Line #42 GameBreaker/XCOM


1	It goes without saying that there are a lot of broken items and strategies in the X-COM and UFO series. Of course, depending on who you ask, they're either common sense, broken as all hell, or mandatory to your success on [[NintendoHard higher difficulties]].
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5	[[foldercontrol]]
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7	[[folder:The Original & Terror From The Deep]]
8	* Psicorps in ''VideoGame/XCOMUFODefense''. They are hard (and expensive) to acquire, as you need to capture a psi-using alien (specifically, a Sectoid Leader or Commander in the early game, which means either assaulting a larger UFO or finding the Leader in a Sectoid Terror Mission) that is blasting you with said psi-abilities ([[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard often straight at the easily affected guy that it can't even see]]), interrogate the alien, research the tech, build the required buildings, then wait until the month ends for results from said building. If you're ''extremely'' lucky, you'll have this by the 4th month, else you might have to wait until the late game aliens show up.\
9	But it was well worth it. First off, you get to see the Psi-Defense stat of your units, eventually allowing you to get a team entirely immune to psi-attacks. The abilities themselves are powerful as well. The more accurate skill causes the target to panic, making them an easy kill. The other skill is Mind Control, a skill so powerful that you can use it to win the final mission ''on the first turn single-handedly''.
10	** ''[[VideoGame/XCOMApocalypse Apocalypse]]'' {{nerf}}ed it to merely powerful (the second was merely so hard [[NintendoHard you actually needed it to win on the higher levels]]). You can use it to mind-control a zombie, kill it, then you have a pet Chryssalid.
11	** And then there's the [[{{BFG}} Blaster Launcher]], a weapon that could send a missile out the door of your transport, over the heads of your units, down through the door of the UFO and up the elevator shaft to [[DungeonBypass blow a hole]] in the otherwise impregnable UFO hull material. Or alternately just take out a [[HumongousMecha Sectopod]] in one shot. Its successor, the DPT Launcher, was nerfed in a way you can only fire it underwater... unless you consider that you troops can still reaction-fire it! Not to mention that one of the resources necessary to make ammo for it is more abundant in the sequel.
12	* Avenger/Leviathan craft. Though the basic interception unit is so weak that ''every'' alien craft can outrun it, these two can outrun and outgun even the strongest alien craft - with a bit of a twist: if they survive, they become TOTALLY USELESS for about a month until repairs are done (plus they consume valuable resources to even keep flying). Meanwhile, aliens are happily wreaking havoc...
13	** You can actually stick any craft weapon on any ship capable of dogfighting. Cue the Plasma Cannon: not overly powerful or fast, but its range exceeds that of any UFO except the largest Battleships, its ammo is free, and it has plenty of the stuff. And you can order your craft to fire from their maximum combat range, hence making even your lowly Interceptors effectively invulnerable. Battleships are immune to this tactic and do deal massive amounts of damage, but this can be mitigated by attacking them with multiple ships at the same time - the damage gets spread out (dividing repair times amongst the ships present) and the UFO goes down faster (meaning it deals less damage in the first place).
14	* [[http://ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Smoke_Grenade Smoke grenades]] are remarkably effective at decreasing the aliens' initial advantage; just drop it at the foot of the transport's ramp, before leaving, and the chances of the aliens' reaction fire hitting the redshirts drops drastically. [[http://ufopaedia.org/index.php?title=Proximity_Grenade Proximity grenades]] are sworn by for many players to mine UFO exits and buildings aliens might be hiding in. Both together are a potent combination, especially if you've mined a Zombie that turns into a Chryssalid.
15	* Running low on money in [[VideoGame/XComTerrorFromTheDeep TFTD?]] Go into business selling Craft Gauss Cannon. Even after having to pay for the workshop space and technicians and the construction cost, you can make a killing doing this.
16	** Ditto Laser Cannons from the first. It's quite useful to build a base filled entirely with working and living facilities, doing nothing but producing and selling them.
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19	[[folder:Apocalypse]]
20	* The Toxigun. A highly powerful weapon that costs just a pair of [=APs=] per shot to fire and completely bypasses the aliens' Disruptor Shields, and does minimal collateral damage as the toxic payload is essentially harmless to your soldiers. After researching this and the Personal Teleporter, the game pretty much turns into administering point-blank euthanasia shots to the aliens. Even more Alien Gas Grenades and Alien Gas Rockets are available late in the game, provided you manage to [[spoiler:capture the Alien Queen live]]. The [[{{Teleportation}} Personal Teleporter]] allows you to instantly teleport your soldiers anywhere on the map, and it is not uncommon to [[SingleStrokeBattle win the mission on the first turn]] considering that your soldiers are likely [[PersonOfMassDestruction people of mass destruction]] by the time you research this item.
21	** In realtime mode the Toxigun is also extremely accurate even when dual-wielded, and is functionally a machine pistol. The whole catch, though, is that the most powerful toxigun ammunition requires difficult live captures; the lower-grade ammunition is ''much'' less effective.
22	* Early game, Androids. Completely immune to enemy psionics, and untargetable by Brainsuckers (though they can still be brainsucked due to physics shenanigans in realtime mode). They have good physical stats, extremely high stamina, etc. etc. - they can sprint forever whilst carrying heavy weapons, they're quite durable, and are fairly accurate marksmen. This is offset by their ''extremely'' slow stat growth; human soldiers that survive to late game can be absolutely superhuman monsters that surpass Android troops in all regards, whereas Androids will gain barely any stat improvements.
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25	[[folder:Afterblank Series]]
26	* Warp weapons. Subverting the previously established player knowledge of armor=longevity, warp weapons inflict ''greater'' damage if the target is wearing heavy armor, due to the way the series' resistances system works. Devastating when first encountered, when the weapons are reverse-engineered by the player, they become the single most devastating weapon in the game, capable of one-shot killing ''anything'', as enemies are ''always'' wearing heavy armor at that point. Greatly toned down in ''VideoGame/UFOAfterlight'', as the player only gets two warp weapons, with six shots each that can't be recharged during a mission and low base accuracy.
27	** To clarify the resistance system; every weapon and armour type has a series of resistances to various damage types like "Hard", "Soft", "Fire", and so on; these define what kind of damage weapons do, ''e.g.'' small-caliber firearms are mostly "soft" damage which is effective against unarmoured enemies, but resisted by heavy armour. Heavy armour resists most damage types very well ''except'' Warp, which it has a massive penalty against.
28	* ''VideoGame/UFOAftershock'' has psionics with level 3 sniper, using the .50 caliber rifle with accuracy add-on and accuracy boosting psi-gear has a 1.1 - 110% chance of a torso hit. A headshot is merely 100% chance of instantly killing the standard mutant or [[ScaryDogmaticAliens Wargot]]. Also you can field a whole team of these girls, and depending on the status of your install the accuracy aura buffs may stack. Gets more insane if you give them Katanas against [[ButtMonkey Wargots]] in room-to-room combat...
29	** Even against enemies that could take multiple headshots and survive, a called shot to the head is considered a critical hit and topples the target over (there are enemies with "knock back resistance" ability but they are not common). Guess how much time it takes to stand up? Approximately same amount as making another called shot. If there is another enemy between sniper and target, then there is chance of hitting the enemy blocking vision, and if this happens, that enemy will be critically hit as if it was intended target of called shot, even if it is impossible to make called shot on that enemy. Very effective against mutants and Starghost combat drones.
30	** ''UFO Aftershock'' has also short range game breaker. GunsAkimbo. Well developed Cyborg/Ranger/Commando with 2 [=MP5=] [=SMGs=], armour piercing ammo and proper implants has greater range than assault rifles, 10 shot long burst (each shot has individual check for critical hit meaning that at least one critical hit in burst is virtually certain), very low aiming time (if enemy comes from beyond the corner it is possible to kill him before he finishes turning around) and (due to bug) insane movement speed, team him with Human Scout/Ranger/Commando who has much lower range but (even) higher critical hit chance and can spot living target from half the map. That duo can: shred anything into pieces at short range, suppress and outgun anything at medium range, rush from cover to cover so quickly that no enemy can even aim at them and obviously spot targets for snipers. Only drawback: huge ammo consumption.
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33	[[folder:2012 Reboot & Enemy Within]]
34	* Snipers. Oh sweet heavens, snipers. A mid-level sniper with the abilities Squad Sight (lets the entire team do spotting for the sniper) and Damn Good Ground (gives additional bonuses for elevation), when given a skeleton suit or a ghost suit, can just camp out on a high building or object, and pick off enemies as the other party members locate them. As long as there is nothing directly between the sniper and the target, it can be shot, and with better accuracy than the character closer to it. On terror missions, two or three snipers with laser weapons at least and a little elevation can one shot [[DemonicSpiders chryssalids]] (and believe me, you definitely want those down quickly) with a headshot.
35	** But wait, there's more: The ability Opportunist removes the aim penalty for overwatch and other reaction shots, and allows reaction fire to score {{critical hit}}s. This means that if a sniper is on overwatch, and the enemy comes in sight of the sniper (or with Squadsight, any player on the field and there is an open shot between enemy and sniper), it's a much easier and deadlier hit. And then there's In The Zone and Double Tap, the final abilities: In The Zone allows a sniper to take an extra attack if the last shot was made at an uncovered or flanked enemy. Combined with Archangel armor, this can destroy an entire attacking force in one turn, at the risk of your own sniper being out of cover. Double Tap allows a second shot if your sniper doesn't move on his turn. This means your sniper can fire twice if he doesn't move. Once a sniper is in a good position to attack, he no longer needs to move, and on many maps (even the really big ones) it's possible for your sniper to be on one end of the map, and take down with devastating accuracy enemies on the opposite end. Three snipers at Colonel rank with Plasma weapons can fire at least 6 shots a round, with each shot doing enough damage to guaranteenly drop anything less powerful than a Chryssalid with one shot (and they can still land {{One Hit Kill}}s against those.) Enemies typically travel in groups of three, meaning that unless you get attacked by 2 or more groups at once, you can wipe them all out with shots to spare. If your team is half Snipers, half Assaults, your assaults can track down enemies quickly and your Snipers can pick them off as they are found.
36	*** Oh, and with In The Zone, this allows you to devastate the most dangerous enemies in the game: Chryssalids, Ethereals, Muton Berserkers, and Sectopods. All four ignore cover, so with a full clip, it's possible to just unload with sniper shots until they die.
37	** Squadsight Snipers are fearsome orbital cannons of death once armed with Archangel Armor and Plasma Sniper Rifles, yet the alternative, the Snapshot Sniper, is also a mobile engine of death. With a good suit of Ghost or Archangel Armor, a Snapshooter can mow down cover-ignoring enemies with In The Zone giving them lots of free shots, ''then'' take to the air with the Archangel or grapple to a vantage point with the Ghost armor, ''then'' they start snap-shooting the now-flanked enemies with more ITZ attacks with their Snapshot accuracy penalty negated by the combination of height advantage, the use of the SCOPE item, and flanking.
38	*** No longer this in ''Enemy Within'' due to the new enemies introduced avert the ComplacentGamingSyndrome. Seekers, specifically, are introduced to kill isolated snipers relying on squadsight.
39	*** Unless you give them one of the new Gene Mods which shocks them if they try to grab the sniper, or are wearing heavy armor, such as the Archangel suit...which allows a unit to fly and only uses move. Meaning you can fly the Sniper straight up into the air and cover almost the whole battlefield.
40	*** ''[[AvertedTrope Rebroken]]'' if players realize that Battle Scanners can detect stealth units. Combine that with the Mimetic Skin, toss out a Battle Scanner and the sniper is still in stealth mode while any Seeker will go directly to your squad only to get themselves detected.
41	*** Or you could just bag all this and double your firepower by sending two Snapshot-equipped snipers in a pair to cover each other. But that's just unfair to the aliens.
42	*** Or simply have someone accompany the sniper and stay on overwatch.
43	** Ghost Armor is the most fearsome suit of armor X-Com has ever produced. Despite its lighter protection than the Titan Armor, it gives a +20 evasion bonus, a passive movement range bonus, ''plus'' it comes with a [[GrapplingHookPistol Grappling Hook]] ''and'' 4 charges of invisibility! Being invisible not only prevents Aliens from seeing you, it also gives you a +100 bonus to critical hit rates. Apart from being able to position your squad for perfect ambushes with impunity and no fear of being shot at, your Snipers and Assaults can use the invisibility charges to give them free killer critical hits with their powerful weapons. ''Enemy Within'' nerfed the critical hit bonus to +30.
44	** Snipers combined with Heavies are flat out unfair against cover-using enemies: Oh, you want to hide behind cover? BOOM!!! Where's your cover now? In pieces on the floor! You can have heavies with rocket launchers devastate anything your opponents are trying to hide behind, opening up a clear shot for your snipers to pick off all of your enemies with In The Zone.
45	** With Enemy Within, we now have the MEC Trooper, the single most overpowering thing in the game. Its Minigun will shred virtually any early game enemy it encounters, the Kinetic Strike Module can One Hit Kill anything short of a Cyberdisk, Sectopod or Mechtoid, the Flamethrower is easily one of the best AOE attacks in the game (and has the bonus benefit of ''spreading the flames further than the Cone intended'', as well as panicking anyone hit by it) despite its limited Ammo use, and this is before having a special Class ability. ''And this is just the Mark I, unupgraded model''.
46	*** That being said, MEC Troopers are ''designed'' to be unbelievably powerful in the early game. Conversely, they get upgraded much slower than your normal troops, with fewer weapon choices, no ability to swap out upgrades (i.e. if you get the flamethrower, you cannot get the kinetic strike module without building another MEC suit), and prohibitively expensive costs. You will guard your MEC Troopers religiously because, despite their high initial HP, if they die, you will be out a ''lot'' of money and Meld. Mercifully, if a MEC Trooper is KIA, you can still salvage and repair the suit itself, then assign it to a another new MEC operative.
47	** The Training Roulette game option allows for some unholy cross-class combinations - Snipers with Squadsight, HEAT Ammo and Disabling Shot, or Assaults with Close Combat Specialist, Bullet Swarm, Rapid Fire, and HEAT Ammo are possible, and may god help your enemies should he be found to be Psychic or given Gene Mods.
48	** Amongst the Gene Mods in ''Enemy Within'', the Mimetic Skin. It's even more effective than the Ghost Armor, an already great armor in the game, as it allows risk-free scouting for your troops. The only thing limiting about it is that the unit must be at full cover and that once they see an enemy and they attempt to move, the enemies will go directly towards opposite directions. The one exception? Snipers (again) thanks to their "Low Profile" perk (or, for that matter, any lucky operative who gets Low Profile due to Training Roulette). In fact, get a Sniper with Snapshot (that did get buffed by negating its penalty aim by -10), go near any cover, and either shoot and kill enemies with the ITZ or set up your other squad mates and wait for the next turn. And it ''doesn't run out and that unit is still in stealth mode'' as long as said unit hasn't made a move yet. In fact, they're the better recon team ''than assaults'' in this case. Problem with the -10 penalty aim? Just equip a "Scope" to your Snapshot sniper to negate the penalty aim. The only downside is that it costs an ungodly amount of MELD (''65'' meld + 150 credits for that single augment where the other mods cost less than 35 Meld!) to give to one person thanks to an early patch.
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51	[[folder:XCOM2 & War of the Chosen]]
52	* Once you get them to a decent level, Psi Operatives snap the game in half. Their huge range of offensive, defensive and utility abilities allow them to annihilate most enemy units in one turn, and either Dominate or Stasis those they can't. If they manage to get [[MasterOfAll ALL psionic skills]], you basically have a soldier that can adapt to ANY situation on the battlefield.
53	** Between Fortress and Solace, you will have a Psi Operative utterly immune to any attack that does not inflict direct damage (like melee attacks, gun/beam attacks, and psychic attacks like the Avatar's Null Lance). They will end up immune to disorientation, panicking, ''mind control'', acid, fire, poison, and ''explosions''. Sustain makes sure that they will survive supposedly-fatal injuries by going into Stasis with a single hitpoint, and Soulfire combined with Soul Steal allows them to recover health through a psionic attack that cannot be evaded by organic enemies.
54	*** Bonus points if you can get a Templar who can learn Fortress. Templars are normally reliant on their psi blades to deal damage to enemies as their machine pistol is ScratchDamage most of the time, but several enemies may explode on death (Gatekeepers and Sectopods are guaranteed to, Purifiers are a [=50/50=] chance). Plus it just allows your Templar to charge through envirohazards like fire or acid pools, which is also good for getting to enemies.
55	** You don't even need to do ''that'', as ALL it will take is the right combination of psionic abilities from the SuperpowerLottery. An example is the combination of Void Rift, Null Lance, and Soulfire. This gives the Psi Op an AOE attack that can disorient, panic, or ''outright mind control enemies on the spot'', a long range linear, high damage attack, and an AlwaysAccurateAttack that ignores all possible defensive variables. By that point, anything that CAN survive the Psi Op will be easy pickings for the rest of the squad.
56	** And to top it all off, ''all but one'' of the psionic powers are limited only by a cooldown, rather than a fixed number of uses. Bring two psi-ops in the last mission and you can save all your explosives for the final battle.
57	** Most important of all is that Psi Operatives require no combat experience or fieldwork to level up - which is how you ''usually'' gain increases to stats like Health and Aim; their rank is determined by gaining psi powers. You essentially just throw them into the psi lab for TrainingFromHell for a couple of months, and they come out as gamechangers. Compared to other soldiers needing to slog through and ''survive'' many, many dangerous field missions in order to be promoted, and it's easy to see how picking up psionics early can pay off bigtime.
58	* It's generally agreed that the Grenadier is the most effective starting class, mostly due to how powerful and how useful grenades are in the game. Grenades deal guaranteed damage, shred armor, destroy cover, AND can hit multiple enemies at once. Grenadiers can take skills and upgrades that allow them to shoot grenades farther, carry more grenades, shoot multiple grenades in a single turn, AND deal more damage with grenades. This isn't even getting into the special grenades you can develop like proximity mines, acid grenades, incendiary grenades, gas grenades, and more! Two of their skills make their munitions even more effective - Volatile Mix makes grenades do more damage and have a larger splash radius, while Salvo is the Bullet Swarm of the Grenadier, allowing them to take another action after launch if they used their first action to fire a grenade or Heavy Weapon. Due to the synergies, Grenadiers are even more deadly with the heavy weapons used with the E.X.O suits and W.A.R suits, such as Blaster Bombs, Shredder/Shredstorm Cannon, Flamers, and the humble Rocket Launcher. Grenades aside, their secondary skillset options are immensely useful as well - Chain Shot is a slightly less-powerful Rapid Fire, Suppression is ''better'' that it was in ''Enemy Unknown'' (with the larger Aim penalty inflicted by suppression as well as the ability to stack multiple Suppressions from different operatives), Holo-targeting is more effective than in ''EU'', Hail of Bullets guarantees a hit regardless of enemy evasion/cover/defense in exchange for massive ammo consumption, and Rupture is an auto-critical that inflicts the Ruptured debuff on enemies - anything that survives it likely won't survive the next attack. Such a powerful secondary gunner skilltree allows Grenadiers to continue providing fire support after using all their grenades during an extended mission.
59	* The Colonel level skills are ALL this. Considering how hard it is to get a soldier to Colonel due to the NintendoHard AnyoneCanDie nature of the game, it's probably a case of PurposelyOverpowered.
60	** For [[CloseRangeCombatant Rangers]], Rapid Fire and Reaper. The former is basically taking two shots against an enemy. EXCEPT this time, it has no cooldown, being limited ONLY by the clip size of your soldier's weapon (which can be alleviated with the right upgrades). The latter is a KillStreak ''that continues as long as the Ranger gets kills''. Sure, every attack in the sequence gets weaker, but with the right set up, (like, oh say a Gunslinger's Faceoff) a Ranger can kill large mobs of enemies in one turn. Add to that the Untouchable perk (if the Ranger gets a kill, the first attack, ''any'' attack will have no effect) and the Bladestorm perk (anyone who gets in melee range of the Ranger gets a fistful of sword), and hoo boy, unstoppable killing machine when played right.
61	** For [[LongRangeFighter Sharpshooters]], Serial and Fan Fire. Serial makes every kill made with their primary weapon a free action, effectively making it a RANGED version of Reaper and arguably ''better'' than In The Zone from Enemy Within as it even works on enemies in cover, limited only by the clip size and accuracy of your weapon (which can also be alleviated with extended magazines and autoloaders). Fan Fire is Rapid Fire taken up to eleven, being 3 pistol shots instead of 2, ''all of which are counted as a single move'', meaning that they have 1 hit chance, and will only cause a reaction from enemies AFTER all the shots connect. Now keep in mind that Special Ammunition stacks with pistol damage from Gunslinger-type Sharpshooters, and you'll see that a Fan Fire burst from a gunslinger with Bluescreen ammo will ''shred'' mech enemies. Another Sharpshooter skill, Face-Off, allows them to take potshots at all enemies in range with their pistol, no matter how many of them there are. This skill, when used correctly, will not only allow you soften up multiple pods of enemies at once, but can result in truly mind-blowing numbers of aliens slain with your sidearm in one non-stop chain of pistol shots. There are reported instances of player managing as many as six to nine kills with a single use of Face-Off.
62	** [[SupportPartyMember Specialists]] get Restoration or Capacitor Discharge, both skills being upgraded versions of the first skill in their respective trees. Sounds boring? WRONG. Restoration is, ''in sequence'', Stabilize, Revival Protocol (clears debuffs), and Medical Protocol (healing), on all squad members within range, whilst Capacitor Discharge is [[AlwaysAccurateAttack Combat]] [[ArmorPiercingAttack Protocol]] turned AOE with a flashbang thrown in, which can effectively render mobs of enemies impotent, whilst ''outright killing most robotic enemies''.
63	** Lastly, [[TheBigGuy Grenadiers]] get either Saturation Fire or Rupture. Saturation Fire eats up 3 ammo pips in exchange for ''damaging every enemy and demolishing all cover within its cone of effect'', whilst Rupture is a shot that is a guaranteed critical, as well as applying a DamageIncreasingDebuff to the target. The latter ultimately suffers from the weakness of bad aim, but, [[RuleOfThree again, weapon upgrades can alleviate that weakness]].
64	* As if that wasn't crazy enough, the Advanced Warfare Centre facility grants soldiers the ability to randomly acquire ANY skill from the other classes, allowing non-Colonel soldiers to get Colonel level skills not meant for their class. Combined with the weapons upgrades and utility weapons and you've got some ridiculous combinations that break the game into a million pieces. A Sniper with Rupture and AP Rounds can OneHitKill anything that isn't a full-fledged [[BossInMooksClothing Sectopod or Gatekeeper]], and even then, those two will lose about half their health AND be vulnerable to everything else thrown at them. A Ranger with Serial can do the job of a Ranger with Reaper, but even better due to using the stronger shotgun; sure you need to reload, but a Superior Extended Magazine raises the magazine size to six shots, and if you need more than that in one turn you have bigger problems. [[BoringButPractical Additionally, the AWC facility speeds up your soldiers' healing rate and allows soldiers to retrain their abilities in case of a mistake.]]
65	* The Mimic Beacon in its original incarnation, which can be acquired extremely early in the game. When deployed, it creates a holographic duplicate that enemies will try to attack and then end the next turn. It's intended to only draw in one or two enemy attacks, but due to the fact it can take cover and get defensive buffs, it often results in the entire enemy team running out of cover to try (and fail) to kill an obvious dupe. Jake Solomon has compared it to a "get out of jail free" card, and the March 2016 patch removed duplicates' ability to take cover. They even had to be nerfed so that enemies gain a forced ''+1,000%'' to-hit bonus on the Mimic, just to ensure they can't miss it.
66	* To lesser extent, the repeater weapon mod. The mod causes any weapon strikes made by the soldier to have a chance to be a OneHitKill, with the highest level mod to be 15% chance. This ignores armor or anything else and it works even when the target is a Sectopod, Alien Ruler, Chosen, or [[spoiler: Avatar]] and even when said hit is a [[ScratchDamage glancing blow from the stock upgrade]]. In addition, if weapon with a Repeater attached inflicts Poison or Fire damage on an enemy via the specialized ammo types, the lingering damage inflicted by the statuses inflicted by that weapon have additional chances to instantly kill thanks to the Repeater. Yes, this means that that Lancer you hit with Venom Rounds can randomly drop dead at the end of your turn because the poison damage will also work with your Repeater. Firaxis fixed this in an update so Repeaters can only trigger on a direct hit from the weapon it's attached to. Even then, it's so bad that ''there are {{game mod}}s specifically made to {{nerf}} it'' by changing its gimmick, for example to dealing extra damage on a CriticalHit.
67	* Introduced in the ''Alien Hunters'' DLC is the Frost Grenade, which engulfs its targets in a frosty explosion, freezing them. No enemy is immune, not even the Alien Rulers or [[spoiler:the Avatars]]. This can buy the team valuable time to wail on the target, as damage won't undo the freezing (it only expires after a few turns). It can't be reproduced, so it's best used by a Grenadier. It was sadly nerfed in ''War of the Chosen'', as it only causes The Chosen and [[spoiler:the Avatar]] to lose a movement point for that turn.
68	* Most Damage Over Time effects are game breakers when used against the Alien Rulers; all of them are applied when the Ruler takes an action, even a special Ruler Reaction. Whilst this means that status effects ''technically'' don't last nearly as long against the Rulers, they're also pretty much guaranteed to feel the full force of said status effects whilst they last, whereas weaker enemies can easily die from the first 'tick' of damage and functionally waste the rest. For Rulers, though, every time you move a soldier or take an attack, they take damage, turning what is normally a ScrappyMechanic into a GoodBadBug. [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?time_continue=370&v=6a6xP3HBYMA Christopher Odd]] demonstrates this, being able to kill the Berserker Queen on the first mission they encounter her.
69	* The Shredstorm Cannon deals the most damage of all the heavy/powered weapons, enough to OneHitKill many lesser enemies. It can shred a whopping four armour pips, which is enough to strip an Andromedon bare; only Gatekeepers and Sectopods have more. Being a heavy weapon it always hits, and does so in a massive cone to boot. The only two limiting factors are only having one charge per mission and having to roll for it to appear when doing the necessary Proving Grounds project, but these are flaws common to all heavy weapons anyway.
70	** Speaking of Heavy Weapons, the Blaster Launcher is, like in the original, earlier XCOM Games, one of these. Think of a massive explosion that has absolutely ''no'' vision restrictions and an incredible range. That's right, a couple of these can turn [[ThatOneLevel the Avenger Defense]] into a cakewalk, since the projectile can be launched at the tower preventing the Avenger from escaping immediately without need of line of sight.
71	* There's also the Flashbang grenade, which deals no damage but Disorients most organic enemies, and they are completely harmless to your own soldiers (despite being, you know, ''flashbangs''). A debuff that reduces stats and prevents all special abilities. This makes dealing with most aliens monumentally easier since they rely heavily on them, and those that don't still have their stats reduced. They're practically mandatory when dealing with Codexes since it prevents them from teleporting, cloning, or doing their AOE blast, as well as the Alien Rulers to negate their [[TheComputerIsACheatingBastard free turns for every little action your troops make]]. Best of all they can be built from the very start of the game. In addition, the Grenadier's passive bonuses to splash radius from Volatile Mix and their upgraded grenade launchers makes the effective radius of their Flashbangs tremendously large, and Volatile Mix renders Flashbangs capable of inflicting small amounts of damage - at that point, with the disorientation debuff and the massive radius, the only drawbacks of Flashbangs is that they cannot disorient mechanical enemies, The Chosen, [[spoiler:or Avatars]], and that they cannot shred armor.
72	** Special mention has to go to the fact that not only do flashbangs prevent the use of abilities whilst disoriented, but they also disrupt any ''ongoing'' abilities. This makes them ''ruinous'' versus Sectoids, as it immediately kills their Psi Zombies ''and'' terminates any Mind Control they're sustaining or Panic they've caused, on top of reducing them to using their fairly weak wrist plasma gun with reduced aim. Again, all this with no negative effects to your own squad, so you can use flashbangs with impunity when soldiers are in danger.
73	* All of the personal weapons the Chosen carry around are given to you as a reward for taking them out permanently. Since this is no easy feat to accomplish and you will only be able to do so near the endgame, these weapons are all ludicrously powerful and by far the strongest weapons you can acquire in the game.
74	** The Chosen Assassin's Katana does the most damage of any melee weapon in the game, ignores up to five points of armor, ''[[AlwaysAccurateAttack always hits and cannot be dodged]]''. A melee spec'd Ranger equipped with it is truly terrifying, doing up to 10-11 damage ignoring all armor and guaranteeing automatic hits on anyone who enters melee range with Bladestorm. Combine this with Untouchable and Implacable (the AWC & Training Center lets you acquire both) to make the Ranger impossible to retaliate against: combine it with Reaper to gain truly devastating attacks against low-health enemies. The fact that the blade can never miss also negates enemies which can melee counter-attack (like the Muton).
75	** The Chosen Hunter's Darklance is worse. Unlike every other sniper rifle in the game ''it only takes a single action to fire it''. This might not sound too impressive on paper, but it means you can have a highly mobile, highly accurate death dealer running around the battlefield, and since most mission are timed and many require you reach an EVAC zone this is a god send. But there is more: When paired with the Sharpshooter's "Serial" ability (kills completely restore all your actions) you can literately keep shooting until you run out of targets since you can reload and fire over and over and over. On top of that, it is heavily pumped up with ''four'' Superior weapon mods, meaning you are guaranteed to have a selection of heavily buffed specs on it, including things like the Superior Scope for +15 Aim, Superior Auto-loader for up to three free-action reloads per mission, Superior Hair-Trigger for 15% chance for shots to become free actions, and Superior Stock to ensure even missed shots do 3 points of ScratchDamage. The Hunter's sidearm is equally impressive, as it sports tremendous damage potential for a pistol and, like the Assassin's blade, can ignore up to five armor pips.
76	** The Chosen Warlock's assault rifle is no slouch either. Though he prefers to use his psionic powers and so you won't often see him using it, his rifle is naturally sporting four Superior upgrades - with the added bonus of ''always'' dealing critical damage to any Psionic target. It can reliably oneshot Sectoids, and absolutely maul Priests and Gatekeepers.
77	* There are a number of Resistance Orders that can easily turn the tide. Examples include the ability to turn back the Avatar countdown every month, make instantaneous contact with new regions, double the amount of ability points acquired, and make research breakthroughs far more likely to occur.
78	* Not all [=SitReps=] are bad. There are a few mildly positive ones such as having a few civilians provide a few supplies when contacted, or having some ADVENT boxes with the same amount of supplies lying around that can be opened. Some of the grand-daddies of [=SitReps=] would have to be the Location Scout, which reveals the entire map and all of its enemies, and Shadow Squad, which gives ''all soldiers'' a charge of Conceal, allowing for some more liberal scouting and ambushing.
79	* The trips to the Training Center have some game-breaking potential if you are diligent enough. Soldiers gain Ability Points (and XCOM having a shared pool) when they get promoted or do things like killing outflanked enemies, doing so from higher ground, via "combo" attacks, and so on. Said ability points can be used to buy skills you were normally locked from gaining or completely new ones. If you have the patience and diligence, your squad for the final mission will be composed of soldiers that could probably all complete it solo.
80	* The Reaper faction soldiers in general can make your life a whole lot easier, mainly owing to their extremely advanced stealth skills. A properly utilized Reaper is nearly impossible to detect by the enemy, allowing them to scout ''far'' ahead of the main party without triggering the pods they find, even when your other operatives already busted their concealment. Knowing where the enemy forces are, and being able to plan accordingly, is a massive boon in any situation. Sneaking aside, Reapers aren't too shabby in combat, either. Their rifles don't exactly have stellar damage output, but they have high crit damage that can finish off weak or weakened enemies, often without revealing the shooter (or without ''ever'' revealing the shooter if the appropriate skill is unlocked). Claymore mines can be used for crowd control in a variety of ways, explosive world objects can be utilized to devastating potential, and the major-level skill Banish is powerful enough to one-shot anything but the hardiest bosses. Out of the three factions introduced with ''War of the Chosen'', Reapers are arguably the most versatile and most useful in the long run, to the point that no strike team should take to the field without one.
81	** Taken to the next level if you unlock Annihilate in combination with the upgraded Weapon mods and then outfit your Reaper with a combo of Superior Repeater and Superior Expanded Magazine - giving the Reaper 7 shots with a 20% chance for each shot to instakill anything (not even Chosen or Avatars are immune). With 7 shots on a single target this gives a 79% chance that at least one instakill will trigger, making most Chosen appearances with this combo laughably easy.
82	* Outfit a high-ranking Ranger with Bladestorm and the Assassin's Katana and boom, you have a soldier that the Lost simply can ''not'' hurt, no matter what they try, and who can solo missions with the "Horde" Sitrep effortlessly. The biggest risk is the risk of boredom as they all line up, Ranger draws katana, kills lost, sheathes katana, then draws it again for the next, over and over.
83	* Like in ''Enemy Unknown'', you gain bonuses for having an entire continent under XCOM coverage (though in this case, it's radio coverage, not satellite). They're randomized on a campaign-to-campaign basis, but among those bonuses are:
84	** "Fire When Ready" and "Suit Up"-- the former completes all experimental ammo, grenade, heavy weapon and powered weapon projects in the proving ground instantly, and the latter does the same for proving ground armor. If you have ''both'' in the same campaign, ADVENT is gonna have a bad time. No more waiting a week for your WAR Suit to be completed.
85	** "Armed to the Teeth" allows a third mod slot to your weapons. This means you can finally put a scope, autoloader and expanded magazine (all Superior if possible) on the same sniper rifle, which means your colonel sniper can activate Serial without ever worrying about ammo and reloads.
86	* The Resistance Orders in War of the Chosen can be equally overpowered. Among them:
87	** Between the Eyes: A Reaper order that makes any attack that connects with one of the Lost an instant kill, regardless of the base damage dealt. This makes your sniper and their unlimited-ammo pistol capable of clearing any Lost swarm ''by themselves, as a free action''.
88	** Munitions Experts: A Reaper order that lets experimental ammo projects be completed instantly.
89	** Rapid Collection: Another Reaper order: resistance supply drops are collected automatically.
90	** Sabotage I/II: Reduces the Avatar project by 1/2 blocks respectively at the beginning of each month.
91	* A lesser example of this trope is taking a Sharpshooter, preferably with the Quickdraw skill, on any mission with The Lost, with at least the first upgrade in the pistol line, your Sharpshooter should be able to clear out every Lost onscreen that isn't in high cover, which given their behaviour isn't going to happen often. Most classes can go on killing sprees until their guns run dry, but a Sharpshooter's pistol never needs reloading and even if they miss their first shot, their turn isn't over. The main benefit to this is just being able to grind a ton of exp easily on a low level sniper to get them to Captain or even Colonel rank very quickly.
92	* Want to play as the [[VideoGame/{{Doom}} Doom Slayer]] without mods? No problem, Vanilla [=WoTC=] got you covered with the Assassin's Arashi shotgun, Talon rounds, Implacable and Serial on Rangers. The Arashi grants you a 10% bonus crit chance and plus 1 crit damage over the Shard Gun, Talon round grants you another plus one crit damage and a whooping 20% crit chance, Implacable gives you a free movement action for a kill, and Serial (acquirable by rolling a Ranger with it in the Training Center) refund your attack action for every kill. The result? An absolute juggernaut who can run to any enemy's face and one-shot them with guaranteed crit, then run to the next enemy and one-shot them too with the free implacable movement; rinse and repeat until your slayer either run out of shells or nearby enemies. To push this even further, assign your Doom Slayer a bondmate and a psi-operative to grant them two more action points per turn. Your Doom Slayer now has enough action points to kill every single Advent on the field in a single turn with points left to spare. Worried that moving your Slayer so close to the enemy will leave them vulnerable to counterfire? Not an issue, as the Unstoppable skill on Ranger gives them a guaranteed chance to dodge the next attack. Plus, Unstoppable refreshes for every kill your Ranger made, so you can combine it with Bladestorm to gain extra guaranteed dodges for every enemy you kill during their turn. And if you're especially especially lucky, you might roll Deadeye to go along with Serial, which will allow your slayer to deal around ''22'' points of damage to a single enemy at the cost of some accuracy, reducing even a full health Gatekeeper to near death on every difficulty. With this combo, XCOM basically has an allied Alien Ruler on the field.
93

Context GameBreaker / XCOM