Ignore too hard missions?

[Che Eder]

So, I startet playing Enemy Unknown for the first time and just had my first total ♥♥♥♥ up.

I saw the sequence with the Aliens bombarding cities for the first time and got a mission afterwards to save civilians in France. It was described as "very difficult", but as it was given to me (no other missions to choose from) I just accepted.

Well, no one survived :P

Now I wonder, besides playing better during the fight, should I have ignored this mission?

Because judging frome the amount of enemies I saw I guess I wouldn't really have fared better even with a better strategy.

I lost four of my most advanced soldiers at this point and ... well, I don't want that to happen again :P

So what to do?

[happy]

get better

the mission you re talking about is a terror mission, if you win, you get nice panic reduction that would help you a lot to keep the country in the xcom project

you have to do these missions unless you ve planned to let panic rise

[Che Eder]

Well I'll check it off as learning experience then...

It's just that the difficulty jump was so high, with the missions before being really easy, even those labeled as difficult, and then having this massacre, with new types of Aliens, and lot's of them too.

[asd]

You can't ignore any missions, the game just doesn't let you relax at any time. If you ignore or lose a terror mission, the country will always leave xcom.
I always start my games with researching meld recombination, then building cyber labs and making a heavy mec, then researching weapon fragments and then laser rifles.

It works like this: weapons >> armor
Killing a 8 hp alien in one turn with assault rifles needs between 2-4 soldiers. Killing a 8 hp alien in one turn with laser rifles always needs 2 soldiers. Killing a 8 hp alien in one turn with a kinetic strike module always needs 1 mec trooper.
And the heavy mec can turn the tide of the battle even if you lost some soldiers

[Tankfriend]

You can ignore terror missions like that one, but I don't think it's a good idea. Doing that means a lot of panic in one go, which might be something you can't afford if you already have too much panic from choosing the standard missions, or if you fail to shoot down UFOs etc. Too much panic means countries drop out of your support at the end of the months, and if you lose too many, you lose the game.
Besides, there's a lot of aliens in these missions which translates into a good deal of experience for your soldiers, and brings you a lot of corpses, materials etc. for your R&D departments.
So, if you can handle them, there's no reason to ignore them.

That said, it's normal to lose your first terror mission if you're unprepared, because they're quite a step up from the usual missions you get at that point. There's a few things you can do to make it easier for you:

Firstly, get laser weapons as soon as possible. Research Weapon Fragments -> Beam Weapons -> and then the laser weapon subtypes.
In the ideal case, you'd focus everything on these from the start of the game, and have your squad outfitted with laser weapons by the time your first terror mission comes along. The added firepower is just that big a help.

Secondly, if you have laser weapons for your squad, get better armour next. Research Alien Materials -> Carapace Armor -> Skeleton Armor. If you feel your squad is doing well enough with just lasers so far, go straight for the Skeleton Armor and don't waste ressources on building any Carapaces. The Skeleton provides less hitpoints for your soldiers, but it comes with a defense bonus (less likely to be hit), more mobility, and a grappling hook.

Thirdly, if you already have the Officer Training School built, make sure you get the Squad Size upgrades as soon as you can (it depends on the highest rank of your soldiers). Extra people to bring along are a massive help.

And last, but not least, be very careful when you're moving through terror missions. Never (!) use dashing (two moves per turn) unless it's an assault you activate the Run&Gun perk on. You always want all of your soldiers to be able to shoot with Overwatch at the end of your turn, in case some aliens hunting for civilians turn up.
There's also the Chrysalids (four-legged insect-kind of beast) you meet the first time here. With these beasts, keep these points in mind:
- they are fast
- they are melee (!) creatures with no ranged attack
- they ignore cover
- if they kill civilians or soldiers, those will come back as zombies and attack you, too; if left unchecked, zombies will eventually turn into new Chrysalids

So, if you see these things: Always focus on killing these first to prevent a zombie horde. Also, try to move your soldiers as far away from the Chrysalids as you can with the first action (remember: they have to stand next to you to attack), then use the second action to shoot them. If there's no other aliens with guns around, you can even stop your soldiers out in the open with no cover, as the Chrysalids don't care, anyway.

On another note: Bring rockets (heavy soldiers) and grenades, and use them if any number of aliens is bunched up close together (Chrysalids are often good targets, because they charge you in a pack).

[red255]

in long war, yes, ignore missions.

in regular game, no, just get better. *judging from the number of enemies you saw*

...? what it couldn't have been more than 20. Unless the crystallids ate EVERY civilian making 16 more...

you want times for terror missions? terror missions are EASY because you can just ignore cover because the enemies will shoot civilians alot making your own cover moot. unless you are really unlucky. But seriously in titan armor you can't be one-shotted so the enemies will prioritize shooting civilians. so no need to even bother with cover until all of the civilians are dead.

Can't think of any other advise really same as other missions, don't trigger too many enemies at once, deal with threats. Ignore in game advise from Vahlen and Bradford.

[Temper]

Originally posted by Che Eder:

So, I startet playing Enemy Unknown for the first time and just had my first total ♥♥♥♥ up.

I saw the sequence with the Aliens bombarding cities for the first time and got a mission afterwards to save civilians in France. It was described as "very difficult", but as it was given to me (no other missions to choose from) I just accepted.

Well, no one survived :P

Now I wonder, besides playing better during the fight, should I have ignored this mission?

Because judging frome the amount of enemies I saw I guess I wouldn't really have fared better even with a better strategy.

I lost four of my most advanced soldiers at this point and ... well, I don't want that to happen again :P

So what to do?

You can ignore the first terror mission or a nasty council mission in the first couple of months or even a abduction or UFO landing if you don't think you have a hope of completing the mission anyway.The outcome for the country and continent will be the same as if you failed the mission but you'll keep your troops instead of losing them on the field and losing troops as well is a much grimmer prospect than dealing with just continent panic levels.

As you play more and learn more about Xcom you'll understand when it may be prudent to sacrifice not just a country from the Xcom project but a whole continent.It's common on the highest diffculty setting to win a campaign with the bare minimum of countries required to keep the project together and impossible to hold them all with all second wave enabled.

If your not playing ironman mode then reload and give the mission another try and learn from it.

A hint for terror missions,you need only rescue ONE (1) civilian and keep your troops alive while clearing the mission site to complete the mission succesfully.Your mission rating will be low,but your troops will be alive and the country/continet still in the Xcom project.

Last thing I have to share is,do NOT ignore cover,that's just bad policy no matter what function the AI carries out regardless of what armor your troops are wearing.Avoid being shot at all costs or you'll definitely be having some *that's Xcom baby* moments.

=)

[Kash]

Umm who says there is no magic in X-Com. There are these wondrous things called grenades.

[Falentir]

Originally posted by Temper:

Last thing I have to share is,do NOT ignore cover,that's just bad policy no matter what function the AI carries out regardless of what armor your troops are wearing.Avoid being shot at all costs or you'll definitely be having some *that's Xcom baby* moments.

=)

Indeed. There can be other nasty foes than crids on terror missions, and they can spawn very quickly, their goal is not always to kill the civilians first....

[Martial.Lore]

tankfriend got it all I think. Sometimes luck will play a part. I rescued all 18 civilians once before having to fire a shot. It was just the luck of the draw regarding the placement of civilians mostly on one side of a big building and the aliens on the other.

I would emphasize the need to proceed carefully and avoid rushing to save people in order to minimize the danger of multiple alien activations at once.

[Che Eder]

Thank you for all the tipps, I'll try to act accordingly :)

I'll see if I can recover from this as I started in Ironmode, maybe not the wisest choice for the first game. Otherwise I'll just start a new one, as it's still tons of fun, even watching the team getting wiped out :D

[Stardustfire]

when u get wiped out in terror mission i guess u advanced to fare to fast. the point in terror missions is to wipe out all aliens, no matter how many turns it take, and save ONE civilian. yes one civilian surving is enove, so ignore civilian saving and prefer soldier saving and alien killing, but slow, save and planned. if u rush in to save civilains u will end in chaos and to many active pods.

[G.O.A.T]

Ah yes my first terror mission...... I remember sitting looking at my keyboard in stunned silence after a brutal squad-wipe.

Overwatch.
Kill aliens don't save civilians.
Firepower is more important than armour.
Don't go in too many directions at once to avoid triggering too many aliens.
You still need to think about cover as floaters usually accompany terror missions.


...Enjoy your trip to the fishing village...

[Stardustfire]

fishing village is a parkstroll, never get it why ppl think this mission where hard. 2 MECs alone coud acomplish it without sweating, even in classic and higher.

[Adaarable]

Originally posted by Che Eder:

Thank you for all the tipps, I'll try to act accordingly :)

I'll see if I can recover from this as I started in Ironmode, maybe not the wisest choice for the first game. Otherwise I'll just start a new one, as it's still tons of fun, even watching the team getting wiped out :D

Oh and since no one brought this little tip up: explosives will stop zombies from coming to life, best used the turn immediately after the chryssalid kill, to stop the zombie and to injure/kill the chryssalid.

[Che Eder]

Originally posted by G.O.A.T:

Ah yes my first terror mission...... I remember sitting looking at my keyboard in stunned silence after a brutal squad-wipe.

Overwatch.
Kill aliens don't save civilians.
Firepower is more important than armour.
Don't go in too many directions at once to avoid triggering too many aliens.
You still need to think about cover as floaters usually accompany terror missions.


...Enjoy your trip to the fishing village...

Yes, this was exactly my problem. I wanted to save all those civs and spread out way too much, triggered everything at once and had no overwatch because of dashing.... Well, experience!

Originally posted by Cash.net Dallas:

Oh and since no one brought this little tip up: explosives will stop zombies from coming to life, best used the turn immediately after the chryssalid kill, to stop the zombie and to injure/kill the chryssalid.

Thanks, that will be helpful :)