So I was just fighting againsthe Foresaken, and of my exprienced troopers got hit by two bursts from that weapon that does viral damage (R something). Not all bullets hit.
-15 will per turn
He was cowering for the entire length of the battle. Made useless. I don’t recall it being this devastating before.
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Actually, virus effects are not removeable by medkits, i don’t know if it ever was removeable, but you can supress the panic effect with stimpacks and priesters rage. You won’t be able to any abilities in the next few rounds, at least you can fight, even with 0 willpower.
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High-end equipment that I’m not even close to researching and takes up precious inventory slots?
And a weapon that effectively removes someone from combat at a time I can only bring 6 people on a mission? Yeah, terrible.
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Well, it works both ways. Try using viral weapons against a Siren, they are very effective. Equally a soldier with the viral skill with a shotgun, especially against enemies that you can’t quickly kill. Watch them run away to hide. Try using one on a Scylla!
The Virophage kit, although high tech research is also a high end medkit and is half the weight of a regular medkit. Unfortunately, since the new update, they may be quite expensive to manufacture.
Actually, I would say “pretty good”. Yes, it takes out the operative for a few turns - how many also depends on how careful or careless you were with your WPs, and in general it’s less of a deal than paralysis.
But the key point is that it doesn’t kill him. IMO, that’s a very good thing, and it’s good to have more non-lethal interactions with the enemies.
I also prefer when soldiers get their body parts disabled. Not because it isn’t a big deal - it is! And not because Aspida/Technician can heal them (I don’t usually have one of those around), but because it’s a non lethal outcome.
Viral damage attacks on your operatives can be countered by a few other means besides Virophage Kits, Priest Psychic Ward and Judgement Priest Head/Stimpack Frenzy buffs. Bionic body parts reduce viral damage by half when they are hit, the New Jericho alliance tech ‘Project Hecate’ when researched reduces viral damage by half on all of your operatives for free and the Disciples of Anu Resistor Head mutation reduces viral damage by half too.
Standard and viral damage from ‘Redeemer’ viral rifles can be stopped completely by giving operatives armour that has an armour rating of 30 or more. The use of heavy class armour pieces and the use of the level 7 Technician ability ‘Electric Reinforcement’ can make it possible to gain 30+ armour ratings on your operatives. The way viral damage works, means that unless each weapon hit inflicts at least 1 net point of standard damage after armour, then viral damage from those hits will not be applied at all.
You got hit by two bursts from a virus rifle. If you’d been hit by two shots from a sniper rifle, your soldier would be dead. Virus rifles aren’t very dangerous by comparison.
Just have the virused soldier sit out the rest of the mission and kill everything with your remaining 5 soldiers instead.
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Yes that is outcome, but as 4 above posts shows it isn’t so terrible and you can also use them. You are right that it wasn’t like that before, but virus damage went up in one of the builds.
Well, the guy that was shot had 10+ WILL and goliath armor (on chest) and was put out of commission for 7-8 turns.
As for cybernetic head replacement or mutations - a BIG no to that. This is still early game, and even if I had that tech unlocked, I hate it with a passion of million suns.
Yep, that’s about right. If he got 15 virus damage and 10 Will he would keep panicking until virus is reduced to 5, with 12 Will until it reduced to 6, with 14 will it reduced to 7, etc. Unless you had someone to inspire him, or get some WPs from a white zone.
But to get 15 virus damage you have to get hit with the whole burst of the Reedemer (the viral “assault rifle”) which has an effective range of only 17, and can’t penetrate armor 30 or above (it does 20 damage and has 10 armor penetration).
The Subjugator (the viral “sniper rifle”) does 10 virus damage and has high range (ER of 51), but recovering from 10 virus damage with 10 will takes 5 turns at most.
Again, it’s not negligible, but what’s better: getting hit by a Redeemer, or an elite Arthon MG (a burst of 6 projectiles doing 50dmg and 3 shred each)? Or by a Subjugator or a Sniper Rifle?
I got exactly same situation. My assault with a rifle thought he can plink at priest. He couldnt and I can live with that.
But what made whole situation completely stupid was, that once he panicked he run out of cover into no mans land ( empty space between him and priest and his buddies)
Haven’t tried it since the change to rage burst but have a heavy with biochemist use it with a deceptor against a scylla. Basically takes the scylla out of the fight
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Is it just me or does virus damage just seem outright broken and not fun at all as a concept? I get the whole ‘you lose will’ aspect of it. Thats not the problem. It could be an interesting concept but in my opinion not in its current implementation. Its the fact that it only drains by ONE per turn that I feel is the annoying part about it. That just means that a soldier can be out of combat for like 10 turns while getting hit by 1 or 2 burst.
And like some people here mentioned, we can use this on the Pandorans as well… Its not a fun or interesting concept. Its just annoying. And for our own soldiers very easy to abuse…
I personally think it would be fine if the will draining effect only applied to the next turn or if it just drained faster. Maybe drain 10 of it per turn? Or if you have other (non-end game tech) options of dealing with it. As it stands its annoying at best and doesent add anything. Unless you want to cheese the Pandorans with it for 0 challenge. Come to think about it, arent they kind of already afflicted by the virus? Why the fuck does it work on Pandorans?
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Well, if you hit every bullet, 12 *5 =60 WP , then yes, but it is not easy
Thats 60 potential viral damage from 1 character though. If you bring 2 or 3 characters with viral weapons (or a full party for shits and giggles) you can just make all Pandorans you meet run around like headless chickens. They would be incapable of fighting back and with enough effort you can easily have backup weapons for doing proper damage (most viral weapons do very low damage) to slowly seal-club them when they cant fight back anymore.
Because you use different strain of the virus.
I guess? Not sure if its listed in the lore where the viral damage from the priest’s gun (for example) comes from, forget to check.
I suppose it isn’t mentioned anywhere. 
But I think that devs could make Pandorans resistant to this type of damage vs faction opponents.
Had one of my soldiers hit today 2 times with Virus Rifle (Redeemer I think) => 30 Viral damage … WTH am I suppose to do ? Try to defend him 30 rounds ?
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