Finally got time to load my old squad and try the new Lair a la Derleth today.
It was great! Such an improvement. I like the way the spawn points now funnel you towards the Maguffin, then set you up for a classic fighting withdrawal to the evac point. Much more tactical & satisfying than the old Cheezefest or Slog (depending on which way you used to deal with Lairs).
Yes, there was lots of open ground which could expose you to Chirons (I was lucky, I only had a Worm Lobber to worry about), but there were also lots of overhangs you could hug to limit its angle of fire.
Dunno what you do to piss off the Pandas so much mcarver2000, but my Lvl7 Squad close to the endgame only triggered 2 Sirens on the whole map. I can sympathise if youâre still getting 3 Sirens and a couple of Acid Chirons in the early game, though. I thought they were doing something to fix that.
EDIT: Oh, and the Spawnery was much more obvious, which will help the newbies when they come Steaming in all aGoG
Thatâs the downside of procedural generation. Yes, it makes things less predictable, but as any mathematician will tell you, true randomness results in protracted runs of certain setups - in your case closely bunched PP bases with no Havens.
IMO, PP could do with a little less RNG and a little more structure in its basic architecture - 1 PP base per continental region, for instance; early Missions spawn no further than X tiles from Base Alpha - that kind of thing.
Iâve done a couple of citadel missions now, and it simply reinforces my opinion that the Maguffin (ie. the Scylla) needs not to come to us, but we should be forced to go to it.
As things stand, itâs still a turkey shoot - and then you Dash & Jet Jump with a couple of Rallies to bug out.
If the Scylla was hiding behind the conch shell (or better still in it, with it turned the other way round) and only activated when you could see it, it would force you to advance across the Citadel to seek it out, rather than setting up a defensive perimeter, sitting back and shouting: âPull!â as we do at the moment.
I know something like this is in the pipeline - just letting the devs know how itâs currently working (or not) with the Evac option as it stands.
I heartily agree. There is far too much slot machine going on. In fact itâs the heading for one of the paragraphs in the ongoing review am doing for when PP hits steam.
I wouldnât know, I gave up on Firaxis XCOM after the Alien Hunters DLC, and went down the LW2 route instead.
TBH, itâs my biggest concern about PP - they seem (quite understandably) to be chasing the âcartoon super-soldierâ market thatâs made XCOM2 so successful, rather than creating a nicely balanced tactical sim. And I suspect Iâm not the only Fig backer who hoped theyâd be going the other way.
Donât get me wrong:I think Snapshot has every right to chase the money if they think it comes from that direction - Iâd just like there to be space in the game for those of us who were hoping for a more X-Com-like experience as well, is all.
PP not only copied the Firaxis supersoldiers, they clearly surpassed them in terms of superpower!
Personally, the (light) Supersoldier from Firaxis never bothered me because,
Taking cover (no matter how unrealistic) was relevant from the beginning to the end of the game. PP: Positioning becomes obsolete if you have âFlashâ or extremely high accuracy
Overwatch: Even if it was already too much with XCOM2, it was always a relevant tactic. PP: You can kill significantly more enemies on the offensive by regenerating AP.
DRAMA and TENSION: In Firaxis you canât overflow everything and kill in 1-2 turn(s). Of course there was an alpha strike in Firaxis, but no âFTSâ terminators! You couldnât make the entire team invulnerable there. Even the teammate mechanic in WOTC only allowed to transport 1AP to a teammate, but not to start the AP-Generator as with Rally the Troops!
All in all, I just have to say that there was more drama and excitement at Firaxis, in my opinion for precisely these reasons.
I personally would have nothing against a âclosenessâ to Firaxis Supersoldiers, but not as PP does in the totally exaggerated implementation.
Iâm with you there - though to be fair to the devs, they have acknowledged this is a problem and are doing something about it. However, based on their experiences with Acid etc, they are quite sensibly planning to do it in a series of small thoughtfully considered steps, rather than a big jerk of the knee in the other direction.
Itâs a very unpopular position, but IMO one of the biggest game-changers was the knee-jerk nerf to RF when people started complaining about it in the early days after release.
Arthron Return Fire existed as a mechanic that prevented people from unrealistically waltzing out into the open, sticking a shotgun in their targetâs face and blowing its head off, because if they did so they got gunned down by the targetâs buddies.
Now, you can run right across the map, stand right next to half a dozen Crabbies, RC, blow oneâs brains out, move on to the next, blow its brains out, Rally, move onto the next, blow its brains out⌠And the Crabbies donât react! Itâs added to the unrealism of the game in a very significant way - which is why I use @pantolominâs excellent âRF a la Carteâ to reset the balance the other way.
The more disharmony in skills, the more difficult it is to build a stable beautiful System.
Especially if it conflicts with the Basic Mechanics (Reality VS Non-Reality - instead of Pseudoreality).
And it will break deeper as more DLC is added. Although there is an opportunity to gradually smooth out the problem area, but for this it is necessary to constantly increase the amount of resources and forces, which is the Snapshotgames weakest point (There is no way to ignore the problem, filling it with money).
But this is not enough, @UnstableVoltage & Snapshotgames decided to make it worse by pushing active fans to the groan of the opposition (we will do our own thing, and you are a minority / âyouâre nobodyâ).
At this time, at the finish line / in Steam - a game awaits, a bunch of skeptics and embittered fans who endured silently the Epic scandal.
@Snapshotgames, you went through a problematic release thanks to the great support of the fans, based on the fact that the game âsoonâ will be completed and âit will only get better.â If on the way to the release in Steam, there will be a âsilly super-soldier gameâ, even the opening of Moding will not save.
I wonder about design of Lairs. Donât you think they are somewhat empty? I think that there should be also elements from Nests, so
occasional (not always present, but possible) one Hatching Sentinel or maybe two to trigger below change (but not as objective),
double or triple the amount of eggs - currently there are like 3 or 4 and I almost never trigger them because of open spaces (it would be fine to spend at least one turn to clear path from them)
put there occasional mist sentinel or two so tritons could hide in the mist and siren could regenerate WP not only by Recover ability
when there are those additional sentinels spawn less Arthrons and Tritons in the number of these additional sentinels.
Of course it may require more balance in the way of even lower number of Arhtrons and Tritons, but current composition of enemy deployment allows me to finish such Lair with the team of for example 2 soldiers at levels 6-7, 2 soldiers at levels 2-3, and 2 soldiers at levels 1. So I suppose that there is space to improve and work with that.
I miss those enemies when there are no Scavenge Sites anymore and when you can find only Lairs instead of Nests.
It depends on the roll of the dice. Is the spawnery clear across the map? Does one get holed up attempting to deal with twin Chrions? Does one have to deal with clearing out a 3-headed sentinel to reach goal and evacuation?
Iâve had both easy and some extremely difficult ones. With most in the middle.
Distance to Spawnery doesnât change too much. You just need to run turn or two longer. Almost whole combat is still happening around the starting zone.
More stationary enemies shouldnât interfere with your dealing with Chirons. And what more lower number of Arthrons and Tritons could make it more enjoyable.
Terror sentinels are almost always in the way so it is not a variable. To be true thanks to them I often know where to look for Spawnery. What more, those single Terror Sentinel gave me that idea. They are so lonely thereâŚ
Personally, I think the balance is about right. Lairs can be easy, if you get a good RNG, but theyâre usually tough but enjoyable right now. Add much more to the mix, and youâre back to players complaining that theyâre a slog.
That said: Iâm playing on Veteran right now, so Iâd have no objection to Lairs having more of what @Yokes is describing on Heroic and Legendary Difficulties.
There are many important changes to the game coming, particularly on the Pandoran evolution front. I think we should see how that works out first, before considering another pass on Lairs.
