This is a long post, feel free to only read/comment on one section. I'm interested to hear from others.
So I just finished my first campaign and beat the game. (It was on beginner, so you can hold your applause.
) Now that I'm done, I'm curious how my experience compares with others and what I might expect in my next one.
I wanted to make it a bit of a
"trial by fire" so I purposely didn't look up too much info or tips on how to tackle the game. Consequently, I had a lot of dumb deaths (ie shooting a cyber disc standing a foot away from you and blowing yourself up) and it took me a long time to get going with the proper research chain (didn't hire a bunch of extra scientists at the start, didn't work my way up to flying suits/avenger until end of February 2000 I think).
Point is, I racked up
114 soldier deaths through the campaign which I beat in May 2000. That included like three full squad wipes on terror missions. Once I got power suits deaths dropped dramatically and once I got good at MC, deaths pretty much stopped all together. I probably could have launched to Cydonia in March and been fine, but I took my time at the end racking up soldier experience and expanding to 8 bases. So my questions are...
1) How long (game time) does it usually take you to beat the game and how many soldier deaths do you typically go through? Obviously this will vary a lot based on mods/play style, but assume vanilla and not doing save scumming or a bunch of reloading. It's hard to imagine losing 114 again next time since I improved so much by the end (even without MC), but maybe that will be negated by upping from beginner to veteran or superhuman as I plan to.
3) What are your thoughts on
Cydonia? Playing normally with MC I beat it losing only 1 soldier and it was way too quick and easy. Very anti-climatic for this big blowout battle I was prepping for. Then I re-loaded a different Cydonia map and did it again, this time using no mind control (no blaster bombs either time) and I brought along some of my oldest soldiers who were very psi weak and/or cowardly. It was definitely more of a challenge this way and a lot more fun. Lost five soldiers, but was still less daunting than I imagined as I was never even close to losing. Felt like the map was too small and not enough enemies. But it's beginner so I know that's a big factor.
Are there any mods that make Cydonia more "interesting" or do you think when I up the difficulty setting that's going to be enough to make it more of a challenge.
5) Blaster launchers: Even though I really only used it to blow holes in UFO hulls, if I wanted to exploit them fully they really are too powerful. I'm going to change the rulesets to balance them for my next run, but wanted to hear other's perspectives. Do you think it's better to:
a) Change it so the aliens can use the waypoint system, but XCOM can't. Obviously they still get the advantage. You get the huge explosion, but not the "cheap" endless waypoints.
b) Use this mod (
https://www.openxcom.com/mod/customizable-psi-blaster-balance) to create a "heavy blaster launcher" which is way heavier and costs more TUs. You can still use the waypoints, but you'll need a very strong soldier who won't be able to carry anything else and won't be able to do it many times.
Option
a) was my original plan, but then stumbled across that mod and thought it was an interesting idea.
*If relevant, I played on OXC 1.0, but am moving to the latest nightly or OXCE/OXCE+ for my next campaign (am torn between the extra stuff you can do in OXCE and the soldier diaries in the nightlies ... from what I've tested so far both versions are great).
