Is Mind Control supposed to take you out of cover?

[sacho]

The last few times one of my soldiers has been mind controlled, they were considered out of cover by all enemy aliens. Is this new to 1.3 and intended?

[nmkaplan]

Are you sure they were considered out of cover (ie. not being given the cover defense bonus)?

Or are you just assuming that because the soldier pawn animation changed? I noticed this while diving into 1.3 last night that mind controlled soldiers tend to "stand up" out of cover. I think this is just the "I'm flanked!" animation, since MC'd soldiers will often be "flanked" by their teammates. It doesn't necessarily mean that the cover defense bonus is not being applied to enemies it has cover from.

[8wayz]

It would help if you can provide a bit more details what exactly is happening on your end.

In general once a unit changes side, it will no longer have any cover for its new squadmates. Case in point, when you Mind Control an Alien/Advent unit, you can shoot at it without fearing that cover will help them. All innate defence boni still apply.

After the unit gets back to its old side, it should again have cover against the enemy side.

When exactly are you seeing the lack of cover? During the Mind Control or afterwards?

[sacho]

Are you sure they were considered out of cover (ie. not being given the cover defense bonus)?

Or are you just assuming that because the soldier pawn animation changed? I noticed this while diving into 1.3 last night that mind controlled soldiers tend to "stand up" out of cover. I think this is just the "I'm flanked!" animation, since MC'd soldiers will often be "flanked" by their teammates. It doesn't necessarily mean that the cover defense bonus is not being applied to enemies it has cover from.

Well, it's hard to be sure. I have perfect information and gotcha, the soldier's cover icon changes to yellow once mind controlled and all the shots at him have accuracy displayed as if he is out of cover. I don't really have a high sampling of data(4 MCs), but 2 of them were crits.

In general once a unit changes side, it will no longer have any cover for its new squadmates. Case in point, when you Mind Control an Alien/Advent unit, you can shoot at it without fearing that cover will help them. All innate defence boni still apply.

When exactly are you seeing the lack of cover? During the Mind Control or afterwards?

Sectoid mind controls soldier in high cover, two advent shoot at now "exposed" soldier. This is weird, I didn't know it was the intended behavior! I don't recall this being the case in 1.2, but maybe I'm misremembering?(it's been a while since I played). I only remember sectoid mind control as being a minor nuisance. Maybe in 1.2 the AI avoided shooting at the MCed soldier?

[8wayz]

As far as I know this has been the case since the original Xcom 2 - you do not have cover against your squadmates.

However the AI seems to be wiser now - they use more often their psionic powers and try to flank you if possible. And give a lot more priority to flanked targets.

In hindsight, this is a good thing, since the player could hack/Mind Control enemy units and then kill them at their leisure. It makes sense for the AI to try and benefit from this as well.

[JM01]

The last few times one of my soldiers has been mind controlled, they were considered out of cover by all enemy aliens. Is this new to 1.3 and intended?

As far as I know this has been the case since vanilla (I know it has been the case for Long War 2 since its inception). When your unit is mind controlled they are treated as a unit that cannot take cover (from any direction, even if they were already behind cover before being mind controlled). This makes sectoids super dangerous and you should always keep a way to disorient them.

Though it may suck, thematically, it makes sense. Don't let a sectoid go uncontrolled.