Advanced options for fresh (legend) WOTC playthrough- recommendations?

[Peter Griffin]

I can see the appeal in some of the options like Reaper/Skirmisher/Templar ally (not sure if that affects how many of each you can have), Skirmishers seem less useful than the other two.

Lengthy scheme seems like a no-brainer, while Grim Horizon should be avoided, unless dark events can still be counteracted in some way.

Time turner would seem to fulfil the same function of a couple of the resistance projects, possibly freeing up space that could be used elsewhere.

The explosives option looks to be a double-edged sword since it's difficult to know whether it's help or hindrance.

Any thoughts?

I also unlocked the prototype armours, weapons and stuff and found they're mostly cosmetic. Except the weapons, which only have two (superior) fixed upgrades they're actually weaker than their normal counterparts.

[Greb]

Might be a good idea to take Lost and Abandoned on while starting with a Templar so you potentially discover all three factions near-instantly, assuming you can pick a HQ to start at with Lost and Abandoned active, anyway.

Otherwise yeah Lengthy Scheme and starting with a Reaper is pretty much the most advantaged start you can imagine. You'll get to use a Claymore to soften one of the three pods in Gatecrasher too.

I thought about the explosives functioning akin to their Long War 1 counterpart but in the end I decided against it because of all the explosives you get to use in the game anyway. It would especially effect Reapers and their Claymores and potentially Remote Start in a big way, too.

Time turner could be useful, sure. Depends what other Resistance perks you have at the time and how lucky or unlucky you get with missions and SITREPs though.

[Aranador]

Lost and abandoned force sets your start faction to the reapers.

[Eggy]

Originally posted by Greb:

Might be a good idea to take Lost and Abandoned on while starting with a Templar so you potentially discover all three factions near-instantly, assuming you can pick a HQ to start at with Lost and Abandoned active, anyway.

This does not work.
If you disable Lost And Abandoned you instead choose ONE starting faction.
You then have to get to a point in game where you have built the resistance ring and do a mssion for each other of the 2 factions to "find" them.
Disabling Lost And Abandonded (which counts as a tutorial mission) also rerolls the chosen traits.
If you do Lost And Abandoned it is always the assasin you hit first and she always has the same traits.

[crossed]

Time turner is a must imo, I have no idea how I beat the vanilla game without it :p

And you (should) use way more explosives than the enemy uses against you, so the less explosive damage option is definetly an extra challenge.

[Stardustfire]

the Ai can get very trigger happy with Explosives, best example the Advent Mechs and the Adv Advent Soldiers.

[Greb]

Originally posted by Eggy:

This does not work.

Figured as much. It wouldn't make sense to go through the faction introduction if you already had a Reaper or Skirmisher in your squad.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Stardustfire:

the Ai can get very trigger happy with Explosives, best example the Advent Mechs and the Adv Advent Soldiers.

Yes but damage falloff from explosions doesn't really matter there because dealing a non-zero amount of damage means they succeeded by injuring your soldiers.

[Stardustfire]

And the big mouse over explanation that tells you exactly start faction wont work with the wotc tutorial enabled woudend make much sense also if it worked.....

because the aliens use plasma grenades from start it can make a big difference when tze damage falls off to the outer areas, because they never aim at a soldier directly but ever try to hit as much as possible, meaning mosttimes no soldier is in the center. and thrust me i see a big difference betwen taking one or 5 dmg in L/I runs, specially when more than one of my soldiers is involved.

[Greb]

I was elected to LEAD, not to READ.

[Nick Naughty]

Beta strike, well thats my plan.

[Shining Hector]

I think Skirmisher is probably the most useful one to start with, actually. The double speed building from the HQ helps a lot with the slower build times in Legendary, and Skirmishers are really strong in the early game, with the starting grapple, Justice ignoring cover, etc.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Stardustfire:

because the aliens use plasma grenades from start

Not really. Visually they are, but they're far weaker than your own plasma grenades except for Mutons. The first Captain and second Trooper grenade deals 2-3 damage (80% of the time it's 2). Second Captain and third Trooper do 3-4 (66% of the time it's 3), and the third Captain does 3-7.

And, ultimately, the main thing the explosives do is remove your cover. If you get blown up but not shot afterwards you'll be alive but injured for weeks whether it's 1 or 4 damage, and if you get blown up and shot you'll be dead whether it dealt 1 or 4 damage in the early game. Taking less damage from the aliens' explosives doesn't change much of anything, but dealing less with your own definitely does.

[Sovereigndrake]

Legend + Double HP is fun. I can't play without it anymore. (Beta strike is it?)

I start with skirmishers because they can pull advent out of cover which is so useful especially when basic troops have 8hp to start. You need to make every shot count or else it takes the whole squad to down a trooper. They can also grapple to highground or to flank an enemy and get to take 2 shots.

The only ♥♥♥♥♥♥ thing is if you get the assassin popping in with 60hp on the first retalliation mission. The other chosen are so much easier to handle.