XCOM EU Panic Level

[marauderim]

hi, i´ve finished the game in classic with normal save mode, and then started classic/ironman, i know im not the best player and blah blah, but the thing that made me come here is this, im geting pissed off with the 90%+ missed shots, and on top of that, geting hited and killed by an alien thats so far that sometimes i cant see him and my soldier in the same screen(19" monitor), i know that 99% means i still have 1% possibility to miss, but cmon...do u think normal when i get to lets say 3 or 4 tiles away and with a clear shot and with 90%+ chance to hit, i miss both shots on a rapid fire..., but this is not all, i also had situations that with 2 or 3 soldiers with 90%+ chance to hit and all missed on the same target in the same round, this can kill a game, and the worst is this also kills the fun, i dont get that values of % without tactics and then see all my work wasted like that..., but this is not what i want changed, the game is like this and so i need to take the punch, what i want to change is the panic level of nations, if im doomed to loose squads to the 10% less chances of missing shots that i miss in every mission, yes every mission, its not allways fatal but it happens every mission, so ill drop to rookies lots of time, and then ill loose more missions, so ill loose nation suport, that i cant recover, and ill loose the game, i dont mind to take the blame, but what i dont want is to loose the fun, i like the game so i want to play it, so i ask u guys, how or is it possible to lower the panic impact of loosing missions, so i have fair time to recover from bad luck shots

 

thank you in advance and sorry for my bad english

[Drakous79]

Hello, welcome to the forum :)

 

Your problem might be, that aliens have increased aim and crit rates on higher difficulties (known as AI cheating).

 

In my opininion, you have a lot of options.

 

1. Adjust combat strategy for the difficulty.
   
   • Don't rush forward (dash), use one move, check the situation and then decide - one move with other soldiers or the second move with the current soldier. Acting this carefully gives you an opportunity to act, if you trigger alien pack.
     
   • Don't fight too many aliens at once. One pack is enough.
     
   • Learn to fall back. Can be used to lure aliens into prepared trap.
     
   • Have plan B. If one soldier misses, have another one to do the job.
     
   • Use rockets and grenades. It's lifesaver even if it destroyes fragments. Can be used to weaken aliens or to destroy cover.
     

[*]Do correct strategic decisions.

• Go for priority research at the start, so you have an option to assault alien base asap. It gives you -2 panic globally. It's fine doing it before end of the month.
  
• Plan satellites to lover panic in countries, you have chosen not to help with abductions.
  
• It's better to shot UFO and leave it alone, if you are undermanned.
  

[*]Mod the game :)

• Get Modpatcher and edit DefaultGameCore.mod. Setting 2 entries bellow from 5 to 6 disables country defections for classic difficulty, except not helping with terror mission. Tried myself and had 9 countries in red for 2 months. Only Germany left because terror mission took place in there. Tested it by doing only the first mission and then just scanning and clicking not now, not interested, ignore.
  

  PANIC_DEFECT_THRESHHOLD_HARD=6
  PANIC_DEFECT_THRESHHOLD_NOT_HELPED_HARD=6

  
  

• Or you can increase aim bonus on weapons to miss less often.
  
• Or increase health bonus on armor to withstand more damage for better survivalibity.
  
• Or try No Aim And Crit Bonus for Classic AI mod to stop AI from cheating. Can do yourself by changing aim and crit values for aliens at BalanceMods_Hard lines to zero.
  

  BalanceMods_Hard=(eType=eChar_Sectoid,iDamage=0,iCritHit=10, iAim=0, iDefense=0,iHP=0, iMobility=0,iWill=0)
  BalanceMods_Hard=(eType=eChar_Floater,iDamage=0,iCritHit=10, iAim=10,iDefense=0,iHP=0, iMobility=0,iWill=0)

  
  

• Or play more with panic settings, there's Compiled list of DefaultGameCore.ini settings and their funtions available.
  

Well, there are many possibilities for sure. Just find the one that suits you the best.

 

Edit: Also note that Classic is Hard in DefaultGameCore.ini/mod and Impossible is Classic. And corrected some typos.

Edited November 25, 2012 by Drakous79

[marauderim]

Thank you a lot Drakous79

 

the first 2 points is about skill, those are all good advices, some are skills i already have others are skills i need to learn ;)

 

the point 3 is what i really need, i feel like the game falls into oblivion to fast, after all we are a single organisation protecting all the world, and in a game that uses dice roll in backwards to avoid save/load, they should have made panic a lot smoother so we can recover from losses(without making the game too easy ofc), or at least allows us to work panic down by option, allowing us to pic missions where we want and when we want, it could be made by allowing us to ask council for missions, we could loose those missions also and even get our situation worst ofc but im not asking to make the game easier, just more fair, i beleave there are ppl that owns the game in impossible, and probably most ppl will say that i should go for normal dificulty if i cant do it in classic, and i would agree if i didnt feel that is not my skill that is weak, is the game that is not balanced, i even like the feeling in my belly when a mission start to colapse, what i dont like is when even if i make a perfect mission, nations go panic coz i choose to not save them, this is not balanced, we have only one team, that most of the time is injured or dead, and we have to choose missions depending in panic coz if we dont and choose depending on reward things go even worst, panic related, what would be fair was allow us to make all the missions, saving a team for each mission(if we had not the manpower then we would have to ignore some and then it was fair their panic increase), that way, i would feel that my actions and effort counts, if i saved all the missions i would have panic lowered in all, or if i failed some panic would increase where i fail, this would make the game longer to finish(more missions to make, more time the game takes, after all the game is 99% about doing missions) what is also good, if materials gained from each mission become an issue by having more missions=more materials just lower the amount per mission and problem solved...anyway, im geting lost in my toughts lol

 

thank you for your reply, ill try to do that thing u said about avoiding nations to leave council, duno if ill be sucessfull but ill try :)

 

p.s.what version of modpatcher should i get? :P

Edited November 25, 2012 by marauderim

[Drakous79]

Version 0.12 is the latest.

 

Also there's setting in DGC (DefaultGameCore) allowing to intercept UFO's preparing a mission (abduction or terror). So 3 UFOs for abduction preparation. If you shoot one, there is only 2 more countries to choose from, when the abduction happens. Also if I remember, they are hard to shoot with basic ship weaponry.

 

Haven't tested the setting myself so I can point you only to ini line: ShowUFOsOnMission=1

 

I started modding too soon and it keeps me too busy to play :)

 

Well, if you are playing classic ironman, then there's no doubt you have skill and will improve it each playthrough up to impossible. Appearantly some people will love to have Nightmare difficulty.

[marauderim]

ok ty m8 :)

[Trucidation]

Imho there are way too many "choose 1 of 3" incidents; I'd rather have a steady flow of 1 or at most choose between 2 missions.

 

Currently I can sit at base for days on end with nothing happening, then suddenly *blam*, choose 1 of 3 missions pops up. I'd rather have a steady flow of missions e.g. once per every other day. That would keep the overall mission count same over the same period of time (e.g. 3 missions per week), while not forcing you to eat panic because they magically happened at the same time, forcing you to pick which one to do.

 

At the same time it wouldn't be easy since if your soldiers get hurt you can't simply take the subsequent missions as they come - so there would still be missions you'd need to skip, or risk doing with a weaker squad. More realistic imho.