my strategy for breaching

[Falidell]

i have my troops set up by the door like this

DOOR

T-----TTT

T-----TTT

one of the Troops opens the door.. we see enemies we toss in smokes so they can't reaction fire at what they can't see then we toss in a bunch of stuns and move in.

this is the safest way I've found to enter a UFO what do you guys think? what are your strategies?

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EDIT

i don't bother with shields waste of space ATM.

and so far i find that my troops are either snipers OR Stunners.

stunners are equipped with a pistol with lots of ammo

and a ton of non-lethal grenades(smokes; stuns; flash-bangs; shock )

i found no use from any other weapon types. i only use Sniper rifles and pistols

Edited September 27, 2013 by Falidell

[Wraith_Magus]

I bother with shields, for one thing. I don't know why you don't, because in my last mission, I had a guy take a full burst fire into his shield, only to have it survive with 4 durability left. (And I had a spare shield for him, too, so it was fine.)

Other than that, if it's too hardened a target, I'd try using more grenades. Try throwing smoke down on the corner, so that you can throw those flashbangs from within cover. (Just throw them blind.)

If that doesn't work, screw it, and C4 a hole into the place. They didn't expect the Spanish Inquisition to come in through the walls!

[Elydo]

Just don't research assault shields, they seem to be bugged. As in they will replace your starting shields, but not actually exist.

[Falidell]

well with my current strategy i rarely suffer any losses or even get hit.

the reason i don't use shields is that i just never needed them and i'm playing on normal and on a corvette landing site for example the most I've ever lost is 1 out of my 8 troop team. i've had roughly 8 this time around and i've only lost 4 guys. those smokes really help so i bring a lot of them. as well as every other non-lethal grenade. 3-5 each type per Stunner troop.

i do actually use a lot of c4 as well.. to level down buildings and such. and take down walls sense grenades utterly SUCK they're horrible

can't toss farther then 4 squares?! damage area of 2? screw those grenades. Bullets lots of Bullets, smoke gets me in smoke blocks their reaction firer. flashbang suppresses them Stun Rod Takes em down. anyone i can't get in the room within 1 turn gets bullets

thats why i open the door first to see who is in there. though that only works on scouts and light scouts. for bigger ships i smoke the first room entirely set in positions around consoles and such and toss a bunch of stun grenades around the edges of the room sense they are always there.

Edited September 27, 2013 by Falidell

[Wraith_Magus]

Anyway, I do have another style of entry that works well for me, although it depends on having a little room to set my guys up.

Rather than have my guys around a corner, I set them up facing directly at the door. Two lines, first line crouching, second line right behind them, firing over their shoulders.

I use two guys with shields with no guns equipped - one opens the door, the other stands slightly to the side, and chucks flashbangs. The grenade-tosser is ironically the one most likely to take fire. Once you've got the enemy stunned, pull the door-opener back, and have your snipers and riflemen in the firing squad hose the area down with lead (or light or superheated ions as the case may be).

The advantage of this is that you don't burn TUs on repositioning or tripping all over your own guy's feet. Unless it's a scout or something, you might not have an angle on the whole contents of the UFO, but that's fine - they won't have an angle on you, either in that case, and if you save some TUs for reaction fire, and keep the (heavily armored) shield guys closer to the enemy, they target them, first, if the enemies charge you. (Of course, if you pull your shield guys back far enough, then anyone not in the firing squad can be on the sides with shotguns, waiting.)

[victorix58]

I use flashbangs and smoke. I also usually have 1-2 snipers, a shotgun guy, a heavy weapon/rifle and the rest are rifles/stun/flash/nades. This is my general squad layout, not just breaching.

Course, I am not playing on Ironman and I load if I lose someone...

[Ripley]

Smoke and flashbangs is a great strategy for breaching UFOs....when the aliens are suceptible to it.

When you got androns and dont have electroshock grenades I smoke and move into mele range with shotguns and rifles on burst, which can lead to several casualties.

Shoving c4s, rockets and grenades into the ufo can be god as well, but you miss out on tech and money.

The safest way I found memorizing were the aliens are, smoking and then burst firing blindly through the smoke. This works very well when breaching a landing ship´s comand room. Especially with androns.

[MikeV37]

I used smoke to a point, but once they set up their alien bases in Europe, NA and USSR, I had to do something about it but my men were woefully under-prepared. I had half my men in jackal armor and they'd get hosed by the terminators standing in cover one tile away from the door. If I threw a smoke I'd get so much reaction fire it killed a few guys right there.

My new strategy to breach is to position one guy next to the door, the other five tiles back on the opposite side of the corridor. Top guy opens door, second throws in C4 charge. Works wonders. Bonus cookie points if more aliens come up to the cover ignoring the charge before it blows them to smithereens.

On that topic, what's an alien base power core and how do I kill it and exfil my guys?

First, It says in the intel that it glows blue, but god damn near everything in he base glows blue. a picture would be nice.

Second, there's no chopper in the mission, so if I abort it, everyone goes MIA. how do I get my men out of there?

[bobbys]

The base core looks like some sort of giant reactor. It is massive and hard to miss. If you are in it's room and it disappears then you move your people to the glowing or lighter tiles in the first room. Abort and hey presto, base nuked.

[MikeV37]

I had a feeling it was that one...

But the intel says there's two, and only one of those things in the bases I've been to so far. Maybe they mean up to two? Could use a little clarification in the xenopedia then.

I'll make sure to do that.

Also, it feels like capturing a massive alien power core and hologram thing would give you new research. Does it, or does only the officer count?

[bobbys]

Don't forget that if you bug out with an officer but the base gets detonated then there are no artifacts left. To be honest I have never captured a base as I forgot to unload my Hunter car and all six of my soldiers died. Then my game bugged out so I had to start over.