5 game in row lost ♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥♥!! I hate avatar project.....

[Lord Zultron]

I dont get it I get to doomsday timer and avatar project just keeps kicking my♥♥♥♥♥.. I run out of intel unable to make contact and bam lost again... I am stuck watching time ticking out... I need tips I never seem to have enough intel to make contact with other regions.... And becaue I cant maek contact I lose on world map....

[TradeGy]

What difficulty are you playing on?

But general tips are don't do story missions/objective or alien facilities as soon as you can, wait until the timer starts and then launch an assault on a facility or story mission. While doing this you will build up tech and intel so you can make contact with another area with a facility or story mission when you need to.

Doing this I haven't had any problems with the Avatar project.

[Lord Zultron]

Originally posted by TradeGy:

What difficulty are you playing on?

But general tips are don't do story missions/objective or alien facilities as soon as you can, wait until the timer starts and then launch an assault on a facility or story mission. While doing this you will build up tech and intel so you can make contact with another area with a facility or story mission when you need to.

Doing this I haven't had any problems with the Avatar project.

I am playing on commander difficulty... I have all armor all weapons fully gearedd out.. By the time doomsday timer hits I have 2 facilities unlocked but after that it just becomes struggle to keep up with timer and makign contacts with regions.... It seems I have to prioritise my expenditure on map instead of buying or building facilities... I outperform in every mission I am just not able to deal with unlocking more facilities

[Fringehunter7719]

Are you building radio towers?

[Lord Zultron]

Originally posted by Fringehunter7719:

Are you building radio towers?

initially yeah but overtime I spend more on making sure I build facilities and have gear just to keep up with enemy.. My income is something like 300-400 just when doomsday hits.. But I either run out of intel or I need radio upgrades just to make more contacts...

[Fringehunter7719]

It's hard to tell what is going wrong, I can't see why you need to spend a lot of supplies on facilities later on (since everything you need should be built by mid game and nothing is that expensive to build in the first place), but you cannot afford to skip building radio towers and pay the double intel cost.

Anyway, a bunch of guesses at dos and don'ts that may help in your situation:

• Always build a radio tower before contacting a region unless it will result in game over.
  
• Try and build exactly the number of radio towers in a continent to activate its continent bonus and no more.
  
• Don't waste intel researching facility leads if you can contact the region yourself (it's 50 intel and the item each time and you can get access to that facility for no cost if you get to the region on geoscape).
  
• Don't spend more intel than you can spare at the black market.
  
• Progress your objectives. Raiding the blacksite, skulljacking an officer, doing the blacksite follow up and doing the skulljack follow up all provide significant doom reduction.
  
• Don't assault facilities until you need to, additional doom values from dark events and other sources get added to specific facilities, the longer they are on the map the more doom reduction they provide when destroyed. Save them for when you're at 10-12 pips.
  
• Always plan ahead, know where your next doom reduction is coming from. If you don't control at least one region with a facility or story mission in it, you need to prioritise that on the geoscape. Remember that at least half of all rumours are trash and should be ignored.
  
• Don't forget that you can research data pads and data caches for a lot of extra intel when you're running short.

[TradeGy]

For me it depends on if I want to try for early Psi or not but I normally only have AWC, GTS, power plant, proving grounds and resistance comms until quite late game where I build a shadow Chamber and Psi Lab, and sometimes a defense matrix if I haven't had a avenger defense yet.

Doing this I don't have problems upgrading my weapons and armour, getting enough intel/supplies...

[talemore]

Don't make contacts unless you have to make a contact. If there's no facility don't make a contact. Research to reduce the avatar and hack objectives to gain leads.

You only make contacts to reach a facility. You create specialists because you need to hack objectives to gain facility leads and you research to unlock missions who reduces the avatar and you finish the game because you have to do it.

[theworld]

Considering that even Legend timer isn't that hard with proper strategy it seems the OP doesn't use the proper strategy, even though it's simple.

1)Only do facilities and story line Avatar reduction objectives when you are on the last day of the timer.

2)Do not, I repeat, do not attack facilities or Blacksite or do Skulljacking, etc. until Avatar meter is filled up and the timer has almost run out.

3)Expand towards regions with facilities.

4)Early game try not to go for bad reward scans (Always scan for Engineers though), but instead scan at base for intel.

5)If you have a Facility lead (obtained on mission as hacking reward) in your inventory, but have not researched it - be careful if you see "Cipher" dark event, as it DOUBLES the Intel cost of researching Facility lead.

[76561198322429733]

I always bring a specialist with me on missions. On city missions, that gives me an extra hack attempt with the lamp posts. With any hacking missions, that gives 2 hack attempts that can give intel rewards.

I try to get skulljack and skullmining as soon as I can and give it to my specialist. This gives me another chance to hack as long as I'm fighting advent grunts. Skullmining has a high possibility to get intel and supplies as rewards. If I remember right, there's a chance to get facility leads too.

I build relays so that I don't have to spend more than 60 intel when contacting regions, positioning them in "forks" so I can contact many regions with just 1 relay. I prioritize expanding for the first few months instead of fully decking out my squad with shiny gear. You have to balance it.

Use the story mission objectives to prolong the avatar counter. Save skulljacking the commander and raiding the blacksite until the doomsday counter is activated.

You can attack advent facilities to lower the counter. I play veteran and I have no problem managing the avatar counter, by the time I the clock is down to 1 day, I usually have a squad fully geared with T3 tech.

There's also an option to lower the difficulty until you're used to the game mechanics.

[The Bored Chairman]

Don't expand too often. I know this sounds crazy, but you'll want at least 1 free contact in case a facility shows up in an area you can't get to. Believe me, I understand all too well the desire to get absolutely everything under your command.

Resource management includes territories, and agressive expansion will strain your resources, as the bonus in income has to be measured against the cost of expanding, since you burn intel to expand and then time to establish comms. And as others have said, keeping the primary mission objectives on the sidelines helps you to "cheese" the AVATAR Project, since if the Doomsday timer starts, you can launch a main mission (i.e. Blacksite) to delay their progress and reset the clock.

Also, it's better to take out the earlier facilities, as destroying them removes all progress they have made.

Another thing to keep in mind is the Dark Events that increase Intel costs. If you're looking to expand, make sure to get rid of this one. Using Intel to decript the hidden event is likely not worth it, since most Dark Events can be dealt with proper planning. Reseaching ADVENT or Alien Datapads can give you Intel too, as can scanning at the HQ along with VIP capture mission (You MUST capture the VIP to get the Intel reward, however).

Hope this has helped.

[Fringehunter7719]

The dark event that doubles intel costs is called alien cypher. It lasts for a month (as do they all) and is one of the worst to get, however, if you see it coming you can circumvent it to a fairly big extent by simply paying any upcoming intel costs. If you have to expand into a region or two, then you can start that contact and then cancel out and carry on scanning or doing missions that are more pressing, you won't have to pay more when you come back to carry on, even if the alien cypher triggers in the interim.

The only time this won't help you is if you've left yourself without enough doom reduction and have to get to a region that is not adjacent to your currently controlled regions.

This also works for facility leads.

[PsychoDino]

Originally posted by Legend:

I dont get it I get to doomsday timer and avatar project just keeps kicking my♥♥♥♥♥.. I run out of intel unable to make contact and bam lost again... I am stuck watching time ticking out... I need tips I never seem to have enough intel to make contact with other regions.... And becaue I cant maek contact I lose on world map....

That's XCOM baby!

[Jeff]

Get engineers, excavate sites, build power center and relay station ASAP. Make contacts and have the power to do it. Those are the key

[wicked lester]

Originally posted by TheWorld:

Considering that even Legend timer isn't that hard with proper strategy it seems the OP doesn't use the proper strategy, even though it's simple.

1)Only do facilities and story line Avatar reduction objectives when you are on the last day of the timer.

2)Do not, I repeat, do not attack facilities or Blacksite or do Skulljacking, etc. until Avatar meter is filled up and the timer has almost run out.

What exactly is the reason for 1 and 2? What particular advantage is there to waiting instead of attacking with, say, two ticks left?

3)Expand towards regions with facilities.

4)Early game try not to go for bad reward scans (Always scan for Engineers though), but instead scan at base for intel.

5)If you have a Facility lead (obtained on mission as hacking reward) in your inventory, but have not researched it - be careful if you see "Cipher" dark event, as it DOUBLES the Intel cost of researching Facility lead.

So I have a facility lead in my inventory but no Research option for it. What gives? Does that mean I have no facilities to find. I have 8 ticks on the Avatar, 2 facilities free to attack.

[Bindal]

Originally posted by wicked lester:

So I have a facility lead in my inventory but no Research option for it. What gives? Does that mean I have no facilities to find. I have 8 ticks on the Avatar, 2 facilities free to attack.

Pretty much - these leads are, as far as I know (I didn't have the need for one yet), allow you to attack a facility in an area you haven't made contact yet. If you don't have any or all are available for attack already, you can't use it.