What types of Ammo/Grenades do you typically use? (Commander/Legend Difficulty)

[Sykomyke]

So I didn't really even see much of a different on the easier difficulties, but on my Ironman Commander playthrough I've been noticing different grenades and ammo are better/worse. I wanted to share my own opinoins and see what everyone else thought as well.

Ammo

Tracer Rounds: Useful early on if you happen to get it as one of your first ammo projects, otherwise tends to drop off in usefulness later on.

Talon Rounds: Crit Chance is nice, but I found that unless you put this on your full sniper sharpshooter build, or a run and gun flanking ranger build, it was inconsistent since the rounds only proc when you get a crit.

Venom Rounds: Inconclusive is the best I can put for now. Reducing movement/aim is useful, but I can't tell if it's any better then Dragon Rounds.

Dragon Rounds: Same thing as venom but does more damage over time, but doesn't debilitate the enemy as much. I would rank this slightly higher then venom rounds.

AP Rounds: The most useful founds against enemies with armor since you can ignore it. However, in my run through I found armor to be not typically a problem because of grenades which I'll go into below. While I found it VERY useful in the mid game when enemies armor started to out-tech me, I found that in late game I was switching back to other types of Ammo in some instances.

Bluescreen: Useful as a "one off" in the squad, but really couldn't justify more than one. I've read about people using nothing but bluescreen late game and I can't imagine why. If you want the ability to ignore armor, use AP rounds, and if you want to worry about mechs, just take a specialist with haywire protocol.

Grenades

Gas Grenade: If you somehow get one of these early I think this is useful, but it drops off in late game usefullness IMO.

Incendiary Grenade: Very useful throughout the game but is overshadowed by Acid Grenade once you get it.

Acid Grenade: The best armor shredding grenade ever. I would typically throw this on my grenadier's main grenade slot (so he got 2 of them) and carry one backup regular grenade for environmental destruction.

Regular Grenade/Alien Grenade: Once you uprade to alien grenades this becomes better than any other grenade for a short period of time until you upgrade the rest of your grenades. However, it's still useful for terrain/environment destruction so it always warrants at least one to be on your utility items.

Flashbang: Immensely useful early game, almost required in every mission until you start unlocking tier 2 weapons/armor



Bonus!

Armor

Hazmat Armor: Moderately useful as an upgrade to Nano vest, other then that outshined by the other armors immensely. Useless on Psi Class with fortress ability.

Plated Vest: Pretty useful until I reached late game, most enemies tend to have armor shredding abilities or grenades so the armor it gave tends to not last long.

Stasis Vest: Generally the best vest. Healing over time effect allows you to not have to worry as much about using an action to heal, also allows more build diversity if you wanted to go full "Hacker" specialist. I generally used these on my psi troops since this+Soulfire Leech would mean they could heal to near full health at will.


I'd love to hear anyone else's opinions/tips on what they used and why.

[Giant Space Hamster]

Note that, to the best of my knowledge, poison and dragon rounds both have the same damage potential.

My experience below is from a mix of Commander and Legendary.

I switch up my ammo and grenades based on the mission. Obviously this is more effective once you have the Shadow Chamber built, but even before that the type of mission can affect my decision. For example, I take Battle Scanners on retaliation missions more often than on other types of missions (unless Infestation or Infiltration dark events are active). Overall I generally end up using almost every ammo type and grenade type throughout a game. The only exception are Smoke Grenades...I don't use those. I use Flash Grenades instead. Same effective bonus but also prevents special abilities.

I frequently use two or three Bluescreen rounds on missions with MEC/HMEC/Sectopod/Codex. Andromedons also skew my decision in favor of Bluescreen but not as much as those four. I also use an EMP grenade frequently and I've been known to take as much as three Bluescreen rounds and an EMP grenade on a single mission before. It can be VERY useful and I wouldn't blame someone for taking more anti-robotic armament on certain missions.

Tracer rounds are great in the early game and even mid-late game when you need to train up a new soldier. On high level soldiers I never use them though.

I use AP rounds almost exclusively on one sniper all campaign. If I take a second sniper on a mission they usually get Bluescreen rounds. I find that the AP rounds fit my play style better on snipers for me. Similarly, I use Talon Rounds exclusively on my primary Ranger all campaign and only if I take a second Ranger do I equip them with something else (again that is generally Bluescreen rounds in that case). I never put Talon rounds on a sniper, but that's just my preference.

Proximity Mines are my favorite. My primary grenadier always gets two of those (one in their double-slot for a total of two uses per mission). Their other slot is usually an Incendiary or EMP grenade.

Acid grenades also show up on my team whenever I am fighting high armor things like Andromedons, Sectopods, and Gatekeepers.

I actually don't use Mimic Beacons very much. They can be useful in the very early game for a few missions after you can research them but ultimately I don't find them all that effective. The only time I want something like that is when I accidentally trigger multiple pods but then a mimic beacon dies SO fast it's usually better for me to do something else with that action. I considered them much more useful when they could benefit from cover.

Armor...let's see. I never use the first tier armor vest that just provides 1 HP. I always prefer more grenades over +1 HP. Later, when you have Predator armor and two utility slots per person, the other experimental armors can be nice. I like Stasis Vests on my rangers but they're also my favorite for any class. I never use plated armor. I've considered making a Grenadier without Shredder (for the other skill that adds a point of armor) and then giving him a plated vest and a WAR suit, but it's just not my style.

Hazmat armor is cool if you like to scout with a concealed ranger with Phantom and want to be able to run through DOT terrain. Otherwise, use a Stasis Vest.

Hellweave can be interesting. I once got a mission with 19 enemies and only three enemy types...Chryssalids being one of the three. So I loaded up my rangers with Hellweave on that particular mission. I sometimes use them when I see Berzerkers etc on missions, but usually lean towards Stasis Vests.

Almost everything is useful at some point in the game on certain missions.

[HeyRomo]

Originally posted by Sykomyke:

Tracer Rounds: Useful early on if you happen to get it as one of your first ammo projects, otherwise tends to drop off in usefulness later on.

Talon Rounds: Crit Chance is nice, but I found that unless you put this on your full sniper sharpshooter build, or a run and gun flanking ranger build, it was inconsistent since the rounds only proc when you get a crit.

Venom Rounds: Inconclusive is the best I can put for now. Reducing movement/aim is useful, but I can't tell if it's any better then Dragon Rounds.

Dragon Rounds: Same thing as venom but does more damage over time, but doesn't debilitate the enemy as much. I would rank this slightly higher then venom rounds.

AP Rounds: The most useful founds against enemies with armor since you can ignore it. However, in my run through I found armor to be not typically a problem because of grenades which I'll go into below. While I found it VERY useful in the mid game when enemies armor started to out-tech me, I found that in late game I was switching back to other types of Ammo in some instances.

Bluescreen: Useful as a "one off" in the squad, but really couldn't justify more than one. I've read about people using nothing but bluescreen late game and I can't imagine why. If you want the ability to ignore armor, use AP rounds, and if you want to worry about mechs, just take a specialist with haywire protocol.


I'd love to hear anyone else's opinions/tips on what they used and why.

Talon rounds are excellent on Rangers - especially early/midgame and Reaper builds. Max crit build ranger can achieve 105% crit against enemies who take cover and 65% against enemies who do not. 16-18damage flanking crits will oneshot kill a wide range of threats. Rapid Fire rangers do so much reliable non-crit damage that talon rounds lose value and bluescreen rounds for late-game mechanical destruction works better.

Mechanical threats become common in the late game so Bluescreen rounds are equipped on my Grenadiers, Rapid Fire Rangers and Sniper. Non-crit damage from a cannon is 13-15 (all codex are dead with 1 shot). Chain Shot does 26-30 (goodbye Mecs, Sectopods, Gatekeepers, Andromedon shells). RF shotgun attacks do 26-30. Bluescreen rounds are arguably unbalanced and boringly OP. I yawn at Sectopods and Mecs.

I used AP for a bit but i no longer think AP is very good. Bluescreen rounds are going to do +5damage to mechanical units regardless of armor status. The only units with much armor are Shieldbearers, Mecs, Gatekeepers, Sectopods and Turrets. 4/5 are mechanical. If the armor is gone or does not exist in the first place then AP rounds have no value. AP rounds bypassing 1 armor on various organic units is outweighed by +5 bluescreen or +5 crit damage (Talon). Typically my Grenadiers are shredding armor anyway so by the time anyone else is attacking the armor is gone and AP rounds are useless. Shieldbearers can be reliably killed with a single shot shotgun crit or a non-crit RF attack from a Ranger.

I agree Tracer rounds are useful early. I don't use Venom or Dragon so no opinion.

[HeyRomo]

Originally posted by Sykomyke:

Grenades

Gas Grenade: If you somehow get one of these early I think this is useful, but it drops off in late game usefullness IMO.

Incendiary Grenade: Very useful throughout the game but is overshadowed by Acid Grenade once you get it.

Acid Grenade: The best armor shredding grenade ever. I would typically throw this on my grenadier's main grenade slot (so he got 2 of them) and carry one backup regular grenade for environmental destruction.

Regular Grenade/Alien Grenade: Once you uprade to alien grenades this becomes better than any other grenade for a short period of time until you upgrade the rest of your grenades. However, it's still useful for terrain/environment destruction so it always warrants at least one to be on your utility items.

Flashbang: Immensely useful early game, almost required in every mission until you start unlocking tier 2 weapons/armor



I'd love to hear anyone else's opinions/tips on what they used and why.

I'm fine with only ever using Plasma Grenades. Cover destruction. And the environmental effects from Acid/Gas/Fire interfere with my Rangers. It's fun to watch enemies burn for 3-5 if you have taken volatile mix. Ability debuffs from fire are useful.

Hazmat vest is useful on your rangers if you want to use those grenades. I'm currently playing around with the huge area of effect from Gas Grenades + Volatile mix coupled with a Reaper Ranger and a Hazmat suit.

[gimmethegepgun]

Plasma grenades are the best damaging grenade in almost all cases, and the rest of the cases are when you need the 4 armor shred from acid bomb. Incendiary and Gas are nearly worthless. If they weren't blocked by cover (or at least low cover) they'd be worth considering, but as it is they basically don't even work on enemies that are in cover due to LOS, and enemies out of cover are either already doomed (because they're supposed to be in cover) or never take cover, and they aren't terribly common.
The one real niche use I can see for those 2 is that enemies within poison/fire/acid won't move if they can be affected by it, which is really nasty. But since that applies to acid as well, and acid affects more things than poison and fire, and is a better grenade otherwise anyway, the other 2 still don't hold much value.

[Napoleonic S]

Talon round + superior laser sight shotgun ranger = always minimum 45%+ crit, goes up to 100%+ meaning your ranger would many times crit.

Ap round for serial snipers to take out many remaining low hp enemies

Proximity mine + incendiary bomb = guaranteed 1 pod dead on initial ambush as long as they are not archon/andromedon/sectopod/gatekeeper

Blaster launcher = zomfg nuke

Shredstorm cannon = awesome cone of death

[marshmallow justice]

Tracer is ok.
Venom, Gas, Acid and Flashbang are all top tier.
Smoke, Bluescreen, AP, Incendiary (eh) are next in line.

[ZeroHindsight]

Before the Shadow Chamber; I always put talon rounds on my rangers. That extra crit can make your shots do explosive amounts of damage on average 1 in 2 chance.

Blue Screen rounds on my gunner since that chain shot will shred almost any robotic enemy in sight thus saving my grenades on more tactical decisions.

I find the dragon rounds to be more viable than venom rounds since dragon rounds will stop all enemy abilities (including reloading) for about two turns plus burn damage.

Venom rounds on the other hand gives them worsened aim and severe reduction in mobility so that might have a better application against enemies with high accuracy and mobility provided you can connect the shots.

I almost never got to use any of the vests because my tactics relied mostly on a) explode their cover, and b) shoot them in the face.

[.O.]

AP on my sniper
Talon on my shotgun ranger
Dragon usually on the rest unless I see a lot of mechanical enemies on the list

At least 1 mimic beacon per mission

Gas if it's a "protect the device" mission because if they end up camping the device inside a room I want to be able to do aoe damage to the aliens without damaging the device itself.

EMP if I expect a lot of mecs

Incendiary, almost never used

Acid & Plasma are my go to grenades usually

I rarely use proximity mine, but I do find it useful in some situations

Shredstorm cannon probably my favourite. It absolutely wrecks both enemies and terrain.

Hellfire/Flamethrower I don't use, I find it kinda useless since it gets blocked by cover.

[CavityCommunion]

I never have enough cores so I do not bother spending them on ammo except for blue screen rounds. My cores go to getting an acid grenade, suits of armor, and various upgrades. And due to soldiers lost in the AoO cores go into making whatever was lost.

If possible my squad will consist of a sniper, two grenadiers, two specialists(one heal, one ant-robot), and one ranger. Sniper will have spider or wraith armor so only one slot which gets blue screen rounds. Grenadiers have mines and one will have acid grenade as well as a slot taken up by missle launcher or one of the upgrades. The ranger will also have one slot taken up by a missle/upgrade due to armor and the other will be a plated vest. The healing specialist will have a stasis vest and nanomedkit. The anti-robot specialist will have a nanomedkit and an upgraded skull jack. That is the ideal.

I always end up not really needing to use an EMP grenade. I just use grenades/mines to shred armor as well as shredder gun/cannon on the ranger.

Ammo is over shadowed by AoE dmg be it in a cone or sphere.

The plasma blaster is almost worthless since its a single line. Enemies generally do not line up for you. Also the flamer throwers do less dmg than the shredders, shorter range, and do not go through cover. Also I've only ever seen an alien panick from psy abilities, so that also makes flame throwers mostly useless.

The blaster launcher is useful, but I often find I do not need its homing ability. But of course use it over missle launchers.

I never use poison cloud. Too big of AoE which can cut enemies off from my soldiers or create a barrier after the aliens in the cloud are dead. Incendiary are alright because the burning effect stops certain abilities from being used, but its AoE is small. Flash bang is better for that use and has a much larger AoE.

I use plasma grenades when I do not have some of the things listed above.

[Bullett00th]

Commander walkthrough:

- AP rounds:
I've unlocked them for the first time (haven't gotten on my previous run) and they're amazing on my sniper. No longer do I rely on hitting enemies with my shredder grenadier before firing at them with others. Also one shotting all turrets so far.

- Tracer:
Like you said, useful early game, immensely useful on machinegun grenadiers who tend to suffer from low aim.

- Venom and Dragon:
Like you I used to compare them just in terms of damage over time but that is wrong. They serve different purposes: venom reduces aim and speed, fire disables abilities for the time. Overall I'd say Dragon rounds are better because of this. You restrict your enemies to just shooting and disable melee on berserkers and stun lancers. Also vipers and (I think) Andromedons are immune to venom.
Both are best used with gunslinger so you can tag several enemies on one turn.

-Bluescreen:
They're nice, but very situational. More useful late game when you deal with more advanced MECs, sectopods and andromedon shells. Also great on gunsligers for pre-hack tagging and increasing hack chance.

-Talon:
Never used them, never intend to. XCOM2 offers almost no soldier builds based on crits, unlike EU and especially LW.



As for grenades, I've used quite a few of each but since I only equip offensive nades on grenadiers I tend to always return to the tried and true acid-plasma combo.

[Shakaw]

Based on my last campaign 4man commander. I have forgotten what the luxury of 6 feels like:
Talon rounds on rapid-fire ranger, why would you even consider bluescreens or anything else?
Tracers on chainshot/rapture grenadier for the kind of destruction snipers only dream of.
Bluescreens on psyops
Poison and fire ammo are almost useless lategame cause things don't survive your turn to suffer the effects
Sometimes APs instead of bluescreens/tracers if lots of easy hit armor enemies.
Sculljack and medkit on specialist for oneshots, so no ammo.

EMP bombs are the best thing in game. I'd normally bring one for codice and another for gatekeeper. Sectopods are a waste of a bomb.
Incendiary are great for well.. everything
Poison grenades are fantastic early game to make melee enemies run in circles.
Acid just sucks, ive never needed grenades to strip armor. For things with a lot of armor you already have EMP, rest get shredded by grenadier.

Haven't used armor since my first playthrough, and use of suites and heavy weapons depends heavily on enemy composition.

[Eggy]

Medic gets medpac and bluescreen.
Hacker gets skulljack and blue screen.
Rangers get war armour and talon ammo.
Grenadiers (2 per squad). One with 1 acid and 2 emp, the other with 2emp and 1 acid. Both get bluescreen.
Dont use snipers.
Pistoliers have dragon rounds. If they are in armour that has a spare slot I take a mimic bacon, but its not used much. Used to prevent skill usage.
PSI ops generaly 1 per squad end game, replacing the 2nd specialist. Have blue screen and a battle scanner/random nade.
Vests and smoke are waste of a slot and flash bangs only get used early game.
Proxmines are too situational and require too much setup to get the desired results, especialy with the hit detection bugs.
Never needed AP ammo. Grenadiers and psiops all ignore armour. If you get lucky one other char will get shredder from AWC as well.
If I need to remove cover, both grenadiers have demo.
Dont use plasma nades.
Dont use incendary nades, although they are fun.
Dont use Gas nades. They are good but dont work throug cover so useless most of the time.
Most of the time I run 2 medics and 1 gets the skulljack instead of the hack.
Skulljack is a free kill "most" of the time and also nets intel.

[Bullett00th]

Originally posted by Shakaw:

EMP bombs are the best thing in game. I'd normally bring one for codice and another for gatekeeper.

I did not know Gatekeepers are effected by EMP and bluescreen, thanks for the heads up!

Originally posted by Shakaw:

4man commander.

I feel sorry for you. Must be very difficult just walking around with those big heavy balls of steel weighing you down.

[merccobb]

Originally posted by Bullett00th:

Commander walkthrough:

-Talon:
Never used them, never intend to. XCOM2 offers almost no soldier builds based on crits, unlike EU and especially LW.

My flanking rapid fire/untouchable autoloader/lasersight/hairtrigger shotgun ranger with serial from my last Legend run disagrees... over 200 kills that campaign :) The >100% crits guaranteeing kills on almost anything, which guaranteed more kills... yes please. He could (and did) clear a board if the enemies lined up right. Crit works on anything, it has no bias.

Admittedly, that was with some luck getting Serial. I Am Become Death, indeed.

To each his own though. That is one of the things I love about this game, there is no "right" way to do things

[Bullett00th]

Originally posted by merccobb:

To each his own though. That is one of the things I love about this game, there is no "right" way to do things

Words of gold.

The way you described things is tempting though. It's just that flanked shotgun crits late game are such a common occurance that I feel increasing their chance is a waste of an item slot.