Jyeeta crew combat is too difficult on Normal

[wilky]

After succeeding twice in about 10-12 attempts, I decided to start logging my attempts. I'm playing on Normal difficulty so this shouldn't be insanely difficult. I've had no difficulties defeating them in ship combat, but all of these missions seem to involve crew combat instead. My team is pretty well outfitted. They have L6+ armor, L7+ weapons, and my snubber has a L11 shotgun. My rifle has a L8 weapon. My swordsman has L8 armor. My medic has a L6 specialist item for bonus initiative/armor/dodge. I feel this should be sufficient for Normal difficulty, right?

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Turn 1: Xeno attack my swordsman down to 25% before I even get a turn, I heal, buff, use Strength of Steal, but then a 2x attack on my snubber kills him in the middle of the 1st turn. This is Alt+F4

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Turn 1: I don't even know what to say. My snubber misses his attack, and the xeno brings my swordsman down to about 35% and kills my snubber by the middle of the turn. This is Alt+F4

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Turn 1: This group, for what it's worth, I notice is 10 levels lower than me. (I think most of them so far have been about 5 levels higher than me.) It doesn't matter. My snubber gets attacked 3x before my healer even goes, so he's at 25% and Cleansing Surge for 37 HP/morale is never going to patch him up. My swordsman's attack misses. Then my soldier's Suppressing Fire misses. My snubber's in the wrong rank but uses Fearsome Charge so it's ok. Then he gets attacked 2x in a row and my healer gets attacked 2x in a row, so both are at 5% HP. I've only gotten one of the enemies down to like 33% HP. This is Alt+F4

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Turn 1: I actually kill one of the xenos on turn 1, and my party all barely survive despite my swordsman being attacked 4x and being knocked back 3 rows. My swordsman begins turn2 at 20% even after a turn1 Field Surgery. I decide to try to bury the swordsman in the back to heal her but it doesn't matter. My snubber gets two-shotted. This is Alt+F4

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Turn 1: Snubber gets attacked 3x before my healer goes for the first time. My heal is never for enough. Snubber gets attacked a 4th time and pushed back into back row. Then front three ranks get AOEd. At this point my entire team is below 50% with some closer to 25%. This is Alt+F4. I think I only managed two attacks for about 50 dmg each (I also healed/buffed once). The xeno attacked me six times (two were AOE). It's too much.

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Turn 1: A rare attempt where my healer actually starts with decent initiative (24) so I can Vaccination Watch right out of the gates. The xeno are also about 6 levels below me. My swordsman misses with her first attack. I drop Backline Leader and Concussion Grenade, so I'm pretty well buffed at this point. Xeno 2x attack my snubber so I use Field Surgery. They attack the Snubber again, then the Medic. My swordsman buffs with Blade & Hilt. My backline rifle buffs with Fearsome Charge (medic is now in the back). This is like perfect. Turn 2 begins with my snubber at 50% and two others at 75%.

Turn 2: My swordsman misses a second time with Flash Flurry. This attack seems worthless. But it still pushed the low HP xeno I was targeting back a rank, so now I can barely reach him. I try to compensate by using Fearsome Charge on my snubber, but it leaves the xeno at 10% HP. I have to use another turn with my rifle to kill it. At this point, both my healer/rifle are at 33% HP and debuffed, and I can't heal both.

Turn 3: Now they attack my snubber down to 15% HP and debuff him too. My medic Field Surgeries the snubber. My snubber gets off a Roaring Barrel for 150 and the xeno is still stunned by that first turn grenade. My rifle finishes him with a 165 Suppressing Fire. Medic uses Field Surgery on my backline rifle who's worse off than my snubber. Enemy responds by AOE'ing the front three ranks.

Turn 4: One of the two remaining xeno begins with 27 initiative and double-attacks my snubber/medic down to 10/20% HP. I decide to Field Surgery the snubber because I want the accuracy debuff gone. I use Full Auto with my rifle, time to go for broke. One xeno dies and the other is down to 20%, but he kills my medic. Medic survives the death save after combat. This is (barely, by the narrowest of margins) a success.


...So what's my reward? 6 points toward the conflict score. I've made 21 points of progress so far. It took me an hour just to score this one victory. And at this rate, it'll probably take me another dozen of these. (Mind you, I'm already Alt F4'ing when the card game picks a non-mission-success xeno combat...) I'm not even asking for help here. I'm just saying, this is too much.

[davea]

That's really painful. Could you give a little more context? What are the levels of your crew and the enemies? Is this a boarding combat where you are attacking a jyeeta ship? If it is an exploration game, what are the risk/reward figures in the lower left of the screen? I'm not sure what the relationship is between "exploration dice" and the level of the opponents, but maybe a low number of dice and a high "risk figure" means you are out-leveled by a large amount.

Personally I avoid crew ground combat with any xeno using exploration talents, and I defeated the jyeeta invasion on "hard", I believe without ever having a ship crew combat.

[wilky]

Originally posted by davea:

That's really painful. Could you give a little more context? What are the levels of your crew and the enemies? Is this a boarding combat where you are attacking a jyeeta ship? If it is an exploration game, what are the risk/reward figures in the lower left of the screen? I'm not sure what the relationship is between "exploration dice" and the level of the opponents, but maybe a low number of dice and a high "risk figure" means you are out-leveled by a large amount.

Personally I avoid crew ground combat with any xeno using exploration talents, and I defeated the jyeeta invasion on "hard", I believe without ever having a ship crew combat.

My crew are like L32. The enemies are often L35-36 but sometimes will be in the mid 20s. It seems to vary by attempt. It doesn't seem to make a huge difference to me, though, because I've been wiped by enemies 10+ levels lower than me.

These missions so far have mostly been exploration-based until you draw a Mission Success card -- and your "Success" is that you get to fight the jyeeta in crew combat. They have 3-400 HP. I have not had any boarding crew combats while fighting the carrier ships yet; they haven't tried boarding me successfully, or I've been shooting them down before they successfully board. I have defeated them with only minor damage in ship battle so far.

[davea]

I didn't quite follow. What is the mission, for which success is fighting jyeeta on the ground? Sometimes I wind up dropping missions once I learn what is actually involved; for example, in the early game, sometimes I pick a mission without realizing it requires ship combat and I'm not geared up for ship combat. Then I drop the mission. It costs a few rep points but I can make it up later with missions I am geared for.

[Trese Brothers]

From your reports, it sounds like the root of the issue is that the enemy gets multiple attacks on you before you get your first turn. Can you share what kind of Initiative averages your team is posting up? How about the enemy?

Yes, they have a lot of HP. Jyeeta are nasty. Have you specifically adjusted your combat team to fight Jyeeta or are you just taking a standard combat team that worked against humans up against the hardest enemies in the game?

Still, it sounds like we may have an issue where difficulty is not being applied cleanly to the base attributes for Jyeeta or something. I'd need more details but then I can start digging and try to figure it out. This isn't an expected result on Normal.

[wilky]

Originally posted by Trese Brothers:

From your reports, it sounds like the root of the issue is that the enemy gets multiple attacks on you before you get your first turn. Can you share what kind of Initiative averages your team is posting up? How about the enemy?

Yes, they have a lot of HP. Jyeeta are nasty. Have you specifically adjusted your combat team to fight Jyeeta or are you just taking a standard combat team that worked against humans up against the hardest enemies in the game?

Still, it sounds like we may have an issue where difficulty is not being applied cleanly to the base attributes for Jyeeta or something. I'd need more details but then I can start digging and try to figure it out. This isn't an expected result on Normal.

I will type a longer reply with more reports in a bit, but I don't think that's entirely the issue. I just had an attempt where my snubber died on turn 1 in between my healer's first and second moves because he was attacked 3x in a row. Mind you, my snubber/whole team was buffed by Vaccination Watch, Backline Leader, and Frontline Leader all three for what, +30% armor?

Healer never even had a chance. My snubber has 123 HP and is wearing a L6 Keepers Plate armor.

EDIT: Just lost another attempt where the snubber still doesn't survive the first turn because he gets ganged up on, 3x attack in a row + poison applied, after my healer's last move.

The only possible solution I see to this is to run with 2 healers, but apparently the game doesn't let you put Doctors into combat, only Combat Medics. So even though I have like six Doctors on my ship, I'm stuck with only the one Combat Medic.

[Pat Fenis]

Going to fight xeno without 2 swords in front is asking for death. You should see about getting one from contacts. Even better is an officer with complimentary jobs, an officer sword/zealot with the unstoppable buff is tanky. Could also take the bodyguard job on your first sword guy and try to cover the snubber with honor guard and some dank heals.. but really just get the second choppy boy.

[wilky]

Originally posted by Pat Fenis:

Going to fight xeno without 2 swords in front is asking for death. You should see about getting one from contacts. Even better is an officer with complimentary jobs, an officer sword/zealot with the unstoppable buff is tanky. Could also take the bodyguard job on your first sword guy and try to cover the snubber with honor guard and some dank heals.. but really just get the second choppy boy.

How are you getting any damage out of the sword? Even when I buff her with like Blade and Hilt, she still does only about 1/3 as much damage as my snubber/rifle who hit for about 150 on average. (She hits for like 50-60.)

The main utility of the swordsman IMO is her tankiness which is why I trot her out there in slot 1, although it doesn't seem to matter because the xeno tunnel my snubber without fail, even when he gets knocked around to different slots. She can also be helpful in debuffing the enemy sometimes.

I just eked out a victory, though, where they attacked my snubber 4x on the 1st turn (poisoned him twice) and then attacked him another 2x at the start of the 2nd turn. The tunneling is vicious.

Anyway, I've had a couple more successes since my initial post where I went like 15 in a row with no success. I'm now at the point where I'm succeeding like... 50% of the time.

[davea]

I didn't spot that before, but if your problem is survivability, then a sword instead of snubber sounds like an improvement. I used two swords.

[Tuidjy]

You do not fight Xenos without two blade users in positions 1 and 2. Not at any difficulty worth mentioning. Period.

The snubber goes into position 3, and the Medic goes into position 4, where a pistol and Spy skills keep him relevant and most importantly alive.

Also, every single character must have the ability to reposition, in case he gets displaced. If they can reposition with an attack - great. Failing that, they should be able to reposition with a self-buff. Alternatively, they should be able to reposition by giving someone else a buff or heal. Repositioning by wasting a turn is unacceptable.

As for blade user damage, it's not their job. Their job is to hold the line - they can inflict plenty of damage, but that comes after buffing. They should spend most of their time with the counter-attack buff on, and with two-three active parry buffs.

Armor: every single character should favor damage reduction over everything else. Forget buffs to initiative, dodging, let alone utility - those are luxuries that you can afford only if near total damage attenuation has been obtained.

Glass cannons do not work against Jyeeta, or at least they do not reliably work against ground based Jyeeta. You may clear the room 9 times out of 10 in 1-2 turns, but focus too much on damage, and you will get nailed once... which will ruin you run. In my last Brutal run I had 2000+ Xeno fights. You cannot play the odds this many times. You have to be rock solid.

This means: two blades, heavy armor, and buffs and enemy hindrance before worrying about damage.

[wilky]

Originally posted by Trese Brothers:

From your reports, it sounds like the root of the issue is that the enemy gets multiple attacks on you before you get your first turn. Can you share what kind of Initiative averages your team is posting up? How about the enemy?

Yes, they have a lot of HP. Jyeeta are nasty. Have you specifically adjusted your combat team to fight Jyeeta or are you just taking a standard combat team that worked against humans up against the hardest enemies in the game?

Still, it sounds like we may have an issue where difficulty is not being applied cleanly to the base attributes for Jyeeta or something. I'd need more details but then I can start digging and try to figure it out. This isn't an expected result on Normal.

Well I finally finished the unlock by attempting to avoid crew combat as much as possible, and I wrote down some of the initiative numbers for you. My team was L33 consisting of:

Rifle with 19 quickness, init 10-19, calm, ex-military, steady traits
Medic/doctor with 19 quickness, init (12-22)+2 due to specialist gear, fearless & thick skin traits
Snubber with 23 strength 20 quickness, init (11-20)-4 due to L6 Keepers armor, righteous trait
Swordswoman with 26 strength, 23 quickness, init (11-22)-2 due to L8 armor, hard hitting trait

In the numbers you see below, my healer is listed 2nd from the left. (He started these fights in the 3rd position.) Also note that halfway through these battles I switched the 1/2 positions between my sword and snubber to see if it would matter (it did not; they still went straight for the snubber)

15 - 19 - 20 - 16 init vs. 20 - 17 - 16 - 15 (L27 xeno, Loss, snubber attacked 4x + poison 1st turn)
14 - 18 - 13 - 10 init vs. 14 - 13 - 12 - 17 (L37 xeno, Loss, they killed my rifle(4th rank) 1st turn)
14 - 14 - 14 - 14 init vs. 13 - 16 - 17 - 5 (L16 boarding xeno, Win)
11 - 14 - 11 - 20 init vs. 18 - 13 - 10 - 13 (L32 xeno, Loss, attacked my snubber 3x 1st turn for death)
14 - 17 - 13 - 13 init vs. 18 - 19 - 17 - 18 (L26 xeno, Win, snubber survives despite getting nuked 1st turn)
13 - 21 - 7 - 10 init vs. 12 - 14 - 24 - 20 (L26 xeno, Win)
11 - 20 - 14 - 16 init vs. 24 - 15 - 13 - 11 (L25 xeno, Loss, slow but decisive, wore me down by 3rd turn)
12 - 22 - 7 - 13 init vs. 12 - 16 - 18 - 13 (L28 xeno, Win, barely, survive with all chars wounded)

15 - 17 - 13 - 18 init vs. 16 - 11 - 11 - 10 (L23 boarding xeno, Win, ugly but decisive win, my swordsman missed 6 of 8 attacks in this battle including Balanced Blade twice, they never really threatened me in this fight but my attacks kept missing, I ended this boarding battle having taken some damage...)
12 - 15 - 14 - 15 init vs. 14 - 13 - 17 - 16 (L23 boarding xeno, Win, come from behind, this was a continuation from above and I was very surprised to survive back-to-back boarding attempts. My swordsman almost singlehandedly saved this battle. The snubber got nuked to 10% HP and pushed back to rank4 in the first turn, but the swordsman somehow fended off everything by herself until I was able to recovere)

One thing I noticed is that I tended to be more successful in the battles where the enemy spent a fair number of turns buffing itself (I was removing these buffs constantly anyway). In some battles, though, they used way too much AOE while simultaneously always nuking the snubber, and it was too much damage to handle despite many defensive buffs.

@Tuidjy - thanks for the very helpful advice as always, but I don't think I will be going after any jyeeta again, let alone on any difficulty level worth mentioning :o)

[wilky]

I was reflecting more about the crew combat on my drive to my parents, and I think if I may offer a suggestion to the devs, I think it’s surprising that your fighters have the same amount of HP, like 100-120, at the end of the game vs. the beginning of the game. I would like to see some kind of HP gains over the course of the game, such that maybe a L30 fighter is averaging more like 200 HP than 100 HP. Of course, enemies would probably need to “level up” with you to keep pace, but I just think it’s surprising that HP stays pretty much static in this game independent of levels. It means you’re always like 2-3 hits away from death, even at full HP.

Also, why can’t the swordsman dual wield with an offhand blade? It feels like this should be an option.

[Trese Brothers]

No, swordsman cannot dual wield.

You can gain a good deal of health through Trait mutation and if you an officer by wearing the right gear. The design for opponents never include upscaling health. A human body can get a little tougher (relative to getting shot or chopped) with aging and hardening (Traits) but what really shifts is your skill and equipment.

[JimmysTheBestCop]

It does appear it might need a 2nd look to see if any wonky business is happening with difficulty spike..... But here are some random thoughts that might help


I haven't played on normal since the game original launched so I can't comment 100% accurately. Jyeeta are def the "big bad" of STF and even on Impossible it is a huge difficulty spike compared to normal xeno.

You need completely different builds, equipment loadouts, and tactics when facing Xeno especially Jyeeta Xeno. I would assume this is for any difficult.

You not only need to buff armor but you need to buff hit chance. Especially on your blades users because they are going against high parry. Same thing you not only need to buff armor but parry on your blades users for the same reason.

I rarely go with anything besides Melios Scale I think it is the best contact gear by far. It covers basically any situation while some other gear might be better for specific uses.

Just like others said 2 blades users even better. Especially if 1 has Wing Commando because their buff Knife works buffs 2 blade users. Rash Courage is also really important.

And debuffing Xeno is also huge. You need to be doing that. Bounty Hunter debuffs for sure. i like blade users that can debuff init personally as well.

I personally like Contact Armor 4. It's the best heavy armor from a contact for melee which still allows above average protection from ranged.

[wilky]

Originally posted by Trese Brothers:

No, swordsman cannot dual wield.

You can gain a good deal of health through Trait mutation and if you an officer by wearing the right gear. The design for opponents never include upscaling health. A human body can get a little tougher (relative to getting shot or chopped) with aging and hardening (Traits) but what really shifts is your skill and equipment.

How do you "gain health through trait mutation"? You make it sound like the player has some agency in this process. But isn't it totally random and up to chance, a slow process over the course of the entire game? How can you guarantee that your fighters/officers "gain health through trait mutation"?

I still think the Jyeeta are too difficult on Normal and that a reasonably well equipped party should be able to defeat them without resorting to hours of Alt-F4'ing out of failed crew combats. You shouldn't have to resort to specific specialist strategies on Normal; that should be for the higher difficulties. In almost every single one of my aborted combats earlier, it's because my crew failed to survive the first turn. I only remember two crew deaths occurring on the 2nd turn and one on the 3rd turn. They output too much burst damage on the same target and/or AOE damage across the player's first three ranks. It's not even the debuffs and the rank changes that were killing me; it was the sheer damage output. The doctor/medic spells (single-target Cleansing Surge for like 37 HP/MP, Field Surgery for about 47 HP, Lifeline for closer to 60 HP, and the AOE Suture heal for like 34 HP) were simply not enough. If I were to do this again, I would probably do it with two healers.

[wilky]

Originally posted by JimmysTheBestCop:

It does appear it might need a 2nd look to see if any wonky business is happening with difficulty spike..... But here are some random thoughts that might help


I haven't played on normal since the game original launched so I can't comment 100% accurately. Jyeeta are def the "big bad" of STF and even on Impossible it is a huge difficulty spike compared to normal xeno.

You need completely different builds, equipment loadouts, and tactics when facing Xeno especially Jyeeta Xeno. I would assume this is for any difficult.

You not only need to buff armor but you need to buff hit chance. Especially on your blades users because they are going against high parry. Same thing you not only need to buff armor but parry on your blades users for the same reason.

I rarely go with anything besides Melios Scale I think it is the best contact gear by far. It covers basically any situation while some other gear might be better for specific uses.

Just like others said 2 blades users even better. Especially if 1 has Wing Commando because their buff Knife works buffs 2 blade users. Rash Courage is also really important.

And debuffing Xeno is also huge. You need to be doing that. Bounty Hunter debuffs for sure. i like blade users that can debuff init personally as well.

I personally like Contact Armor 4. It's the best heavy armor from a contact for melee which still allows above average protection from ranged.

Let me ask this, because only one of my 4 fighters was an officer (doctor/medic), because this was my first playthrough (hell this playthrough even used the default "Bounty Hunter" template, although I didn't risk my captain in crew combat). On Normal difficulty.

What do you do with the starting swordsman, 2 soldiers, and pistoleer that the game gives you? Do you dismiss them and replace them with...I guess what I probably had as my officers? (stuff like Spy/Smuggler/Diplomat/Merchant/etc.)