you can only be hit by an enemy that has >95 base aim. And i don't mean "can be grazed" i mean you can't even be grazed unless they're >95 aim. They can also take out high value targets because of their mobility due to their defense.

The sharpshooters kill 1 target/turn with DFA and stocks. Pick off dangerous targets and make sure your shinobi isn't flanked (as they will not have a good way to clear overwatch unless they have a line of low cover)

Tehnicals clear cover so that when the enemy advances into your gunners they don't have good places to take cover, so your sharpshooters can pick them off. They can also take forward positions with the flamethrower to get rid of high value targets.

Specialist medical protocol's anyone who gets significantly hurt(though most everyone should bring their own med kit or hazmat suit). Revival protocols units that get stunned/disabled. And aid protocol's units that are in dangerous positions.

Its eminently doable
JM01
Posts: 69
Joined: Fri Feb 10, 2017 2:29 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JM01 »

Goumindong wrote:
JM01 wrote:
JackDT wrote:Do we know the fix is they are limiting it to 8 soldiers? That just changes the threshold at which you break the economy and nothing else matters. It will still be the case that once you can do ONE 0% with 8 soldiers, you can keep using the same soldiers since there's no infiltration time and do them all. Then the other missions feel kind of pointless.

The houserule fix many streamers are using is only allowing themselves to go on Supply Raids if they get to 50%, so they have vastly fewer of them, and when they do go on it, they have to actually tie up their soldiers.
Yeah the thing is though is that 0% supply raids, even with a squad of 10 is still super risky. I only go on them if I can take at least 2 gunners and 2 - 3 grenadiers (I always take needle grenades as sapper has been way to unreliable for me so I don't worry about losing corpses). Even with this kind of manpower you have to be super careful, especially if it is in the early game as your soldiers have less options to deal with large groups and it's easy to pull more than 1 pod at a time on those since there are so many of them close to each other and each one is a pod of 8 on 0% runs.

With 8 people it will be to high risk to try 0% supply raids, I think they will still be somewhat doable but not really worth risking.

I get that we aren't supposed to do every supply raid, but with the pathetically low times you get on so many (even with all people in the haven going full intel job) it becomes very hard to even do some. I am ok with them lowering the limit of soldiers to 8, just make the supply raids a little easier to detect, doesn't have too be by a ridiculous amount but you definitely do need to be able to do more.
They really aren't that hard, especially if you've got some good specialized soldiers. My suggestion might be that you're taking too many grenadiers and not enough gunners.

My ideal set is

3 gunners
1 specialist (medic)
1 Shinobi (Combat Tank if you have one high enough level, otherwise a technical)
2 sharpshooters
2 technicals (tank set) (assaults OK here, grenadiers less OK)
1 free.(Support Grenadier ideal)

The Gunners primarily area suppress. Get them in good cover, make sure they have a med kit or hazmat suit, and cycle two on area suppress while the third destroys cover/kills. Basically you're going to be cooldown swapping to clean cover and kill high value targets.

To accentuate the power of your gunners you're going to want to keep them in smoke if you can, deep smoke is better but of course level dependent. You should have 5+ smoke among your team in order to keep their defense up (you don't want them getting hit and losing suppress on a dangerous target)

The Shinobi is your forward tank. Once they have evasive they're almost invulnerable when hunkered down. I mean literally if you go right down the middle of the tree, at 7 tiles away from a friend, are hunked down and have evasive you can only be hit by an enemy that has >95 base aim. And i don't mean "can be grazed" i mean you can't even be grazed unless they're >95 aim. They can also take out high value targets because of their mobility due to their defense.

The sharpshooters kill 1 target/turn with DFA and stocks. Pick off dangerous targets and make sure your shinobi isn't flanked (as they will not have a good way to clear overwatch unless they have a line of low cover)

Tehnicals clear cover so that when the enemy advances into your gunners they don't have good places to take cover, so your sharpshooters can pick them off. They can also take forward positions with the flamethrower to get rid of high value targets.

Specialist medical protocol's anyone who gets significantly hurt(though most everyone should bring their own med kit or hazmat suit). Revival protocols units that get stunned/disabled. And aid protocol's units that are in dangerous positions.

Its eminently doable

I don't really have much of a problem with the 0% raids as they are right now because I can take 10 people, you would be surprised how fast you can clear pods with 2 - 3 grenadiers (again taking needle grenades to keep all loot/corpses).

My usual group is 2 - 3 Grenadiers (usually 3 in the early game when they still lack a lot of the perks), 2 gunners, a sharpshooter, a technical, a ranger, specialist, an assault and a shinobi (and if I only brought 2 grenadiers possibly another gunner or technical).

My problem is going to be when supply raids get nerfed and the max squad size goes down to 8. That will make low% supply raids very risky unless you can get enemy activity to heavy or lower (possibly even the first tier of Swarming at 33 but that is the maximum I would go on a low % raid with 8 people).

Supply raids need to be a little easier to detect, again I know we aren't supposed to be able to do all of them (and even in my campaign currently I still haven't been able to do every single one) but the way advent strength plays out you really need to be able to do more.
Goumindong
Posts: 193
Joined: Tue Jan 24, 2017 11:04 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Goumindong »

I agree that they need to be easier to detect. I proposed a solution in an other thread which I think works out pretty well. Just stating that I don't think dropping hints down to 8 will make all that much of a difference.
trihero
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Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by trihero »

I think xwynns subtly mentioned in one of his videos that they are increasing mission duration timers across the board, allowing for better infiltration timers and more varied size groups. That's not exactly the same thing as making them easier to detect, but still has a healthier outcome in general.
Goumindong
Posts: 193
Joined: Tue Jan 24, 2017 11:04 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Goumindong »

trihero wrote:I think xwynns subtly mentioned in one of his videos that they are increasing mission duration timers across the board, allowing for better infiltration timers and more varied size groups. That's not exactly the same thing as making them easier to detect, but still has a healthier outcome in general.
It's close enough. Mission detection possibility starts ticking as soon as a mission is spawned, so increasing the timer increases the probability to detect a mission for any given remaining timer. So long as they're not compensating with decreased detection probability.
Alketi
Posts: 159
Joined: Sat Jan 28, 2017 3:11 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Alketi »

How about we nerf 0% and ALSO make Supply Raids easier to detect???

The reason people are (allegedly) running them at 0% is because the infiltration timers are obscenely low and they're generally either at Heavy+ or Swarming levels.... What is the point of even detecting these at such ridiculous timers/levels???

BTW, here's a nice 0% supply raid by Perfidious Pete. His experience was exactly the same as mine. First move -- accidentally activate. 16+ enemies on the map. More coming in. WIPE. End of entire campaign.

Enjoy: https://youtu.be/8QVh8-QKRuU?t=41m56s

Lots of fun to be had by all.

Except Perfidious Pete didn't type console commands or save scum, and he wasn't playing with all sorts of ridiculous mods to make LW2 easier, he was playing LW2 "stock" and he just rebooted his entire campaign.

Yes, 0% supply raids suck but not for the reasons most are claiming.
Maebalzurakin
Posts: 44
Joined: Wed Feb 01, 2017 2:02 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Maebalzurakin »

If you can beat it at 0%, then you deserve the extra supplies.

If the problem is that 0% is not challenging enough and you breeze through it, then the solution is to change your difficulty setting. You don't need a patch to compensate for using cheese tactics.

https://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/ ... earchtext=

The above mod "All Pods Active" is pretty much a must for me in this game. I find it incomprehensible that pods would be inactive when their is a huge battle 50 feet away.

The only other change I would make is to add sectopod escorts to any supply raid under 50% infiltrated. I would also find a way to give all of their mechs and officers 'lifeform scanners' to uncover your shinobi spotters.
Sir_Dr_D
Posts: 84
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2017 2:28 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Sir_Dr_D »

The fact is I don't find supply 0%l hard, just tedious. I wish the enemies were just harder instead of more numerous. I do think on 0%

- The aliens are all ready for you and are wearing full body armor. (Extra Hp and damage reduction)

- All aliens start off activated in the mission.

- any XCOM invisible is immediately detected.

- among the enemy units that start off activated would be squadsite enabled defense turrets.

That last one should make low infiltration missions quite undesirable.

-------------
I like the concept of the all aliens activated mod. But I think it should be integrated in such a way that in only takes an effect in low infiltration missions. It is a way to make things harder without increasing the amount of enemies. Missions with lots of aliens just gets boring.
darkerevent
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Joined: Sat Mar 04, 2017 12:12 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by darkerevent »

Hmm... I'd sooner suggest making supply raids and troop columns into quick response missions (no infiltration) and balancing the rewards and enemy count suitably around that. If people already aren't infiltrating them, you might as well balance them around the fact and be done with it.

Besides, realistically speaking, what defensive perimeter are we even infiltrating past in these missions anyway? Especially on troop columns, which are explicitly stated to be cases of us jumping some group of saps that we know are currently separated from the rest of ADVENT's legions in the area?

As things stand, cutting the Supply Raid squad limit down to 8 as the solution (if that's the only thing that's done) is probably just going to mean I stick even harder to the tedious strategy that has worked for me in the past, which is to stack three DFA sharpshooters at a corner of the map and field an overly defensive+controlling frontline (e.g. overwatch medic specialist and two suppression gunners) that can stand in smoked full cover and keep the enemies distracted until the sharps kill them all.

In general, reducing the squad size still doesn't solve the core issues with low infiltration, which is that low infiltration = more corpses = more profit = better use of the frontline characters' wound timers, as long as you can handle clearing the mission somehow. It does mean that players will be forced into using even more tightly optimized squads to achieve the same result, which seems likely to reduce build variety. It might prompt me to build dedicated "We only do raids and ambushes" squads, instead of mixing and matching from my 10-person base assault teams.

Of course, I may salivate less for Enemy Materiel missions in general once smash and grab is implemented. We'll see.
Goumindong
Posts: 193
Joined: Tue Jan 24, 2017 11:04 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Goumindong »

Quick response is OK but a bit too easy. You lose no troop time doing them, and balancing them means that players will almost alway want to do any that pop up like current 0%

Better would be to swap the infiltration vale so that a low infiltration gives an easy mission (you strike before the enemy has had time to bring supplies in) while a long means it's hard.

This gives bonus value for infiltration as the faster your troops infiltrate the more safe advent feels and so the more supplies and troops they bring in.

Infiltrate too low and the mission doesn't have negative effects for advent, they immediately spawn an emergency resupply to have the same effect.
CasualGamer
Posts: 33
Joined: Wed Feb 15, 2017 8:51 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by CasualGamer »

Goumindong wrote:
Better would be to swap the infiltration vale so that a low infiltration gives an easy mission (you strike before the enemy has had time to bring supplies in) while a long means it's hard.
This really seems like the best way to deal with 0% infiltration issues - simply remove the primary reason for doing it.
Troops must be tied up, like 'normal' to get better rewards.
JulianSkies
Posts: 301
Joined: Thu Jan 19, 2017 12:17 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by JulianSkies »

You know, I like the idea of making troop movement and supply convoy quick reaction missions.
My favorite part of those missions is bringing a large squad against an outrageous number of enemies, reducing squad size removes one of my favorite parts of the mission. There simply isn't enough advent HQ missions to sathe my desire for this kind of combat.
Sorbicol
Posts: 14
Joined: Thu Feb 02, 2017 10:35 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Sorbicol »

In the late game, the only reason I am doing supply raid mission with low infiltration times is to try and get some of the rarer alien types to drop for research and item building purposes. I would gladly forgo any number of "advent trooper" corpses if I could get an andromedon or Archon to pitch up on one of those missions :(
Dwarfling
Posts: 524
Joined: Wed Jan 25, 2017 12:16 pm

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Dwarfling »

My current C/I campaign has a "as close to 100% infiltration possible" house rule on the Supply Raids and Troop Columns. Columns I seem to always get with good infiltration times with 4 rebels on Intel. Supply Raids are a mixed bag: about a third that show up have impossible times to meet the house rule, others I got to boost to get 5 people in and on the rest got decent time.
Sir_Dr_D
Posts: 84
Joined: Sat Feb 11, 2017 2:28 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by Sir_Dr_D »

Supply raids that you can do at %100 are actually a lot of fun.
bountygiver
Posts: 74
Joined: Mon Feb 27, 2017 3:33 am

Re: So 0%/low% supply raids are getting nerfed....

Post by bountygiver »

trihero wrote:I think xwynns subtly mentioned in one of his videos that they are increasing mission duration timers across the board, allowing for better infiltration timers and more varied size groups. That's not exactly the same thing as making them easier to detect, but still has a healthier outcome in general.
that's an ok way to balance, as the detection formula is not linear and a lot harder to balance, but increasing mission duration will just add a flat amount of time to infiltrate which is far easier to mess the values with.

What I'd like to see is also maybe adding more infiltration boosts, 1 boost that adds retroactively but cost a lot of intel and a repeatable non retroactive one would be nice, so you use the non retroactive boost if you really want to do some missions (RNG can still cause missions to have low expiration time, but this will not make it impossible to do as long as you have excess intel) and only use the retroactive one on emergencies.
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