Last on in July, wonder what happened

[Jacke]

I last read the LW2 forums here back in July, so I'm behind the times and wanting to catch up.

I tracked down a deal for WotC but right now I'm not finding playing time for XCOM 2 in either LW2 or WotC form.

I did read a bit and see that XCOM 2 can be run without WotC and that's how LW2 (now with v1.5 released) can still be played. There's been no public announcement of any LW2 version to work with WotC. There's a strong unofficial suspicion that there may be a LW2 for WotC in a year or more to extend WotC sales.

So, beyond that.... How is LW2 v1.5? How is WotC? What do those who've played both think of them?

[Doctor Sticks]

WotC is pretty good, much better than Vanilla. New classes are cool , and not really that OP, unlike some ppl think. The Chosen make for a fun distraction.

Considering how Lw elevated vanilla, a LW that incorporates WotC should be nothing short of legendary.


Havent played 1.5 yet, so I cannot comment.

[8wayz]

Long War 1.5 fixes quite a few bugs and makes progression more granular. It is still a more difficult game compared to War of the Chosen though.

The main change is that a few items do not require so much resources to build now, namely corpses.

War of the Chosen is just a fresh start. It is worth only for the optimisation they did to the game, it runs great and loads lightning fast.
The Chosen are really well integrated thematically - if there is a retaliation, one of them is usually leading it. If they hit maximum knowledge about you, they launch an Avenger attack, so you may have more than a few in a single campaign and you are aware when to expect one.

There are quite a few new mission types, including a redone supply drop and Avenger attack ones. In the supply drop you race against time to either kill all of the guards as fast as possible, or pick up more crates before Advent airlifts them from the map. It works better than the Smash and Grab mission from Long War 2 in my opinion.

The Avenger defence mission now includes 4 small vehicle-mounted turrets and one large mobile-artillery canon to destroy. The Avenger starts with a 400-points of shield and each turn a small turret does 1 point of damage to it, and the large one (about every 5 turns) does 80 points. You are very much time constrained to take out at least the big turret before going on to wipe out the aliens. There are no reinforcements on that mission, but there is always one of the Chosen that is present. You also get to choose 2 different squads before you start the mission, so there is no more random soldiers being sent as reinforcements for you. Usually you get 12 of your soldiers against around 30 aliens, including one of the Chosen.

It is a lot of fun and it helps a lot if you have at least 2 Sharpshooters to destroy the turrets (depending on the map).

Being able to buy perks with ability points via the Trading Center is also a great addition. It makes you build super-soldiers, but also risking to spread your experience too thin. It also works kind of like the AWC in Long War - each soldier has a set of random perks that they can get for ability points (instead of time training).

For example an Assault can get Hail of bullets or Shredder pretty early, making them a lot more flexible.

[LordYanaek]

I have to say i haven't played 1.5 yet, just finished a Commander WotC campaign and will probably try Legend and/or some second waves options (there isn't a lot of those, but at least there's Beta Strike that could make the game pretty different - it doubles every HP for you and enemies)

WotC brings several new missions, in addition to those explained by 8wayz

• a new Retaliation where you get help from local armed resistant fighters, something i hope Pavonis incorporates at some point because i always found it strange that rebels were just sitting ducks in retaliations even thought they are armed during other missions.
• a destroy the psi relay mission that works like the old bomb disposal from XCOM EU (you have a short timer but destroying small objectives scattered around the map gives you an additional turn)
• some "VIP" missions where you are asked for help by one of the rebel factions and which allows you to rescue a few soldiers in addition to the VIP
• neutralize the field commander where you get to slay an advent commander : as soon as you break concealment an ADVENT transport is called and you have 5 turns to kill the commander before he can attempt to flee from the map

The lost are fun to kill in stupid numbers but they are even funnier to unleash on ADVENT and watch them kill each other while you camp inside some ruined building and kill whoever tries to climb up to you

We get covert ops back, thought they play different from their EW counterparts : you no longer have a mission at the end to bring back the agent (her you deploy 2-3 soldiers) but they might be ambushed, which triggers a mission where they have to fight for their lives. Covert ops can give you a number of rewards (from some free tech, loot or additional contacts to faction soldiers to the location of a Chosen Stronghold - it's the only way you can get rid of them for good) and improve your relations with the rebel factions.

Soldiers can become insanely strong thought, with the new Breakthrough research and the ability to learn both trees if you chose to spend enough Ability Points.

The faction soldiers are really cool. They are all pretty unique. The Skirmisher is the most common of the 3 but being ADVENT clones that broke free from their Psionic enslavement, they have a unique feeling. Reapers and Templars both have unique mechanisms that set them apart from any other soldier. They all have pretty low base damage compensated by good abilities making them slightly stronger than regular soldiers, but far from OP (especially when your soldiers start having both trees filled).

Chosen are interesting and have unique personalities (that shows mostly through their dialogues). I just wish i could decide which one i put on the trophy wall, the Assassin was a respectful adversary and i really which i could give her a proper burial (well, hopefully the mod that removes the trophy room will be ported to WotC at some point )

[Phaseless]

You make WotC Sound quite spectacular, damn it.
But no, I'll hold off until LW2 Support. I have to be strong now, more than ever! Also no Money, I spent all on Scotch.

[Dwarfling]

You make WotC Sound quite spectacular, damn it.
But no, I'll hold off until LW2 Support. I have to be strong now, more than ever! Also no Money, I spent all on Scotch.

Well you can hold off for a sale in the future, but I gotta say, the game is a must buy. Might not have as much depth and complexity as vanilla LW2, but it's a great game by its own right. You get different strategic sub-objectives (Chosen strongholds), much more variety of tactical missions, a new skill system (that isn't as RNG heavy as AWC), different mechanics (heroes, the Lost, new enemies, techs).

[Noober]

WoTC is a peace of cake compared to LW.
Regular grenades 100% destruct cover - no need even for plasma. Other grenades are just useless.
Ability to pick up both path's skills is just insane.
Promotion reward for covert OPS is OP. You can quickly power level one chosen soldier (ranger preferably) to major and thus unlock both squad size upgrade in GTS as well as unlock chosen stronghold which require major rank.
Mass BS round completely trivialize the final stage of Chosen Stronghold. I finished my first final batlle with Asaain in July at mags in 3(!) rounds! This is clearly not how that game was meant to be played.
Chosen weapon is OP: Dark Lance + DFA + HighGround = everlasting serial.
Perception PCS with right breackthrough once again give up to +21 AIM.
Reapers has only 1 tile (!) visibilit. It can solo any mission without kill them all requirement.
And there are a lot of other OP things: all skilled PSI, Bond comand like ability (you can have up to 3 at one turn and it even not end your turn!), etc, etc...
And it's on Legend.
I'm not sure if anyone test it for balance before releaze.

[Phaseless]

WoTC is a peace of cake compared to LW.
Regular grenades 100% destruct cover - no need even for plasma. Other grenades are just useless.
Ability to pick up both path's skills is just insane.
Promotion reward for covert OPS is OP. You can quickly power level one chosen soldier (ranger preferably) to major and thus unlock both squad size upgrade in GTS as well as unlock chosen stronghold which require major rank.
Mass BS round completely trivialize the final stage of Chosen Stronghold. I finished my first final batlle with Asaain in July at mags in 3(!) rounds! This is clearly not how that game was meant to be played.
Chosen weapon is OP: Dark Lance + DFA + HighGround = everlasting serial.
Perception PCS with right breackthrough once again give up to +21 AIM.
Reapers has only 1 tile (!) visibilit. It can solo any mission without kill them all requirement.
And there are a lot of other OP things: all skilled PSI, Bond comand like ability (you can have up to 3 at one turn and it even not end your turn!), etc, etc...
And it's on Legend.
I'm not sure if anyone test it for balance before releaze.

Maybe you just played so much long war that you can't be expected to feel challenged by vanilla games anymore
It also sounds like you do a lot of research outside of the game too and then you calculate the most efficient path? Doing that, you can break almost any game.
I found out for myself, I takes out all the fun if I try to see through a game's mechanics too much. The fun and the fluff start to disappear and it's all just numbers with a clear path in the middle. That kills games for me. So I try to understand most of what's going on but try to remain a little bit naive and casual about it.

[Psieye]

I'm not sure if anyone test it for balance before releaze.

There's such a wide variance in player skill level that they couldn't accommodate everyone with just 4 difficulty levels. Jake is on record for admitting he should have made more difficulty levels and calling them different names. On the one hand, you have players who well-understand the implications of OP features. On the other hand, you have people who find Rookie to be too hard to beat - "I can't even savescum if I want to go back to the Geoscape to re-tune my squad - the mission is generated differently".

From a commercial perspective, it's more lucrative to aim for a wider audience and let the modders crank up the difficulty for those who can power play the system.

It also sounds like you do a lot of research outside of the game too and then you calculate the most efficient path? Doing that, you can break almost any game.

Key word: 'almost'. It's not a bad philosophy that a game should still be engaging even if you know all of its mechanics, even if most games fall short of that yardstick.

[LordYanaek]

WotC obviously still suffers from XCOM's (1&2) biggest shortcoming : the earl y game is quite challenging (and can be randomly extremely punishing) but once you get past the mid game and have good soldiers with solid gear and high level perks, it becomes extremely easy.
LW2 manages to maintain some challenge much later but even it becomes quite easy once you have MSgts equipped with Plasma weapons. The challenge is to keep AVATAR under control until you reach that point.

That doesn't stop the new missions, maps and enemies from bringing a lot of fresh air to the game.

[Psieye]

the early game is quite challenging (and can be randomly extremely punishing)

Hmm, I was going to say "frags OP" but LW2 early-game is also about frag spam. It's not as OP in LW2 but you get to bring more of them per mission. I find the transition from early-game to mid-game is when the challenge heats up: you're barely getting some of your bread & butters online when the aliens are starting to throw sneks, mecs and mutons at you.

[Noober]

WoTC is a peace of cake compared to LW.
Regular grenades 100% destruct cover - no need even for plasma. Other grenades are just useless.
Ability to pick up both path's skills is just insane.
Promotion reward for covert OPS is OP. You can quickly power level one chosen soldier (ranger preferably) to major and thus unlock both squad size upgrade in GTS as well as unlock chosen stronghold which require major rank.
Mass BS round completely trivialize the final stage of Chosen Stronghold. I finished my first final batlle with Asaain in July at mags in 3(!) rounds! This is clearly not how that game was meant to be played.
Chosen weapon is OP: Dark Lance + DFA + HighGround = everlasting serial.
Perception PCS with right breackthrough once again give up to +21 AIM.
Reapers has only 1 tile (!) visibilit. It can solo any mission without kill them all requirement.
And there are a lot of other OP things: all skilled PSI, Bond comand like ability (you can have up to 3 at one turn and it even not end your turn!), etc, etc...
And it's on Legend.
I'm not sure if anyone test it for balance before releaze.

It also sounds like you do a lot of research outside of the game too and then you calculate the most efficient path? Doing that, you can break almost any game.

The only thing I knew (incedently) - is that BS round deals additional damage to the relay and so objects.
There is no wiki like resource for WoTC.
And about true OP - look at the Reaper. This is broken beyong all.
1. 1 range visibility.
2. Bahish = delete this boss button. If lucky with tac riding XCOM skill it single handily kill Gatekeeper (BS Round + elite magazine). It also trivialize Rulers as one use is enough for all but Archon King to flee from battle. And banish doesn't provoke the Ruler reaction! (I played with the regular ruler - unnerfed ones).
3. Homing mine on the boss. Without breaking concealment and it also doesn't end the turn! And you can have up to 2 of them! Just use it on sectopod and the next turn - bahish it - all pod will be damaged and the boss - dead. And at Colonel Annihilate allows you to kill the entire boss pod with 2 mines and 1 banish. To kill the entire boss pod in 1 action - is there anything more broken then that?
4. Early game skill with +100% explosion damage and range on explosive objects is very powerful. It kills the whole midgame pod without breaking concealment. A little bit situational but still very powerfull.
5. Silent Death skill allows to keep conceal if the shot kills target. So reaper will be concealed until he/she use banish.
6. Re-conceal is a base skill (in LW conceal is at MSGT)!

[Phaseless]

It also sounds like you do a lot of research outside of the game too and then you calculate the most efficient path? Doing that, you can break almost any game.

Key word: 'almost'. It's not a bad philosophy that a game should still be engaging even if you know all of its mechanics, even if most games fall short of that yardstick.

Yeah sure.
But I'm talking about things like knowing that after liberating a region, advent won't attack for 21 days. You can't find that out reliably ingame so it's kind of insider knowledge that allows you to get quite some supply out of a region you are afraid will come under attack where a not-knowing player will put everyone on intel for nothing.

It's things like that where I ask myself, should I know this?

[8wayz]

Hm, I am not sure that War of the Chosen is unbalanced. I am also playing on Legendary and some of the relation missions feel more unfair than a Swarming+++++ HQ Assault mission in Long War 2.

You get multiple Berskers (at least 3), Chryssalids, a Chosen, some Faceless, one or two MECs for good measure, and all of them active at the same time. Unless you have one of the Hero classes, you are doomed to fail any retaliation mission on Legendary.

The game is balanced for the new Hero classes and as such they might seem a bit overpowered at times. Put into the context of some of the new missions and pod composition, they actually are fine-tuned.

Also, the Chosen themselves are overpowered, compared to Long War 2 - the Assassin always hits you and does not trigger Overwatch and reaction shots. The Hunter is so fast that oftentimes you have to level to the ground whole buildings just to deny him any place he may hide. That in Long War 2 will end badly for you.

The Warlock can easily Mind Control you and at a later stage he can also summon Advent Priests, which can also use Mind Control.

I can not overstate this - think about against what exactly are balanced the new Hero classes.

A small comparison how different Long War 2 balancing is - in Long War Squadsight + Death From Above removes almost all range penalties.
In basic Xcom 2 + War of the Chosen you can not camp on the other side of the map and wait for the pods to come to you - your Aim will be atrocious because of the penalties. It can reach up to -80% only from range penalties.

That is why PCS have a better effect in the base game, combined with the fact that you find a lot less of them compared to Long War 2.

[LordYanaek]

I find the transition from early-game to mid-game is when the challenge heats up: you're barely getting some of your bread & butters online when the aliens are starting to throw sneks, mecs and mutons at you.

I guess it depends a lot on what you consider early or mid game.

Anyway, even in really early game you can only have 4 frag grenades (if you decide you don't care that a sectoid might mind control you and don't take a flashbang) and it can only kill a trooper. Captains and Sectoids are not killed by a simple frag grenade and i can't count the number of times i've blown their cover to then miss my shot. Early game a sectoid with 1 HP left can cause a mission loss and it's not uncommon to get hit in full cover by the remaining trooper after your entire squad had to use their actions to kill the sectoid.

That's what i mean by "randomly extremely punishing"

And about true OP - look at the Reaper. This is broken beyong all.
1. 1 range visibility.
2. Bahish = delete this boss button. If lucky with tac riding XCOM skill it single handily kill Gatekeeper (BS Round + elite magazine). It also trivialize Rulers as one use is enough for all but Archon King to flee from battle. And banish doesn't provoke the Ruler reaction! (I played with the regular ruler - unnerfed ones).
3. Homing mine on the boss. Without breaking concealment and it also doesn't end the turn! And you can have up to 2 of them! Just use it on sectopod and the next turn - bahish it - all pod will be damaged and the boss - dead. And at Colonel Annihilate allows you to kill the entire boss pod with 2 mines and 1 banish. To kill the entire boss pod in 1 action - is there anything more broken then that?
4. Early game skill with +100% explosion damage and range on explosive objects is very powerful. It kills the whole midgame pod without breaking concealment. A little bit situational but still very powerfull.
5. Silent Death skill allows to keep conceal if the shot kills target. So reaper will be concealed until he/she use banish.
6. Re-conceal is a base skill (in LW conceal is at MSGT)!

1. Completely ridiculous, totally agree on this.
2. I had no issues making rulers flee without acting once even without a reaper in the squad, the real use i got from banish was to finish the Archon King on first encounter after he summoned his gate as the Viper King vanished and never showed again so i missed his armor. Banish is powerful but at once/battle it should be (a psi trooper could instead give you the control of a big bad enemy rather than "just" remove it once per battle). Also i'm not sure but i think it doesn't crit, at least it never did for me.
3. Grenadier is just as powerful, the unique thing about the claymore is not breaking concealment which is great of course but not really "broken beyond all"
4. And i regretted taking that skill the entire campaign as i think i used it once (maybe twice, not even sure about the second one). I'm totally for a removal of that skill if the reaper is ported to LW2 (i hope he will be) because it's a bad skill : OP when you can use it and useless most of the time but it doesn't make the reaper as a class OP unless you're really lucky and your enemies like to gather around explosive objects.
5. Coupled with a low damage weapon that makes you good at finishing badly wounded targets only.
6. I hope a good middle ground between those extremes can be found as i think both are equally bad but i don't really want to re-open the concealment at MSgt discussion.

Don't get me wrong, Reapers are strong but every soldier is strong (or maybe i should say overpowered) after they gain enough levels, especially in WotC.

But I'm talking about things like knowing that after liberating a region, advent won't attack for 21 days. You can't find that out reliably ingame so it's kind of insider knowledge that allows you to get quite some supply out of a region you are afraid will come under attack where a not-knowing player will put everyone on intel for nothing.

Not really a good example because the real think to understand is not the 21 free days that i can't bother counting but the fact that not gathering supplies to avoid loosing supply gatherers is obviously a wrong move as it's like you already surrendered the region to ADVENT.

It's true that too much information is just as bad (if not worse) as too little but when a game has some strategy elements, it's also a natural expectation to be able to plan some strategy and this requires some understanding of game mechanisms that unfortunately LW2 doesn't really pass to the players, certainly due to time constrains - i say this without any criticism towards the developers - but it doesn't change the fact that the strategic layer can't really have much strategy without some additional knowledge (trial and error isn't really strategy).

This is hardly relevant to WotC anyway because the base game "strategic" layer has almost no strategy : it's just react to this, then react to that and you don't plan anything beyond which room to build first and which tech to research next (and WotC made this last part more chaotic with Breakthrough) so i don't think there's a lot to break with external knowledge. The real issue is that the "power shift" is too pronounced once you get better tech and higher rank soldiers but that's hardly a WotC issue. It's slightly more pronounced in WotC due to + damage breakthrough, chosen weapons and ability to fill both trees for those soldiers you want to turn into superheroes but it's nothing new, it was already present in EW (i didn't play EU so i can't talk for it).

[8wayz]

@Lord Yanaek -

There is some strategic thought in War of the Chosen. The new Covert ops let you choose what you want to do. For example Noober went with all of the promotion-grabbing ones to quickly level up someone to Major.

I choose to use Sabotage a lot in my campaign, thus prolonging it. There are 5 different facilities on the map in September, but each one has only 1 pip (for a total of 5 pips on the Doom meter). Oh, and you will need to prolong it, since without that Promotion reward levelling is really slow. I only have one Major and that is it. The new Fatigue system is doing its job.

[aedn]

@Lord Yanaek -

There is some strategic thought in War of the Chosen. The new Covert ops let you choose what you want to do. For example Noober went with all of the promotion-grabbing ones to quickly level up someone to Major.

I choose to use Sabotage a lot in my campaign, thus prolonging it. There are 5 different facilities on the map in September, but each one has only 1 pip (for a total of 5 pips on the Doom meter). Oh, and you will need to prolong it, since without that Promotion reward levelling is really slow. I only have one Major and that is it. The new Fatigue system is doing its job.

Not really, your never required to make a choice that has any long term consequence, and if you choose option A you can always go back and get B, C, and D easily with no impact on your game.

The grim dawn option is really the only thing that presents some kind of strategic choice for you as the player, but it's buggy and some of the dark events are not working or permanent.

[Jacke]

Hey, thanks for all the replies.

BTW, Xavier Wynns has started his 3rd LW2 video series, playing a v1.5. campaign. Two episodes already out.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ZxFWZoR ... FySI5PU66C

From what I've read, LW2 v1.5 for XCOM 2 without WotC is likely close to the final form, with any possible future versions most likely almost all bug fixes.

But considering how to bring together LW2 and WotC in some future LW2 for WotC is revisiting a lot of the discussion about LW2. I think that's good. I like many of the elements of LW2: planning ahead to infiltrate squads, wider selection of items and greater combat load, longer and deeper campaign, etc. I like many of the elements in WotC: troops fatigued by combat, more options from training the troops rather than being locked in by a soldier class and some of its perks, allied groups with whom XCOM has to forge relationships and receive some specialists troops, importance of keeping squads and soldiers together, etc. I think bringing them together has a lot of possibilities to make a better LW2. And the best possible ways to do that aren't going to be hammered out for months I think.

Personally, I'd like to see fewer soldier classes and fewer perk choices, replacing much of that with kitting out a squad with the right gear. Tools like Robojumper's Squad Selector make that relatively easy. As well, I'd like to see the 3 allied groups and their troops kept separate from the XCOM soldier classes. Both XCOM and the allied groups will need balancing for LW2, but I'd like them to keep their separate character.

[dethraker]

Honestly WotC feels much more planned out than LW2 was, might get some scrutiny here but it makes sense in the terms of how many people are on each respective team.

Fatigue in LW1, great mechanic to tie up soldiers so you have to rotate, didn't make any sense
Infiltration in LW2, great mechanic to tie up soldiers and makes some sense in lowering difficulty of mission etc.
Fatigue in WotC, well thought out mechanic that doesn't force you to take different soldiers or face sure injury but does punish you for taking them while tired.

Infiltration in LW2, sensible strategic mechanic that forces you to plan out more carefully and make sure you have gear for more than one squad at a time, in many cases 3-5 squads.
Covert Ops in WotC, sensible strategic mechanic that allows you to have a variety of methods to approach the strategic game, focus on prolonging, focus on soldier improvement, focus on resources and items, etc.

Even without a WotC LW2 it is well worth the buy with all that it adds to the game, there's so much more and I could go on and on but I don't want to give away details and take away from the experience. You really need to try it out!

[Noober]

Covert Ops in WotC, sensible strategic mechanic that allows you to have a variety of methods to approach the strategic game, focus on prolonging, focus on soldier improvement, focus on resources and items, etc.

Covert OPS would be much more fun if it always ends up with the real mission like in EW.
For now it looks like: "send your 1-2 soldeirs + sci/eng/supp/intel to aviod capture/injure risk there, wait for a 6-10 days and get your reward". Even ambush seems like the same all times (I had 4 of those and it was always the same map).

[dethraker]

Covert OPS would be much more fun if it always ends up with the real mission like in EW.
For now it looks like: "send your 1-2 soldeirs + sci/eng/supp/intel to aviod capture/injure risk there, wait for a 6-10 days and get your reward". Even ambush seems like the same all times (I had 4 of those and it was always the same map).

That comes down to a matter of opinion, some people like that it doesn't add a huge influx of additional missions on top of the already large amount of missions available, some think like you, and I'm sure there are other stances as well regarding this single topic. The fact remains that you're able to choose the route that best suits your playstyle.

To put it similarly I could say, "Infiltration would be much more fun if you got to actually play a mission before the mission which determines how easy the mission would be." That alone would almost double the amount of "real missions" that a player has in a single playthrough, some people I'm sure would love to have 2 different mission types each type they deploy their squads. One mission where the focus is on remaining in stealth and accomplishing the objective, the other being the actual mission they deployed their squad for. Other people would hate that they are forced into even more missions and worse that they are forced to play stealth then loud(just an example naturally).

I for one much prefer the Covert Ops because I like to consider the long game and take part in the strategic game just as actively as the tactical game, I don't want to have the game consist of 80% tactical and 20% strategic. Don't get me wrong, I was excited about Infiltration when Long War 2 first came out but it just felt like a completely artificial way to lock away not just your squad but also the items, weapons, and armor that you equipped on them. It makes sense, I mean in RL we have units that do the same thing, but in respect to gaming it just feels too much of a "we need to force the player to get more items somehow" rather than an enjoyable mechanic. Fatigue on the other hand makes perfect sense to me, most of the time your soldiers are going to be rockstars, but start applying too much pressure and sending them on too many missions in a row and suddenly they can be impacted severely by enemy actions.

[Noober]

Sorrry - I fear you didn't understand me.
IF there is a real mission at the end of covert OPS then you should carefully consider the soldier to send there.
Not just send two useless/not so usefull soldeirs to get the reward (e.cores/breakdown/avatar reduction/promotion/etc.).
But it could force you to make a hard decision - who of really usefull soldeirs should be locked for 6-10 days because they will have to fight at the end to get this reward.
I think (just think!) this approach could greatly increase the strategic part of this game.
Right now Covert OPS is a garanteed reward (and sometimes an incredibly powerfull reward like promotion to major/colonel or very powerfull breakthrough/resistance order!) for just a 6-10 days with minimal risk for your A/B team (well, until DE with umbush appears).
That's all I wanted to say.

[dethraker]

At the same time, having it as is allows you another alternative to leveling new soldiers without putting the vital mission on the line. Also there is somewhat of limitations and considerations to make, some Ops require higher ranked soldiers. Thought it would be fun to see a mod take this concept and make it riskier for those that are willing to take those risks, maybe the rewards can be amped up as well, more chances of being captured, more chances of ambush, chance to lose items, etc. Maybe even the ability to have gear equipped help/hurt the odds of consequences encouraging you to equip the soldiers better before sending them.

Having a mission at the end, by itself, would not make most people consider which soldiers to send. Some will send their A-listers often to give them more experience, help them bond with the person they want them bonded with, etc. but others will never send them whether there's a mission at the end or not, that just comes down to personal preference in playing. The only [definite] thing adding a guaranteed mission at the end [of Covert Ops] will do is make the people happy that want more control over what happens and piss off the people that don't want any more missions to worry about.

[8wayz]

Noober - It really depends depends on the risks associated with that mission.

Some of the key ones, for example Sabotage, have a high Ambush chance and I always send experienced soldiers on those. Also new Covert Ops can be added as part of Long War 2 where the Op ends always in a given mission (choose 4 soldiers, retrieve a cache of loot from a infested with Lost city).

Some variety will be great, but having 100% of Covert ops ending in a mission/ambush will be a bit too much.