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Psi Powers, Berserking - any strategy to use?


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Psionics already use squad sight, but we can change some of the more powerful abilities to be based on direct LOS...or give them more limited range. But if that's the case, I think powers like fear should not require any LOS (not even squad sight). It's cool to have the X-Com 94 approach where your units are being attacked from the darkness, it's rather panic inducing.

They should at least attack the blue/morale bar, so only low morale units are in danger/you can protect yourself by raising morale again.

Tbh, the fear attacks are not really a threat, but REALLY annoying to have 5+ pew sounds every turn from some psi attack. Dread is even worse.

Edit: I know that morale should have an influence, at least the tips tell you so. I didn't really see anything, everyone had 99/99+ morale and got controlled/feared like crazy.

Edited by kat0r
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Having just gone through a carrier ground assault I would say they Psy abilities need a little tweek. Just getting to the carrier cost me 4 soldiers as the aliens seem to be able to see my troops when I cannot see them (from inside the carrier I guess - I know there were none outsider as I used the game as a test to go and see).

Although the bug I reported with the carrier assault made it worse, having a solider mind controlled every turn was not fun.

With the other abilities, they all seem to just trigger my troops firing on each other...

Would it be possible to stop soldiers using reaction fire on soldiers that have been mind controlled? I had one mind control cost me 5 troops - the mind controlled killed 2, 2 were taken down by friendly fire trying to kill her...

When she dropped I was so sick I just reloaded....

Added to the problem I posted in the bug section, this one mission has kicked a lot of the fun out of the game... It is almost as bad as the blaster launcher/mind control missions in the OG...

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Was doing a battleship breach today and oh boy...at one point I had 4 (four) soldiers mind controlled in a single turn.

It's really fine if psionics are powerful, but in that case there has to be something I can do about it. Some kind of gameplay mechanics that allows me to increase my chances but at the moment there is none. There is only reload and hope that it won't be as devastating this time.

I really think that psionics has to be either nerfed a lot or we need to have some anti-psionic mechanics.

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I just started my first carrier attack and it was really crazy considering every turn someone went berserk apparently and then with everyone at I think 99+ morale(no reason not to be since no suppression or casualties) then after the apparent berserking one of my best troops gets mind controlled shoots another commander then after KOing said soldier I end turn and my game crashed :/

But hey at least I get to reload and hope it doesn't happen again

How exactly does berserking work since my soldiers don't really shoot anyone and it's during hidden movement, either a soldier is unnerved or berserks and nothing really happens in terms of morale or anything.

also this

Edit: I know that morale should have an influence, at least the tips tell you so. I didn't really see anything, everyone had 99/99+ morale and got controlled/feared like crazy.
Edited by Top Doge
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How exactly does berserking work since my soldiers don't really shoot anyone and it's during hidden movement, either a soldier is unnerved or berserks and nothing really happens in terms of morale or anything.

They didn't shoot anything because you used all of your TUs during your turn so they couldn't do anything. Try leaving some soldiers with reserve TUs and the result will be very different.

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i discovered a giggletastic way to protect your troops from mind controlled soldiers on my stream last night. I still need to make a highlight of it.

Basically keep room in your backpack and stow their weapon at end of each turn or you can drop to the ground if you cant afford the 4 time units. mind controlled soldiers cannot use grenades nor melee, they also will not equip guns out of the backpack or on the ground. this is a little bit of a headache inventory management wise, at one point i 'left behind' one of my soldiers guns but got it back at end of mission automatically. bring lots of grenades for this strat, the low time unit cost for no equipped gun is pretty amazing especially with a squad of 12 haha.

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i discovered a giggletastic way to protect your troops from mind controlled soldiers on my stream last night. I still need to make a highlight of it.

Basically keep room in your backpack and stow their weapon at end of each turn or you can drop to the ground if you cant afford the 4 time units. mind controlled soldiers cannot use grenades nor melee, they also will not equip guns out of the backpack or on the ground. this is a little bit of a headache inventory management wise, at one point i 'left behind' one of my soldiers guns but got it back at end of mission automatically. bring lots of grenades for this strat, the low time unit cost for no equipped gun is pretty amazing especially with a squad of 12 haha.

I did that in the OG a lot when the mind control was really intense at late game. And it was a as intensely annoying either.

However, I kind of remember that the soldiers were using the grenades then.

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I am at the start of a battleship assault and I guess the Psi Alien survived as each turn all my troops feel dread.

What I did notice as I am saving at the end of each turn (to test this9 is that although I leave me troops with very few TUs, they can still act when mind controlled.

I had a Miss Gomez left with 9 TUs, and she still managed to get ne shot off and run about 4 squares - with 9 TUs..

Having seen that, I think the only way to deal with this is to give up on reaction fire and do what is said above, pack the weapons in the backpack at the end of each turn. Fun when there are reapers about.

Any word form the Devs on sorting this out yet? All my troops have had 99+ bravery when mind controlled and if they get to act in the alien turn, it is going to lead to at least two deaths if you leave enough TUs for reaction fire (if not, maybe only one death).

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This mind control shenanigans ruins the late game.

I can't see any connection with direct LOS, squad sight, or soldier bravery making soldiers more unlikely to be MC. It happens to all of them, anywhere in every nook and cranny, and of course, while making way through a UFO, can't make it with only 1 soldier, let alone with them killing each other in every step.

It takes some patience, thinking and effort to keep soldiers alive so they can wield weapons a little better then a monkey wields a banana, and suddenly, all that is bombed back to the stone age with MC.

Fact is, losing trained soldiers late game because of some clumsy MC mechanics (as it will certainly happen right now) is game over, and very unlikely to get a replay. The "why can't i f**** use a tin foil hat?????" question can be very powerful.

Explain to me the why of antigravity vehicles and armors, hypersonic aircraft, "mini black hole" torpedoes, and NO defense against MC.

Oh, wait. Maybe if i can put together the most dumass team of soldiers ever, too stupid to me MC'ed... maybe recruit Steve-o and friends?

He knows the A-B-C of keeping the mind protected

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i discovered a giggletastic way to protect your troops from mind controlled soldiers on my stream last night. I still need to make a highlight of it.

Basically keep room in your backpack and stow their weapon at end of each turn or you can drop to the ground if you cant afford the 4 time units. mind controlled soldiers cannot use grenades nor melee, they also will not equip guns out of the backpack or on the ground.

You could do that in the OG too and it's fricking stupid that that's what you have to resort to in a brand new game! It made me want to gouge my eyes out then and it does now too. Edited by StellarRat
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You could do that in the OG too and it's fricking stupid that that's what you have to resort to in a brand new game! It made me want to gouge my eyes out then and it does now too.

Agreed. It just ends up being busywork for busywork's sake rather than a tactic to defend again. I'm hoping the details will change over the next couple of months.

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I guess not all of the Caesan thugs have psi powers and can do mind control.

If no protective gear is possible, wouldn't it be better to have a cooldown of maybe two rounds for the psi-guy-alien to be able to do the next mind control?

Thus there will be mind control and you don't have a protection against it but it cannot be done each round and for all guys.

And if that would be too much a nerf let the soldiers recover slow from mind control, meaning after the mind control is off, recover only 50% of TU's ("soldier is shaken by mind control effect") and next round only up to 75% ("soldier is still edgy due to former mind control"), and be complete over that in the third round ("soldier has totally recovered from mind control effect").

And don't stack the effect so that a 50%-mind-control-recover guy that is mind controlled again is downed to 25% regain-TU. The recover percentage should be on the unchanged max TU or the current wounded-max TU.

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I just started my first carrier attack and it was really crazy considering every turn someone went berserk apparently and then with everyone at I think 99+ morale(no reason not to be since no suppression or casualties) then after the apparent berserking one of my best troops gets mind controlled shoots another commander then after KOing said soldier I end turn and my game crashed :/

But hey at least I get to reload and hope it doesn't happen again

How exactly does berserking work since my soldiers don't really shoot anyone and it's during hidden movement, either a soldier is unnerved or berserks and nothing really happens in terms of morale or anything.

also this

Pretty much this. Also, psi is not squad sight based, it's universal in my experience, as soon as the aliens spot you you're going to be getting random shit like that all day erryday, even if you kill all the aliens in sight. As for what chris said, I wouldn't mind if LOS was universal if mind-control wasn't so ridiculously OP by having no counter. It's insane that the only counter is player meta bullshit like wasting all TU's or putting weapons in your backpack. And they're about to RELEASE this game!? The game is great and balanced in all ways except this.

EDIT: woops doublepost didn't realize this forum lacks automerge.

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That is why the game is not released, because they are still balancing things like psi powers.

The experimental build will be updated frequently I imagine with changes designed to balance these powers.

Remember that they have not been present in the game as long as most other features and most players have not spent as much time play testing the late game as they have the early game so there is less feedback available.

Something as simple as a chance to resist psi powers based on current morale percentage with a small loss of morale each time a test is made could make a massive difference.

The enemy would need to wear your troops down with fear and regular troops before mind control could be effective.

More like chipping away at your defences and eventually sneaking in when your will fails than beating you around the head with a psychic hammer.

If you have read Crimson Dagger then (small spoiler):

It describes the more subtle mind control I am thinking of when suggestions are planted rather than direct control asserted.

If you haven't read it I suggest you do, it can be found from the Xenonauts launcher, just click on 'Extras'.

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Stable builds are called stable because they change less than the experimental builds and have most of the game breaking bugs ironed out.

They are there so people who want to dedicate more time to getting to the late game and test things beyond the first few weeks of game time have the chance to do that.

An example is the psi abilities.

Without the stable versions few people would be able to get to the point where psi powers were more common before another experimental change broke their saves again so there would be little or no feedback on them to help the devs balancing.

Stable does not mean finely balanced and ready for release, it is just a snapshot of how things currently stand.

It allows people to give in depth feedback and make suggestions on fixes for problems that are well thought out because they have been able to dedicate time to playing the broken parts of the game as well as the good parts.

Concentrate less on the upcoming release date, Goldhawk will not release the game if it is so broken people are giving up before they reach the end, they are not EA :P.

Concentrate more on the problems you find and suggest solutions that you think would fix it.

Remember though that at this stage adding whole new features like psi labs and so on are unlikely.

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They are there so people who want to dedicate more time to getting to the late game and test things beyond the first few weeks of game time have the chance to do that.

An example is the psi abilities.

Without the stable versions few people would be able to get to the point where psi powers were more common before another experimental change broke their saves again so there would be little or no feedback on them to help the devs balancing.

Yes, I played v19 up til late December, then v20 came out, and it looked so promising I dropped my v19 game. Then I played v20 also to the point of late December, when v21 came out, and I dropped my v20 game. But because of all the controversy over psi powers I'm sticking with my v21 stable version no matter how many tempting experimental builds GH releases so I can see for myself what's going on late-game.

The steady release of experimental builds is truly a double-edged sword; it shows GH's fantastic response to the community and their continual efforts at balancing, but as you said it can also hurt vital endgame feedback when new goodies are regularly being dangled before players like me (why keep driving that Chevy when now you can have a BMW?)

EDIT: wow, just reading the preceding posts has me really worried that my guys are going to get torn apart by psi attacks, and ragequit after so much time invested....

Edited by dpelectric
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I think a lot of people play the experimental builds because they feel they are missing out if they stick to the boring stable version as well and then don't enjoy the constant change.

Exactly.

But this effect is amplified by the considerable fanfare and trumpet-blowing by GH every time a new experimental build is released. This is completely understandable, as they've just put a considerable amount of work into it, and are looking for player feedback, but they ought to somehow add a caveat that they still very much need x amount of players to keep driving their Chevys. Maybe experienced forum dwellers understand this, but new players like me are tempted to jump from one new build to the next and thus potentially impair late-game balancing

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Yes, I played v19 up til late December, then v20 came out, and it looked so promising I dropped my v19 game. Then I played v20 also to the point of late December, when v21 came out, and I dropped my v20 game. But because of all the controversy over psi powers I'm sticking with my v21 stable version no matter how many tempting experimental builds GH releases so I can see for myself what's going on late-game.

The steady release of experimental builds is truly a double-edged sword; it shows GH's fantastic response to the community and their continual efforts at balancing, but as you said it can also hurt vital endgame feedback when new goodies are regularly being dangled before players like me (why keep driving that Chevy when now you can have a BMW?)

EDIT: wow, just reading the preceding posts has me really worried that my guys are going to get torn apart by psi attacks, and ragequit after so much time invested....

Most likely they will, and you'll have to do annoying metagame reacharounds like waste all AP by doing squatthrusts or spinning in circles, or stowing weapons in backpacks each turn (and wasting 12 ap equipping them again) to ensure they either have no weapon to attack with or no AP to attack with.

I think this game is going to be delayed until this is fixed, atleast, I hope it would. I haven't even reached the endgame and it's still ruined the game, I can't imagine what the heck the final mission is like.

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Most likely they will, and you'll have to do annoying metagame reacharounds like waste all AP by doing squatthrusts or spinning in circles, or stowing weapons in backpacks each turn (and wasting 12 ap equipping them again) to ensure they either have no weapon to attack with or no AP to attack with.

I think this game is going to be delayed until this is fixed, atleast, I hope it would. I haven't even reached the endgame and it's still ruined the game, I can't imagine what the heck the final mission is like.

Man, that's such a shame. Mid-January, I just finished a vicious fight against 20 sebillians in a landing ship. Fire and smoke everywhere, bullets flying, blood spraying, corpses littering the ground. 9 of my 12 soldiers wounded. I loved every minute of it. The sebs were tossing grenades, rushing me in packs, and taking cover intelligently. I was very impressed with the AI.

And now people are telling me this great experience is soon to get flushed down the drain

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Had an equally impressive mission with Andron terror team - i downed just another cruiser. Turned the dropship was slowly surrounded by Andron soldiers. Then Harridans opened fire with volleys of sniper fire and plasma cannons. As team weathered the first wave, the second wave brought more androns with an officer and a team with heavier weapons. A pair of medium drones kept at the distance, drawing fire from my 2 machinegunners. Cover from smoke grenades kept my soldiers from being singled out and everyone (including two rookies with laser carbines among all plasmas) barely alive. What i liked most is the actual sense of having to defend the drop point as i've met my first andron in range of 1 turn. After that the clean-up of a cruiser was rather anticlimactic - same 5-6 androns and 1-2 harridans. Shame there are no guard turrets (half-life 2 style) inside UFOs.

Minor gripe: shouldn't all the robots (both androns and drones) have gotten immunity to smoke grenades? I mean advanced cameras and other sensors and all... This would make them seriously deadly. Possibly at least reduced effects by half, while lizard-trolls keep full immunity?

Edited by Beltorn
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