When to use weapon upgrades?

[Charlemagne]

I have been saving them because I don't want to lose them when the weapon changes (from conventional to magnetic for instance), however it seems that they may be "inherited" to the new weapon on the same soldier? In that case it may be better to use them right away, but I'm not sure about the mechanics, sometimes soldiers seem to keep their upgrades but other times the new weapon is "clean" (and what happened to the modded lower-tier weapon?)

Also there is the factor that Chosen can sabotage stored weapon or PCS upgrades, so that's an incentive to use them as you get them.

[Sepherix]

When you 'upgrade' weapons, already modded guns get upgraded to that newer tier, with no cost. So have fun and go wild ! Modded (from mods) guns might not have that behavior though.

The only negative part of equiping mods is that you'll have to drag the body out if you have to extract if you want to keep them. Just like other worn gear. Buuut you wont have chosen sabotaging thoses. Maybe, don't quote me on that. Never had moments where it was a sabotage and had no spares in the trunk.

[KRON]

Originally posted by Sepherix cuddleling:

When you 'upgrade' weapons, already modded guns get upgraded to that newer tier, with no cost.

There is one exception. If you give a soldier a gun with weapon mods and send him on a covert action with a chance of ambush and if he gets ambushed after you make a tier upgrade, after he returns his gun will not get upgraded to a new tier, so those mods will get stuck on it.

[Scorrp10]

In any case, at game start you typically find tier 1 upgrades. Later in game you can find tier 2 (advanced) and tier 3 (superior) upgrades, so you likely will be replacing anyway.
Also some continent bonuses: lock and load lets you swap weapon upgrades and pcs.
There is also armed to the teeth (opens 3rd upgrade slot) but personally I prefet the advanced modular weapons mod that makes that bonus a PG project instead.

[gimmethegepgun]

Originally posted by Scorrp10:

There is also armed to the teeth (opens 3rd upgrade slot) but personally I prefet the advanced modular weapons mod that makes that bonus a PG project instead.

In WotC, Armed to the Teeth is removed, and instead individual weapon types get the extra slot from breakthroughs.

[Eyal]

Originally posted by Charlemagne:

sometimes soldiers seem to keep their upgrades but other times the new weapon is "clean" (and what happened to the modded lower-tier weapon?)

If you choose to make weapons available during the pre mission screen, or if a soldier is injured, then their modded weapon will be unequipped and they'll have a clean weapon instead. Just choose to replace the weapon and you should see your modded weapons in the list (They'll have a small symbol indicating what mods they have).

[Sepherix]

In the default game behavior, covert ops de-equip anything a soldier is equipped, unless there is ambush chances.
I didn't know that the game would bug out with the soldiers in covert ops.Guess they really don't want players to change a soldier loadout before it ends.