Xeno/Jyeeta ground combat...

[cswiger]

I've played enough to have completed about half the unlocks, and I can generally hold my own in ship combat and ground combat against humans. But ground combat against either the Xenos or the Jyeetya end up in repeated slaughter, even at rank 20+ where I've got some relevant combat talents unlocked.

I've gotten the max Weapons Locker A5. I've tried upgrading to specialized weapons, armor, or aux gear from contacts, but for the most part only the gear seems to offer any noticeable advantages. I'm generally taking me as a MilOfficer/Pistoleer/something and a Doctor/Combat Medic/Pistoleer, and two crew, maybe a blade dude or shotgunner in front, and a rear sniper or maybe rifle soldier (Full Auto).

If I go full manual and fire some dudes and promote some new officers from the early crew, I can get one Xeno-Hunter/Soldier type at the cost of not having a Merchant, or Smuggler, etc. That helps a bit, but my party is still getting jacked by the Xeno even at normal difficulty.

Is it expected that one needs to train up several XenoHunters? Or something else that I can try?

[davea]

There are quite a few threads on combat comp to beat xeno ground. They are usually much higher level than you, and you need to plan. Most people agree you need two blades in front and a healer. Surprisingly, maybe only one xeno hunter in the middle.

[Ev]

I made this exact same post awhile ago when I had the same problem. Xeno require two things and two things only--Good Buff management and initiative. Really really easy script:

Tips:

- All combat depends on high initiative scores. The higher your initiative and the less initiative your talents consume, the more actions you can take per round. initiative is SO important that you need to dismiss any combat crew with low initiative. Seriously. Everyone does this. I personally have all crew use the weapon with the absolute lowest initiative in their class. No sniper rifles. Reduces cost on all those costs 1.5x or 2x weapon initiative talents. 10 int weapons also mean you never take int Penalty. Winning initiative also allows you to remove buffs before they attack....

- Xeno win with buffs and lose without buffs. When you remove their buffs, #1 they waste a turn re-applying the buff instead of attacking you, #2 they lose the buff. Bounty Hunter's lvl 5 Unfaltering Ire removes the first two enemy's buffs 100% of the time, no dodge. It de-buffs xeno accuracy and damage by -25%. All in a level 5 talent that costs like 10 to use. Hunters also have a +20% Dmg/Acc/Piercing talent at lvl 1.

NO MATTER WHAT REMOVING XENO BUFFS IS PRIORITY 1. (in my opinion)

- Second priority, you need to resist or remove the xeno de-buffs on your team immediately. Most combat classes has a lvl 5 or 8 remove debuff talent and a resist de-buff talent. Swordsman has a remove de-buffs from front 2 ranks talent. Bodyguard has a lvl 5 Honor Guard block ability that removes de-buffs from teammates in any position.

- Just as important are the Resist Debuff % talents. Each combat class should self-apply their resist de-buff talent as their 1st action every time. Medic's Lifeline 'big'' heal has a 50% de-buff resistance and a +2 Imitative buff.

Military Officer has the most OP talent: Tactical Edge at _LEVEL ONE_ gives+4 initiative +20% Damage and +10% Armor and cost 6 initiative to use. Every medic needs 1 level in MilOfficer.

So now you have a script for every xeno combat.

1st thing all medics do is put Lifeline on everyone to resist de-buffs+2 Int. 1st thing all combat classes do is self-apply their resist debuff ability. 1st thing Bounty Hunter does is apply Unfaltering Ire over-and-over to remove xeno buffs, accuracy, and damage in the first two ranks. No exceptions. Simple to follow.

2nd thing all medics do is cast the level 1 military officer's Tactical Edge for the +4 imitative +Dmg/Accuracy on everyone. 2nd the Body Guard does is put Honor Guard on people. 2nd thing all combats do is self-apply their +2 Int talent.

All this happens before you take your first attack on the xeno.

[Ev]

I put this in second comment since it's so much less important than the buff and initiative management above... and it's all personal preference where people can disagree or do better...

Last points:

- Combat classes have high evasion against melee. Unless you're a combat medic, or leveling to your specialist class level 5 abilities, put all your levels into your primary combat class for evasion alone (plus the accuracy is nice). Blade skills also evade melee so my first two ranks are always swordsmen + this specialist class.
- Xeno have armor so high that it your damage per attack is so much lower than them that you can't get in a 'gun fight' damage race without buffs. So bleed abilities bypass this, debuff armor/deflection helps, and high armor penetration attacks are key.
- 4 high-level xeno have too many actions to get ahead of them. You need to debuff and burst damage a single xeno--usually rank 2 where your team's melee and gun attacks overlap. Until the first xeno goes down, you're gradually losing the action economy and can't recover. So you can't relax until you're fighting 3 xeno.
- Gear: Get bonuses until you're 125-ish HP, then all into initiative. Xeno-level dice pools are large enough that the thing that kills you will be an armor penetrating attack, so deflection then soak then initiative on armor. Dodge/parry has very limited impact at high levels with Xeno.

- Personal line-up: I'll call out what I consider the minimum mandatory levels to get the mandatory talents to even look at xeno: 4th position: Bounty Hunter lvl5 - Exo-Scout lvl1 combo. 3rd pos. Pimary healer: 99% points in combat medic with lvl 1 mil officer(I don't like pistol-based damage dealing vs. xeno due to their armor soaking most of it, so no points invested in pistols here). 2nd position is the buffer with military officer lvl1 + medic lvl 11 lifeline + swordsmen or similar for tanking. 1st rank is your rockstar damage dealer so do whatever. For Quality of Life but not essential I do body guard lvl 5 at a minimum, lvl 8 for a nice counter attack that has lots of nice buffs. For me I like lvl 15 blade-dancer here for the Thousand Cut Dance that applies bleed and an armor de-buff to _ALL_4_ENEMY_ in one attack. Without the armor de-buff on the xeno, everyone else's attacks are weaker so combat takes longer. Also has 2 nice self-buffs including a +4 Int buff.

This is just preference and other people's viewpoints are viable or better or counter to all of this...

[wilky]

Short answer, try something like:

Swordsman/Zealot/xxx
Swordsman/Zealot/yyy
Soldier/B.Hunter/Xeno Hunter or Exo Scout
Medic/Doctor/M.Officer

Put the most levels into the job classes I listed first. xxx/yyy can be like W.Commando, Assassin, B.Dancer, BGuard, whatever. Key abilities are like Sharp Counter, Balanced Blade, Strength of Steel, Unstoppable Fury, Unfaltering Ire, etc.

Basically, you want to boost your own parry/defense and defbuff the enemy's aim, etc. Put the two blades users up front because they have high parry + defense. If you have the L11 story snubber (Bahamut) you probably want to use that on the Soldier.

[Gilmoy]

There are many threads on this topic. Search for "xeno crew", or similar.

I shall be terse here.

0. The strongest combat crew is Captain + 3 officers, with 11-12 combat jobs.
You may also need to upgrade to a 5-officer ship.

1. Blades, Blades, Rifle, Healer. Xeno ground crews are always 3 blades 1 ranged.
Those blades will slaughter your front-row shooters. You must parry them, or they'll wipe you. Then you also need a healer, which leaves only 1 slot for a rifle.

2. Stats. Fighting Captain needs A.Attributes and 30 30 30, else why bother.
Fighting officers want 23+ Init and Fortitude. Recruit many and keep only the champions.

3. Heavy armor. Everybody must rely on soaking damage. By stacking armor, gear, and buffs, you can soak >90% damage, which nerfs xeno hits from 120 down to single digits. That's how you stay alive and win the damage and healing races.

4. Talents. Always take your self-heal. When choosing a 3-combat-job officer, always pick a 3-job combo that has at least 1 self-heal. Un-debuff you. Unbuff them. Push/pull them around. Push/pull friendlies to fix position. Move-and-act to fix positioning.

5. Your rifle guy can be a Xeno Hunter for Irid-Laced Resolve, which is the single best On-Init talent in the game when you're hunting xeno. You probably can't fit 2 Xeno Hunters into one combat crew.

I actually do enjoy having 2-3 Xeno Hunter bridge staff who never fight, solely for their extra copies of Blooded Lure, Macabre Harvest, and later on, Here Be Monsters. They're just another kind of mission specialist. A smuggler playthrough would have Smugglers in those seats, a spy playthrough would have extra Spies, a xeno-farming playthrough has Xeno Hunters, etc. If you're chasing the xeno unlocks, this is almost mandatory. (But also do all of the above, because the point of generating extra xeno fights is to win them all and bank the loot.)

6. Gear from a Contact. You don't get that from A5.

~~~~~~~~

Originally posted by cswiger:

a) ... even at rank 20+ ...

b) I've gotten the max Weapons Locker A5.

c) I'm generally taking me as a MilOfficer/Pistoleer/something and a Doctor/Combat Medic/Pistoleer, and two crew, maybe a blade dude or shotgunner in front, and a rear sniper or maybe rifle soldier (Full Auto).

(a) Alas, simply passing enough time to reach L20+ does not, by itself, get you ahead of any power curve. The curve rises equally fast. Enemy xenos will be roughly the same level as you, with equally strong talents.

This is why we emphasize stats, team composition, talent choice, and so on.

(b) A5 is good enough. You're correct that C5-C7 from contacts is not clearly superior.
We generally prefer to swap out the Weapons Locker, because we're also hunting xeno ships in space, and we need +1 small module for more defense.

(c) Briefly: Too many shooters, not enough parry. Xeno always have 3 blades, and they'll chop you down like you're naked. Learn to love ye basic Swordsman, and open with Strength of Steel for the whopping +60% Parry buff, even if you're not yet injured.

~~~~~~~~

In a nutshell, you haven't prepared your combat crew specifically to hunt xeno. Your combat crew is pretty good for being done seat-of-the-pants and on-the-fly, but xenos are deliberately scaled to beat that kind of team.

Try the xeno unlocks Then you know from day 1 that you're hunting xenos, and you can customize your Captain template and fighting crew to focus on that 1 goal. Don't expect to finish those unlocks in your 1st attempt, either. Fight, kill xenos, die, learn, repeat.

[Trese Brothers]

There is tons of great advice already on the thread, so I won't try to add any more of that. The one thing I will say is that many players make the mistake of thinking that their highly effective human-killing combat team is ready to face xeno. the truth of the matter is, you need a very different build for a combat team that is capable of handling xeno. it is far easier to build a human team that smashes humans. The bar to defeat xenos is much higher. Great advice on the thread, hope it's helpful.

[cswiger]

Thank you all for the detailed responses.

I'm sure my crewmates will be overjoyed to hear that I've gotten the best possible advice when I deliberately lead them into fighting a bunch of xeno. Again.

[Innocent]

I'm still a "new" player with 200 hours ish :D and only just sort of figured out how to fight Xenos in my current Explorer/XenoHunter run. So I feel your pain! Lots of good advice in here, here are some key points that were not obvious to me before this run:

- a single point in Blade will allow you to dual wield a knife in your second hand, which instantly gives you +6 parry i.e. +6 strong defense dice against melee. This is massive! And why everyone is telling you to go melee at the front. You can also abuse this to turn any pistol user into a front line tank by investing one or a couple of levels in a melee class. A good one is Body Guard, since it also adds pistol, and Tactics which are needed for defense, but a level 5 swordsman with Strength of Steel also looks amazing (see below).

- While you need melee for defense, you will RARELY land a melee blow on the Xeno (never if you don't debuff them), their parry is too high. Your melee fighters need to be built to tank, not deal damage. I was struggling for a long time with the Swordsman since most of his skills require you to land hits to proc. Then I realised the only reason people skill Swordsman is to get access to the ludicrously OP level 5 talent "Strength of Steel" :D So just level Swordsman to 5 to get this talent and forget the rest. You can apply this logic to a lot of classes. Which segways nicely into...

- Easiest way to beat Xeno: Bounty Hunter level 5 with "Unfaltering Ire". If you struggle just start here. Once you understand the fight a bit more, you won't have to rely on this "crutch" too much!

I've been trying 2 Snipers against Xenos on Brutal and have had some success, I won the last fight without access to a debuff! but my two frontline fighters fell and the doc died :/ But it's kinda working, I'm sure with access to a debuff I can wipe them. You can eliminate one xeno on round one easy with 2 sniper rifles. Just make sure they also carry nades if they end up on row 1 and consider giving one of them a retreat talent. This is what I'm aiming for now:

| ExoScout++ | ExoScout15/XenoHunter++/Soldier5 | Assassin++/pistoleer8/spy2 | bodyguard++/combatmedic8/swordsman5 |

Soldier is for the retreat talent,although I also carry nades. The Assassin/spy2 combo is well-known and is based on stacking Stealth defenses (look it up if you are intrigued) and Pistoleer 8 is to get the Pistol debuff skill "Terrifying Accuracy". CombatMedic8 to access the superior heal, Swords5 for the OP talent mentioned above, and the rest in bodyguard.

Anyway, have a plan! Or just use Bounty Hunter 5... :D

[ptirodaktill]

The key to Xeno fight`s is highest melee deflection armor combined with %armor buffs and %resist debuff stacking. You don't need blades at all, as at low level they don't work due to low blade skill and at high levels you don't care for incoming dmg due to armor. I like to use 2 heal and 2 DD setup.

[Innocent]

You don't pick Blades for the skill, you picked it to get +6 parry from the offhand knife, which is an instant +6 strong dice in defense. I find it hard to agree that "they don't work".

[ptirodaktill]

6 strong dice is nothing against lvl 25+Xeno.

[Innocent]

100% disagree. Stacking strong dice is key in this game, if I'm given 6 strong dice for free just by equipping a knife, I'm taking it. Has been working wonders for me.

[ptirodaktill]

Stacking - yes, but just 6 w/o skill bonuses is nothing https://youtu.be/n8ylyMH4QLM . And once you have armor and talents Jyeeta hit for 12 dmg once/twice per round, making your block irrelevant.

[JimmysTheBestCop]

Blade users deal a ton of damage because they get so many turns. You just need to know how to set them up.

If you are going 2 blade users always have 1 job as a Wing Commando on your front 2 blade guys. You want Knife Works. +25% Melee Accuracy, +25% Melee Damage, +10% Critical, +20% Parry for 3 Turns

Plus Swordsman Rash Courage +30% Melee Accuracy, +30% Melee Damage, +10% Armor Piercing, -10% Armor for 4 Turns

Plus a Wing Commando's 2 main attack talents hit with +10% melee accuracy by default.

I would also drop Blade Dancer on the other front 2 guys. Feint is +50% melee accuracy.

swordsman/zealot/blade dancer
swordsman/zealot/wing commando

Plus all of those jobs have attacks that debuff enemy parry, armor and initiative. You can drop -11 init on an enemy. That will probably end their turn and put them into negative for next turn. Making them combat ineffective.

I haven't played since increase level cap. But I routinely slay Jyeeta previous max level 40 while my combat team was level 15-17 on Impossible. It is totally possible to buff to hit them and buff so you dont take much damage. My 4th Position never fires. And my 3rd position mostly drops Unfaltering Ire or Suppressing fire.

So that means my 2 blade users are dealing all the damage.

But there are plenty of ways to create a combat squad. I just wanted to point out it is totally possible to make you blade guys deal a ton of damage

[ptirodaktill]

I don't like melee after the nerf, it take way too much IRL time to pump the dmg to acceptable value. I dropped both Assasin and Zealot runs around lvl 25 cause i felt useless in combat even with lvl 11 weapons. And just settled on +10 med captain .