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General strategy for survivng at insane: tips needed


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I've only tried the game for a few days so far, modifying every approach slightly, but so far it doesn't seem to work just as i thought. Let me tell you how i try to play and any advice would be appreciated.

So, it currently looks that i can't really have more than 3 bases. Therefore, i place them like this (sorry, i'm at work and don't have xenonauts map with me) :

h_1404908584_4934532_9ff8c1e32f.png

The starting one is the one in europe, it covers much of european Soviet Union, Europe itself (except for ireland, but more radars later fix that), big part of nothern africa and some middle east. Then i immediately start building the second one, each of those other two will do - Central American covers much of US, at least after second radar goes live, central america itself and some south america, thus covering 3 regions, and asian one covers asian part of SU, indochina itself and a little part of australia.

I build one more radar, hangar, living room, stock thing on first base. Some extra soldiers if i see good stats, rest of the living room goes to up to 5 scientists.

Then i just wait for second base to be built, lay down 3 hangars and radar there and wait for the month to end. If i have the money by some miracle, i order 2 F-17 in. MiG-32 research starts as soon as possible. After that, i go full plasma research until i get laser gatlings, then switch to alenium to get alenium missiles.

While the month is ending, i obviously try to intercept as many aliens as possible and conduct at least one UFO raid to bring me materials for study. Rest i usually airstrike because even a few dead guys make raids unprofitable for me compared to air strikes, and i really really really need money for planes and their bases. I build at least one MiG on the primary base, and if i have more money, i build second one while sending first one to base 2.

Second month - with fresh money i start building 3rd base, lay down second radar and probably run out of money. As soon as possible, i finish base 3 and build things there, usually with just one radar because money is low. 2 F-17s and 1 MiG-32 as soon as possible.

Next objective is to raid a corvette to bring materials for study. Stun weapons might a good choice to research on the way, because stun grenades help with raiding UFOs a lot.

Situation with funding sort of stabilizes at this point and even gets into positive if i'm lucky. However, now the problems with ground combat arise. Simple mistake or just an alien using cover too well can turn UFO raid in a slaughter with over half the team dead. Terror missions bring real terror, i usually pop in, kill 1 or 2 aliens and then the only option is the nuclear strike. If i go about researching and building wolf armor, i lack firepower. Jackal is totally useless. Laser weapons cost too much and take too much time to risk carrying them around on unarmored guys. I still do it sometimes, but this is very risky.

Where am i doing mistakes and/or what am i supposed to do next? I guess the logical idea would be to research and build shrike as soon as possible, and then go for corsairs? The thing is, where to get the money for that all? I might have the money to do it very slowly due to one lab/workshop, or i can spend money on additional labs and workshops, probably on the first base because trying to move production elsewhere takes too much money, but then i hang in the air with not enough interceptors or without the 3rd base in general. Generally, funding regions fall off in next months, and earth dies.

Something's gotta be wrong. I already had major improvement in ufo hunting with just building 2nd radar on each base, so there must be something else.

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I dont like your first base placement, my first is usually Northern Africa or maybe the Middle East. I place my third in Oceania, yours seems too up north for my tastes. Soviets have a large field to cover and yet, they never let me down even if I only survey the European part. Our 2nds are more or less the same.

I wouldnt bother with ordering f-17s, the two you get at start is usually good enough for me, migs are faster and stronger. Sure theres alien superiority fighters, but not nearly enough to justify 2 condors per base, the upkeep of aircraft is ridiculous. Go 2migs 1f-17 per base, the third base doesnt have to be up and running the second month, but you do need 3 radars in the first two.(Thats my opinion anyway)

Other than that I cant really think of any hints for your geoscape, you seem to have the right idea.

Now to the good part... ground combat. Jackal is useless, it saved some lives for me(probably anyway), but dont bother. Research stun weapons asap, lasers are expensive and take long to build, while stun batons are free and reliable. Flashbang to supress, then beat senseless.

You should be just fine until corvettes with this. Androns and Sebillian Officers dont really respond well to the shock treatment. It is possible to do corvettes with just the basic free gear, but a laser carbine or a precision laser goes a long way. Scatter(heavy) lasers are awesome not to mention the ata guns upgrade, get those fast!

Dont be afraid of unarmored laser arms. Ive had many soldiers in wolf armor killed by a single burst from a normal plasma rifle, the damage range is that insane... on insane... xD. Not to mention their more dangerous weaponry and grenades.

So thats it, go damage first and try to outmanouver the enemy, the armor is unreliable. Oh and while ground combat is hard, you need that cash, so go do the mission, airstiking doesnt give nearly as much as a successful raid does, never mind what the tip says.

[EDIT]

Ive recently tried vehicles again, because a number of people said theyre getting good results with 6+1. I must say they did get better, when its no longer about money(youre in danger of losing the mission), or in terrors in general that additional firepower works wonders, just dont let the enemy hit your "armored vehicles" because they die way too easily.

[/EDIT]

I never made it when I tried to skip plasma, so I dont recommend that, blue androns and armored sebillians make a habbit of ignoring my lasers so build a few plasma guns. (again only carbines, precision and heavy).

Edited by ViniJones
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not to mention the ata guns upgrade

What's that?

Other than that, hm, you seem to be right about migs. Need to try that now. And i guess i should skip laser rifles completely and take mostly specialized arms since jack of all trades rifle doesn't look too good at all.

As for vehicles, i played a bit with hunter. Yeah, it's good, just very expensive to lose. But levelling everything with pulse laser feels like old x-com with rocket to every barn just in case. Good stuff. Never tried scimitar yet, shrike dropships and corsairs are always more important to build.

As for not covering eastern part of SU, well, i tried to keep it safe due to sentimental reasons, but i guess global war on humanity means i have to make sacrifies. Oh well. Poor far eastern guys.

Let's see how "more migs, less condors, bases further to south, more lmgs and less rifles" play out,

Edited by Huntota
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No victory is without sacrifice. :)

ata= air-to-air your dogfighter cannons get upgraded with the tiers heavy research completed.

Shrike only adds 2 places, back when it had 12, I rushed it. Now im not so sure, they do offer much less cover than charlie. Corsairs would take priority before a tank though. For me it boils down to wether I plan to play terror mission (go tank) or try to stop them before they begin(go corsair).

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Wow hardcore players. :D Please dont tell me that you guys play also with iron man on?

Yes,... of course we do. Theres challenge to it, whereas being able to reload every mistake and correct it before it was done makes you unable to lose. If you cant lose, whats the point of winning? :o

Because someone said that will build more then 1 radar, so I don't know if he want to have 2 radars in base or stand-alone radars on the map?

More than one radar inside a base. If you have one you have this small-ass perimeter, if you add another one or two, the range increases accordingly. Doesnt work with more than 3.

Edited by ViniJones
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Okay, used the modified approach for a while. Works better. Sure i have to manually control migs shooting down small annoying evading UFOs, but at least it's sort of working.

However, it just seems that the initial game heavily depends on zones ufos spawn in. If they spawn around your base (around your two bases when second one gets operational), you're all good. If just a few ufos appear elsewhere and wreck everything, you suddenly see yourself dropping to negatives due to one small annoying alien ship. That doesn't look too right, but what can one do.

Let's see if there's some bottleneck ahead. I've already decided to spend money on 2nd lab and 2nd workshop instead of saving them for when 3rd base finishes command center (month two), so maybe that'll help with getting to necessary tech faster. Maybe not. We'll see.

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However, it just seems that the initial game heavily depends on zones ufos spawn in. If they spawn around your base (around your two bases when second one gets operational), you're all good. If just a few ufos appear elsewhere and wreck everything, you suddenly see yourself dropping to negatives due to one small annoying alien ship.

Yea, thats why you need the coverage. Thats why were aiming to cover as much land as possible. Because the dice can roll really bad sometimes. I get negatives almost every September.

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Let's see if there's some bottleneck ahead. I've already decided to spend money on 2nd lab and 2nd workshop instead of saving them for when 3rd base finishes command center (month two), so maybe that'll help with getting to necessary tech faster. Maybe not. We'll see.

Haven't played in a while, but I usually leave building a lab and workshop until the end of the first month. I time it such that they're completed just after month end, so I can avoid maintenance/wage costs during the first month. It's not a huge difference, but might be worth considering as you don't lose that much in terms of research/workshop time (you can cut vehicle and jackal armour research, and workshops are mostly idle during the first month anyway).

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Yes,... of course we do. Theres challenge to it, whereas being able to reload every mistake and correct it before it was done makes you unable to lose. If you cant lose, whats the point of winning? :o

Put some screens, movies, after action reports, whatever please :D Im intrested.

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Put some screens, movies, after action reports, whatever please :D Im intrested.

Theres a deutch I/I letsplay by kordanor on youtube. Theres also Dranaks I/I in english. Im sure theres more, this was just a quick search.

I might do my own. But that would be the XNT mod with the psionics off or severely limited. While I understand random shit that makes people rage is fun to watch, but its rather painful to play. :)

Haven't played in a while, but I usually leave building a lab and workshop until the end of the first month. I time it such that they're completed just after month end, so I can avoid maintenance/wage costs during the first month. It's not a huge difference, but might be worth considering as you don't lose that much in terms of research/workshop time (you can cut vehicle and jackal armour research, and workshops are mostly idle during the first month anyway).

I find the research speed to slow,... adding a lab and a workshop immediately, before I even check the soldier stats. Building migs is far from idle.

What DO you do in the first month?

Edited by ViniJones
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I find the research speed to slow,... adding a lab and a workshop immediately, before I even check the soldier stats. Building migs is far from idle.

What DO you do in the first month?

I used to build them immediately, too, but I came to the conclusion that the benefits you get aren't worth the cost. Research you might benefit from a little bit, but part of that is contingent on whether you can bag a Scout at any point during the first month (which isn't always assured). And in any case, you can easily cut Hunter and Jackal armour as a research projects to prioritise other things (they're not pre-requisites for anything else). Moreover, Alenium Explosives is less important than it used to be since MiGs were buffed to take out Scouts one-on-one with Avalanche Torps so there's no need to rush for that. So early game research is, for me, pretty much bagging lasers and wolf armour and having less lab space for the first month doesn't seem to make much of a difference with that.

In terms of manufacturing, more or less the only thing to build in the first month is MiGs. Again, since they were buffed vs. Scouts, you can get away with one in your main base and two is more than sufficient. If you're interested in building a day-one second base, you'll want one or two planes to stock that as well, but even with a starting work crew the build time is only four days which gives you plenty of time. (Actually, it might be eight days instead. Even then, you can get three built by around the beginning of October).

Hence, I don't really feel compelled to buff science or manufacturing from the off.

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Sounds good. It seems youre listing exactly the things I do, that you skip or not put a high priority to. An early 2nd base, hunter research. Youre right about Alenium Explosives. I can virtually guarantee scouts in the first month, as well as corvettes the second. What bugs me is the alien biology, I sometimes only get one race to fight for half the month, so when the other finally comes along, I have more labs to make up for the lost time. Aaaaand I hate ground combat without stun batons.

How many labs do you add to finish on the 1st Oct just one?

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I like to think im using the second strike team, taking care of the odd small UFO crash getting more materials, training rookies to replace vets in the charlie 1... I like to think the game is more macro than it actually is. :) They only take what the other team doesnt need anymore though, im not building 20 sentinels that would be... quite insane.

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I really enjoy this thread, especially since I will be starting my I/I LP start of next week. Getting som extra pointers before going live so I don't look like a complete idiot on the stream killing my self of within the first few months. :)

Edited by SnowiiFrog
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Yes,... of course we do. Theres challenge to it, whereas being able to reload every mistake and correct it before it was done makes you unable to lose. If you cant lose, whats the point of winning? :o

I believe the point is to crush your enemies, to see them driven before you, and to hear the lamentation of their women. That is what is best.

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