23 enemies RNF in a single turn

[WanWhiteWolf]

I know retaliations cannot be won. As in, best case, you save half of the rebels.

But Heaven defense seems seems pretty unbalanced. I just had a mission where 23 enemies spawned in single turn. To be clear: I had one viper with 1 hp burning when I ended the turn. I was surrounded by 23 enemies at the beginning of next turn.

Is it possible to disable this mission type? I think I will skip this one for the next campaign and be happy with the classic retaliation.

[justdont]

In all cases of full retaliations, you're on a very tight timer, and it's always a question of how much you can protract the action to save some more rebels. So yes, at some turn it'll come to huge clumps of RNFs. So what?

[tracktwo]

There are a couple of bugs in the defend and supply convoy missions in 1.3 and 1.4. We have fixed them for 1.5. First the missions were using the wrong reinforcement schedules - they use the standard timed reinforcement schedules instead of the specific ones defined for these missions. The timed ones typically start off easier but get much more difficult much faster than the schedules for missions with regular RNFs which start off a little harder but don't ramp up nearly as quickly. A different bug also caused these missions to start deeper in the schedule than intended, so not only were you on the harder schedule it was skipping the easier first entries altogether. So combined, defends are (accidentally) much more difficult than they were in 1.2.

Unfortunately there is no easy workaround in 1.4 for the incorrect schedule without severely nerfing the regular RNF schedules, but you can fix the incorrect offset with an ini edit.

In XComLW_Overhaul.ini search for MISSION_REINFORCEMENT_MODIFIERS and add the following below the existing entries:

Code: Select all

+MISSION_REINFORCEMENT_MODIFIERS=(MissionType=SupplyConvoy_LW,			BucketModifier=0.0, ReinforcementsCap=-1, QueueOffset=0, ReinforcementsTrigger=eReinforcementsTrigger_MissionStart)
+MISSION_REINFORCEMENT_MODIFIERS=(MissionType=Defend_LW,			BucketModifier=0.0, ReinforcementsCap=-1, QueueOffset=0, ReinforcementsTrigger=eReinforcementsTrigger_MissionStart)

The bug there is that it wasn't finding entries for these mission types and was incorrectly using the last entry, which has a queue offset of 3.

This change will make defends/supply convoys a bit easier, but the reinforcements will still be on the wrong schedule and ramp up differently than expected.

[Exquisitor]

This explains the issues I've been having with the "rescue the resistance workers" haven missions. I recently had one mission where the second, third and fourth reinforcements were pods of 8 and by pods of 8, I mean not trivial advent soldiers, but 8 aliens (mutons, sneks, and sectoids). The first set of reinforcements were out of LOS so I didn't see their number, but there were at least 4-6 (mutons, sectoid, sneks). Advent strength was 3 or 4 in this region, playing in late October if I recall correctly. It was challenging to say the least. This really should be fixed as they're great "training" missions at low force levels.

I also had a recent "rescue the prisoners" mission where the first wave of reinforcements consisted of three mecs (one heavy and one armored longbow) and a sectopod! Thankfully I was on the evac site for that one. I think that one had an advent strength of 8 so I was deserving of some backlash.

[llll BlackFlag]

Something similar happened to me today as well. On legend a 3 strength region triggers a recruitment retaliation (emergency evac mission) which is very light. Immediately after my first turn reinforcements drop and 3 other pods trigger activating 11 enemies. It's unwinnable, it feels like moderate or moderate-heavy to have 11 enemies on the very first turn. This is my first legend playthrough so I'm not sure how normal this is. Are recruitment retaliations something I should avoid like the plague?

[WanWhiteWolf]

In all cases of full retaliations, you're on a very tight timer, and it's always a question of how much you can protract the action to save some more rebels. So yes, at some turn it'll come to huge clumps of RNFs. So what?

I am not talking about a normal full retaliation where you fight 20-25 enemies on a tight schedule - mission has no RNF but you have to trigger pods as soon as possible to keep them from killing rebels. That mission is fine - somewhat -. You cannot save many rebels but you can do the mission without casualties.

I am talking about the Heaven Defense type of retaliation where a pod drops each turn. On turn 5 , 23 enemies drop. On turn 6, another 23 enemies drop. By enemies I mean muton elites , superheavy MECS , Andromedpm ...etc. If you don't see a problem with this "design", then I invite you to show me a strategy that doesn't end up in full squadwipe of your "A" team.

Something similar happened to me today as well. On legend a 3 strength region triggers a recruitment retaliation (emergency evac mission) which is very light. Immediately after my first turn reinforcements drop and 3 other pods trigger activating 11 enemies. It's unwinnable, it feels like moderate or moderate-heavy to have 11 enemies on the very first turn. This is my first legend playthrough so I'm not sure how normal this is. Are recruitment retaliations something I should avoid like the plague?

Multiple activation is usually lack of shinoby and//or bad luck. This is not what I was complaining. In my case 23 enemies were spawned as a drop pod from "Reinforcement incomming".

Not much scouting you can do about that.