Don't take this as hostile, these are some good points. But I am not able to read a wall of text without spaghettifying it back.
I think some more guidance would be nice in the early game.
That is more in the realm of a strategy guide, isn't it? Personally, I'm not a fan of everything having explicit instructions and quest compasses, but obviously the modern gamer disagrees.
We do have the four 'strategy' articles and a Field Manual section in the Pedia.
Acquiring a intel/bio lab is absolutely essential, but I had no clue these were important or even how to get them. I spent a lot of time stuck on 5 researchers...
Well, wasn't that your clue, then?
This is kind of a problem with every game that has a tech tree. Fortunately, you can use the Tech Tree Viewer (or the
XCF auto-wiki) to browse yourself to a path to victory (or at least a less embarrasing defeat). Or learn from your mistakes. One guy made Gantt charts, even.
It would be also nice if the general report more specifically say what is required for promotion. ("ex)autopsy and capture a strange creature").
Well, the "X-Com GIB: General Strategy" article does say "we must capture or dissect such a creature". What do you think is missing there?
I think David Vincent's Secret Shelter comes too early or is just plain too hard.
You need to have gotten both Vincent and a live MiB agent researched for that. Given how long it takes to interrogate one of the MiB, you're either running ahead of the curve or just researching random stuff at that point.
You can also delay researching the dossier. Granted, that's not really a new player thing to do, but if you've gotten your ass kicked once, maybe some reflection is in order?
It's not as if you lose out on anything important if you skip it, either.
No escape missions should be easier than average or at least be clearly labeled as difficult.
"Be careful... We will not be able to retreat..."
I mean, if someone doesn't pay attention to the briefings, even red neon letters will not help. And if they do, the above is at least
somewhat of a warning. A bigger one would be kinda metagamey.
A warning of some kind (Xcom General strategy 3?) that aliens can assault your base before their invasion. I never reached the invasion date.
How? I've never been invaded, period. And many others manage to reach 1999 just fine, even new players. Is this some recent thing?
Aliens don't really fly random retaliation missions before a couple of months to the invasion, at most. And shooting down UFOs is kinda hard before that, too. You aren't playing with Brutal AI's super-retaliation, or something, are you?
Note that theoretically, you can also get invaded by the more terrestrial factions, like the cults, MiB or Syndicate. I've never actually managed to trigger those, either.
...killing 30 of anything that doesn't approach you like zombies is dull.
There's a
submod for that. Not very up to date, but I hope it still works for most critters.
Industrial Undercover missions seem generally not worth it, high degree of risk with a firearm present and no useful/interesting reward. (More money sellables perhaps?).
You get nailguns and Spypistols later on, but yeah, these (and sports/research missions) have been kinda underwhelming for a while.
...I was able to take out the Church of Dragon with relative ease.
Well, a nicely positioned
Deep One Gillman can be a lot of pain, and there are also some sonic guns. But, yeah, if you don't get swarmed/grenaded right away, this is relatively easy.
We think infiltrating the Church of Dragon first would be the most feasible.
How would the intelligence know? Isn't it your job as the
Commander Chief Agent to evaluate your troops' tactical performance against various threats?
I had a facepalm moment when I discovered after dissolving the Church of Dagon I needed a live deep one for an entire arc of the tech tree. Maybe allow Gillmen interrogation to also unlock those techs?
You can access this arc and more live
Gillmen Deep Ones via live Sorcerer interrogation as well, and you cannot even assault the HQ without that. It's just that if you destroy the original cult, it's a lot less likely that you'll happen upon one of these places (20% vs some 30-70%+ per month).
I believe it was on the graveyard mission, I couldn't bring a skyranger but could bring a Dragonfly? I found that a bit weird.
The Dragonfly is supposed to be an infiltration craft, at least for some specific missions. This seems to be one. Skyrangers are full-on military planes.
Was able to manufacture the Dr. Hardrox gun but not any other ghost equipment, which I was thankful for but didn't really make sense.
The Hadriex gun is special, and actually predates the entire ghost arc. But, yeah, since most of these things are just banged-together ectoplasm dispensers, it
is a bit strange.
I haven't done the reclaim the lab mission yet (I assume that unlocks manufactoring?)
Nope.
Exalt grenade launchers with flame grenades seems too strong...
Dagonites also have grenades and Milkors. In general, enemy grenades are a major PITA.
Is there anyway to remove flames besides fire extinguisher?
Extinguisher clips for Hybrid chemoguns. Medical drones. Smoke grenades don't work on people, but do work on open fires.
