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[another_guest]

I definitely agree on the point that 2 fusion defenses + a grav shield aren't always enough. I once ran the test of cycling through several months (more than 100 base attacks) and checking whether my base defenses held. 3 fusion defenses + grav shield seemed to be enough.

Never tried this, but how about equipping your soldiers with decent armour, then first flushing most of the alien base with smoke grenades, add a few stun bombs? Might work well for some races, if you ask me. Of course visibility would be terrible... So maybe blaster bomb your way to the control center :P

[seeker_starkiller]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(Zwischy @ Jun 5 2006, 08:06 PM) [snapback]234536[/snapback]</div>

Actually, yes. Obviously, given the Blaster's explosive range, spreading out doesn't help a lot, but it still isn't a bad policy. Myself, I tend to pair off my soldiers and have them move together as much as possible. On the initial entry into their base from the hangar elevators, I will set a pair of soldiers at each entrance (assuming the random troop placement allows me to do so - sometimes one soldier at an entrance will have to do).

The idea here is twofold: one soldier moves, the other one can take a shot if aliens are spotted. Having the troops paired like this generally leaves the corps less vulnerable to a single blaster bomb, but eventually your troops will overlap as you converge on the control center.
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Aliens don't generally fire blaster bombs unless one of them has a line of sight to your troops, so often it's better to try to take out an alien rather than hide around a corner in the hopes of nailing it with reaction shots as it advances to you.
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It pays to bring your own blaster launcher if possible, to kill groups or particularly hard aliens (any terror weapon, or Chrysallids), or to create your own entrances and smoke where it can give you an advantage (most often, I would use this to blow a hole in the wall directly across from the innermost doors of the control center).

Lastly, I like laser pistols. A lot. Sure, they don't do a lot of damage, but they take tiny amounts of TUs to fire on auto, are very lightweight, and don't require ammo. They're especially useful if you constantly run yourself short on TUs because you tend to move your troops just a liiiittle too far, too often. A few heavy plasmas aren't a bad idea, either, if you need some punch.
[/b]

Thanks for all this good advice. I too like laser pistols for their flexibility and rate of fire. I don't quite use the pairing procedure - I use small teams with one man out on 'point' to draw/spot aliens, and I do try and do the firing from the rear. Haven't quite settled down to a system with this yet, maybe I'll try the 'pairing' idea.

As my guys are all in Power Suits, even a little bit of spreading out can save lives.

Part of the problem in the alien base is that, with its tricky layout, often only the guy at the front has line of sight on the alien. You can maybe bring one or two guys up for a shot but they end up being exposed and congested in a vulnerable chokepoint. As you say, maybe I'm moving too fast and I need to slow down and have more TUs available.

But generally, I'm not having a problem reacting to alien fire. I think the basic problem is that the base is so dark that aliens are sniping me and I can't see them even if I'm looking straight at them. Of course, I should have brought flares with me, and some AC-IC (plus some AC-HE for clearing out the 'gardens'). In the absence of these, I guess I should try and make sure all my guys finish turns behind cover. Not a bad idea in any case.

At the moment I don't have my own Blaster Launchers - working on it. The newest thing out of the labs is the Stun Launcher. I brought 2 along as a combination of capture weapon and support weapon. With only 5 rounds of ammo though it wasn't great as a support weapon. Probably would have been better off trading one small launcher and 2 rounds for an AC with AC-HE and AC-IC.

If, when I came under unseen fire, I'd been able to return fire toward the enemy with area weapons - say AC-HE or Rocket Launchers, or even grenades - the combination of smoke and area-effect casualties might have stopped some of the aliens' Blaster Bomb attacks.

It's funny about the initial placement. I'd forgotten that last time I did an Alien Base my men were split across the 2 hangar lifts. This time around everyone was in the same hangar lift - the one furthest from the control room. Of course, advancing from one position is going to make me more bunched up and make it harder to outflank enemy strongpoints.

One thing I just have a really hard time with in this game is that you are not in a rush. Unlike many games there is no deadline to complete the level. There isn't even really a sense of needing to take the aliens off-balance, before they organise an effective defence (which is so true in games like Panzer Leader). This is counter-intuitive for me. But I really need to slow down, take it very slow and carefully. To be honest the main difference between my 23-KIA mission and my 10-KIA mission was patience. With more patience I'm sure I could get the KIAs down to just one or two.

I don't have the game saved before my Lightning took off so I can't re-equip my squad, but all Heavy Plasma was definitely wrong, given the lack of other equipment it gave me. I would have been better to have brought a couple of Rocket Launchers, and brought Large Rockets instead of grenades. I could have scavenged for personal weapons - Heavy Plasmas were littering the battlefield. In fact I could have brought some men in as unarmed - reserves, or medics. Not as motion scanner operators, they need to get to up close and personal with the aliens to be unarmed. An AC-IC would have been the best option for illumination, as it gives me 14 flares for an item count of only 2. And, as mentioned, on a 28-man squad it would not have hurt to give half the guys Laser Rifles. Though they would not thank me for that if it had turned out to be a Muton base instead of a Floater base.

UFO Defence is really such a great squad game. You really have to think about the combinations of weapons and tactics, "combined arms" almost, and you actually have to practice your tactics to get good at them. No wonder it's the #1 game on Abandonia!



<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(another_guest @ Jun 6 2006, 11:28 AM) [snapback]234716[/snapback]</div>

Never tried this, but how about equipping your soldiers with decent armour, then first flushing most of the alien base with smoke grenades, add a few stun bombs? Might work well for some races, if you ask me. Of course visibility would be terrible... So maybe blaster bomb your way to the control center :P
[/b]

The low visibility would actually help because it would create even visibility with the aliens and deny them the advantage. But unfortunately you can't even come close to saturating the map with smoke. There is a built in limit that only supports a small number of smoke hexes - about 3 smoke grenades worth.

That's not to say there might not be 'invisible' smoke on the map. It's hard to tell. I guess the only way would be to stand in the hex in no armour and see if you start taking stun damage.

[Xeno]

Weird...is it normal that since I've been playing, when I attack an alien base they are always bright? I never got the "alien bases in darkness" everyone's talking about. Some rare times it's total darkness yes but my squad can't move at all so it seems more like a bug (I just reload, re-enter then it's fine, bright and I can move).

Anyway, yesterday I got my first psionics. Boy do they kick behind! It's a HUGE help against muton. Before that I got a huge battle with mutons. My hyper-wave detector spotted a Very Large muton ship so I send 15-16 guys in my Avenger (I usually only send 14 on most missions). But then once the Avenger left, a Large muton ship appears...then another Large...then a Small one . I send my 8 remaining guys in my Skyranger. Finally, my Avenger team was able to finish the Very Large mission, come back for fuel, go do One Large, come back for fuel, then do the other Large all before my Skyranger get to the small one LOL. I lost a total of 9 commando in those battles.

Commando being my "grunts", strong but expendable. At that time I had the money and living space to hire soldiers by group of 30-40. I kept only those with 50+ reaction (I can go as low as 47 if the firing accuracy is really high) and 50+ firing accuracy (I'm more loose on the accuracy because it raise faster than reaction). Then when a guy gets to about 42 strength and at least 60 firing accuracy, he gets promoted to "Death from Above". Those guys I give a flying suit and a rocket launcher. When a guy gets to 50+ strength and at least 70 throwing accuracy, he gets promoted to "Commando-thrower". Those I give a plasma rifle (heavy plasma now) like all commando but also 2 alien grenades, 2 high explosive, 1 smoke grenade, 1 proximity grenade and 4 electro-flare.

And now I have psionics. The results of my first training were pretty extreme...of the 15 trained, I got five 90+, then one 67 then all below 40. I just finished building 2 labs and 2 living quarters in my second base so I transfered all my 100 scientists there, dismantled my 2 labs and built two other psi-lab in my main base (total of 4). Also now I have two free living quarter so I can buy recruits by the hundreds k:

Sorry for the long post I got carried away hehe.

PS: In this game I got really lucky by getting a navigator and a sectoid leader in my first missions.

PPS: Arg! Something I just discovered..when you mind control an alien and make it throw his gun, you won't get the gun at the end of the mission . I thought you would because you retrieve the electro-flares you threw...

[another_guest]

Really? I always disarm mind-controlled aliens, and I never really noticed the lack of battle spoils afterwards.

[Xeno]

Hmm...actually it might be something else...I just battled a large ship of ethereal, didn't control anyone and didn't get any weapon :blink: . Not that I need any with the 70+ heavy plasma I already got but still.

[The Fifth Horseman]

Do you have enough storage space?

Also, weapons and other junk can be destroyed, remember.

[Xeno]

Yeah sometimes they get destroyed but that's not it. And for storage it doesn't seem to be a problem...there was a time when the artifacts I brought back ALWAYS fulled my storage yet I would still get all of them. And now when I come back I still have some storage left.

Anyway, I just fought some snakesmen and again, no artifacts LISTED. That's the thing, they're not listed anymore in the battle report but I still get them. I know because I always sell all the plasma rifle and clips and the last two missions I still got some after the missions eventhough the battle reports didn't say anything about "alien artifacts recovered".

Though I'll still have to verify if I still get them when I mind control/throw weapon.

[another_guest]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(xeno @ Jun 6 2006, 03:25 PM) [snapback]234795[/snapback]</div>

... I still got some after the missions eventhough the battle reports didn't say anything about "alien artifacts recovered".[/b]

Aha, but weren't alien artifacts in the battle reports just the "unknown" artifacts, i.e. those you didn't research yet?

[Xeno]

Oh really? I thought it was every weapons the enemy had...my bad then

[seeker_starkiller]

<div class='quotetop'>QUOTE(seeker_starkiller @ Jun 6 2006, 11:42 AM) [snapback]234718[/snapback]</div>

One thing I just have a really hard time with in this game is that you are not in a rush. Unlike many games there is no deadline to complete the level. There isn't even really a sense of needing to take the aliens off-balance, before they organise an effective defence (which is so true in games like Panzer Leader). This is counter-intuitive for me. But I really need to slow down, take it very slow and carefully. To be honest the main difference between my 23-KIA mission and my 10-KIA mission was patience. With more patience I'm sure I could get the KIAs down to just one or two.
[/b]

Wahey! Did it with only 1 KIA! And using the same (lousy) weapons mix, all heavy plasmas, no support weapons (except 2 Stun Launchers and 3 rounds total), no light/flares/IC, no smoke, hardly any grenades - and I still captured the Commander.

Patience, as they say, is a virtue.

PS I still think half the alien casualties were from their own Blaster Bombs. And this is on Superhuman, so their reactions/accuracy is typical 60/60 - way better than all but my top 4-5 guys.