1.2 General feedback after a few hundred hours of play on veteran

[Autoclave]

Hi, this is my honest opinion on Long War 2 experience on veteran difficulty. I will try to not repeat stuff that I am aware that has been discussed in other threads.

The Long War 2 is greater then the sum of its individual parts. I like when the mod adds new mechanics and different parts of it connect with each other. For example infiltration mechanics and the perks that decrease infiltration: Tradecraft, Infiltration boost, chameleon suit and so on. Without these interconnected mechanics the game would never be as fun.

Here is my main message to you, the developers:
You are not making a game. You are making an experience. It doesn't matter how sophisticated or convoluted the underlying gaming system is if the player is not aware of the available gameplay choices. You might be tempted to push for things that are your genuine designer vision, but please, never disconnect yourself from the player empathy. You might just end up wasting effort on something that will simply not be appreciated.

Strategic layer
Overall I see a solid foundation here. However, a lot of stuff is obscured from the player. Conveying information about what is happenning and what choices we actually have is key. I am ok with doing some homework and reading wikipedia, but some of the stuff simply needs to be in the game. If the mechanic is too convoluted that you find it difficult to explain to the player in a few sentences than you probably need to improve something.

What does exactly "Find a Lead" mean? A lead for what? Advent activity in the zone? A lead for advent HQ whereabouts? Lead for Alien research?

The way how Dark Events currently work has been discussed to death already. I am not going to argue here with more experienced folks, but I will politely ask you not to confuse players. Tactical doesn't exactly imply permanent on the first glance for a new player.

My other gripe is with your decision to make this % number of enemies upgrade adoption system. X% number of stunlancers will get lightning reflexes. But there is no status window in Xcom2. I cannot see what individual perks each alien will have. Modding shows me some basic stuff like aim/mobility/crit ugprade but no individual perks. So you want me to keep guessing? This is the sort of unknown randomness that is simply not fun. Either all have the upgrade, or let the player know exactly what is he/she dealing with.

The missions to prevent data leaks (pre-retaliations) are rarely worth the effort to fight them. They usually spawn with a very short expiration timer. You will have less of an uphill battle doing the retaliation itself than doing an underinfiltrated data leak. Regardless it's a nice warning that something is coming, I usually remove my engineer/scientist from heaven advisory once I see these.

I would like to pinpoint your attention on overabundance of discount/bonus resources continent bonuses. These are boring. I am never excited when I see stuff like 20% black market discount or cheaper recruits. Give us some more functional diversity please, not just % discounts.

Tactical Layer
First of all I enjoy this PCS merging bug. Why not make it a feature? Soldiers have a base chance to "learn" a PCS after each mission. You could go as far create perks similar to field surgeon that increase the squad chance to "learn" the installed PCS. There is room for fun stuff here. Kudos for all the extra PCS you've added. I like most of them.

XCOM: The pod activation game
This is big. This issue, inherent to XCOM1/2, is exacerbated to new heights in Long War 2. Pretty much the entire outcome of any engagement is determined by how and when you activate a pod. The first turn advantage in XCOM is devastating. While in vanilla the smaller pod size allowed for some margin of error, in LW 2 this is a death sentence. The yellow alert aliens converging towards your position limits your movement to a complete halt. Once you engage a pod, you *cannot* advance into fog of war by a single meter.

I don't like the fog of war graphics in xcom2. It's often not very obvious which square is visible and which is within fog. Playing this activation game, where you have to guess what line of sight will open with a blue move is pain.

It's a very frustrating experience because it limits the available tools to engage the enemy. You are better off using classes and perks that can deal with cover either by destroying it or overcompensating with aim. Flanking is a no-no on missions above light enemy activity.

This experience is so aggravating that a scouting shinobi is pretty much mandatory. Discovering pods with your non-concealed squad members is a sure way to get yourself injured at very least. Can you look into ways to improve this part of the tactical game? I don't think the scouting part of XCOM is good enough. May be we need the scouting grenades remain active for a few turns. Keep the fog of war to block squad sighting, but let them warn us of incoming threat. Allow them to benefit of all the grenadier perks.

My opinion about classes:

Shinobi. Right off the bat, I went and changed localization files and renamed "Shinobi" to "Recon". Sorry Pavonis, "Shinobi" is cringeworthy. The class is pretty much mandatory for any type of mission except for defense retaliations. Balance wise the class it's ok for me as I don't spam stealth 1-2 soldiers stealth missions (just a personal preference how I prefer to play). As I said, pod scouting and activation is more important than combat.

Perks I don't like for Shinobi: Infighter, Coup de grace, Serial. Infighter is waste of perk slot how crazy situational it is. And it's just not fun. Replace it with gunner's combatives. Coup de grace should not be a separate ability. Make it a passive so it works with fleche. Serial needs some help from AWC to work. I don't think Shinobi has enough tools to make Serial worth it.

Assaults. This is my #1 "What the hell do I do with you now" class. It looks like a class that doesn't belong in the world of Long War 2 where flanking = more active pods. It's a shotgun class, and there is no point in trying to make it a rifle class because ranger would do the same job better. So I am stuck with a shotgun but I cannot advance into fog of war with it. What purpose to you want the assaults to serve?

Here is an idea for you: Make the assaults be your frontline defense class. It should protect you against lancers, sidewinders, chryssalids and berserkers. But here is the problem: lightning reflexes and shadowstep. Give either the assaults a perk or the shotguns a special feature that ignores lightning reflexes or shadowstep. Moving into melee range of a shotgun class should be something very risky for everyone, human or alien. With a perk like this you could make MK1 lancers/sidewinders/chryssalids stronger by giving them lightning/shadowstep perk without the dark event.

Good job at adding the slug shot for Assault, but we need something more. How about a perk that allows us to overwatch with arc thrower?

Technicians. Make them an EXO suit exclusive class. Lets be frank here. The gauntlet alone doesn't belong in the world of X-Com. It's a small wrist mounted device that unleashes hell and doom. Really? Look at the opportunities that open with this change. You could make an entire technician perk tree focused on the exo skeleton: jump boots, temporary speed boost, loot magnet, personal evac system (without needing a flare). Jeeez.. the possibilities are endless.

Sharpshooters are fine but snapshot needs some more flavor. Currently it doesn't really bring something important/unique enough to warrant a spot in my team. You already have weapon specific perks, how about armor specific perks? I would kill for 1 turn cooldown grappling hook for spider armor upgrade. Snapshotters would benefit a lot from it.

Oh, and why does snapshot have to deal with 2 AP Precision Shot, Kubikuri? Why are all the sniper AWC perks require 2 AP for other classes? I got a shinobi with kubikuri, wow amazing i thought! Good luck using that when it uses 2 AP. And let's all give some attention to the elefant in the room: Killzone. For a master sergeant perk it's crazy situational for you to have 2 AP to use it. Gunners are better off using saturation fire. Rangers are better off using Rapid reaction.

Gunnersare OK. My only gripe with them are the multiple functionally overlapping skills. Demolition vs Hail of Bullets. Traverse Fire + Chain Shot vs Cyclic Fire. Chain shot vs Rapid fire. One of these perks should be replaced, changed. It needs something more unique.
Cyclic fire just doesn't feel a functionally unique ability.

Specialists. Why is scouting protocol so high up in specialist tree? What purpose does it serve by limiting the access to it? The medic tree is already very situational. Move it in place of the perk that improves medikit healing.

Psi-Ops. Why are you making your life so difficult with Psi-ops balancing? The solution is on the surface. You already have basic abilities and upgraded abilities. Make the basic abilities obtainable regularly in combat just like other classes and the upgraded abilities obtainable only in the tube. It's a similar system to AWC for the rest of the classes. No need to make your system more convoluted.

Your AWC is good. However i will continue to mod revealing the hidden perks because i like planning my soldier perks.

Thanks for your effort at reading all this. I hope it was at least somewhat useful to you.

[chrisb]

Shinobi. Right off the bat, I went and changed localization files and renamed "Shinobi" to "Recon". Sorry Pavonis, "Shinobi" is cringeworthy. The class is pretty much mandatory for any type of mission except for defense retaliations. Balance wise the class it's ok for me as I don't spam stealth 1-2 soldiers stealth missions (just a personal preference how I prefer to play). As I said, pod scouting and activation is more important than combat.

I have actually started replacing my "Recon" (I like the name, I called mine CheeseDoodles) with Phantom Sharpshooters. They're more useful in that they buff aim/crit/dmg. And I don't really miss Ghostwalker/Covert/SMG that much. I typically only use them for certain stealth ops or the network tower to turn on easy mode.

Assaults. This is my #1 "What the hell do I do with you now" class. It looks like a class that doesn't belong in the world of Long War 2 where flanking = more active pods. It's a shotgun class, and there is no point in trying to make it a rifle class because ranger would do the same job better. So I am stuck with a shotgun but I cannot advance into fog of war with it. What purpose to you want the assaults to serve?

This really depends on the mission type. I think the thing I've learned most so far, is that not every class is equally valuable on every mission. Instead of taking a varied approach to squads (one-of-each style), I've started stacking certain classes on certain missions. Assaults I use for the network tower, destroy alien relay, and really most timed mission Light or less. A 5 man squad of assaults can be quite devastating. They also work really well as Haven Advisors, especially if you stick to the Breacher (right side of the tree). During a retal they can easily hold their own. Typically they get the pick of high mobility.

Gunnersare OK. My only gripe with them are the multiple functionally overlapping skills. Demolition vs Hail of Bullets. Traverse Fire + Chain Shot vs Cyclic Fire. Chain shot vs Rapid fire. One of these perks should be replaced, changed. It needs something more unique.
Cyclic fire just doesn't feel a functionally unique ability.

I wouldn't say Demolition overlaps Hail of Bullets, but I guess it depends on how your using them. I typically use Demolition as more of an opener to knock off high cover from high priority targets. Hail of Bullets, while a guaranteed hit, often doesn't do enough damage to kill. So I use it more as a finisher.

There is a lot of overlap in functionality, but it is the gunners job to shoot things. Plus you have options to go for better reaction fire, wider supression or more defense. But I wouldn't be opposed to a bit more variety for Gunners.

[marceror]

I'm finding assaults to be extremely useful in my campaign, and currently my soldier with the highest kill count is an assault. Using them with Shinobis to spot is obviously important, but in general you have to wait for the correct moments to employ them. A well placed trench gun shot or street cleaner, or both in a single mission can absolutely turn the tide in your favor. But, if you run them off on the first turn of battle to take such shots you're likely going to be in trouble.

[JulianSkies]

To note, on your question of knowing what tactical DEs are active on each individual enemy. See the two green chevrons on the enemy that show they have a buff? Know how they show each buff of you hover over them? That's where the info you want is. Base game literally lacks a better tool to convey that information, so PI used it.

[Drogmyre]

I really hate the early game stealth missions.

I shouldn't be penalized this heavily for going loud to deal with annoying patrols which prevent me from making the timer if I engage.

Oh look I missed my 65% flank shots, and now it's the enemy turn. Oh look, yellow alert pod. Oh look, they hit me. Oh look, a soldier died. Oh look, I missed again, oh look squadwipe.

I don't like being completely helpless. I don't like being forced to flashbang literally everything on the map if I want to survive without having my squad get mindcontrolled to death or shot in the face a billion times at 10% accuracy.

Once you hit May or so, the game becomes amazing. You have so many tools to deal with contact, there's fewer stealth missions and more supply raids and troop columns. RNG becomes a negligible factor, your choices matter more than anything else.

But I can't stand the early game for the same reason I hated it in Vanilla, it's fucking boring to sit in concealment and pray to RNGsus that you don't get unlucky when turning a corner, or when you're forced to go loud, or any of a dozen other terrible early game scenarios.

In the first Long War you had some of these problems, but there were a lot more ways to mitigate it. You literally could just grenade everything with impunity if you so chose. You could send out suicide SHIVs to tank for your low ranking troops. You had lots of options.

In Long War 2, early game, you stealth as much as possible, then you go loud, take your shots, take your flanks, throw your nades, flashbang the enemy...

And pray.

And not being able to do anything if the above 4 options don't work and you get unlucky feels really bad.

[Jacke]

I really hate the early game stealth missions.

I shouldn't be penalized this heavily for going loud to deal with annoying patrols which prevent me from making the timer if I engage.

Oh look I missed my 65% flank shots, and now it's the enemy turn. Oh look, yellow alert pod. Oh look, they hit me. Oh look, a soldier died. Oh look, I missed again, oh look squadwipe.

While it will be argued that XCOM is working from a position of weakness and needs to focus on being more stealthy in its operations, I can understand your frustration. I have similar irritations with LW2 as it is. Some of those I deal with using mods.

For your case, I'd suggest you try out the mod Peek From Concealment. It makes some of the silly concealment busting situations not do so. As well, if you want to make it a bit easier to take out more troops and have better infiltration times, I suggest trying An Easier War: Infiltration. And if you want to make timers really only run when you break concealment, you can try True Concealment for LW2.

[Drogmyre]

While it will be argued that XCOM is working from a position of weakness and needs to focus on being more stealthy in its operations, I can understand your frustration. I have similar irritations with LW2 as it is. Some of those I deal with using mods.

For your case, I'd suggest you try out the mod Peek From Concealment. It makes some of the silly concealment busting situations not do so. As well, if you want to make it a bit easier to take out more troops and have better infiltration times, I suggest trying An Easier War: Infiltration. And if you want to make timers really only run when you break concealment, you can try True Concealment for LW2.

It's not that enemies are hard, it's that the early game is still too RNG dependent in a lot of scenarios.

Not saying you can't mitigate it, or that it's impossible, or anything like that. I look at my own play and analyze it, and I see different lines of play I could take.

The problem is that when your current line of play doesn't work out, and that happens eventually in XCOM as it should, you really don't have the options in the early game to deal with certain mechanics if the AI isn't cooperating.

Flashbangs are the only really useful way of dealing with this kind of stuff, but the thing about stealth missions is that you're always on the clock and you can't get bogged down in 2-3 turn fights, and this is exacerbated by yellow alert pulling in more pods and bogging you down more.

Once you've got a few corporals, you don't even need lasers, this changes. With even LCpls you have ways of dealing with enemy units, slug shot the drones or combat protocol, lock the enemies down with suppression or walk fire and shoot them through cover, rapid deploy flashbangs or smokes and protect your squad or rain fire down with Needle Grenades and blow them to smithereens.

These are just examples, and I know the really early game isn't exactly the focus on balancing right now.

Something that might help is having Battle Scanners early on, as a way to check around blind corners and set up an ambush but still be able to move stealthily and plan ahead. The lack of information on the tac layer is something that really bothers me, and just knowing what I'll be up against or what ADVENT units are in Yellow Alert range is very helpful information.

For example, if I had a battle scanner on the last mission I did, I'd know that there's a sectoid, officer, and 2 drones within 15 tiles of the Officer-3 trooper pod I need to maneuver around. With that information, I can say 'well let's not ambush this pod just yet, let's wait a turn and see if we can't sneak by them or set up an ambush outside of the Sectoid's yellow alert range.'

But because I'm blind, and I don't have the ability to scout ahead efficiently because of the ridiculous amount of blind corners in ADVENT city maps, I had no way of knowing that the Officer pod would pull every enemy on the map, and because the Officer was the pod guarding the objective, I had to take them out or else I'd lose the mission due to the timer.

It's a combination of factors that lead to a massive CF of a mission, and upon further review there was a lot I could have changed, but none of it was possible because I had no way of knowing at the time what would happen.

Lack of information kills the stealth game. LW1 had battle scanners available for Squaddies, it was something I always brought, same with Motion Trackers. With accurate information, you can make informed decisions on how to play around pod activation, which mitigates the RNG that comes along with early game firefights and allows you to maximize your odds of success.

Sorry for the long rant, these are just opinions from my experience with the early game's stealth missions and they've frustrated me a lot. The midgame is SO MUCH FUN, but getting there is such a slog.

[Autoclave]

I don't really understand why battlescanners have been moved to proving grounds. It was perfectly fine in vanilla. Again same reluctance can be seen with with specialist's scannit protocol. Why move it two tiers later into gunnery seargeant? Don't we have too much shinobi in the game anyway?

[Jacke]

It's not that enemies are hard, it's that the early game is still too RNG dependent in a lot of scenarios.

I agree with you. That's why I'm suggesting using those 3 mods: Peek From Concealment, An Easier War: Infiltration, and True Concealment for LW2. Between them, you should be able to get your troops trained up in stealth missions that you can finish off with some fighting. I'd also suggest Extract Corpses to solve some of the supply shortages at the start.

But that doesn't preclude all the RNG that can destroy a mission and derail a campaign, as I'm mentioning in the topic on Recruitment (and other) Raids. There it doesn't seem to be open to anything except in many cases your rebels are going to take a beating and in some cases your Advisors are going to just be lost. There's also the Extract VIP from ADVENT City missions, which become close to impossible later on. I currently run 3 Shinobi to escort out the VIP and even with Command and Oscar Mike it's touch-and-go to whether I can succeed.