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Help with combat roles


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BTW this is for CE 0.30 from Steam

OK! First is there a mod that maybe makes heavy weapon actually usable? The 42 TU's or whatever it is means that my heavy weapon guy is never in range of enemies to EVER fire at. I gave up on HW as he can either run close enough to get shot and killed before his next turn so he can fire. Second shot guns are useless also at least in the beginning because the range is horrible. Isn't there any other alternatives?

The only thing I have found useful at this time is rifleman, shield bearers (as scouts), and snipers. I have found no use for other classes as rockets destroy everything so unless I do a terror mission later in the game I avoid rockets.

Scout what purpose are they for? Seems shield bearers do the same thing.

Maybe I am doing something wrong I play on easy and I still lose a man or two by third mission. Especially with that the mod that is definitely not for bad players like me.. the Dynamic UFO Spawn! Running in reapers by beginning of second month them things had multiple attacks and one hit killed almost my entire crew on there first turn.

So what are good soldier roles to use and what should be researched earliest for best survivability? Currently I immediately build another laboratory, hangar, living quarters, and 2 radar arrays. This way I can hire more scientist and engineers immediately to build 2 Foxtrots. The next thing I research than is the alloy's as that got you armor right away in X-Com but I am not sure with Xenonauts.

Edited by molitar
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The only thing I have found useful at this time is rifleman, shield bearers (as scouts),

That may just mean that you don't yet have the experience to know how to use the other ones. Or maybe they're simply not your style.

Maybe I am doing something wrong I play on easy and I still lose a man or two by third mission.

And that is wrong why? It is expected to lose soldiers, just like it is expected to lose pawns in chess.

So what are good soldier roles to use and what should be researched earliest for best survivability? Currently I immediately build another laboratory, hangar, living quarters, and 2 radar arrays. This way I can hire more scientist and engineers immediately to build 2 Foxtrots. The next thing I research than is the alloy's as that got you armor right away in X-Com but I am not sure with Xenonauts.

I don't see anything wrong with that. And, unless you're having serious trouble with playing the game (which doesn't seem to be the case, and for which there is a certain document included with the game), I suggest you just go with the game, as figuring these things out can be a part of what makes the game fun. And even if you get it wrong, getting beaten down by the game can be actually part of the game's experience too.

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I agree that scouts are useless, as Riflemen can perform that role just as well. Heavy Weapons are useful in supporting positions. Granted, they generally cannot move and fire in the same turn. But put them in a good firing position for long range fire, and/or wait for the enemy to come to them. Although their 'to-hit' percentages are low, they fire so many shots that they often get kills, and when failing to get kills, they often suppress the enemy.

The 4 classes I use are: Rifleman, Sniper, Heavy Weapons, and Assault. Assault is good for close quarters situations, where their shotgun packs a solid punch. Assign soldiers with high TUs to this role, as they are best at using the shock baton and take prisoners. Tactics for taking prisoners: equip the stun baton the turn before, so you don't waste TUs, have 1 or 2 riflemen throw carefully placed stun grenades, and then rush the alien with the Assault trooper.

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As a reminder to everyone remember these are not classes. They are roles, or equipment loadouts. Any solider can be given a different role and all roles can be adjusted as you see fit. I, for example, give everyone a shotgun because I find those useful when storming ufos.

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As a reminder to everyone remember these are not classes. They are roles, or equipment loadouts. Any solider can be given a different role and all roles can be adjusted as you see fit. I, for example, give everyone a shotgun because I find those useful when storming ufos.

Thanks for the tip. So basically build up rifleman and give them a shotgun for close range..

Well we all know the only thing HW need really is bravery and high strength.

What stats do you recommend for the other roles as most important?

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Just from my personal xp:

Rifleguys: ok allrounders, don't excel in specific tasks though, but as noted above with enough strength they might get shotguns too for assault tasks

Rocketeer: great for quickly taking out that annoying alien in the open esp. early on before they get harder to kill.

MG: great for suppression and some occasional kill in between

Sniper: long range expert, mostly self-explaing IMO

Assault: close quarter fighting, often in some UFO areas, with good reflexes also nice for getting RF shots

I usually have all roles in use, often 2 assault, 2 rifle, 1 sniper, 1 mg, 1 launcher, 1 shield, for a crew of 8. I read other people prefer way more specialists over riflemen, but personaly I still think all roles have their place if used well. Though I sometimes play without shield-bearer, and found this not so bad either.

IMO if you can't bring heavy weapons into firing positions maybe you move too fast with High TU guys so the rest gets isolated. It's not a race, having soldiers with different strengths supporting eachother is much more important than speed.

Admittedly some missions can get quite time-consuming but I'd always choose a more coodinated and careful advance.

Edited by UfoTubby
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Thanks for the advice. Well putting it that way I think assault may work if I throw a rifle also on him/her so he/she can fire every round until needing the heavy artillery. From playing X-Com got a bit too fixed in classes and not roles and how I can mix weapons with them.

So assault should have high strength, reflexes, and TU since it takes so many TU's to even fire MG.

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I use a really personalized mix, but I guess you could get some ideas from it.

Two "Grenadiers", frontline scouts dual wielding shields or an upgraded shield and empty hand, and carrying a large array of grenades

Two Riflemen, the main attack force, requiring much less setup than the rest, pretty standard

Two Snipers, those are my main damage dealers, and usually end up being my top ranked officers pretty quickly because of the combination of taking most of the kills and safety from their range

One Rocketeer, pretty straightforward, it blows stuff up, also makes a heavy use of stun rockets.

One HW. Because of the heavy TUs cost and heavy weapon penalties, I limit myself to one of these lawnmowers on the early-mid game.

Once I get the predator armor I replace one of the grenadiers for an extra HW. They are just too good to have just one. Also the instant 100 strenght makes it perfect to place otherwise potential sniper privates in this role.

When I get the shrike I get a tank, so no changes there, and by the end, I just take whatever I can afford. Maybe changing the rocketeer for a grenadier and adding 2 more HWs, riflemen and/or assaults could be good.

I'm very partial to the "drop the weapons" approach to avoid mind control and berserk incidents, so I really don't bother that much with the high reflex weapons (I've also been pretty lucky regarding the amount of reapers I encountered so far, so this is prone to change).

There's so many possible approachs to take on ground missions that it's impossible to reccomend an optimal setup, you just have to try what seems logical to you, and you'll eventually succeed.

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If you can hold two shields, that sounds like an oversight, and probably needs fixing.

The key thing that makes me use a range of weapons is the reflex bonus of the pistol and shotgun. These guys can safely scout out for you without incurring reaction fire for a good half of their move. Scouts are also great for hurling heaps of flares in a night mission. I have taken to giving my snipers a pistol, so they can do a dual role like this, and also be less likely to get gunned down during the UFO storming.

I generally only take a missile launcher as a backup weapon for a strong rifleman, as I don't like to destroy gear. I costs you thousands of dollars each time you unleash a rocket, so I will generally only do it if there is a big advantage, like a bunched up group of androns.

Anyway, like mentioned above, the great thing about this game is: there are masses of ways to do it, and you are free to play it as you want.

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If you can hold two shields, that sounds like an oversight, and probably needs fixing.

The key thing that makes me use a range of weapons is the reflex bonus of the pistol and shotgun. These guys can safely scout out for you without incurring reaction fire for a good half of their move. Scouts are also great for hurling heaps of flares in a night mission. I have taken to giving my snipers a pistol, so they can do a dual role like this, and also be less likely to get gunned down during the UFO storming.

I generally only take a missile launcher as a backup weapon for a strong rifleman, as I don't like to destroy gear. I costs you thousands of dollars each time you unleash a rocket, so I will generally only do it if there is a big advantage, like a bunched up group of androns.

Anyway, like mentioned above, the great thing about this game is: there are masses of ways to do it, and you are free to play it as you want.

I guess it's to balance the fact that the starting shields are almost useless. Once you get the upgraded ones, they'll usually hold out for the entire mission.

Yeah, the decreased chance of reaction fire is a big plus to Pistols and Shotguns/Carabines, but IMHO, to use them effectively they need to be too close for comfort.

On the rocketeer side, once you unlock the stun weapons, you can carry several stun rockets to have a decent AoE attack that doesn't destroy anything, and it works decently well against anything except androns. Later in the game, I'm just concerned about not losing Alenium and Alloys, so blowing up all the weapons isn't such an issue. As a minimum, you'll always get a bit more than if you aistriked the ufo anyway.

And yes, I'll repeat it, I love how this game lets you set up your troops in any way that works for you, except for the "new tech is always much better than old tech", there isn't much of a defining optimal strategy.

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I cut the TU cost of heavy weapons by about 40%. Now they can actually be a bit more useful without being op. I still like shotguns the best though, and rifles really aren't worth the time. Snipers typically do more damage and have better range and accuracy than rifles, and if you want the damage from rifle burst, just use a heavy or shotgun.

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Wasn't dual-wielding shields patched out of the game some time ago?

Anyway, I'm an Assault / Heavy-Weapons guy, apparently. The ones pulling the kills are usually my shotgunners and the guy with the machinegun. I usually keep snipers a bit further behind and riflemen in the mid while assault rush ahead behind the shields. Oh and knights are a beast (shield+baton+grenades).

The Heavies deal some significant damage though. The machinegun mows down pretty much everything and when upgraded to tech, wow. Just the total opposite of my shotgun or shield rushers. They run into one position to start firing the next turn.

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Uhm.. I fare the best when I use every weapon at my disposal..

Shield / Pistol (with Shotgun in backpack) for Scouting and Storming

Sniper Rifle (with pistol (or shotgun strenght permitting) in backpack) for long range fire support

HW for supression (but it seems these guys rack up a lot of kills too)

Rocketlauncher: very situational (before stun rockets) but some situations need more firepower (alien entrenched on a roof can be a nightmare w/o RL; with RL you just throw rockets from long range at him until the problem seizes to exist)

Rifles for pretty much everything else; Rifle deals best with "fair" fire fights; Which you should avoid like the plague in the beginning.

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I generally only take a missile launcher as a backup weapon for a strong rifleman, as I don't like to destroy gear. I costs you thousands of dollars each time you unleash a rocket, so I will generally only do it if there is a big advantage, like a bunched up group of androns.
I am not convinced this is true, because I have actually tried to count the gear dropped before, and noticed that the items looted did not match what I had actually retrieved in game. For instance, in one run, it said I had retrieved only 25 plasma batteries. However, I had actually picked up about 40 of them, and that was just the quantity that I was physically carrying as ballast to replace spent ammo. Wondering if it was not counting what I had physically looted personally, I reloaded back to before executing the final enemy, and dropped all the batteries. No change.

Another run I got 115 batteries, although I was not picking up any from the ground...even though a dead enemy has only one battery, and there were definitely not 115 enmies killed.

Weaponwise, I love Heavy Weapons. Even the basic Machine Gun has superior stopping power compared to the puny starter Assault Rifle, seeing as I have to use them until I unlock MAG weapons and can actually begin producing things that I won't simply be pissing my money away on, as unlike X-Com, things produced are only sold at massive loss and money is extremely tight. The regular assault rifle is roughly equivalent to firing spitwads. At least the Machine Gun can hurt something. Therefore, early-game, I have three specialties I use: The Scout Grenadier (Pistol+Shields+Grenades), Bazookaman (Rocket Launcher), and Machine Gunner (MG). Everyone will also carry an extra shield, which, at the start of the mission, they will dump in the Skyranger, so that my grenadiers lose a shield, they can go get another one. My tactic is straightforward: I will probe ahead with my shield scouts, and when I detect an enemy, I will flush him from cover with a barrage of rockets and hose him down in lead should he survive the flushing. The shield allows my scout to survive stray shots unscathed, and when it breaks, I go back and get another one.

Of course, all previously neglected weapon types suddenly come into their own with MAGs that have the stopping power to actually kill something with them. But the machine gun just has so much raw damage potential early on, that no other non-rocket weapon competes (the MAG-Storm has plenty of damage potential...too much, since nothing can survive it, so most of the shots will be wasted).

Rocket is great, too, because not only does it pack sufficient stopping power to bring down an enemy early on, it has excellent accuracy (can hit and kill enemies even at 0% CTH), which no other weapon can manage, and is thus the weapon of choice for both the incompetent rookie who can't shoot for shit, and the 100-Acc Sniper, and on top of that, it is free, all free. No need to waste money on garbage you will throw out at a loss.

The key thing that makes me use a range of weapons is the reflex bonus of the pistol and shotgun. These guys can safely scout out for you without incurring reaction fire for a good half of their move.
Reflex bonus merely so-so. If you're relying on reaction shots to drop an enemy, you're playing dangerously, because they never work and can't hit jack. Meanwhile, incurring reaction shots is often how you scout an enemy, and that's what the shield is for. The shot lets you know where the enemy is, and you can then begin bombarding him with rockets, which will set things on fire and light up the night. Edited by lusername
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I use a fairly well rounded squad. A shield/grenade dude for pushing forward together with an assault (the reaction bonus with shotguns mean you almost never get shot at). 1 sniper who usually has the worse armour and stays rearward where its safe. 2 rocketeers. In the mid to end game these are roles given to the nubcakes, they gain strength and TU from just carrying the things around and can actually be of use blasting open doors or destroying cover. (On terror missions half the squad are rocketeers). and whilst you may destroy some cash giving loot, a squad wipe is infinately worse and best avoided. 2 heavy MGs, supression/killing machines. and then a rifleman or 2 as jack of all trades. with better dropships i tend to add an extra assault/shield/Mg and keep rifles to the minimum.

Never push your guys forward so they have litttle TU left, if you uncover an alien they need to be able to retreat. Never leave troops exposed and dont expect half cover to be of much use, remember you have smoke nades, they are better used 'just in case' than taken home in the bodybag of a dead soldier. Never bunch your guys together.. they will be a nade magnet. and be super careful of areas with lots of cover like dense buildings, expect an alien to pop out from corners everywhere. this is another reason why rockets are cool, you just blow half the building away on your first turn then have the rest of the squad to lay fire down on any exposed threat.

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I were in pain with heavy weapons before. I thought same as u.. but then I figured that I used them wrong.. I tried to use them like assault.. u should use them like defence towers.. run a good spot. Get a good cover and start shooting.. is enemy behind tree? Just shoot.. kill it's cover.. so with a heavy no enemy can stay alive in sight. . At least there will be no cover for them or they will get surpress... let it stay and run with ur rifle and assaults. .

I don't like to use shield.. but if u give a shield soldier a shotgun , u can continiue until ur shield gone or get near the enemy.

Heavy is very good to defend your line against melee enemies too..

Rocket is good.. yes u lose all the loot but I choise a living squadron rather then 2 more loot..

Use smoke grenades between u and enemy.. it will save many lives..

Most mods need more experienced and hard core game play. And many save load.. u need to play really slow with that hard mods. U can't run in like Rambo. . I run and I save load tons :)

And don't forget heavy weapon acc is the lesser one of ur Str and acc.. so if ur guy got 80 Str and 50 acc it will use 50 acc. So it's not so usefull. I use mostly 65 60 around both Str and acc. My heavy can kill mostly an enemy easily even it's far from range. .

Edited by drages
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Combat Roles are IMO heavily based upon some breakthrough points in the game.

Typically the three points to keep in mind are Stun Weapons, Reapers and the Buzzard Suit.

Stun Weapons start making grenadiers, shielders and scouts significantly more effective.

Once Reapers you want Machine Gunners and/or Shotgunners on your team.

Buzzard suit gives you much needed observation abilities, essentially rendering scouts useless due to the ease at which you can scan the area.

As far as combat is concerned you would always want some damage dealers (shotgun,rockets, machine gunners) once Androns and Reapers start showing up.

Scouts are typically not used since you are almost always better off with a shield in one hand at any given point in time.

Typically Machine Gunners prior to the Predator suit can be effectively used in a few ways. First is park them somewhere and lure aliens into their range (at higer Tu's you can move 4 spaces before shooting IIRC; you also want your machine gunner to have higer TU than anything else since mobility is key). Or use C4 to blow the obstructions so the Gunners have a clear shot.

Ultimately my standard built as is possible rely's on lot's of rifleman with moderate range. Machine Gunners and Snipers for long range, and assaults for close range stuff. I typically don't use a scout since I rush for buzzard suits as soon as possible since the LOS bonus is godly

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rockets are only used for killing in an emergency, or just to watch stuff go squish, imo.

by FAR the best use of rockets is to open up areas so you can shoot at exposed aliens with your other troopers.

wait till you have to do a terror mission, and all the buildings are full of snipers. THEN you'll be wishing you brought at least one rocket guy.

sniper hiding in a room on the third floor? no problem. blow the face off the wall off with a rocket, and pick him off with your own sniper.

until you get predator armor, and are using plasmacasters with them, your rocket guy is going to be your entry maker.

with the predator armor though, your heavy weapons guys will end up opening most doors, walls, etc.

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