Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

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EsoxGreen
Posts: 9
Joined: Thu Apr 13, 2017 1:12 am

Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by EsoxGreen »

I noticed that many people on the forums and reddit skip supply raids altogether. I had to skip most of them too when I played 1.3/1.4. (I had to revert to 1.2 due to cover bug popping up way too often.) I think that making supply raids undoable (or doable only with 4-6 men vs. ~20 aliens) is a wrong decision simply because this effectively cuts content and decreases variety of missions in the game.

In 1.3/1.4 you have three options when it comes to supply raids:

1) Low-infiltrate them with 8 men. But the aliens are so overpowered it is not even fun. I am talking not about the command pod (which I think is a great idea and I would love to see more mini-bosses on more missions), but detection radius and yellow alert. I managed to 0% a Supply Raid in March with Cpl's and a few Sergeants and 10+ restarts. My stealth Shinobi was useless because alien's detection radius = vision radius. Almost all aliens had almost 100% chance to do a yellow action. Consider the fact that pods are packed together around your spawn point despite the huge map it was a nightmare. In short 0% a Raid in 1.3/1.4 is unfairly unfun.

2) High-infiltrate with 4-6 men. Then it is a regular Guerilla Op without a timer. Not much different from regular missions. What's the fun?

3) Skip it. Then what's the point of having this mission in the game at all?

I understand the argument that they were breaking the economy as in 1.2 due to over-supply of corpses and no time commitment for infiltration. But there are much easier solutions for that. Lower the price of corpses on the black market or make research require more corpses. Require 100% infiltration BUT do give 10+ days timer etc.

As of right now 10 XCOM vs 50+ aliens showdowns are very very rare, yet are some of the most enjoyable missions in the game.

TL;DR: Now you either skip Supply Raids or infiltrate them with 5-6 men which makes them the same as any other Guerrilla Op. This decreases variety of missions. Bring them back to have epic showdowns with 50+ aliens.
Thrombozyt
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Thrombozyt »

If you set it up properly, you can do supply raids with 7-8 men on a regular basis later in the game. It's not that unlikely to detect them at around 5 days infiltration timer, which is 7.5 with a boost which allows you - if you have at least one GTS upgrade - to bring 7-8 men and still reach 100%.
LordYanaek
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by LordYanaek »

EsoxGreen wrote:2) High-infiltrate with 4-6 men. Then it is a regular Guerilla Op without a timer. Not much different from regular missions. What's the fun?
No timer = extremely different from a regular G. Op.

4) Only attempt a few of them when they have a good infiltration timer which is what i did in this run. I still managed to get a bunch of those, just less than i would have had in 1.2 if i had kept doing 0% till the end (which i stopped at a point as it wasn't even fun anymore)
I understand the argument that they were breaking the economy as in 1.2 due to over-supply of corpses and no time commitment for infiltration. But there are much easier solutions for that. Lower the price of corpses on the black market or make research require more corpses.
That would only solve half of the issue. The other half of the issue, having a barracks filled with MSgts in no time would still be present with all of those options.
Require 100% infiltration BUT do give 10+ days timer etc.
Now, that's an interesting one and i think it would be much better if supply raids were detected less frequently but those you detect would have a good infiltration timer. Being spammed by pop-ups showing missions you can't possibly attempt is somewhat frustrating (and the screen clutter once you have a lot of regions is extremely annoying). I would really like to have an option to not display any mission with less than a given number of days (with a parameter to set that number of days based on mission type so you could still display 3 days hack missions that you can stealth but not 3 days supply raids you can't possibly try to complete).
Unfortunately this would probably be a lot of work for little actual benefit as you can already just ignore those missions yourself, but in games the psychological impact of a feature is probably as important, if not more, than the feature itself and seeing all those missions you can't take can be annoying.
As of right now 10 XCOM vs 50+ aliens showdowns are very very rare, yet are some of the most enjoyable missions in the game.
That's called an HQ assault and those don't have to be rare. Try to liberate more regions, it's very useful in a variety of ways.
TL;DR: Now you either skip Supply Raids or infiltrate them with 5-6 men which makes them the same as any other Guerrilla Op. This decreases variety of missions. Bring them back to have epic showdowns with 50+ aliens.
I really wish Supply Raids were very rare but closer to the old 0% raids feel than the "slightly bigger troop column in the wilderness" they are currently (especially since map type doesn't really change how you play, just the look of the map) but saying that 1.3 decreased the variety of missions is 1000% unfair! 1.2 had 2 missions : 3 men stealth op and 10 men fights. 1.3/1.4 have options for 2-10 men depending on mission type, infiltration timer, squad composition. The variety of missions is better than it was ever in XCOM2 or LW2 so while there might still be room for improvement, the developers' progress was considerable ;)
Psieye
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Psieye »

EsoxGreen wrote:As of right now 10 XCOM vs 50+ aliens showdowns are very very rare, yet are some of the most enjoyable missions in the game.

Bring them back to have epic showdowns with 50+ aliens.
These are really easy to generate: infiltrate to about 25% on some Str 1 GOp and you have what you want. Can't handle epic showdowns with a timer on your back? Then do HQ missions - under-infiltrated 8-man GOps will let you trailblaze through liberation chains.

Your fixes are based around one assumption: that everyone finds it fun to do supply raids and therefore it's no problem making them a requirement. I can kinda understand why people are scared of doing 8-man GOps but if you want variety and you're not on Ironman, what is holding you back?
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nmkaplan
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by nmkaplan »

EsoxGreen wrote:In short 0% a Raid in 1.3/1.4 is unfairly unfun.
I agree that 10v50 slugfests are fun (I love HQ fights), and I agree with your assessment that 0% supply raids are unfun in 1.4. What you appear to have lost sight of was the almost universal agreement that 0% supply raids in 1.2 completely and utterly broke the game's economy.

Supply raids that are doable at normal infiltration are *supposed* to be a rare treat rather than something you do all the time. Anything else breaks the game's economy because of how valuable these missions are.

It seems like you enjoyed these missions in 1.2, and it's too bad that the game was changed to scale back on your favorite mission style. But overall it's really difficult to argue that it wasn't a good thing for the game as a whole.
Clibanarius
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Clibanarius »

My hope is that they'll implement a slightly longer spawn timer for supply line raids that move troops so that we can catch just a few more of them per campaign in 1.5, given that the harder difficulties will only get you a 50% chance at killing a legion with each ambush now.
Dlareh
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Dlareh »

If you enjoyed playing the old 0% Supply Raids, consider deliberately running some 0% Smash and Grabs once in awhile, especially near the start of a campaign.

Remember if you kill at least half the number of enemies that were on the map at mission start (this half number can be partially made up of reinforcements), you'll get half the normal mission XP if you fail the mission objectives, so it can still be a great way to give your soldiers extra training (due to the 0 infiltration time in-between other missions). And of course if you're also able to retrieve at least one of the caches (which won't be doable all the time), you'll get full mission XP.

You can also use "Get Advent's Attention" mission as 0% missions where you kill half the enemies and evac. Vigilance won't spike for failed missions.
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EsoxGreen
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by EsoxGreen »

LordYanaek wrote:but saying that 1.3 decreased the variety of missions is 1000% unfair! 1.2 had 2 missions : 3 men stealth op and 10 men fights. 1.3/1.4 have options for 2-10 men depending on mission type, infiltration timer, squad composition. The variety of missions is better than it was ever in XCOM2 or LW2 so while there might still be room for improvement, the developers' progress was considerable ;)
I wasn't saying 1.3 decreased mission variety overall. Smash'n'Grab alone is very enjoyable and a great addition. But if Supply Raids were untouched, we would have even more playable mission types!

I don't understand why people say that 1.2 it was either 3-men stealth ops or 10-men fights. In 1.2 I had all rebels on intel in un-liberated regions and could regularly send 4-5 men squads. Of course, I could have cheesed the missions with 1-3 people too, but it would be more risky and less fun too. If people stealth-cheese every mission given good timers just because they can and then complain about it...
LordYanaek wrote:That's called an HQ assault and those don't have to be rare. Try to liberate more regions, it's very useful in a variety of ways.
There are 16 (?) regions, so max 16 HQ assaults in the whole game (unless you deliberately fail invasions).
LordYanaek wrote:The other half of the issue, having a barracks filled with MSgts in no time would still be present with all of those options.
I think it is more related to the number of missions you run. Isn't the XP tied to missions and not kills? I try to do most missions and have 8-10 MSgt by early June no matter how many Supply Raids I do. But overall I agree that levelling up should be slower.
Psieye wrote:Your fixes are based around one assumption: that everyone finds it fun to do supply raids and therefore it's no problem making them a requirement.
They weren't really a requirement in 1.2. You could skip them just fine.
Psieye wrote:Supply raids that are doable at normal infiltration are *supposed* to be a rare treat rather than something you do all the time. Anything else breaks the game's economy because of how valuable these missions are.
In fact I would be fine if they pay peanuts so that people don't feel obligated to do them, but do provide fun engagements. I think it is much easier to adjust the rewards than change how the whole mission plays out, no?

For fixing economy effects of supply raids - let every corpse drop with a fixed % chance. The law of large numbers should kick in anyway at some point and you will have your corpses for research without breaking the economy.
Thrombozyt
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Thrombozyt »

In yesterday's session my rebels detected two supply raids with more than 6 days to infiltrate. The key here is to have 13 rebels on intel + radio tower + scientist in multiple regions. For the last 5 game months (currently January) I have consistently completed two supply raids per month with a 4days+ timer.

Even on a 4 day something timer you can bring 8 people and infiltrate to 70-90%. That will give you a challenging fight and it's quite reasonable to have.
Exquisitor
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Exquisitor »

I'm in agreement with Green Pike. I liked the old supply raids. I'd usually attempt them at >40%. I've run two of them in 1.4 and it just didn't seem very fun. Maybe it was because I had ballistics and was facing down the command squad with seriously under-powered troops. Seems like these should have an easier detection schedule, after all, it's hard to hide the movement of troops and supplies...
Psieye
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by Psieye »

Supply raids are fine as is - they're hard to cheese in the earlygame, but once you have some midgame tools and skills at your disposal you can do them like old times.
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WanWhiteWolf
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Re: Can we have (old) Supply Raids back?

Post by WanWhiteWolf »

I think supply raids are useless content at this point.

It depends on difficulty, of course, but on Legend it's not worth trading the intelligence boost to do this mission. Without boost, you are not doing it (or you go with like 3 people).

Yes, if you are 1 year in the campaign with 13 rebels, half of them upgraded + scientist + tower, you can do them without boosting. Otherwise, they are wasted content as doing them is a strategical mistake.

I am not saying the old ones where good. But they got nerfed to the point of non-usage. They have to buff their detection rate / timer. They can put a hardcap to 75% infiltration if they are concerned on under-infiltrating them.
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