Overwatch bugs and global forcelevel not rising?

[Pandemonim]

Hello all! So I'm playing on 1.1, on PC, only other cosmetic mods and a few QOL (faster transitions, evac all, overwatch all), and I'm encountering the following issues:

Really unreliable behavior on overwatch spec rangers, particularly with ever vigilant and covering fire. I suspect maybe some of it might be vanilla-related, but it seems that sometimes ever vigilant won't fire any shots at all, especially if they are covering fire shots. Just recently on one of my missions I ran right up next to a flanked alien on a dash, ever vigilant activated, and the alien proceeding to run away with no shots fired. Covering fire behavior is spotty at best, and these two issues are combining to make this build rather unreliable.

Perhaps a more concerning issue is that I suspect there's something wrong with the global forcelevel in my current campaign. It is November and I have had ZERO retaliations, and I still haven't seen the DLC missions activate either. Local forcelevel is rising, and the troops seem to be getting stronger. Now granted, I'm being pretty cognizant of haven management, and generally unless I'm actively gathering intel or recruiting in a haven I won't have more than 4 soldiers not hiding, so maybe that is leading to fewer retaliations, but NONE? Seems strange to me.

Thanks again for you guys' amazing work! I can also provide a save file if needed.

[Zyrrashijn]

You know, you have to gain an "intel package" mission reward for any POIs to show up? As of 1.1, the POI for the Nest or the Tower can spawn after reaching Forcelevel 12 and 8 respectively. But only, when you find an intel package. At least that's how i understand it.

[Pandemonim]

Hmm, interesting. So I suppose that part, at least, is not outside the realm of possibility to not encounter (though I've gotten quite a few intel packages recently). Does anyone know a console command or way to check the force level? I'm still super confused by there being no retaliations in 8 months.

[trihero]

Really unreliable behavior on overwatch spec rangers, particularly with ever vigilant and covering fire. I suspect maybe some of it might be vanilla-related, but it seems that sometimes ever vigilant won't fire any shots at all, especially if they are covering fire shots. Just recently on one of my missions I ran right up next to a flanked alien on a dash, ever vigilant activated, and the alien proceeding to run away with no shots fired. Covering fire behavior is spotty at best, and these two issues are combining to make this build rather unreliable.

It works fine for me. Recall that sidewinders and scouts have shadowstep, so they won't trigger any kind of overwatch fire.

The one time I've seen ever vigilitant + covering fire fail me was against an advent drone in plain sight who used either his stunner or his attack; my ranger refused to fire at it. But I've seen ever vigilant / covering fire do exactly what it's supposed to do as well, like I double dashed next to a turret and I killed it as it tried to shoot.

There are some stupid things that break ever vigiliant, like if you reload (even free reload), and if you pick up an item during your moves, you will fail to trigger ever vigilant, which is stupid imo.

[Pandemonim]

It works fine for me. Recall that sidewinders and scouts have shadowstep, so they won't trigger any kind of overwatch fire.

Hmm that definitely may explain some of the instances, not sure if all.

The one time I've seen ever vigilitant + covering fire fail me was against an advent drone in plain sight who used either his stunner or his attack; my ranger refused to fire at it.

Yep I JUST saw that right now.

But I've seen ever vigilant / covering fire do exactly what it's supposed to do as well, like I double dashed next to a turret and I killed it as it tried to shoot.

I have too, it certainly works as intended sometimes. Perhaps my perception of it being inconsistent has to do with alien perks, but I don't know. I'm going to keep a closer eye on the specifics of when it happens now.