doubleskulls

I agree almost entirely with your feedback - with this you can transfer equipment on the 'stores' screen - there is a button on the bottom 'transfer items'. Engineers/scientists no, you just have to hire new ones and fire old ones.

I'm not sure magnetic weapons are a trap, as they are marginally better than lasers, but you are right getting Heavy Lasers (and Phantoms) early is critical. In my last playthrough I never built any Angel interceptors, and got rid of the 2 I started with as soon as I could replace them. Maybe having the chief scientist recommend research when you go to the screen? For example "Commander, you seem be ignoring vital research into XXX which help us with YYYY" - really its Alenium Power, and later on Alien Electronics who's headlines don't, at least to me, scream out 'this is critical research, do it soon'. I went with 3 labs early on (end of month 2 I think fully staffed) and I probably had more research than I really needed. Next time I'll go with 2 labs only, but get the Quantum Lab upgrade asap. For my next playthrough I think this is the first 10 researches I'd do. Combat Vehicles Warden Armour Magnetic Weapons Xenobiology Alenium Power Phantom Interceptor Quantum Teleportation Laser Weapons Heavy Lasers Dragonfly Dropship IMO everything after that is really whatever you want, until Plasma Weapons and Electronics (and Electronics ought to get a recommendation too IMO - electroshock grenades and gauss weapons are very useful. I'll probably end up taking the interrogations as the bonus training & damage is quite nice whilst I'm waiting for .

Aliens definitely have grenades, because I get them as loot! I rarely seem them use them (maybe just wraiths once in 2 play throughs), but that could be because I'm rarely offering a better target than they'd get from shooting. I can't recollect any other species using grenades.

Technically the Stun Baton is a melee weapon too.

Thanks for the feedback, the tech tree is updated - I've put it in the first post.

We don't have the complete game yet. I think the 'end game' percentage is getting to the next major milestone.

Did you notice if you picked up anything new? Maybe Alien Plasma Grenades?

Advanced lasers are extra damage and in practice infinite ammo.

@Conductiv you are quite right that Reapers are a lot more dangerous on missions with reduced visibility like the Alien Base, and we do need to be careful when buffing them. I think in my last play through I lost one soldier to one in the alien base, and another when I tried to stun it with the baton, not realising that melee would get a reaction. In most missions though when I see reapers I think, oh that's going to make life much easier - no ranged attack and squishy. Their AI lets them down, as they are too predictable. If they have LOS they charge heedlessly towards our soldiers, but don't have the resilience or speed to get through any meaningful reaction fire - they are quite easy to one shot. That makes them too easy to bait out and kill in their own turn or just bait out and shoot them in yours. I think Reaper AI may want to try something like being more of an ambusher, e.g. can I reach an enemy and attack them? If so, do it. If not I'd look to choose my next position based on a weighting of vulnerability to enemy fire in the next turn - i.e. stay out of LOS or in good cover proximity to the enemy, i.e. the closer the better safest route - i.e. minimal chance of triggering reaction fire or being hit by it. Something like that may make Reapers a lot more effective without really modifying their stats. Also, potentially look at having Reapers use swarming tactics. Probably just spawning them close to one another would be enough to simulate that.

Reapers are very dangerous if they get into melee, but I agree a bit too squishy and not fast enough.

Based off the wiXenonauts 2 Tech Tree.pdfki and my own experiences I've actually put it together in a diagram which maybe others will find useful too. If you spot any errors/omissions etc please let me know.

Suppression is a tactical option to use when you need it. I rarely try and suppress with anything other than flashbangs too. If I get it from shoot its great, but I rarely have that as a goal. Its too unpredictable to rely on and I'd rather just shoot to kill. Generally I'll look at the level of risk I think I have if the alien shoots - if I've got a shield I may use that soldier to generate reaction fire rather than trying to suppress, and also it can be worth checking your reflexes too. High reflex soldiers are less likely to generate reaction fire.

So in my quest to run the numbers and understand how that may influence some strategic choices then one of the questions is about the value of the upgrades. Quantum labs are a $500k upgrade which increases every scientists contribution from 5% more research to 7.5% more research. Simply put, yes its worth it. 2 quantum labs produces about the same amount of research as 3 regular labs (90% more research vs 95%), at a slightly higher initial price ($2.05m vs $1.725m) but substantially lower running costs $195k p/m less - so after 2 months you break even, and after that you are getting the same amount of research cheaper. The primary difference is the wages of the scientists themselves. The 7 additional scientists in the 3rd lab are costing $175k p/m in wages, on top of which you save on lab maintenance and needing fewer living quarters, and less power. At least at the moment I think the research is pretty fast - on my recent run through I didn't get the upgrade, but after building my 3rd lab in month 2 I'd completed all the research by day 200 ish. Next game I'm thinking to have 2 labs but take the quantum lab upgrade as soon as I feel I need the boost.

So in my quest to run the numbers and understand how that may influence some strategic choices then one of the questions is about the value of the upgrades. Quantum labs are a $500k upgrade which increases every scientists contribution from 5% more research to 7.5% more research. Simply put, yes its worth it. 2 quantum labs produces about the same amount of research as 3 regular labs (90% more research vs 95%), at a slightly higher initial price ($2.05m vs $1.725m) but substantially lower running costs $195k p/m less - so after 2 months you break even, and after that you are getting the same amount of research cheaper. The primary difference is the wages of the scientists themselves. The 7 additional scientists in the 3rd lab are costing $175k p/m in wages, on top of which you save on lab maintenance and needing fewer living quarters, and less power. At least at the moment I think the research is pretty fast - on my recent run through I didn't get the upgrade, but after building my 3rd lab in month 2 I'd completed all the research by day 200 ish. Next game I'm thinking to have 2 labs but take the quantum lab upgrade as soon as I feel I need the boost.

We could think about this the other way... what if we made daytime missions tougher? e.g. giving aliens improved vision or range in daytime? So that night time is our friend, not theirs. This often true for the underdog in asymmetrical conflict.

How are you deploying your bases and what level of radar are you putting in? For me, I think 4 bases are enough, a level 3 radar in Chad/Sudan, a level 2 near Beijing, level 1 in Paraguay/Bolivia, and a level 2 in Montana. If you really wanted a 5th base Australia is really the only place you'd not cover if you boost the radar further.

Suppressing aliens is great - you know they don't have reaction fire and, I think Aliens use 40% of their TUs to shoot, so they've got 10% left for walking to line up a shot. If your soldiers get suppressed it can be bad. Particularly losing the 50% TU next turn. If you've a 51% TU weapons (e.g. LMG) you may not be able to shoot at all.

I think Shields are a bit overpowered as is, as they massively reduce the risk of taking losses when scouting. i.e. the shield can soak up reaction fire, and then the rest of the squad kill revealed enemies. Rinse, repeat, mission done. Carry 'spare' shields with your other roles mean even if they lose the shield you just run back to the dropship and equip a new one. Timed missions make that approach harder, but after initial 3 cleaner missions there is just the odd abduction mission with any timer. In terms of alternative mechanisms I don't know what was experimented during the closed beta phase, so its hard to comment on those. I'd question whether shields are even needed at all, and making us focus on high reflexes as the critical scouting attribute may be enough.

On the topic of Alenium Generators, they are producing around 62% more power, e.g. 3 produces 340 vs 210 from regular generators. They have the same build cost ($200k), but higher maintenance ($25k vs $10k p/m). My base strategy is to have the initial base being built up, the 2nd base has additional engineering and the other bases are just hangars and radar. I don't build missile batteries and use sentry guns for defence. 'Hangars & Radar' - we get 100 power from the access lift, which is enough for a single radar. If you want two radars you need 20 more power, so a regular generator is fine. If you want 3 radars you need 180 power, which would be a single Alenium generator or 2 regular generators. In that scenario the alenium generator is $5k more p/m, but $200k less initial investment, so definitely worth having. I don't think I'd ever have a 3 radar base outside of my starting base, so this scenario won't kick in. My secondary base, with 2 radars and 3 workshops needs 225 power, 125 from generators, which requires 2 additional generators of either type. A main base 3 radar base, with training, medical, and 5 workshops/labs, needs 305 power, which is 3 alenium or 4 regular generators. So for my base setup there is no point doing the alenium generator research. I need one more regular generator ($200k) than I would if I did the $500k upgrade (plus Alenium), and the monthly maintenance is lower on regular generators too. The extra tile being used does not carry weight with me, even the starting base isn't full and I've loads of room in my other bases to build additional labs or workshops if I wanted to expand further. At the end of the 180 days the only expansion I'm considering is whether to add more living quarters/training so I can get more rookies in so I don't have to send colonel's on missions. The training centre would push me to need a 2nd additional regular generator, which still would be more cost effective than the upgrade. I'm sure there are other base designs where over all your bases you'd benefit, but you'd need to be using a lot more power than I am to justify it. Probably the most likely scenario would be building missile batteries. The critical question is whether the power demands tip you over the edge in terms of needing additional generators built or not. Overall you'd probably need to have at least 3 fewer generators being required to justify the investment as is, and even then its undermined in value because the maintenance costs are higher. From what I can see between 151-180 power, and between 231-420 you need an additional regular generator, 421-440 you need 2, but then its back down to 1 until you get to 500.

I like the thought process, but if you are playing commander level you don't see HP/Armour of enemies anyway. Also, I think having the outline of the figure in most instances would be an obvious reveal too. There aren't too many enemies with very similar profiles you'd get confused by. And the project lead, Chris, reads this forums, and regularly responds.

Chris was citing my post... I did build Mars, and then it got killed on one of the cleaner missions, which at the time I thought a necessary sacrifice to kill the VIP, and I could not recover the wreck to reduce rebuild costs - I lost half the squad as it was. For a long time I was looking at $250k to replace it and just could not justify that. $35k to hire a soldier and replace the warden armour. Its basically a 3:1 trade cost, just to repair a wreck. My view is that MARS is good, its just overpriced. I'd suggest maybe $150k to build / $75 to replace would represent a better cost/value ratio than at present. At that level you are basically saying 2:1 trade to repair MARS. Its worth bearing in mind that if you skip MARS also leads to other costs for Engineering Upgrades, that you may also avoid, i.e. Alloy plating (500k), Reinforced Plating (750k) - I don't use additional armour 'plates (although arguably you may want them if you rely on Sentry guns for base defence). Both rocket upgrades are another $200k, plus the other upgrades if you really want them. Having played both Veteran and Commander I think there is a fairly big difference on the difficult curve. Veteran is more forgiving tactically (so you suffer fewer losses) and gives more money strategically, so the very hard choices on what you spend money on aren't quite so hard as on Commander. On Veteran I had a MARS, used it the whole campaign and never really thought about it too much.

Yes, I think something that rewards the player for taking on night battles is important. Its either that make them different for both aliens and player, like @Sunnybuns suggested.

Correct, manually fighting every battle. Money is tight and fighting seems to yield much more than auto-collecting. Tactical battles are really what the game is about too, so I'd either use the 'collect cash' option if I was losing badly in tactical and needed to wait for better equipment, or late game when I don't need the cash so much. For bases, I started out around Sudan/Chad, and got a 2nd radar and 3 phantoms there, 2nd base was in the Gobi desert, also with 2 radars and 3 phantoms. Latin America, in Bolivia, had 1 radar & 2 phantoms and I'd just started on a North American base, around Oklahoma. All bases would have had 3 phantoms, and the first base would go to the 3rd radar. Maybe a 2nd radar in NA. I think that would have given all the coverage I'd need. If I'd ever got there maybe a 5th base in Australia, but I doubt it would be worth it. An Access Lift on its own is $125k p/m, which is a big drag on the finances.

I wasn't really commenting on what the intent was or how it ought to work, just sharing my analysis, and maybe helping some avoid a pitfall.

I've been doing some analysis on the economic of engineers I wanted to share, to see if there is significant hole in the logic, and maybe help others optimise their gameplay. TLDR; its not worth having Engineers just to make money Initially engineers generate $50 per hour, or $36k per 30 days. Once you have the nanotech workshops this jumps to $75 p/h, or $54k p/m. However the setup costs of buildings and recruitment mean that the payback period is too long to be worthwhile in the scope of the game. Each engineer cost $25k to hire, and $25k in wages p/m. We do need to factor in the costs of workshops and living quarters too. With 4 workshops in a 2x2 grid you can employ 28 engineers. which also require 2 living quarters (maybe slightly more, depending on adjacency bonuses). 6 workshops/living quarters costs $1.5m to build and $60k p/m in maintenance. Across 28 engineers that means $2.2m to build/hire, and $760k p/m in recurring costs, for a net profit of $248k p/m. That takes 8.8 months to repay the initial investment, and I've ignored how long it takes to build/hire and power costs, so the figure is worse. i.e. in the scope of the game building engineers to make money isn't worth it and you are better off spending money elsewhere. Once you've got Nanotech workshops, which is an additional $500k project, Engineers make 50% more profit, or $54k p/m each. Across our 28 engineer example above, that means the monthly profit is now $752k for an investment of $2.7m, and the payback period is down to 3.6 months. Nanotech research itself pays back in the first month. I've only got early access, so I'm not sure how much longer after the 180 days the game is expected to last. If a game is ~270 days, or 9 months. That would mean all your engineering needs to be fully online by day 160, anything you add after that will not generate any overall profit, so in practice probably around day 100-120 you are better off investing money on things that make it more profitable to take on UFOs (i.e. better air defences to shoot down more of them, better soldiers to suffer fewer losses when taking them on). I think that means strategically there isn't really the time to invest in a long term payback by having excess engineering capacity just to generate income. Strategically you have to have engineers, but the economics would seem to point to keeping that to minimum level you need to actually build the items and upgrades you do want in the campaign.