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What weapons do you take on a mission?


What Weapons do you use?  

26 members have voted

  1. 1. What Weapons do you use?

    • Heavy Weapons [Machine Gun, Rocket Launchers]
      2
    • Close Combat Weapons [Shotguns, Pistols, Riot Shields]
      2
    • Mid to Long Range Weapons [Snipers, Ballistic Rifles]
      20
    • Explosive Things [Grenades]
      2


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I mod the game for larger numbers of troops in the transport, eighteen to be exact, and for my standard crew I use a variation of the modern British Army infantry doctrine. So two sections of eight troops, in two fire teams of four. Each group contains two riflemen, one machinegun and one rocket launcher. The two spare troops are snipers. If I'm taking a tank with me then it's the same deal but with only nine soldiers.

Later in the game I liked to have a designated grab team, to take aliens alive, and this is typically made up of lots of riflemen and rocket launcher troops carrying stun rockets, stun grenades and maybe a couple of guys with batons and shields. This squad has a bad habit of suffering pretty obscene casualty rates, but those are the risks.

I also like to have a designated hard target squad, which is usually a tank and then nine guys with mostly machineguns and rockets with a couple of riflemen as spotters. I use those guys for terror missions or a particularly nasty looking crash site where I don't give a crap if I make a mess of everybody and everything on the ground.

Must confess, I have yet to work out an optimal team for base assaults. I like to take a tank in, but they can get blocked off in unpredictable ways, so I might have to go with pure infantry. However I do it though it always turns into a bloodbath. :(

Edited to add, always carry lots of grenades too. SO MANY GRENADES. Aliens do not like grenades.

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For base assaults: explosives. Lots of. And some more.

Alien bases will have most aliens in one big room with several entrances. So I fill it with explosives. Soldiers firing rockets into the room, then eventually I throw in several smoke grenades and go in, by which time most aliens inside should be dead.

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Like the others, I'm mystified by why you wouldn't take an "all the above" option. With 8 soldiers at the start, I take 2 shotguns, 2 grenadier/shielders, 3 rifles, and 1 sniper rifle. I add a machine gun and another sniper from there.

I also don't see why Rocket Launchers and Machine Guns are "Heavy Weapons", when Rocket Launchers are just explosives-delivery systems, and Machine Guns are just rifles permanently stuck on autofire.

The best I can figure, the mindset that seems to have gone into making this poll seems to be that we, as players, are going with some sort of "zerg rush" mentality that means we only equip one "best" loadout of character and spam that relentlessly. That's not how most people play.

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Like the others, I'm mystified by why you wouldn't take an "all the above" option. With 8 soldiers at the start, I take 2 shotguns, 2 grenadier/shielders, 3 rifles, and 1 sniper rifle. I add a machine gun and another sniper from there.

I also don't see why Rocket Launchers and Machine Guns are "Heavy Weapons", when Rocket Launchers are just explosives-delivery systems, and Machine Guns are just rifles permanently stuck on autofire.

The best I can figure, the mindset that seems to have gone into making this poll seems to be that we, as players, are going with some sort of "zerg rush" mentality that means we only equip one "best" loadout of character and spam that relentlessly. That's not how most people play.

I think the question is really one of mobility, you could categorise MGs and rocket launchers as heavy weapons because you're not really agile using them.

It might be easier to ask if there are any weapons people don't ever use. Only weapons I can think that I'd really even want to live without are the shotgun, pistol and sniper rifle. But then I'm funny like that. :)

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I think the question is really one of mobility, you could categorise MGs and rocket launchers as heavy weapons because you're not really agile using them.

It might be easier to ask if there are any weapons people don't ever use. Only weapons I can think that I'd really even want to live without are the shotgun, pistol and sniper rifle. But then I'm funny like that. :)

Wouldn't the sniper rifle be added to the heavy weapons then since that also suffers an accuracy penaltty if it moves?

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I really like the rocket launchers. Make things go boom. Sometimes I get the impression my troops may be worse than the aliens, and the game really is about an alien race that arrived to save the Earth from a bunch of psychos who airdrop into a random area and blow everything up. Not as bad as it was in classic x-com where I'd level the area with blaster launchers before leaving the transporter, but close.

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right now I've been taking:

2 "Scouts" - Riot Shield + Pistol, with Rocket Launcher + 1 rocket and 2x Smoke and Flash grenades. When I got heavier armor I had to lose the RL. I need to evaluate strength stat of these guys.

2 Riflemen - added 2 of each grenade to belt.

2 Snipers

2 Machine gunners. - added 2 frag grenades to belt.

The scouts lead the way, and act as moving cover for the riflemen, using the rocket launcher as needed. The MG and Snipers are support on the flanks. If needed they can be split up into 2 groups of 4, for flanking missions/etc.

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Granted, I've not played since 17 (or maybe 18), but my squads then consisted of about 4 snipers, a couple of mg's, a couple of light riflemen and/or a rocket trooper.

Being honest, rockets aren't needed. You can carry many more grenades spread out across your soldiers.

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