Base assault, 6 aliens in one room down a long hall, wtf? [build 18]

[the.trav]

So, I completed an extremely frustrating base assault mission.

Plenty of guys scattered through the base, that were fun to fight and kill

2 wraiths, 4 androns, all holed up in the one room with only one exit and a long, coverless corridor on the approach.

Basically I was lucky enough to have two assault troopers with about 110 TU, so it basically turned into,

- walk assault until he can see one alien

- fire snapshot at alien

- retreat

- try to get LoS from one of my two snipers down the hall

Sniper LoS was often not possible, killing the aliens took a LONG LONG time, since the room had lots of cover in it and the androns were using it to their good advantage (I thought they weren't supposed to, but they even moved to alternative cover when I destroyed their initial cover)

I lost one guy just by getting bored and not paying attention to his TU's, ended his turn in their LoS and got shot in the back. Quite frustrating

I may have assaulted the base too early and not equipped properly (laser weapons, no assault shields, wolf armour). It was also a night mission (which should not be a factor in assaulting an underground base, but was).

Regardless, it seemed like a pretty odd scenario, and I wondered if anyone else had encountered it, or if it was intentionally so crazy hard.

Oh, the other weird thing is that the LoS algorithm appears to glitch out in the bases, I saw a lot of plasma and heavy plasma fire happening towards my units from inside rooms which hit walls.

[StellarRat]

Oh, the other weird thing is that the LoS algorithm appears to glitch out in the bases, I saw a lot of plasma and heavy plasma fire happening towards my units from inside rooms which hit walls.

There are still some known bugs with the alien AI or LOS and trying fire through walls and such. I know they've been reported.

[Sathra]

That sounds like a normal base assault. The room in question was probably the command centre.

Its one of the reasons I added Nerve gas in my mod (also because its funny). Though you can have up to 12 aliens in that room.

[wcanyon]

Yeah that mission was crazy hard and that room was damn near unassailable. Lost 5 of 7 guys on that one.

The LOS seems borked in there for sure.

Edited June 25, 2013 by wcanyon

[ThunderGr]

Apart from the LOS bugs, it sounds pretty much right to me. Did you use any smoke grenades for cover, then flash-bangs to prevent any reaction fire, and, maybe, a couple of grenades/rockets to do splash damage? Having many aliens grouped in one room calls for area effect weapons in my book.

[Dranak]

Apart from the LOS bugs, it sounds pretty much right to me. Did you use any smoke grenades for cover, then flash-bangs to prevent any reaction fire, and, maybe, a couple of grenades/rockets to do splash damage? Having many aliens grouped in one room calls for area effect weapons in my book.

Have you actually played a base assault? That room is down a long hallway with no cover. You can't get close enough to effectively use grenades.

[ThunderGr]

Have you actually played a base assault? That room is down a long hallway with no cover. You can't get close enough to effectively use grenades.

No, I have not played a base assault, yet. However, this is what smoke grenades are for. Use them to provide cover for your troops in places that there is no cover. And, of course, there are the shields. You use them to protect the advancement in areas with no cover. I think the developers have given us the tools, we only need to use them.

[thothkins]

My little Andron base attack had the shots going through the walls. After a dozen attempts to get my troops around the bug, I just cheated with an autowin and got past it that way.

[Black Cat]

When I got stuck in that problem (3 Androns and 3 Hadrons) I just coated the room in ko gas. Knocked out all the fleshy ones and then slowly took apart the androns one at a time. Yes grenades will work if you get at least a few steps up the hallway.

And if you are doing alien bases you should have enough TU's to move 4 or 5 squares up, lob grenade, and move back out of the hall behind a wall.

[thothkins]

I found I was still losing a few guys waiting for the gas to take effect. Mainly because they shot through all the walls.

[Dranak]

No, I have not played a base assault, yet. However, this is what smoke grenades are for. Use them to provide cover for your troops in places that there is no cover. And, of course, there are the shields. You use them to protect the advancement in areas with no cover. I think the developers have given us the tools, we only need to use them.

If you stand out in the open with 6ish aliens shooting at you, even with smoke and a shield, you'll be slaughtered. I've pretty much settled on having one guy play forward observer who moves up, spots the aliens, then backs up for the line of snipers/rocketeers to fire at whatever they can get LOS on until it's down to the last couple aliens, and then you can start creeping forward to closer range. It's completely doable, but it feels like it would be more fun (and have more options) if that hall was a few tiles shorter. That would at least give you a choice between playing the cautious sniper style and charging into the room more aggressively.

[the.trav]

Smoke grenades, I hadn't thought to do that yet. By and large I don't understand how they operate, so I really only use them on terror missions to throw at civilians (hope they don't get pasted on turn 1)

Ok, so it's meant to be hard, that's fair enough.

Unfortunately I found a way to minimize risk, which also minimizes enjoyment

I might also have charged after the base a little too early, I didn't have assault shields, and only two of my surviving units were commanders (lost about 4 of them to heavy plasma fire, wolf armour just doesn't cut it).

[Aaron]

Alien base assaults do just generally need a lot of work. Right now they are only a a little better than placeholders - one of my jobs for this week is to start cranking out the props and alien specific room tiles so we can have lots of variations. Also looking at getting the line of sight issues fixed (it's a problem in the Xenonaut bases too).

[thothkins]

good to hear. They're pretty good for placeholders. Apart from the LOS they are enjoyable missions.

Edited June 27, 2013 by thothkins

[the.trav]

Very good to hear Aaron, I didn't realise they were placeholders, nice work

[Dranak]

They're darn impressive for placeholders. I'm looking forward to seeing what the actual versions will look like.

[PerfectDeath]

First alien base was vs selbs, they started trying to shoot through 5 layers of walls from the very beginning, also had to be cautious using doors as cover since they could even see me through those.

I don't play ironman right now because of these issues, aliens with those heavy plasma cannons will eventually, at the right angle shoot through walls and blow your face off.

Those plasma cannons can eventually tear off some wall pieces... O_o

The good thing is that they burn off their TUs for reaction shots! I only had the very last selb who never moved form his spot do reaction shots.

[sherriffjb]

I don't find the alien base missions that bad tbh. Just a case of going super carefully and building a fire team with good acc from a decent postion and using another sparsely equipped unit with lots of movement as the spotter. As I'm sure has been said you use that unit to poke his/her head in, get a bead on em and lay down some doom with -in my case- a couple of rockets and an opening barrage of burst then a few well placed aimed shots. Also lots of moving out of cover to take a shot then slipping back into it is a must. It does mean each base run takes a while though!

[PerfectDeath]

I'm more annoyed with base defenses than base assaults since the AI is 'supposed' to be attacking yet they usually just camp out in my hangars...

[Lancebloke]

Yeah, I think the base defence is a known issue too and in the same state (if not worse) than the alien base assault.

I have assaulted 2 bases, got pasted in one early on and then tried more recently and only lost 1 person due to my own negligence. The day/night thing is annoying but just meant spamming glow sticks.

Waiting for releases with the xenonaut bases that you can actually fight in before I start again.