SQUADS! LW2 second completed campaign

[mmCion]

I finished a LW 2 1.1, 1.2 campaign some time ago. I enjoyed it. However, my "squads" were basically whoever I could put together on the spot for a mission. All my perks and team compositions where similar. I tried to go for "generally more useful" perks and squad compositions. When I finished the campaign, I felt like I completely underused the Squad mechanic implemented by Pavonis.

When LW2 1.3, 1.4 came out, I tried another campaign. Because I wanted to use the squad features, I decided to increase my starting soldier size via INI to 30 soldiers from standard 20.

It worked!! I was able to create specialized squads. Because of this, I tried different perks and different playstyles that I had never done so before.

I had a Squad that was specialized in jailbreaks and VIP extracts. These soldiers had no explosives, just guns to attract less attention from advent. 3 run and gun assaults, 1 sword shinobi for scouting and chopping, 1 specialist for hacking the jail, 1 move and overwatch ranger.

I had a squad that was my emergency response team (for haven defense, network towers, etc). These soldiers had lots of explosives, since they didn't care of attracting more enemies, with 2 technicals, 1 grenadier, a shinobi, a Spark, 1 sharpshooter. These guys would come in quickly and BOOM anything that got in the way. Spark with overdrive and shinobi could quickly get to civilians or rebels protecting data taps.

I had a squad of 2, sometimes 3, for assassinations and destroying alien relays. 1 stealth shinobi, 1 snapshot/damage sharpshooter. I would scout with the shinobi and if the mission seemed doable, I would do it, if not, I would retreat by a corner. This way I was able to do several 2-3 day infiltration missions I would normally not be able to.

I had a squad that was my go to for troop columns, supply raids, and anything that had NO reinforcements. These guys would take their sweet time with 1 shinobi for scouting, 2 long watch sharpshooters to kill stuff, and 2 gunners "the wall" to suppress and destroy cover of anything that got close.

Well, you guys get the idea.

I had the most amount of fun I've ever had in X2 with different squads. It made me branch out, try different builds, and try SQUAD builds. I found a place for sword AND stealth shinobis. I found a place for executing AND overwatch rangers. I found a place long range AND snapshot sharpshooters. etc. Squads had their specialization, their history, their tactics, and of course, their own DressCom styles .
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My feedback is that 20 starting soldiers is too low IMO, 30 ish would encourage squad building more. In LW 1 we started with 40 which was enough to get started, since normally you had to hire more later (and use SHIVS).

[Zork]

Cool for you and cool to read, but my opinion is the overall gameplay isn't well suited to a squads/commanders design. In fact XCOM2 would be much better suited for that. The reasons of this opinion are:
- Wound time are too long and wound too frequent to suit well this squads design.
- Infiltration time make it even less manageable, one example, you have wounded in a squad so you allocate some soldiers to another squad needing someone, fine. But when first squad is ready again ooops multiple soldiers are in infiltration with another team. So you recruit soldier from another squad but you just increase breaking of squads.
- Equipment of each soldier is too heavy so increasing the number of soldiers to sustain better the squads design is just increasing a lot the grinding, and I doubt it's efficient from a global point of view.
- Same problem for training levels than for equipment.
- Infiltration bonus coming from making missions with the same officer are too low to justify a squad wait some injured recover.

What you quote about trying different approach is something you would have done even better without squads, squads was just the mood to pushing you do it, not to help you do it.

I could play my first LW2 campaign, I still have some experience of squads already, because despite all logic I glued to it, and because I decided ok "long" is "hugely long" so I'm ready for a huge grinding.

Squads are a mood element more than anything else, Im' not saying the gameplay design should be changed but to make squads more compatible and efficient with the overall gameplay, some rough ideas:
- Equipment is bought and managed per squad not per soldier.
- Squads can exchange their equipment only if none of both is in infiltration.
- Squads have a strict maximum size limit, 12 seems ok, 10 would be too small (injured management missions of 10 shouldn't be disabled to a squad with one or two wounded or training.
- Each squad could train one or two newbies to manage the deaths, this training would allow level up to caporal at first, then sgt or even higher later game. This training would be linked to current squad level so a newbie squad couldn't train anybody until a level and a time.
- Skills training for Psi/Commander/Specials would be per squad with similar limits than newbies training.
- A squad is allowed only with a main commander allocated, but a squad could include commanders replacements.
- Main commander couldn't be allocated to a mission of a another squad, but all other commanders of the squad could.
- Main commander death or removed from a squad wouldn't destroy the squad, a second commander in the squad or a new commander allocated would inherit a part of squad experience.
- Each soldier would have a visible squad integration level coming from time and missions done. This would allow compute squads bonus and unlocks like training newbies.
- A soldier allocated to a new squad will restart this counter for the new squad.
- Infiltration bonus for number of missions done with the squad/commander should be more significant.
- Commander skills should be at least in part Squad skills allocated to commander of the mission.
- Squad skills would wouldn't work for guests in a mission, some visual would highlight guests in a missions.

Eventually it wouldn't be more fun, but it would justify better to play with squads by targeting equipments grinding, training grinding, commander skills grinding to put them in part at squad level not soldier level, this making lighter increasing the number of soldier, and to justify better use more strictly squads.

[mmCion]

Cool for you and cool to read, but my opinion is the overall gameplay isn't well suited to a squads/commanders design. In fact XCOM2 would be much better suited for that. The reasons of this opinion are:
- Wound time are too long and wound too frequent to suit well this squads design.
- Infiltration time make it even less manageable, one example, you have wounded in a squad so you allocate some soldiers to another squad needing someone, fine. But when first squad is ready again ooops multiple soldiers are in infiltration with another team. So you recruit soldier from another squad but you just increase breaking of squads.
- Equipment of each soldier is too heavy so increasing the number of soldiers to sustain better the squads design is just increasing a lot the grinding, and I doubt it's efficient from a global point of view.
- Same problem for training levels than for equipment.
- Infiltration bonus coming from making missions with the same officer are too low to justify a squad wait some injured recover.

From my experience using this squad approach (2 campaigns, one completed) is the following

-Wound time is always a factor to consider, but was not prohibitive in my approach. Most of my wounds was from assaults on my extract VIP/jailbreak squad, and I had 3, so many times I just went with 2 assaults on a mission. That and other managing did not make it feel like I was borrowing a soldier from another squad and crippling that squad.

-Regarding equipment it also did not feel prohibitive. I tend to go for armor and lasers, skip mag, and go for coilguns. Maybe it was the increased amount of missions I could go on, or a luck world map, but I did not feel like I was stretching for resources any more than a normal campaign (I've played several).

-Regarding promotions, yes, the soldiers do level a bit slower, but you have more. The slower leveling is not felt at the beginning or mid game, but in the later stages of the game, when you want to purchase upgrades based on rank or really need a final perk.

ALSO, because I like to experiment, I play on Commander bronzeman, so of course Legend you have to min/maxn and as the game is currently it probably would not be great for Legend. But it was waaay fun. Thanks for the thoughts/feedback.

[Zork]

Grinding is certainly a matter of feeling, let forget the word.

If you made two campaigns and never had to not use a squad because of soldiers in squad not available then ok squads are fine for you. For me with trainings and wounds it's close to impossible, I even gave up allocate any Psi to any Squad until very late level Psi.

[Icarus]

Infiltration time make it even less manageable, one example, you have wounded in a squad so you allocate some soldiers to another squad needing someone, fine. But when first squad is ready again ooops multiple soldiers are in infiltration with another team. So you recruit soldier from another squad but you just increase breaking of squads.

I had quite good success leaving a couple of soldiers outside the squads and slotting them on whenever a squad is incomplete. So have like 75-80% in squads, leaving the others out. This has the advantage of circumventing the aforementioned problem.

[orion_winterfire]

Infiltration time make it even less manageable, one example, you have wounded in a squad so you allocate some soldiers to another squad needing someone, fine. But when first squad is ready again ooops multiple soldiers are in infiltration with another team. So you recruit soldier from another squad but you just increase breaking of squads.

I had quite good success leaving a couple of soldiers outside the squads and slotting them on whenever a squad is incomplete. So have like 75-80% in squads, leaving the others out. This has the advantage of circumventing the aforementioned problem.

I also use squads. I sometimes use a few floating backups as well, but I see enough wounds/ do enough training that there's usually a partial squad I can pull backups from.

[virtualangel]

I personally like the squad management.

My squads (or Fire Teams) consist of 5-6 core soldiers and the rest of my troops are fill positions.

I have 7 squads total:

Five Core Squads

One officer (normally the Ranger or Specialist)
One Jr Officer (normally the Ranger or Specialist) for when the main Officer is in training.

Officer - Ranger (Ever Vigilant, Locked On, Aggression, Executioner, Bring ‘Em On, Rapid Reaction, Rupture)
Jr Officer - Specialist (Combat Protocol, Field Surgeon, Medical Protocol, Ever Vigilant, Cool Under Pressure, Full Override, Capacitor Discharge)
Shinobi (Blademaster, Shadowstep, Cutthroat, Low Profile, Reaper, Tradecraft, Conceal)
Sharpshooter (Death From Above, Center Mass, Precision Shot, Low Profile, Deadeye, Hunter’s Instincts, DoubleTap)
Gunner (Grazing Fire, Lockdown, Shredder, Demolition, Cool Under Pressure, Rapid Fire)
Psi Ops

Sixth Squad Low Inf Time Missions

Officer - Shinobi (Gostwalker, Shadowstep, Covert, Low Profile, Reaper, Tradecraft, Conceal)
Sharpshooter (Snapshot, Phantom, Lone wolf, Low Profile, Deadeye, Hunter’s Instincts, Double Tap) Assassin Role
Specialist (Revival Protocol, Field Surgeon, Scanning Protocol, Ever Vigilant, Failsafe, Rescue Protocol, Capacitor Discharge) Hacking Role
*Most of the time it’s just the Shinobi and either the Specialist or the Sharpshooter, depending on Mission.

Seventh Squad is a Training Officer (Ext Low enemy missions with good timers)

Officer (Focus fire, Incoming!, Trial By Fire, Lead By Example, Defilade, Infiltrator, Combined Arms
*High Aim*Ranger (Ever Vigilant, Locked On, Aggression, Executioner, Bring ‘Em On, Rapid Reaction, Rupture)
3-5 Rookies/Squaddies

I have recently been considering changing the main Squad Officer to the Shinobi, as they tend to sit around doing very little other than giving sight. This frees up my other officer choices (Ranger/Specialist)to act twice in a single turn.

My Grenadier, Assault and Technical are all available for insertion into any team at any time to cover injuries, mission objectives or hold Havens.

Grenadier (Sapper, Heavy Ordinance, Boosted Core, Heat Warheads, Sting Grenades, Salvo, Full Kit)
Assault *Shotgun* (Slug Shot, Close and Personal, Killer Instinct, Aggression, Rapid Fire, Bring ‘Em On, Lethal)
Assault *Rifle*(Lightning Reflexes, Arc Pulser, Stun Gunner, Aggression, Rapid fire, Bring ‘Em On, Chain Lightning)
Technical (Fire in the Hole, Biggest Booms, Concussion Rocket, Tandem Warheads, Incinerator, Quickburn, Bunker Buster)

[Zork]

Infiltration time make it even less manageable, one example, you have wounded in a squad so you allocate some soldiers to another squad needing someone, fine. But when first squad is ready again ooops multiple soldiers are in infiltration with another team. So you recruit soldier from another squad but you just increase breaking of squads.

I had quite good success leaving a couple of soldiers outside the squads and slotting them on whenever a squad is incomplete. So have like 75-80% in squads, leaving the others out. This has the advantage of circumventing the aforementioned problem.

I used squads that wasn't really squads and with the same usage, but ok I suppose it didn't work well for me, because those non squads evolved to real squads, and the new fake squads was tending get more empty or with lower level new recruits. So I never used such free pool of 25% of soldiers.

Well I have now 10 squads and 3 fake squads but that are more empty or with lower level soldiers I'll probably never use, so it's too late to have 25% of soldiers in a free pool. Will be for another time. That said I persist think the design should be more oriented to squads with elements like I evoked. Currently squads are more the trick to visualize them on world map and to make more concrete the commander idea with bonuses fro infiltration from making missions, and the basic UI of the squad management reinforce the feeling, you don't even see the mission and the infiltration time and you can see details of soldiers.

But ok squads is a quite cool element anyway, and myself I just gave up optimize my soldiers use and favor squads.