Some notes on effective fight on hard difficulty

[_terran]

The suggestions are also valid for other difficulty setitngs but it feels like first two options are just walk in the part.
Also, personally I enable almost all extra difficulty settings except "hard lessons", "body count" and "ammo scarcity". One of the best things in the game is mercs leveling up, "body count" is discussible, but I really have being without ammo.


CAREFUL: possible SPOILERS (tried to mark appropriately)

NOVICE: try to talk to neutral NPCs like villagers, miners etc. Usually RPGs are built this way that it makes sense to talk only to named characters, special NPCs that provide unique role. However, here you will get clues from all characters.

Enemy soldiers move around and often 1-2-3 of them move away from main group and are isolated so you can take them down silently without triggering the rest of the enemies.
Sometimes I would move around the permimeter of sector killing small groups of 2 enemies each, a good example is diamond mine in A1, where all enemies are scattered more or less so I didn't have to fight against more than 3 at the same time.

You can find out you can sneak closer without noticing that would be possible in real life, i.e. 5 steps from enemy on a sunny day.
So, cautiously planning, sneaking between enemies w/o engaging gives much better possibilities especially at the beginning of game when you obtain you first rifle, need to get grenades first before attacking enemy group etc.

If you're in a sector an enemy group has travelled into, having grenades is a way of ending the fight quickly. When enemies appear in a sector, for around 7 seconds they don't move and they're somewhat stacked together. Recently I had a couple of cases I was able to kill 10 enemies in one round thanks to grenades.

It's always been a hard choice for me to decide whether to leave a merc to train militia extensively. In hard difficulty (including seperate difficulty settings on)

HK21 is probably the best combination of max damage (that includes hight precision and low AP cost), safety of use (big distance), but needs lots of bullets to use, so use with caution. HOwever, a well placed merc with good dexterity/markmanship can fend off a group of many 10 enemies (unless veteran snipers, of course).

Dr.Q is probably a unique (and cheap!) character to deal with brutes and alligators without firing a shot. Use a special, switch to knife, finish, repeat on next one. Of course, if there are 2+ crocs near each other, you might shoot others in legs to slow them down, for example.

I stopped picking up Barry because Larry (sorry for tautology) mostly replaces him and is cheap. Barry is initially cheap too but if you have a difficulty option that increases mercs' cost with levels, he will be pretty expensive at the end of the game.

for novices: you might not notice an options to create a merc with your own specs in I.M.P, I did this mistake first two games. A merc for which you pay only once is a bargain!
Also, always give some medical points for him/her. It seems like even with 5 medical he/she can heal effectively (do they use more bandages?).

Knifes are an effective (and in 85% of cases guaranteed way to kill enemy soldier). If you have a group 4 mercs with knives, good dex/str, then you'll be able to take out most of sectors firing very few shots.

Definitely a SPOILER:
Smoke grenades are life saving if you have diffuculty options "dead is dead" and "to the bitter end", and/or when being ambushed at locations like refugee camp, saving president and so on.
A big aid to save president is if you have a smoke grenade in a mortar, made a total big difference.

In general, the game is very well designed, using different kind of passages makes your life much easier by attacking enemies from behind, getting a more defended position etc.

You can bump agility by moving only in turn-based mode. Running/crawling around in normal mode (even if enemies are in sector) never improves this stat. This is contrary to sneak killls with knife/rifle/etc where you can get +1 dex, str, mrk without turn-base mode.
Seperately I try to heal all civilians and allies because that might give me +1 medical.

An ugly way to improve your mercs' health stats is to let them be shot strongly.
Sometimes I notice that a merc can get stats improved twice per conflict. Initially I thought that's not possible and you can get at most one per merc per conflict. Maybe that's becuase of achieved challenges like "kill 5 enemies with headshots".

SPOILER
You can attack Chimurenga (did I spell it right?), turning his comrades against you, but if you defeat him, he'll stay alive, but succumb to your demands (mostly diamond mine I think).

if you have difficulty options "dead is dead" and "to the bitter end", be very careful when you:
trigger a conflict, attacking an ally by mistake, standing up to abusers etc. Game might be saved after an enemy did initial move of attacking your merc and killing him, for example.
Be careful with any dialogs that might result in turning neutral chars to enemies and you're not ready.
I twice had to begin the game from beginning when saving biff and mortar somehow landed on my mercs when I finished last enemy and the game was autosaved right after my merc died.

SPOILER
meeting higher level enemies underground or when army solders kick in is one of the hardest points of the game for me.

Even on hardest difficulty enemies are pretty stupid. If an enemy sniper is in favourable position for him, moving away will make him chase you, where it might be easier for you, around rock formations for example.

SOmetimes I found myself being attacked undeground or in building from two sides.
CLosing doors helped me get out of a situation with much smaller losses because enemies mostly won't shoot through walls/closed door, it takes time for them to open it which gives to time to fend off attack from other direction.

Defending a sector with single rifleman + militia is much more effective than just militia only.

Monitor ammo levels because if you use same weapon type for most/all of your mercs, you might find youself suddenly against army solders and only having shotgun/pistol ammo and they have veteran snipers...

Try to keep at least 1 metaviron to yourself at all times. Personally I only use it only if I got cought up like in refugee camp or getting Larry.

Throwing a grenade at 5+ enemies is ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥ FUN.
Shooting grenade launcher is even bigger happy moment for me.

For NOVICES: Until second game I didn't know I can scrape weapons for parts. Aaaaaaah!!!

I try to keep gas masks but only wear them in scenarios with gas mortars.
Same with night vision goggles.

Don't store powder, flare shots and other stuff in personal mercs' bags! Drop them to squad supplies.

Brutalize with hands (without knife) in the game is still pretty effective, even with avergage strength stat.

SPOILER:
In night club when fighting attacking harns first seemed to be a most effective strat for me, mostly because winning depended on how many punches sparring partner will land on your merc.

Seems like Livewire's "scoundrel" characteristics helped a lot in dialogs.

Personally I find "merc training" to be quite useless. Unless you really need a specific stat like you have 89 of dexterity and you need 3-level level up available.
Otherwise, fighting in conflicts in sectors allows you to level up faster. Exclusion could be if your other part of squad is busy healing/scouting/repairing/etc anyway.