Just Another Guy feedback

[Calavera]

Greetings, i just finished my commander/honest campaign and before i return to play other games, i decided to leave some feedback.

First of all, my English is bad, so there will be a lot of grammatical errors. Second, thank you so much for this mod. In my opinion, there is no game that make the strategic and tactical layers as good and detailed as xcom 2 with LW2. This mod is, by far, one of my best gaming experiences i've ever had in my adult life. Thank you again.

If you guys can't understand some part of my text and it looks interesting, you can ask and i'll try explain in other words or try to write better,

Strategic Layer

I loved most of this. It is hard to start, since there is so much new content, but watching some youtube guys, like JoINrbs or xwynns, helped a lot. I beat the game on my third try. The first two, i lost due to not understanding the new mechanics.

"one thousand clicks mechanic"
The new mechanic of buying individual gear of each soldier is great, it makes the management of supplies much more interesting. However, it brings the "one thousand clicks mechanic" with it. For every new mission, you must find some wounded soldier, take his equipment, equip another soldier, this includes, weapon, armor, 3 utility, special item and weapon upgrades... so many clicks. During my two first playthroughs, i spent a LOT of time perfectly managing the inventory of each soldier, optimizing my supply usage and making each soldier as powerful as possible, but i have to say, it is boring as hell, especially, late game when you have dozens of armor, weapons and different items for all squads. Holy crap.

So during my third playthrough, i ignored the "one thousand clicks mechanic", giving each soldier his equipment and didn't spend a lot time sharing all those equipment. Sometimes they were missed, but the time consumed was too much.

Overall, i really enjoy having to buy individual pieces of equipment for each soldier and would never change that, even tho it results in making them less optimal, to save time or requiring lots of clicking . In this topic, i would suggest a new feature, i don't how hard would be to implement that, here follows:

Basically, it is a load out feature, you would have a button on the soldier equipment screen that when pressed, all the current equipped items would be saved on the soldier loadout, so if for some reason, the solider would be unequipped, clicking of "load loadout x", would automatically equip all the saved equipment and items to that soldier. If the equipment is being used by another soldier in the barracks, that soldier is automatically unequipped and the items would go for the target soldier.

Stealth Heavy Missions
I like stealth missions, but the game felt it could use some non stealth missions, with bigger squads. Sometimes i spent hours, doing only stealth missions. I know that smash and grab is already on development, and think that if it is not a stealth mission, will help a lot the feeling of diversity on the campaign. Furthermore, i think that if added a few more non stealth mission types, this "issue", in quote, because it is not an issue per say, but more of a characteristic of the mod, would be "fixed".

Also, i think the ratio for kills/mission completed should be changed a little bit. Kill experience could be increased and mission complete experience decreased, not too much tho. This would be interesting so the kill exp bonus on the GTS would be more appealing and increase the reward for risking soldiers on non stealth missions.

In addition, the evacuation flare timer, should not be 1 turn at 200% infiltration, i would make it 2 turns at 200% and 3 at lower infiltration.

Datapad Missions
This missions need some thought, they are very frustrating. The reward doesn't feel good for the risks of the mission, on my second playthrough, i moved with the first rebel ONE tile to the left, this activated a pod of bug things (chryssalids). Those damn bugs started to kill my rebels creating more bugs, while i activated all pods in the map, with my squad, at the same time trying to save something. My gunner died twice, well, started to bleed out and stabilized twice.

In the end, after my victory, all i had was my best squad badly wounded and all rebels dead. Started leaving the rebels to die, until some great soldier was there as advisor.

Rendezvous
Speaking of advisors, i think that is a great new mechanic, since they give us this amazing missions. I really enjoy Rendezvous, one of the best new missions, they have that early game feeling that goes away as the game progresses. Love these.

Invasions
I also love invasions, well, i like to play them, i hate to see my rebels dying, but this mission is really fun. I can unleash my assaults and see they murdering joy those ugly spacey things.

0% supply raid
These missions are really fun, specially early game. However, the reward for doing it is way too much. To balance this issue, i would suggest adding a new mechanic for non evacuation missions (the ones that you keep the corpses), which is fatigue from LW1. So the idea is, your soldiers get more time from fatigue depending on the infiltration %. A supply raid/troop column done at 100% would result at a 0 fatigue timer and a 0% infiltration timer would result in a lot fatigue timer.

I think the best way to add this fatigue is to be a quadratic function, based on infiltration %, just like red fog is based on hp %. So if you do a 0% mission, you get a lot of rewards, but can't use your soldiers for something like 20 days. while doing an 90% mission would result in 1 day fatigue.

The reasoning for this is that, since xcom is doing a 0% mission, the rebels in the region didn't have time to prepare to help xcom to carry the bodies and supplies to the avenger. So the soldiers will have to stay on the site and protect the rebels, while the rebels stop what they are doing, prepare the trucks for loading, get there, prepare all load everything on the trucks, put on the avenger, all that loading stuff.

This also, could create a new mission type: protect the supply against an advent assault, while the rebels load all the things. Could be a simple horde mode for some turns. If the mission is succeeded, xcom gets some more corpses, if lost, loose some supply raid rewards.

To end this, i would not call it fatigue, i think a name like "loading" or "protecting rebels" is more suited.

This would be sad, because this 0% missions are the second best mission in the game, but balance is necessary.

Attack UFO
Did just 1 in my campaign, why is it so hard to find them? they are super cool, i would do a lot of those. They were also one of my favorite missions in xcom ew. I'd love to see more of them and different sizes of UFOs.

Network Tower
This are great. Super awesome.

Advent HQ
Now, this mission... this mission is just the best mission in the game, super amazing, crazy fun. 60 enemies, including a boss with a huge pod? so good. I wish there were more mission like these, with bosses, having to manage all consumables, making every grenade count. Really great.

This mission makes me wish for an alternative game mode, where there is no avatar project and you win by conquering the whole world, so we could make all HQ and then 1 super hq in the end, with aliens invasions trying to stop us.

Final mission
This was easy. the mission could use a buff in enemies numbers. Not in the final room tho, but in the way to the final room, could easily add like 30 enemies. I had 10 max level characters, i fought only 3 battles, the first one was like 20 enemies, the second one just as big and the third one was against something like 8, then final room. Also only 1 sectopod, 1 giant bug queen, 2 berserkers in total. 0% supply raids are much harder.

Classes

Assaults
I love theses guys. They are inconsistent, sometimes they are crap but when they decide to work, holy crap, i lost count on how many missions they made the rest of the team look like a bunch of amateurs. I always try to bring them on missions. Also, blue move, shoot guy in the face for 20, run and gun then street sweep or face off with that level of critical damage and if something moves close to him, explodes from shotgun fire? Yes please, 2 of them on last mission.

Grenadier
I had 2 grenadiers, 1 support and 1 cover destruction. Both were useful, nothing to add to this guys. Both in the last mission.

Gunners
Before the nerf in hail of bullets and danger zone, these guys were broken. Now they are "just" amazing =] 2 on the last mission.

Ranger
When i see someone saying "Ranger are horrible, they are like bad sharpshooters" i want to both barrels the guy in the face. I had 3 great rangers, 1 had run and gun, 1 had serial and the other had nothing good. I used them a lot.

They are so versatile, always useful, can tank, deal damage, kill more than 1 enemy per turn also explode poor aliens AND relays with sawed off shotgun.

The 2 with run and gun,serial, a lot of pistol perks and shredder rounds on the last mission.

Sharpshooters
I had 2 of these. 1 focused on criticals and DFA due to bring em on perk on awc and the other the more common holotarget build. The DFA, called Dara, was crazy good, when in high elevations, but without it... was ok. Sofia, the holotargeter, was less powerful than Dara when in elevation, but was more versatile. Overall, i liked both builds.

Also Dara, had the second most kills in my barracks, behind only to Amy, the ranger with serial.

Shinobi
The name of this class is weird and i'm not a fan. Shinobis, in real life, are very regional, existing only in Japan, they had specific training, traditions and beliefs. So it feels weird to see a french, green haired woman in purple clothes next to the name shinobi, using a smg and a huge sword. This is as weird as calling some japanese guy a viking or rangers "rifleman", since they can use smgs and shotgun (Please don't do that and say the some guy in the internet gave you the idea =] ). I know this is a very tiny minor issue, but if i think it can be improved, goes into feedback. Personally, i would call this class spy, agent or spec ops.

Now to the part that probably is more interesting:

Shinobis are very powerful. They can solo missions, help a lot scouting for the team, so you can do crazy moves with your assaults or technicals. Probably, the most import class in the mod. I would suggest, for balancing the following:

- Make the perk conceal a higher level perk. This is too powerful, specially on those capture vip misssions, where you can punch and re conceal and leave the map like a boss.
-Buff the damage perks, to make war shinobis more appealing. This is specially true to sword shinobis, since you risk so much when you try to cut some guy. You can activate more stuff, you can miss, leaving the shinobi exposed. On higher difficulties, mid and late game, i don't think it is possible to use a sword shinobi.

Spark

The spark, i used very little. Nothing to add here.

Specialist
I had a lot of them, for the stealth missions. I had 2 of them on the last mission, 1 medic and 1 combat. Both were very good. Restoration with savior, is a great combination.

Technical
I love explosions and fire, so i love technicals. This guys are completely broken early game, my first technical had fire in the hole and biggest booms....she was literally crazy (had tiny tina's voice, from borderlands 2), the damage early game is beyond insane, but the best part is, if you nerf them, they will become even stronger early game, since their only problem is to destroy loot. And seriously, that flamethrower rework in patch 1.1, what the hell, i had to retrain my technical to get napalm-x. She made a berserker and 2 muttons start crying, panicked, like little babies, while screaming "Burn all the babies", epic moment.

Mid and late game, they don't keep up with the other classes and become 1 turn wonders. Bunker Buster, with 2 sharpshooters and 1 ranger with serial on the team..... yeah. My sharpshooter, Dara, just killed 14 guys in 1 turn and my ranger 8, in the same turn, after a Bunker buster, command, rocket.

Some people say it is fine for them to become weaker than other classes late game, since "they are so good in early game". Well, i disagree. I think the concept of the technical is so good, their possibilities goes beyond any other class, next only to psi ops. They burn and explode stuff (Have i said i love fire and explosions?), i want them to be amazing. Always. EVER. "insert Maniac Laughter".

To address their power mid and late game, i would suggest adding a new slot on their gauntlets, starting on mkII. This slot would be just like the grenade slot for grenadiers, but would contain only "tech items". This solution is based on the assault class. When an assault can't get close the enemy to do their amaziness, they still can be useful with arc thrower and slug shot. This tech slot would contain some item that would give the technical a cooldown based ability, i thought on some examples:

Explosive Shot: Normal shot, with +10 aim, that is a 1 target rocket, including the effects on perks, will get on that.

Fire Shot: Normal shot, with +10 aim, that is a 1 target flamethrower.

Smoke shot: shoot an ally with the burnout perk effect.

Concussive Shot: Normal shot, with +10 aim, that is a 1 target flashbang.

Healing shot: heal ally for half the weapon damage.

Serum: Action free, of that item created using berserker corpses for the technical or can be shot at an ally.

Those are just some examples, the technical class has a lot of potential, you can make any item and call them "tech". Also, the perks could be adjusted a little bit like:

Biggest Booms: rename to something like "explosion Mastery", because grenadiers also have it: Rockets, grenades and tech ammo can cause 2 additional damage.

Napalm-X: flamethrower and tech ammo can cause disorient and panick.

Bunker Buster: gain the rocket and tech ammo explode cover.

The possibilities would be endless and i don't think would change concept of the technical, as it is today.

Psi Ops
I had 2 psi ops, they were ok, nothing special. I would comment a lot here, but since i saw on reddit, that you guys are reworking the class, i will wait to see what happens. Hopefully, they became as awesome as the flamethrower rework, because of fire.

Also, I forgot to say that i love fire, explosions and enemies flying because of Singularity. Can't wait to use that.

Yellow Alert
At first i hated it, it would limit my grenades usage =[

But, after sometime, i got used to it and i now even say that i like it. However, i have a problem with it. The way that some enemies can get activated, run A LOT, get to your flank, shoot, crit and kill your soldier at the same turn without the chance to react. I lost the same soldier twice because of this, and of course i reloaded the game, since some maps have terrible cover. In my opinion, the critical damage chance should be zero, since i don't think it is fair losing a soldier just because i guessed wrong from which side the enemy would come and the enemy being able to choose their positions. Shooting and other reactions are fine, the only tweak that i would like is removing the critical chance.

To clarify, if, while in yellow alert, an enemy shoots and kills your soldier, i think it is ok, since most enemies don't kill soldiers in 1 shot, so if your soldier died, he was shot already, which means, you made a mistake and/or should have healed him/her. My problem is an enemy getting activate and instantly killing my soldier full health.

AWC and GTS
This will be quick, I think that the progress in soldier training should be paused and not restarted if removed from the facilities. The mod has so many thing going at the same time, i had to remove my assault 3 times from center of mass training, which is 4 days. a lot of time wasted.

Yeah, this is getting too long. If i remember anything else, i will edit.

To end this: I'd like to say thank you again, not just the guys who spent thousands of hours creating this but everyone who help this mod, be it developing or posting funny images on reddit. Again, this mod brings something that no other game has, challenging and fun gameplay in strategic and tactical layer.

And like my assault with arnold schwarzenegger's voice used to say: "I'll be back"

[johnnylump]

Thank you for your post.

[Clibanarius]

I really like the ideas for the Gauntlet an awful lot. Hopefully someone will create a mod for that functionality if it's never implemented in LW2 base! I agree with you on most of your class commentary, although I would like to say that, if you're so inclined, you should totally try out using SPARKs with the Metal Over Flesh mod for upgradeability. They are fantastic with that mod in LW2. I have two that are built entirely differently in my game based on their NCE stats being totally disparate (one's got lowered defense and dodge with increased aim while the other is pretty much Standard SPARK Stats) and both are friggin' amazing, even with coming into the game around April-May.

[ndessell]

I really like the ideas for the Gauntlet an awful lot. Hopefully someone will create a mod for that functionality if it's never implemented in LW2 base! I agree with you on most of your class commentary, although I would like to say that, if you're so inclined, you should totally try out using SPARKs with the Metal Over Flesh mod for upgradeability. They are fantastic with that mod in LW2. I have two that are built entirely differently in my game based on their NCE stats being totally disparate (one's got lowered defense and dodge with increased aim while the other is pretty much Standard SPARK Stats) and both are friggin' amazing, even with coming into the game around April-May.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/f ... =871581360

[Clibanarius]

I really like the ideas for the Gauntlet an awful lot. Hopefully someone will create a mod for that functionality if it's never implemented in LW2 base! I agree with you on most of your class commentary, although I would like to say that, if you're so inclined, you should totally try out using SPARKs with the Metal Over Flesh mod for upgradeability. They are fantastic with that mod in LW2. I have two that are built entirely differently in my game based on their NCE stats being totally disparate (one's got lowered defense and dodge with increased aim while the other is pretty much Standard SPARK Stats) and both are friggin' amazing, even with coming into the game around April-May.

http://steamcommunity.com/sharedfiles/f ... =871581360

Thanks, though I use the mod already! Haha, I'm kinda a Technical fanboy.

[Phrozehn]

Great post. I especially like your suggestions for the Technical's gauntlet augmentation. I'd stick with abilities that are atached to the perks personally. POssibly put some against eachother on the perk tree rolled into other perks so that you don't wind up being able to get ALL of them. Only maybe a max of two possible to get, andonly if you actually choose the perks.