Okay, i really need an official answer for this:
is the fact that you cannot overwatch correctly behind cover a bug or a feature, to force you being in the open more often?
Because in the last patch i saw that they fixed “an issue with invalid targeting when behind cover”, but i don’t see any difference between before and after the patch concerning overwatch.
From what I can tell, the shooting animation takes into consideration the position of the gun (right handed), and the cover.
If you are standing behind a cover that prevents you from shooting to the right side, then it is a no go.
Example would be standing beside a 1 tile structure infront, and a wall to the right, and you want to overwatch infront. No shooting here.
Feature.
Even in the original x-com series, coming around a cover to shoot is one extra action on its own. If you are fully behind a cover, you ought not be able to look at and respond to whats happening behind that cover, right? As such full cover is a trade off between protection and aggression. If you want aggression while having cover, you would have to go with a half cover. Having full view of the field behind a full cover implies the soldier have head out at all times and therefore a target for a sniper.