How greedy with supply raid/troop ambush?

[trihero]

How low on infiltration do you go on these missions for purposes of corpse collecting? Does your risk taking behavior vary over time as advent gets stronger?

I noticed on rookie I can go in at 0% for the first few months at least, netting a ton of corpses, but on legend I can't go in at 0% (super super easy to pull 3 pods back to back, with yellow alert system at 33% and nasty abilities = rekt).

Do you always try to go in at 100%+? Or how low is your tolerance? (maybe 50% is ok?)

[aedn]

Unless you have detected them early enough to get the numbers in your favor, there is no point in wasting time on infiltration for the supply raid and troop ambush. For me supply raids are 3 to 1 ratio of aliens vs number of soldiers, Troop ambush are 4 to 1, due to extra cover as an urban enviroment. If i can't maintain those ratios i just 10 man supply raids, and largely ignore troop ambush as they are much riskier at swarming levels then supply raids.

[Narcissistic_Martyr]

Honestly, it depends on how many particularly nasty critters are in the enemy forces. But in general, before sectoid commanders come into play... I'll run them at 0% without a second thought. Once they do... well... when you see 50 (hyperbole) zombies raise from off screen... you know you're in trouble.

[GavinRuneblade]

I suck and had multiple squad wipes on them. So I don't get greedy at all. I go max infiltrate and sometimes buy more.

[Daergar]

My next play-through will certainly see me sending in ten guys at 0%, simply to harvest the alien bastards for tastier Advent burgers.

So far I've been silly and brought the numbers down by going to 100% just to prevent the reinforcements, not giving a thought to treating them as instantly completed missions. Play and learn!

[trihero]

For those of you jumping in at 0%, what difficulty + month? I couldn't handle it on Legend in the first month. Part of it is gear/rank issues; I can wipe the first 8 man pod pretty quickly, but the 2nd and 3rd mesh together + 33% yellow alert gunner suppress/viper grab/poison reactions = rekt, not to mention pods 4-6 are still on the map somewhere. Are there other stopping points/considerations? Like one poster said sectoid commander. I would probably stop once andromedons show up; I remember once on rookie I jumped in at 0% at a very late month and they were dumping 8 man squads, where 3 in a pod were andromedons and I was like o.O

[PropheticShadeZ]

For those of you jumping in at 0%, what difficulty + month? I couldn't handle it on Legend in the first month. Part of it is gear/rank issues; I can wipe the first 8 man pod pretty quickly, but the 2nd and 3rd mesh together + 33% yellow alert gunner suppress/viper grab/poison reactions = rekt, not to mention pods 4-6 are still on the map somewhere. Are there other stopping points/considerations? Like one poster said sectoid commander. I would probably stop once andromedons show up; I remember once on rookie I jumped in at 0% at a very late month and they were dumping 8 man squads, where 3 in a pod were andromedons and I was like o.O

I usually go for about 50-75% trying to stay at light and moderate, to prevent injuries, but im not really desperate for advent resources, and im just trying to keep a healthy roster, sure i could do a swarming mission, but too many days out for me, i prefer to keep hitting advent everywhere

[bingo12345]

You don't have to fight many enemies at a time. go many ambush missions instead of a big ambush.

[aimlessgun]

I almost never detect supply raids with enough time to infiltrate. 9 guys on the intel job? Have some 3 day supply raids with Heavy base activity. Pretty much no point in infiltration at all.

To me it's really all about finding a good defensive position. Yellow alerts aren't too bad when everyone is in cover, also a Spark is nice to be a big fat damage soak for the yellow alert shots. Also a couple smokes will last you through the big multipod engagement while you camp in your nest...just never ever leave AoE guys alive and unsupressed/undisoriented

For those of you jumping in at 0%, what difficulty + month? I couldn't handle it on Legend in the first month. Part of it is gear/rank issues; I can wipe the first 8 man pod pretty quickly, but the 2nd and 3rd mesh together + 33% yellow alert gunner suppress/viper grab/poison reactions = rekt, not to mention pods 4-6 are still on the map somewhere. Are there other stopping points/considerations? Like one poster said sectoid commander. I would probably stop once andromedons show up; I remember once on rookie I jumped in at 0% at a very late month and they were dumping 8 man squads, where 3 in a pod were andromedons and I was like o.O

I bailed from my first supply raid for the same reasons, killed 2 pods but was out of juice. After that I've never really been in danger of a squad wipe, but horrible injuries or deaths can easily occur if I set up in a bad spot.

Also I don't think vipers can grab or poison out of yellow alert? At least I've never seen it.

[LordYanaek]

You don't have to fight many enemies at a time. go many ambush missions instead of a big ambush.

Unfortunately, going on many ambushes means you don't have time to infiltrate those (unless you have a good dozen squads) so that's many big ambushes or a few small ones for me. I try to survive the big ones and get corpses.

[GavinRuneblade]

I just had my first victory vs a big raid. Took several restarts and lost two guys but I managed to win.

My start was in a gulley with no high ground and three pods right on me plus two turrets. When I finally won I had found a way to flee from the start all the way up the left side of the map and engage from the opposite side of the train instead. Was a really horrid spawn point.

[trihero]

I just had my first victory vs a big raid. Took several restarts and lost two guys but I managed to win.

Hmm, is that really a win if it cost you 2 men? Hope they were expendable, cuz that's a lot of experience points down the drain.

I can flawless victory 0% on rookie mode, but on legendary the 33% yellow alert + extreme density give me too many wounds/deaths to make it worthwhile.

[GavinRuneblade]

I just had my first victory vs a big raid. Took several restarts and lost two guys but I managed to win.

Hmm, is that really a win if it cost you 2 men? Hope they were expendable, cuz that's a lot of experience points down the drain.

I can flawless victory 0% on rookie mode, but on legendary the 33% yellow alert + extreme density give me too many wounds/deaths to make it worthwhile.

Actually my biggest complaint about the new xcom s (not specific to long war) is that so much soldier power is located on the soldier and not gear. The original was based around the assumption that not only would soldiers die but most of them would. Still you could slap blaster launchers and flight armor on a rookie and curb stomp any mission. Here, all the power is in your perks. Sure gear helps, but rookies are jokes. I really miss the meat grinder.

Sometimes I deliberately get my guys killed because flawless victories feel like I'm playing the game wrong.

Like I said, not a long war complaint, but I don't enjoy teams of superheroes. So when they die I am always ok with it.

[Olin]

This.

Honestly, it depends on how many particularly nasty critters are in the enemy forces. But in general, before sectoid commanders come into play... I'll run them at 0% without a second thought. Once they do... well... when you see 50 (hyperbole) zombies raise from off screen... you know you're in trouble.

I will seriously think hard before doing my next supply raid like that. In the early game they were managable. I would get 3-4 out of 10 wounded but very much alive. The last raid I had...oh man. I am at a point when sectoid commanders started showing up together with advanced and longbow MECs, muton elites etc. I spawned on a quite good spot on a hill. Placed myself a few tiles away from the edge so all the activated pods needed to climb up to get me and got overwatched in the face. I still got wounded guys but it was managable. However, at some point sectoid commander who was in the last pod started ressurecting all the dead although his pod was not active yet. I fought off like three waves of zombies while cleaning the remainings of the 3rd pod. Then 4th and 5th pod activated and the MECs showed up. It's a lot harder to fight in a very restricted area when advent gets many AOE abilites. I was constantly flanked and bombarded as I couldn't keep up with killing all the stuff they threw at me.

I savescummed 2 times at the beginning as against my better judgement I got too greedy with flanking and activated too many pods at once. And 2 times at the end when overwhelmed I forgot about advent overwatches. I got 7 wounded (2 bleeding out) and 1 dead. I fought 55(!) enemies, around 15-18 of them zombies. I was able to stablise one girl but then ran out of medkits so I barely saved the other guy that was bleeding in the last turn. Hell of a ride.

I play on veteran. Finished C/I on vanilla and found it much easier

All in all I consider this mission a waste. I wasn't desperate for resources and if you want to bring down advent strenght in a region it is better to farm troop columns. You can always get your alloys by rendering the corpses you get from these missions. The wounded ended in the sickbay for an average of 20 days. I could use those guys to start inflitrating alien base in another region.