Having learnt so much from many earlier failed attempts where I neglected the importance of the Air-game, I went into this campaign with a preemptive tactic that my Air-game would be my primary focus above all else, And as expected, my tactical game did suffer. My overall game strategy had evolved into the method of thinking that the foundation of success started with the Air-game and I still think that to be the case.
With the emphasis on Air-tech, the early-mid tactical was sluggish and rough, but by the end of the first year it was paying dividends, as for the first time I had successfully pulled off skipping both Guass and Pulse thanks to the backbone of my economy- my Air-game. With a fresh supply of Plasma weapons to start the new year, our ground forces finally caught some well deserved slack. But in the realm of LW this is still not enough. Contrary to my belief that I was running an optimal campaign, the realization set-in that I cannot sustain an ongoing war no matter how well I planned, researched or orchestrated tactical missions, it was in the end, just a means to buy more time.
All along I seemed to have mistaken what this mod is all about- I thought the "Long" in Long War was in some way a signification that it accommodates for those truly seeking an epic ongoing war, which is probably subject to my own masochistic, perfectionist, OCD interpretation to what it actually means. Either way, I am disheartened at the direction and cheapness that LW takes in the Late-late stages of the game.
Cheapness in that even with a massive fleet of fully upgraded Firestorms, complimented with Fusion weapons, you are no match for the late-game UFO-spam. Situations as ridiculous, but not limited to 2 Assault carriers, 1 Terror ship, 1 Battleship on the same continent in a single day and 21+ UFO's per month 90% of which being the variety that crit a fully upgraded Firestorm for 90% of it's HP. It has gotten to a point where the best possible craft you are able to field, using the best weapons, only last about 2 seconds against these UFO's and believe me, it's not uncommon to lose a Firestorm before those 2 seconds are up.
It is now October 2017, I've had nothing to research for the last 6 months and half my play-time in this mod now revolves around me save-scumming a minimum of 20 times just to get a scenario where my Firestorms don't get killed in the first 2 seconds of engagement. It doesn't sound like fun and it isn't. Despite all my efforts and planning, despite my fleet being at the pinnacle of advancement, despite my admirable attempts at slowing Alien research, I am getting cheesed relentlessly by what I think to be a very broken mechanic.
With my passion for this campaign dwindling more each day I was left with no choice but to reduce the repair hours for our craft as all time in Geoscape had slowly morphed into a mundane chore of save-scumming 50 times an hour just to prevent the aliens from completely raping the world. And please don't give me that "you're supposed to take losses and take unwinnable situations on the chin" speech, for it is well known to me that this was one of the intended goals imagined by the LW devs- and believe me I've dealt with many losses and I've learned to walk away from the spoils of war on many occasion, but those lumps you have to swallow pale in comparison to blatant game mechanics that force you down a particular avenue of game-play, in this case "cheesing" you into submission when all else fails.
Now if there was some kind of player input that could be used to combat this I would have nothing to complain about, but this is it, I've done all I can do. At this point there is literally nothing I can do to prevent total collapse beyond save-scumming. I struggle to believe that this was somehow an "intended" feature in what is otherwise a masterwork mod. But then I ask myself- am I being unreasonable in my expectation that the Long war mod truly lets you experience and endure the essence of alien warfare with epic scale and depth ? Perhaps I was only right about the "depth" part and not so much the "scale", but I am disappointed, as I imagined the Long war to be somewhat "Longer".
I know, I know, "nice Rant bro" but I don't honestly believe subjectivity has anything to do with this issue beyond my own particular expectations or interpretations. If there is one universal constant in gaming it's that the player should always have some kind of tool to overcome obstacles and the true dynamic is how the player uses those tools. But how can it be considered a functional system when both player input and tools are denied to them ? At any rate, it does sure feel good to get that off my chest.
![Wink ;)](./images/smilies/icon_e_wink.gif)