The idea behind them is that you have make your shots count.

There is one crucial difference between Primes and Rulers: With Primes, you get to decide when they take their actions, Rulers just do it no matter what.

Do not use some low damage attack like Lightning Hands against them, their reaction is probably not worth doing like 3 or 4 damage. A similar thing holds true for grenades, unless you really want that armor shred. Primes are when the big guns come into play. Rupture, Deadshot, etc.

Be careful about overwatch around Primes.

Also, don't shoot at a Prime that is currently flanking one of your guys. Move your flanked guy first. Primes that are hit will often try to flank one of your soldiers with their bonus move, so the next time they get an action they have a target. Using your soldiers in the right order can be important here so you're not ending your turn flanked.

Another thing:
Most of the Primes don't actually hit harder than the vanilla enemies. Often, it makes sense to kill the rest of the pod first. An example would be Archon Prime, who just uses the vanilla archon staff attack on his turn.

Of course, there's also always the possibility to use freeze and stun to deal with them. Frostbomb and Serpent Suit both allow for taking out problematic enemies without them acting. Try to save those limited charges for the real heavy hitters (Sectopod, Gatekeeper and Andromedon Prime).

Appreciate the advice. I always wondered if frost was a viable method to dealing with them, or if it would just freeze them for an action rather than a turn.

I'm trying really hard to play you mod DerBK. It's a lot of fun, don't get me wrong. The enemy variety, boosted AI, and A Better Barracks really refresh the game for me. However this has to be my fourth or fifth attempt at it (before the stress got the better of me).

I haven't given up completely, and genuinely thank you for you time.

Well, it's meant to be harder, especially in the endgame :)

As long as you feel it's beatable, keep going. The payoff when you see the end of the campaign is worth it. I only just beat the A Better Everything on Commander for the first time two weeks ago. Felt like a boss.

If it's too much, think about ticking down the difficulty by one.

Did ABA or ABC change to make the prime spike hit harder?

When I played a few months ago, I felt like it introduced them gradually, giving me a sectoid or muton or spectre prime first, then introducing the harder ones later. This time, the first time I saw any primes it was a codex and gatekeeper on the same mission. It was also only the second gatekeeper I had seen total. I managed to get through it after few save scums, but it seemed like a really harsh way to introduce primes into the campaign.

There has been no change to spawnweights of ABA units in a long while. Sounds like something went haywire on your end? Maybe some other mod interfering?

I have to say that I really enjoy all your new enemies, but there's one that I would just call bad right now, the Gatekeeper prime.

Not only his insta zombie skill tend to be buggy (I had it just break the enemy turn multiple times), but it also offer little to no counter play. You can't kill the zombies, even just to slow them down, you have to focus on the keeper, and here lies the problem.

The guy has way, WAY too much armor for a guy with so much health and his response fire is just grossly overthune and will kill even the most armored character behind cover in one shot. Just like his zombies, the guy has no counter play, and will be litteraly unkillable by any groups not entierely comprised of heavy anti armor burst damages.

And the last (and probably worst) problem with that guy is that he spawn way too often.

Having an hard enemy is a thing, having something grossly overthuned is another.
Try to drop the armor, make him stay in open form all the time.

Gatekeeper Prime can be taken out very easily by using a Flashbang or similar.
If GK Prime gets disoriented, all his Zombies will die, he won't be able to make new ones and all that's left is a big chunk of hp with low aim and a death cannon.

Using something like Stun or Freeze is even more efficient. So i wouldn't say that there's no counter play available - it's just different from what you'd do to other enemies.
Not everything needs to be bursted down, in fact preventing things like that is one of the main reasons that Primes exist.

They only appear at maximum alien force level, by that point you should be running around with Colonels. I don't see how any enemy can pose an unassailable threat to a squad of 6 Colonels. At that point you are at the victory lap, it's time to wrap up the campaign and take down the Avatars. If you are seeing lots of GK Primes, that's a sign that you are dragging your feet :D

Originally posted by DerBK:

I only just beat the A Better Everything on Commander for the first time two weeks ago. Felt like a boss.

HAH, you're the author and you've not even beaten your own creation on Legend/Ironman! ;p

I run this game exclusively on L/I with A Better Everything. Prime enemies feel managable to me. You're doing something right, don't worry.

My first ever encounter with Firestarter Prime splatted two of my favorite units since I was new to the reaction mechanic, but in subsequent encounters I've started to figure it out. Disorientation and even Smoke Grenades become very powerful against them (I had a Grenadier who rolled Dense Smoke *and* Combat Drugs and he was able to shield and empower his squad as they focus-fired a Disoriented Viper Prime and brought it down).

I love the Prime mechanic so far, as it adds a whole new layer of depth and strategy to the late-game that makes me fear coming into it instead of wind up bored with shiny late-game gear.

You can also use Prime reactions against them, particularly on the Melee users, since you can have 'em run right into a Bladestorm or Retribution, or a conveniently set up overwatch trap.

for instance, CX's Armored Berserkers have a similar bit with Bull Rush, and i used that to lure 'em into the open where a Sentry Turret Ambush was set up to cut them down.

also should make sure to deal with a Prime in ways you'd normally deal with that species, i.e. using high ground and blocking off ladders/vines/pipes on berserkers, keep your guys spaced out to avoid Archon Pinions or Acid Blobs from Andromedons, etc.

and of course, whenever possible, deal with 'em when they can't see you, via the good old scout/sniper combo, or suppress the hell out of them if they can. can make Prime Sectos and Gatekeepers lose a lot of their deadlyness when they can't hit anything worth a damn.

This works with all primes, you can deal with them. Except for sectopod primes. Those guys are just not balanced.

The problem with Primes is that they uproot the basic strategy layer of the game, reveal and overwatch turn, also they make all the witty reaction abilities complete liability, return fire, guardian, ever vigilant, bladestorm, retribution, etc. are potential death wishes.

To counter you can resort to heavy scouting with hunkering or take the occasional suicide on the chin, not appealing. This can be tense fun for 3 unique rulers but not so for common spawns.

My ABA campaign turned into a boring crawl when I had to adjust troop movements following my skirmisher's archon-prime-suicide with an overwatch-return fire combo. I finished the campaign (no primes on final mission) but did not enjoy it.

What you percieve as a problem is actually one of the goals i had: Uprooting basic strategies and forcing players to adapt. I realize that this is not to everyone's taste, but with mods this big it will never be. In the end, i made the mod that i wanted to play.

Playing it now, heavily modded, I've gotten to the point where my answer to them is always Flashbangs, Frost weapons and Suppression. Would be kinda nice to get something more from the Primes, personally.

My solution to the problem has been to mind control them. Of course that becomes a little problematic if I don't have any psionic members on my squad, but I tend to try and keep at least one available once Primes start to appear.

Mind control works quite amusingly in your favour, especially since you can throw plenty of damage at them from your own squad, and the Prime will respond by killing Advent forces meaning you can take it down whilst still directing damage to the enemy.

Using Domination on a Gatekeeper Prime and watching it obliterate Advent is one of the most satisfying things I've done on any Xcom.

Good Sir, im running this excellent Mod @ Betastrike. I can tackle most Primes, however i find the Sectopod Prime to be unbeatable due to Annhiliation Protocol.
Would you kindly tell me which file i would need to alter to simply Ruler Reaction ruleset from the SteathSectopod ?

thank you

EDIT
For the record, i like the mod greatly. Personally im not a fan of Frag and HE grenades and i would if possible prefer if the Avatar project was a real threat as opposed to an ok-now-i-must-pick-that-specific-covert-ops-to-handle-it, but thats not so major.
I think some classes are possibly underwhelming, for example Agents specifically because of the lackluster Knife arent really interesting, holo-targeter isnt that useful in my opinion as well. On the other hand, sawed-off shotguns are too stronk.
All in all its a very good mod.
I wish you would make Psi a bit more interesting, possibly opening it up earlier than the stock wotc-game does.